Linkenholt A picturesque village that has two blacksmiths, a shop, a cricket club and a three-storey manor house, is being sold for about £22.5 million.

The village, which is part of a 2,000-acre estate on the North Wessex Downs, near Andover, Hampshire, and in an area of outstanding natural beauty, is being sold by the the Herbert and Peter Blagrave Charitable Trust.

The trust has held a meeting with villagers, outlining its plans.

David Cath, who acted as chairman of the Linkenholt public meeting, said there was concern over the sale and that locals wanted the village to remain as “pleasant and harmonious” as it is now. “Villagers enjoy living in a beautiful part of the world in a settled way and they want it to stay like that,” he said.

Ray Smith, a former head gamekeeper on the estate, said that everything in the village belongs to the trust except the 12th-century St Peter’s Church, pictured above.

Also included in the sale is a commercial shoot, farming land, an educational activity centre for children and 22 houses and cottages.

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