RANDWICK, a parish in the upper division of the hundred of WHITSTONE, county of GLOUCESTER, 2 miles (N.W. by W.) from Stroud, containing 984 inhabitants. The living is a perpetual curacy, in the archdeaconry and diocese of Gloucester, endowed with £200 private benefaction, £400 royal bounty, and £800 parliamentary grant, and in the patronage of the Vicar of Standish. The church, dedicated to St. John, has recently undergone considerable improvement, a new chancel having been built by Lord Sherborne, and one hundred and seventy-nine sittings, of which one hundred and thirty-four are free, added to the original number, the Incorporated Society for the enlargement of churches and chapels having contributed £125 towards defraying the expense. There are places of worship for Wesleyan Methodists, and those in the connexion of the late Countess of Huntingdon. The Thames and Severn canal passes through the parish, in which the manufacture of woollen cloth is carried on.

A school is endowed for forty poor children, who are taught by the parish clerk, to which a National school has been lately appended. There are also a school of industry for poor girls, and a small parochial library for the use of the poor. On a hill called "The Castles" are traces of an ancient settlement, supposed, from the discovery of a burial vault of stone, containing human remains, to be of Saxon origin; and in many parts of the parish have been found small balls of stone, rudely turned, indicative of some battle having been fought in the neighbourhood. A petrifaction, termed by geologists "calcareous tuphur", abounds here; of this stone the ancient porch of the church is constructed. An annual festival is kept on Low-Monday: it is attended with a ridiculous [sic] custom, and is said to have originated in the dedication of the church.