The following brief history was taken from the 2008 Upton Snodsbury Calendar.
Before the current settlement of Upton Snodsbury was formed there was an Iron Age Fort at Castle Hill, above Bow Wood. It remains an important archaeological site today.The church of St Kenelm’s stands on the site of an older church dating back to Saxon times. In the grounds is the base of a preaching cross dating back to the 13th century, and the church registers go back to 1577.

The parish was once surrounded by orchards containing plum, apple and other fruit trees. These provided cider and food for the farm labourers and their families as well as for market. A few orchards still remain and since 2006 an “Apple Day” has been held in the village in October to celebrate our local heritage.

Several properties in the village are reputed to house ghosts. Most famously, Bull Cottages are said to be haunted following the brutal murder of the owner and her maid in 1707. The remains of the gibbet from which the perpetrator was hanged was found in the grounds of Bull Cottages.

There have been 5 pubs in the village still remembered today. The Bull Inn is probably the oldest, the Red Lion has records dating back to 1726 and the Yellow Lion is believed to have been a cider house in the late C18th. More recently, the Coventry Arms (now Bants) and the Royal Oak have been serving since the C19th.

Upton Snodsbury C of E First School was founded in 1865. The then vicar’s mother, Mrs Alice Greene, wanted to improve the education of the parish children: the Sunday School was the only education provided and had 70 children attending regularly. She bequeathed the rents from three cottages to found the school and the same building is used today for teaching children aged 4 to 9 years old.

The school is recognised as a centre of excellence within the Worcestershire County. In 2001 the school’s history was researched. Documents and photographs were collected as well as recording verbal histories. 

A video was made, titled: “Counting the Cows”, the title being taken from a story told by an ex-pupil of the school during the First World War: “We were football mad even back in those days. One day my dad told me to check the cows in the lower meadow when I came home from school.
Of course, I went off playing football and when I got home my dad asked if the cows were all right. I said: “Oh yes, they’re fine!”  “That’s strange,” said my dad, “they must have found their way home again – I took them to market this morning!”” 2001 was also a very bad year for foot and mouth disease, and the meadows surrounding the village were empty. 

Dominating the hamlet of Cowsden, Cowsden Hall was once the vicarage. The diary of the rector’s son survives from the 1770s, one entry from which records that he had spent the night in the Red Lion Inn after a long day of hare coursing rather than make the journey home in wet weather. Both the Red Lion and Cowsden Hall survive today, although these are now family homes.

Lower Cowsden is usually a quiet corner of the parish, but during the Second World War it played an important part in the defence of Throckmorton Airfield. A decoy site was built here to confuse enemy bombers and some buildings still remain from this time.

In the 20th century, Upton Snodsbury boasted three public houses, a school for young children, a garage, a general store, a church room and a post office. Today two pubs (The Royal Oak and Bants), the village shop with post office, the school and a village hall survive.

In 2001 a few local residents started a project to provide a recreation space for the parish. Thanks to the support of The Big Lottery, the project culminated in the opening of Upton Snodsbury Parish Park on Cutts Roller Orchard in August 2007. Any profits from this website will contribute to the upkeep of the park.