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OUR VILLAGES AT THE BEGINNING OF THE NINETEENTH
CENTURY AND NOW. (1901) ELMSTONE the DOVER EXPRESS AND EAST KENT NEWS—FRIDAY, 1 AUGUST, 1902. OUR VILLAGESLXill.—ELMSTONE. Elmstone is a small parish and a psetty little village 2* miles north cf Wingham, adjoniug Preston and Stourmouth, and 3 miles from Grove Ferry Station. The principal houses in it are the Count. Lodge and the Rectory, and the most striking feature is the Church, occupying rising ground on the eastern boundary. HISTORY OF ELMSTONE. The situation is pleasant, and it appears to have attracted settlers at a very early period. It was doubtless well known to the Romans, who had a large station On the upland half a mile westward. Of the Saxon period there is no history beyond the fact that the manor was a part of the possessions of the Convent of St. Augustine from soon after its formation at the close of the Sixth Century. The record concerning this Manor in Domesday Book is as follows; " Ansfred holds of the Abbot, Elvestone. It was taxed at half a suling and half a yoke. In desmesne there is one carucate, and three villeins, with three oxen in one team. In this Manor Ansfred holds half a suling of the desmesne of the Monks, and pays from thence to St. Augustine one hundred pence per annum. Godessa held it in fee simple, ' and gave from thence to St. Augustine 25 pence in alms every year. In the time of Edward the Confessor it was worth forty shillings, afterwards ten shillings, and now sixty shillings.” From the foregoing Norman record, which at the time it was made was partly au entry of existing facts and partly historical, it seems that the Manor of Elmstone had in the later Saxon period been held under different tenures and at > varied rents, but it is clear that under all the dfferent circumstances the Convent of St. i Augustine had some kind of lien upon it. There is no record of the actual termination of Ansfred’s holding, but in the year 1269 it i was held by Roper de Leyborne, and contin- : ued in that family until Juliana de Ley- . home at her death conveyed it to Edward i III., together with her-other estates, with a < view to its being appropriated for religious i uses; and accordingly, in the year 1388, it i was settled on the Prior and Canons of i Chiltern Langley, in whose possession it re- i mained until the Reformation. Then this i Manor, like that of Preston, was granted by J Henry VITT, temporarily, to Richard, 1 Suffragan Bishop of Dover* to hold till he < should be nromoted to some ecclesiastical i henefice of the yearly value of £100—a com- i mon device of the Crown for hanging up propertv nending its more permanent settle- ! went. Six years later, the Bishop of Dover s obtained the reouisite benefice, and the i Manor of Elmstone was given by the King < to Walter Hendlev. Esq., his Attorney Gene- 1 raT, together with the patronage of the i Church, which had been attached to the ! Manor of Elmstone from then until modern ] times. Hendlev was afterwards Knighted, 1 and Sir Walter dving in 1553. his daughter -sold Elmstone to Mr. Simon Lynch of Staple, 1 •who in the beginning of the reign of Eliza- 1 beth sold it to Mr. William Gibbs. The . family of Gibbs whose lordship of the Elm- 1 stone Manor then commenced, were from 1 Devonshire, but settled at Folkestone in the . rpign of Henry VIT. According to old < tombstones in the Churchvard the familv 1 remained at Flmstone until the Eighteenth ] Century, but they sold the Manor to Robert 1 Jaques’, an Alderman of the City of London, < towards the close of the reign of Charles I. j The Alderman was Sheriff of London, and I kept his Sherivalty at Elmstone Court in : the year 1669. He also had a seat at Luton 1 in Bedfordshire. At his death, which oc- ; curred in 1671, the Elmstone estate went to his eldest daughter Joan, and so became the : property of her husband, Henry Partridge, of Berkshire, from whom it descended to his son, of the same name, who was Recorder of Lynn Regis, Norfolk. He died in 1773, and was succeeded by his son, who held it in the early part of the 19th century. The Partridges were succeeded some time pnor to the year 1846 by the Delmars. William Delmar, Esq., was the Lord of the Manor, patron of the living, and owner .of Elmstone Court; but during the time of the Partridges the property had been divided, part of the land having been carried in marriage by Rebecca Partridge to her husband, John Whitfield, of Canterbury; and that part of the property, in 1846, was in the hands of various owners, including Mr .Samuel Elgar Toomer, Mr. William Hams, and Mrs. Robinson. According to the electoral returns for 1902 those who are now registered as owners at Elmstone are Mr. John Austin (freehold land). Mr. C. W. Firebrace (Elm-stone Court), the Rev .Walter Delmar Lind-ley (freehold benefice), and Mr. John West (freehold house and land). ELMSTONE AS IT IS. Turning from history and the successive ownership, to Elmstone as it is to-day, the little village does not afford much scope for varied description. Hasted, who wrote a hundred years ago, said the::e was no village, and that the parish only then contained six and a half houses, the fraction arising from the fact that one house over-hun~ the stream which divides Elmstone from Preston, and the other half of the house was in Preston parish According to the county records, the head* of households at Elmstone now are: Austin, John, Bailey, Henry. Bailey, W. H. E. P.,Barton John Buddie, C. E., Carpenter, Wi liam, Drayson, W. M., Foreman, S. T., Gambnll, Jo)™-Firebrace, W. C., Groombndge, Henry James, Hambrook, A. H., Harrison, H. S^, Lindley, W. D. (Rev ). Parker, Edward, Set-terfield. Walter, and West, John. According to the census returns there are now la houses in Elmstone parish, one of whicn, at the taking of the last census, was umnhab.-ted The population consisted of 35 males and 41 females. During the first half of the last hundred years, they have declined, but during the whole century there has been a net increase of 26 persons and 12 housML Tn 1801 there were 7 houses, in 1841 tnere ¦were 14. and now 19. The population at each decade of the century was as follows: 1^-50 • 1811-69: 1821-76; 1831-97: 1841—81. 1851—66; 1861—75 ; 1871—79: 1881—61; 1891 —74; and 1901—76. Thus has fluctuated the stream of life at Elmstone. No doubt, the plih* and flows of population have been lwev" governed by the stele of things at the Manor House :a little increase or decrease of the establishment there—development o? stagnation in the -yofTProv. nipnt's—have no doubt from time to time ,vav station at no great d,fiance. *ul-ture mav be encouraged, and more vegftable produce' raised. Also with the opening of the new bridge to Thanet this nretty snot mav he to some extent tis^d for the building of eountrv residences. Th? inhabited part " the parish is at prcsei.t. vep- c.rcnm-scribed, and there are excellent building sites near the church, which stands on a knoll on the east side. The central house of the village is the Court, which occupies a well-wooded 20 acres, and has recently become the property of Cordell W. Firebrace, Esq. It has beautiful lawns and flower beds, the water of its moat giving luxurious growth to vegetation, while the mansion itself has all the charms of antiquity without its inconveniences, it having, during the last fifty years, been enlarged and provided with modern equipments. The Manor Court grounds are encircled by the public road, on which abut the other dwellings of the village; and on the north-west side of that road is a stream which separates the parish | from Preston, Elmstone therefore looks lar- I "er than it really is by reason of houses in ; Preston parish margining the dividing rivulet. Beginning the circuit at the Church, he northward road leaves the Court moat on the one hand, and two or three pretty residences, apparently the homesteads of market gardeners, on the other. ‘ Passing round to the west the houses are few, and mostly over the Preston boundary; but turning towards the south, there are the forge and some other dwellings in a cluster, while on the right is the roomy and comfortable Rectory, standing in pretty grounds, and having over its portals the date 1840. Thus is Elmstone situated, like an encampment, with the moated Court as its central citadel, the other dwellings encircling it, with the church, on the high ground, like a watch tower. THE CHURCH AT ELMSTONE. The church at Elmstone is remarkable for the fact that its dedication is unknown and its origin, is buried in obscurity. There is very little about the church in any records prior to the Reformation, but the style and the stones of the sacred edifice bear unquestionable witness to its having existed in Norman times. The church consists of a nave, chancel, small north aisle, and at the north-west angle a square embattled tower containing three bells. Although there are several characteristic marks of Nor- ! man work in the building, it is mainly Early English. On the south side of both the nave and the chancel are examples of low windows which are supposed to have had some ancient use beyond that of giving light.. At the top of the nave on the south side, under . a restored window containing stained glass, is a brass thus inscribed: “To the glory of ( God and in beloved memory of Charles , Edward Delmar, 1886.” The south side of the nave is lighted by two Norman windows, one of which was restored in 1878. The i north aisle is divided from the nave by three pointed arches resting on octagonal pillars. There is no chancel arch, but there is preserved a part of the 14th century screen and seating, which has been incorporated and ' reproduced in the restored work—the new chancel screen, which, together with three windows on the south side, was given in memory of Harriet Delmar, who died in . 1898. In the aisle there are two double- : light windows on the north, and a square headed three-light window at its east end. 1 At the bottom of the nave is a narrow poin- i ted arch to support the tower. The three bells in this tower were cast by Richard Phelps in 1712—the same founder who cast the great 5-ton hour bell of St. Paul’s. The bells bear the name of Mr. William Gibbs, , churchwarden, this inscription, like those . on stones in the churchyard, showing that the Gibbs family remain and took an active 1 part in parish affairs long after they ceased to be the owners of the manor. The weight . of the bells is as follows: Tenor 5 cwt., second 4 cwt., and treble 3 cwt. The treble bell was re-cast by Mears in 1808. The font : is old, Consisting of a large bowl resting on four dark small pillars. There appears to have been an altar in ancient times, at the top of the north aisle, where there is still an aumbry. The large 3-light east window of the chancel is filled with stained glass picturing Scriptural subjects, in nine compartments. On the cill of this window are three bases for images. On the south wall of the chancel is a mural monument surmounted with a handsome bust, for Robert Jaques, a former owner of the Manor of Elmstone, who was an Alderman and Sheriff of London and died in 1671. There is also a monument for the wife of Thomas Hutchesson, rector, obit, 1768. This rector was afterwards vicar of Northbourne, where there is a window to his memory, and also an inscription here. Over the Holy Table is a triptych, having in the centre an oil painting representing the Ascension, with the sacred monograms on either side. On the south of the nave is a mural tablet for Henry Whitfield, obit 1779, who resided at Elmstone, and whose father by marriage became entitled to a portion of Elmstoue Manor. In the churchyard, on the south side, are two headstones near each other, the one to the memory of Thomas Gibbs, obit 1712, aged 46, the upper parts of two skulls decorating the top part of the stone. The other stone, which is larger, is to the memory of Edmund Gibbs, of Preston, and Elizabeth, his wife; she died 175.7 aged 86, and he 1762 aged 93. On the top of that stone are the arms of the Gibbs family and two cherubs. Near bv, under the large spreading yew tree, is a stone covering a vault, with an inscription to the memorv of Edmond Gibbs, who died 1727, aged 84. There is one rather remarkable upright stone, undecipherable, entirely covered with ivy on both sides. The creeping plant seems to cling with loving tenacity to several of the tombstones. Some of the rectors of Elmstone have been inci-I dentally mentioned, but the rector is in possession of an authenticated list traced back to the year 1311. The immediate predecessor of the present rector was the Rev. William Baldock Delmar, B.A., who held the living 56 years. The present rector, the Rev. Walter Delmar Lindley, has been there since 1895, and he also, on the death of Bishop Jenner, became rector of Preston. Although not an unvariable rule, it has from time to time been customary for both livings to be held by the same clergyman. The patronage of this church was appendant to the Manor until the death of the last Delmar owner of Elmstone Court—William Delmar—when it passed to the mother of the present rector, who was daughter of Charles Delmar. of Elmstone Court. The patronage has since passed to the present rector . SUTTON A correspondent calls our attention to the village pond at Sutton, which used to be a welcome solace to the equine race, especially in hot weather, is now barred off by a barbed wire fence. We are not. aware whether this is any infringement of a public rieht. hut however that might be, the public user of the pond in summer must be desirable. |
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