Category: Holy Trinity

I am grateful to Andy Baxter for pointing out to me the existence of these boundary markers.  When he was a boy at Bushfield School he discovered a stone marker in the bushes on the eastern boundary of the school.  He describes it thus from memory: ‘The stone took the appearance of a miniature headstone with, from memory, a date in the 1840s and some other markings such as “St G” and “No.2″.”

Photo courtesy of Chris Gleadell

He asked Ken Speaks, who was at that time a teacher at the school, and he did a little research to discover that there were at least three of them.  Andy Baxter then found another on the Old Wolverton Road, near to the Arden Park light industrial units and was led to believe that a third was in the cellar of the house on the corner of Jersey Road and Stratford Road – possibly Number 82.  He doesn’t say if any dates were associated with these markers, but the location suggest that they were later. The original parish of Wolverton included the whole manor, from the east side of the Watling Street and bounded by the River Ouse to the north and Bradwell Brook to the east and south and this remained unaffected until the later middle ages when Stony Stratford was large enough to form two parishes – St Mary Magdalen on the east side and St Giles on the Calverton side.  Holy Trinity continued to serve the extensive parish of Wolverton quite complacently until the arrival of the railway in 1838.As I have described elsewhere, the original land purchase by the London and Birmingham Railway was quite small but in 1840 they purchased another 22 acres to the south of the Stratford Road. 

As you can see from the plan here, Wolverton Station was quite small, being bounded by the canal to the north and east and a hedgerow bordering the west of Bury Street and including the Creed Street school.  I did thin that the southern boundary was Green Lane, but Andy Baxter’s discovery of the marker a little further south suggests that the railway portion extended to that point. ( They were later to build The Gables and the doctor’s house and surgery here.) 

St. George’s was originally a chapelry and the first incumbent, George Weight, was styled Perpetual Curate.  St George’s itself and the Vicarage was built on Radcliffe Trust land and the Radcliffe Trust retained a controlling interest for a number of years afterwards. 

At about the time the church was completed the Church Commissioners, in recognition of the quite sizeable population, wished to create a new parish.  Their first definition, that it would include all houses and buildings on the western side of the railway, met with opposition from the vicar of Holy Trinity, who foresaw that if Wolverton expanded further his parish would be gradually eaten away.  In this he was supported by George Bramwell, Secretary to the Trust, who was already at odds with some of the directors of the railway company.  Bramwell formulated a definition which was tied to a plan (such as the one above) and this was agreed to.  The parish was thus created by Queen in Council on 19 May 1846. 

It may be after this that the first marker discovered by Andy Baxter was installed. 

The Radcliffe Trust then resisted further expansion and would not sell any land for housing development until 1860.  In the meantime, the L&NWR were forced to develop New Bradwell in order to accommodate their workers.  When the expansion did come, it went as far west as the back alley before Cambridge Street.  Possibly, when the parish thus expanded, a marker was laid down here.  Wolverton so remained until the next expansion of the 1890s which saw the development of Cambridge Street and Windsor Street. 

At the turn of the century, the Radcliffe Trust itself, bowing finally to the inevitable, developed its own streets to the west of Windsor Street, including Jersey Road and Anson Road. 

I don’t know the detail as yet, but it sounds to me from Andy Baxter’s description, that a new parish boundary was determined at Jersey Road.  I do recall that Anson Road residents tended to use Holy Trinity and Jersey Road residents tended to split both ways – some went to Holy Trinity and some to St George’s.  My grandparents, who lived at 179 Church Street, went to Holy Trinity for example. 

After the National Insurance Act was passed in 1948, benefits offices paid out sick benefits every two weeks.  If you ever wondered why it was set up this way (and you probably didn’t) it was because the Government was latching onto a much older tradition. From 1948 those who claimed sick benefit had to produce a doctor’s certificate every two weeks and benefits were paid accordingly.  I don’t know what system prevails today. 

In the Churchwarden Accounts for Holy Trinity payments to the sick are made every two weeks.  Judging by the names that are repeated most of these cases are for old people or those with long term illnesses.  I doubt if a cold or a sniffle would have got much sympathy from the overseers.  In any case, with payments of only 2 shillings a week, nobody would willingly wish to see their income cut by two-thirds.– 

It is not clear why some were paid different amounts, although this would suggest that other factors were taken into account, such as age and household income.  Most of these people I would judge to be seriously ill as the payments go on for some months.  There are few, if any, examples that I have seen where someone appears on the books for a week or two and then restored to health, so as I remarked earlier, nobody took time off for minor complaints.  The money was provided only to alleviate extreme hardship. 

On December 11th 1808 the following entry appears in the Churchwarden’s Account Books:

Received of John Tucker on account of Mary Edmunds Child £20 0s 0d. 

This was the usual practice when a man responsible for getting an unmarried girl pregnant was assessed a fine to defray the cost to the Parish – in this case £20.  Some months before this entries for payments to “Tucker’s Girl” begin to appear, starting with a payment of 2/6d for one week on July 20th 1808.  Thereafter, there are regular payments of 2/- a week, paid every fortnight, to Tucker’s Girl. 

The subsequent account references tell a story. 

In September there is a payment of 4/- to the magistrates for a removal certificate and a few days later a payment of 6/6d to “a man to Convey Tucker’s Girl to Marsh Gibbon out 2 days.”  The payments of 2/- a week continue and then on November 5th there is a payment to Bet Williams “for Tucker Girl Towards her Months” – 10s.  And again on November 19th another payment of 10s. “ Paid Bet Williams on account of Tuckers Girls Month.”  She gets a similar payment on November 25th and December 3rd and on December 10th is give a further 2/6d for extra trouble.  Weekly payments to Tucker’s Girl continue to january 7th 1809.  Thereafter, Mary Edmunds is entered under her own name and is paid £1 every 10 weeks (still at the 2s a week rate) for a year after this.  I assume until the £20 is used up. 

My reading of this is that the pregnancy of Mary Edmunds is first recognized and acknowledged in July.  She is thereafter paid at a rate of 2s a week.  The initial reaction must have been for her to move to Marsh Gibbon, presumably where she had relatives, but that she may have chosen to return.  The removal certificate was required for movement from one parish to another at this time.  Bet Williams is the midwife who is paid 10s.  a week during Tucker’s Girl’s last month of confinement.  Bet Williams appears in other unrelated entries, so she must be local to Wolverton.  It is interesting that she is only described as Tucker’s Girl until the child is actually born and John Tucker has made his payment of £20.  I assume that if the pregnancy had not gone to term or the child had not survived then John Tucker would not have been liable for the whole amount.  I assume that Mary Edmunds is not named because of some arcane notion that if no child survived birth then the stain of illegitimate birth would not attach itself to Mary Edmunds. 

John Tucker was probably already married when he got Mary Edmunds pregnant, so she was effectively on her own.  2s a week amounted to bare subsistence and was the rate paid to the sick, so out of the £20 put up by John Tucker, she received about 20 months support after the other expenses were deducted.  Options for girls in this situation were extremely limited.  Support could either come from her immediate family or she could get married.  One of my own ancestors got herself into this predicament as a sixteen year old in 1822 when she gave birth to my great great grandfather.  Paternity was acknowledged by the already-married farmer, and recorded in the Leighton Buzzard register with a £50 bond.  Two years later she married an older man who was able to provide for her and her son.  She had no more children and her son took over his adoptive father’s business and did fairly well for himself.  I hope the Mary Edmunds story had a satisfactory outcome. 

Until we developed a more complicated society local government was localised to the Parish.  Justice was dispensed by the Justice of the Peace (often the Lord of the Manor) and social welfare was administered by the Church, usually in the person of the Churchwardens. 

The Holy Trinity Account Books for the 18th and 19th centuries survive and are kept in the Buckinghamshire Archive.  They record payments made to the sick, the widowed and the poor and managed the costs of out-of-wedlock pregnancies.  Two of their number were appointed overseers for the year beginning in April It appears that they divided the parish, which extended from Bradwell Brook in the east to Watling Street in the west.  I am not sure how it was divided.  The overseers appear to come from the ranks of the larger farm tenants.  The new overseers for 1809-10 are Robert Battams from Stacey Bushes Fram and William Wilkinson from Brick Kiln Farm.  The rate, at 1/6d in the Pound, was assessed only against land and property, so the farmers had a vested interest in the management of this money , which they appear to have managed very carefully, because there was usually a surplus of income over expenditure.  The Poor Law Act of 1834 replaced this system, which had become inadequate to the purpose by the 1820s and moved the administration to a larger administrative district, the Poor Law Union, which was subsequently based at Potterspury. 

Here is the minute of the annual meeting of April 3rd 1809

Balance recorded of late overseers £86 17s 9 1/2d

do of John Tucker £20 0s 0d

by 1/6 Rate £271 11s 0d. 

Total £370 8s 9 1/2d

Disbursements brought down £290 0s 7d

Balance due to Parish £ 80 8s 2 1/2 d

April 3rd 1809.  At our annual meeting this day held we have perused the preceeding accounts of Thos.  Ratcliffe and John Brill and approve of the same and find due to the Parish Eighty Pounds eight shillings and two pence halfpenny which we Direct to be Paid to Robert Battams and Wm Wilkinson who were appointed to be overseers for the ensuing year. 

The arrival of the railway in 1838 led to a rapid development of the new town at Wolverton Station where the population quickly outnumbered the inhabitants of the old manor and in a few years outstripped Stony Stratford.  The old Wolverton Manor had only grown along the Stony Stratford strip.  For the most part it had the same population as it had 1,000 years earlier. 

The new a rapid influx of population in 1840 quickly led to a new church, and in time to a new parish. 

I have already written several posts on St George’s which can be viewed here:

The church was enlarged in the 1880s as the town expanded, and the westerley expansion of Wolverton in the early 20th century also swelled the congregation of Holy Trinity.  Many households in Anson and Jersey Roads walked the half mile or so across the fields through Slated Row to the old church and there were those who preferred the older church to the newer St George’s. 

When Henry Quartley arrived at Wolverton in 1794 the church was considered to be in a very poor state.  By this time the building and tower was over 400 years old.  Thomas Harrison, the Trustee’s agent, was asked to conduct a survey and estimate the cost of the work.  However, Quartley’s view was that the Rectory, by that time about 70 years old, needed more urgent attention and in 1796 the Trust contributed £200 towards the cost of rectory repairs. 

The church stayed off the agenda until 1802 when Harrison presented a plan for repairs.  There was no action as one of the trustees, the Earl of Aylesford, was interested in a grander design.  The idea took flight in 1807 when Aylesford, who came with experience of church building, was asked to develop plans for a new church.  He found a young architect, the 36 year-old Henry Hakewill and brought him to a meeting of the Trustees on 27th May 1808.  At this meeting the Trustees made a decision to procure plans and estimates and a year later Hakewill’s plan and estimated cost of £3,742 17s.  was given the green light. 

It is interesting that the new canal played a significant part in the building of the new church.  Two quarries were used: one at Attleborough near Nuneaton and another at Bilston, near Northampton.  Although stone was transported considerable distances during the medieval building period, the new transportation system made the carriage so much easier and faster.  This was also a new age of iron manufacture and the windows were made by a company in which Thomas Harrison had an interest and were delivered by canal to the Old Wolverton wharf. 

The design of the church was quite distinctive, and proved to be even more distinctive in that few churches were built in this style after this.  Hakewill settled on a neo-Norman style using rounded Romanesque arches, rather than the pointed gothic style which had dominated church building since the 13th century.  The style is also a deliberate reminder that this church is the oldest foundation on the Wolverton Manor and precedes by at least 200 years the development of Stony Stratford. 

Hakewill’s plan involved pulling down the old nave and chancel, but retaining the structure of the tower.  the tower now became the western entrance for the new church and was faced and decorated in the new style.  The drawing above, dating from the 1840s, shows the new church in pristine condition.  Below, is a plan drawing to show the siting of the 14th century church. 

Construction was completed in 1815 and the final bill, almost double the first estimate, came in at £7,792 18s 7 1/2d.  Some final touches included the landscaping of the grounds around the churcha and rectory, which unfortunately led to the filling of the ancient castle moat. 

The stonework carries some history of the building.  Some of the older stone from the earlier church has been used in the foundations and rubble walling.  This rather poor quality limestone has been identified as coming from the local quarry at Cosgrove.  Some ashlar ironstone came from a quarry at Towcester.  Other limestones of better quality may have come from quarries in Northamptonshire at Weldon, Clipsham and Helmdon.  Again these materials have been re-cycled from the earlier church and thus provides some historical continuity. 

The new building is brick-built but faced with stone from the midland quarries.  The tower was preserved in its limestone form but faced with cut stone from the Attleborough quarry. 

What follows is a very full description of the design and features of the church from a monograoh written by John Brushe. 

EXTERIOR

It is important when looking at Holy Trinity to bear in mind that it is a pioneering church, probably the first complete church in Britain built in the revived Norman or Romanesque style.  Quite a few neo- Norman churches were built in the 1840s but Wolverton church was designed and built by 1815, well before the reign of Queen Victoria.  Very little had been published on the Norman style at that time and its architect, Henry Hakewill, would have had to base his deSigns on per­sonal research.  In this light Holy Trinity is a remarkable achievement, and a building of national importance. 

The architectural display is concentrated on the west front of the tower, the entrance elevation.  The door is impressively treated in the Norman style with three orders of shafts and, to the round arch, chevron or zigzag moulding framed by roll mouldings.  The shafts bear capitals which are scalloped in the Norman style but the ornament above the trumpet scallops of fleur­de-Iys and circles in relief has no Norman precedent and shows an unfamiliarity with the style which results in a certain originality. 

Above the door is a run of blank arcading with inter­secting round -arched heads between the big pilaster buttresses, whose angles are treated as shafts.  This dec­oration of intersecting arches is used on the tower of the Norman church of Stewkley, not far away, as well as in many other Norman buildings.  Repeated again on the corners of the tower parapet, this motif anticipates the decoration of many of the fittings within the church. 

On the south side of the tower is a clock face which is unusual in only having a single hand, a feature asso­ciated with early clocks.  The clock mechanism isunsigned and may well pre-date the rebuilding of the church.  The cast-iron clock face is framed by a hood mould with a carved head either end: a young man’s head on the left and a rather comical old man’s head on the right, with a curious sort of head-dress.  The young man’s head is framed by foliage and is clearly a version of the medieval carvings of the Green Man.  There are more carved heads high up in the corbel table below the battlemented parapet of the tower. 

Before it was wrapped in new stonework, the medieval tower had a projecting stair turret at the south -west cor­ner, rising above the original battlemented parapet as a polygonal turret.  In the rebuilding the tower was height­ened and the stair turret hidden within the south-west buttress.  Only the small round-headed windows light­ing the stairs signal its presence. 

The windows lighting the nave and transepts, and the east window are all much larger in relation to the expanse of walling in which’ they are set than in eleventh or early twelfth century churches.  They are closer in proportion to the windows in classical Georgian churches or the City churches designed by Wren.  Again they manifest the underlying classical spir­it of the building.  Not that it is designed to deceive, but is rather a building of its time whose style deliberately evokes an important moment in history.  The window frames are of cast-iron specially designed for this church with three circles alluding to the Trinity. 

Over the corners of the projecting transepts and the chancel rise tall, octagonal lantern turrets.  They are fea­tures more characteristic of the greater Norman churches rather than parish churches.  Their inspiration is indeed said to be the Romanesque turrets on the transepts and east end of Peterborough cathedral.  As one of the most important surviving Norman buildings, Peterborough would have been an obvious source for details when Hakewill was making his designs.  They have conical stone caps with ribs which terminate in wolves’ heads, a nice pun on Wolverton’s name, though you will need binoculars to appreciate it! 

The tall gables to the chancel and transepts are large­ly decorative, rising well above the actual roofs which are, as has already been noted, quite low-pitched. 

The great round window filling the eastern wall is the architect’s boldest stroke.  Round windows were employed in Norman churches but never on so large a scale.  Where a circular window appears in the East end it is high in the gable above a row of the more usual narrow round-headed Windows, as for instance at Barfreston, Kent.  A closer parallel is with classical churches such as St Michael’s Cornhill in the City, of 1670-77, and St Mary’s Twickenham by John James, built 1714-15, which each have a single relatively large round East window.  Holy Trinity’s is larger still.  Why?  A comparison between the East ends of these churches and Holy Trinity’s suggests the reason.  At St Mary’s and St Michael’s the windows sit above large altar pieces.  At Holy Trinity the round window is positioned almost directly above the altar, eliding an altar piece.  As origi­nally completed the window held stained glass featuring the Sacred Monogram IHS in a sunburst, which often appears in 17th and 18th century altar pieces.  In other words the round window at Holy Trinity is both window and altar piece. 

The East end is best studied in winter when the trees around it have shed their leaves and the great east win­dow can be seen from the field beyond the churchyard boundary, startlingly large, the dominant feature of a building which is the masterpiece of its architect and perhaps the most powerful church of the early years of the nineteenth century before the Battle of Waterloo. 

INTERIOR

The Tower

The lowest stage of the tower forms a porch to the -.l.  church beyond.  This was formerly the crossing of the medieval church.  The floor was originally at least 3 feet lower than it is now.  If you open one of the doors in the modern timber screens either side you will see the medieval stonework of the original central tower, hidden within the present west tower.  The walls are of the local limestone rubble, framing the better quality stonework of a fourteenth century arch either side.  These arches formerly led into the transept chapels which originally flanked the tower.  They are the same either Side, of simple powerful design with a chamfered shouldered arch outermost framing two massive cham­fered arches which die into the piers. 

Low down on the right side of the arch in the north wall is a stone inscribed with an upside down cross within a lozenge partly cut offby the outer chamfer.  This has been interpreted as a re-used stone bearing a pos­sible Saxon consecration cross.  It could however refer to St Peter, who was crucified upside down. 

The medieval stonework was rediscovered under early nineteenth century plaster during the course of the 1907 repairs to the tower carried out under the supervision of Charles Harrison Townsend.  Plaster still covers the east and west walls, hiding the stonework of the arches which originally opened into the nave on the west side, and the chancel to the east, instead of the present doorways.  Part of one side of the chancel arch can be seen, however, inside the cupboard in the inner right hand corner hous­ing the clock weights.  The arch was wider than the present doorway, but probably no higher.  The door in the outer right hand corner by the entrance leads to the medieval stone spiral staircase up to the ringing cham­ber and the roof. 

The present floor of the tower is paved in Kingsthorpe stone, another of Northamptonshire’s many limestones.  The fine oak cross-beamed ceiling may conceivably pre­date the early nineteenth century rebuilding.  It bears stencilled decoration. 

If you get a chance to go up the tower you will use the original steep medieval stone spiral stair.  It has 55 stone steps.  At intervals there are blocked doorways to roof levels of the medieval church.  At its head, built into the wall, is a carved stone head which may be Norman. 

The Bells

The ringing chamber is directly above the porch.  Its upper half was originally the bell chamber and at the top of the medieval tower.  The top stage, the present bell chamber, was added in the early nineteenth century rebuilding.  It houses a fine ring of six bells hung from an oak bell frame.  They were cast in 1820 by John Briant of Hertford, a notable early nineteenth century bell founder.  They are unusual in being hung in a “left-hand” ring. 

The Nave and the Transepts

Instead of the small, relatively short medieval chan­cel, the tower now opens into a spacious nave.  Nave and transepts form a single T-shaped space for the congregation.  The cross­ing in front of the chancel is defined by tall corner shafts with deeply undercut foliage capitals. 

Between 1870 and the end of the nineteenth century the interior of the church was transformed under the supervision of the architect Edward Swinfen Harris.  Daniel Bell, of the firm of Bell and Almond designed a complete scheme of painted decoration informed by the knowledge that the interiors of medieval churches were originally brightly painted.  The scheme was carried out from 1870 onwards by Bell and Almond.  This consisted chiefly of stencilled decoration but on the west wall of the nave, around the chancel arch and the east window, figurative work painted by Daniel Bell “with his own hand”. 

The walls of the nave and transepts were formerly entirely stencilled with diapered masonry patterns and decoration around the windows.  This has unfortunately been largely painted over and now survives only round the transept windows. 

When looking at the west wall it should be borne in mind that the font originally stood nearby, to the left as you enter, on a square of decorative floor tiles which still exists below the present boarded floor.  The prox­imity of the font explains the themes of the wall paintings which are related to baptism.  Their source is the Order of Baptism in the Book of Common Prayer.  The first prayer of that service alludes to the Flood and the Passage through the Red Sea, which prefigure the Christian rite of baptism.  Noah is shown on the far left with his family giving thanks to God after the Flood, with the Ark in the background.  On the far right are Moses and the Israelites at the Red Sea with the pillars of cloud which guided them out of Egypt.  Either side of the tower arch the Old and New Testament practices are contrasted, with the scene on the left referring to the ancient Jewish rite of Circumcision, and on the right a Christian baptism.  The priest carrying out the baptism may be a portrait of the Rev. John Wood, vicar from 1871 – 1895.  Above the tower arch, stretching the full width of the nave, is a fine group showing Christ welcoming the children.  The painted text below is taken from the Gospel according to Mark, Chapter 10, verse 14 the gospel reading in the Order of Baptism in the Book of Common Prayer.  The wall painting repays close study.  For instance, the architectural backgrounds to the scene in the Temple and the baptism show stencilled decoration of the kind Daniel Bell designed for the church.  In the Red Sea a delightful fantastic fish can be seen.  Moses and other figures have sumptuous patterned robes.  This important Victorian wall painting awaits restoration when funds become available. 

The decoration of the east end of the nave, around the chancel arch, survives largely intact.  Great angels in roundels flank the arch.  The angel on the left holds a cross with a crown of thorns in one hand, and, sym­bolising the communion, a chalice with ears of wheat above it in the other.  The angel on the right holds a palm branch of victory and the crown of glory. 

The beamed ceiling of the nave and transepts was probably deSigned by Edward SWinfen Harris.  It retains its original painted decoration.  A series of corbels supports the ceiling; the six over the chancel arch bear the coats of arms of the six Radcliffe Trustees in whose time the church was rebuilt.  From the left, the arms are those of Sir William Dolben baronet, Wriothesley Digby esquire, the 4th Earl of Aylesford, Viscount Sidmouth, William Ralph Cartwright esquire and Sir Charles Mordaunt baronet.  In the photograph of around 1900 a set of brass oil lamps can be seen hanging from the ceiling on long chains, from rings which are still there.  The two fine brass chandeliers hanging in the centre of the nave at the east and west ends are Georgian, and may have come from the old church. 

The scheme of polychromatic decoration was comple­mented by a new set of stained glass windows.  Those in the nave were probably designed by Daniel Bell and date from the 1870’s.  The central figurative roundels depict, from the left as you enter, the Nativity, Christ in the carpenter’s shop, the Supper at Emmaus and the Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles.  The second window was set up at Christmas 1876 in memory of Mary Wilkinson by her husband George, a tenant on the Radcliffe estate for 56 years.  The third window com­memorates Henry Snaith Trower of Wolverton Park, who died in 1878.  His wife is remembered on the brass plate below; she died a few years short of her centenary in 1920.  The fourth window commemorates another ten­ant, George Brooks Wilkinson, who died in 1879. 

The north transept window is an early work by Henry Holiday made by Powells’ and depicts Christ’s baptism in the River Jordan.  The heads are a bit grim but the colours are very vivid.  It commemorates a retired cler­gyman, the Rev. John Miles, who was vicar of Holy Trinity Paddington, a Victorian church now alas demolished and replaced by a block of flats. 

The south transept window, earlier in style than any of the others is probably the first of the set and rather naive.  It shows the Resurrection, and commemorates Richard Harrison, agent to the Radcliffe Trustees for 53 years, who died in 1858 at the age of 97.  The present church was rebuilt in his time as agent.  He lived at Wolverton House, which he rebuilt around the same time. 

The organ originally stood in the chancel and was removed here as part of the re-ordering of 1974. 

The font is in the Gothic style.  It is mid 19th century and of Bath stone.  Faint stencil patterns can still be made out on the stonework which was damaged when it was moved to its present position at the re-ordering.  The towering font canopy is later and designed by Edward Swinfen Harris.  The body of the gilded dove from which it is suspended hides a rise­-and-fall mechanism. 

The pulpit is also probably mid-nineteenth century and of Bath stone.  Its painted decoration is later and well preserved.  In the arches of the intersecting blank arcading which decorate it are pots of lilies and roses alternating with four early saints known as Fathers of the Church: St Gregory with a dove on his shoulders, St Jerome carrying a model church, St Ambrose with mitre and holding a pastoral staff, and St Augustine of Hippo.  There is more intersecting round-headed arcad­ing in the lectern and prayer desk, and to the front of the blocks of pews in the transepts. 

The banners which hang at each corner of the cross­ing were presented in 1888. 

The Chancel

The chancel is raised three steps above the nave and transepts over a vault which was made to replace that under the medieval chancel.  The bottom step has been obscured by the general raising of the nave floor to the level of the raised platforms on which the pews sit. 

The handsome chancel arch is in the Norman style.  The opening has semi -circular responds with stylised leaf ornament to cushion capitals, framed by thin shafts with attenuated foliage capitals.  The round arch has two orders of roll moulding, painted zig-zag or chevron ornament and an outer moulding known as billet, a characteristic Norman moulding like alternating chopped sections of roll moulding. 

The chancel is square in plan and has a quadripar­tite vault with a large boss in the centre where the ribs meet.  It is of plaster imitating stonework.  The vault springs from four vaulting shafts at each corner of the chancel with foliage capitals. 

The stone floor is late seventeenth century and came from the old chancel as did the black and white mar­ble chequer pavement within the communion rail.  In the middle of the stone floor are set five grey marble memorial slabs.  The oldest is to the right of the centre and commemorates the Rev. Alexander Featherston, vicar of Holy Trinity from 1673 until his death in 1686.  It was in his memory that his widow Catherine laid the stone and marble pavement, as the inscription records.  Catherine Featherston is commemorated on the right.  She died in 1712 leaving the parish a substantial sum to found a charity which is still in existence, intended to provide clothing and blankets for poor parishioners regularly attending church.  Her commemorative inscription in lower case script in contrast to the Roman capitals used on her husband’s memorial is rather beau­tiful and worth quoting:

Here Resteth the Body of Catherine Featherston Blessed with the Love of her Parents in the Time of Their short and vertuous Life A Longer Space happy in the Society of her dear Husband more joyfull in her hopes of Everlasting happiness by the memory of the holy Trinity. 

To the left of centre the two memorial slabs com­memorate Rebecca Green, who died in 1750, and her husband Edmund Green, vicar of Holy Trinity for 34 years from 1720 until his death in 1754 aged 70.  In the middle is the slab commemorating the Rev. Edmund Smith, the Rev. Green’s successor, who died in 1785.  The superb monument against the north wall of the chancel also came from the chancel of the old church.  Sir Thomas was Lord of the Manor and patron of the living (he appointed Alexander Featherston).  The mon­ument is composed of two types of Italian marble: a fine veined grey marble for the structure and a pure white marble from Carrara known as statuary marble for the life-size semi-reclining figure of Sir Thomas.  The figure is mounted on a high pedestal with a big gadrooned cor­nice.  On the tall panel behind the figure is a long commemorative inscription in Latin praising the deceased in rather conventional terms, and mentioning his first wife, Mary, daughter and co-heir of Sir William Fenwick, knight, of Northumberland, their only son Edward who succeeded him, and his second wife Catherine, second daughter and heir of Sir Thomas Peyton, baronet of Kent.  They had only been married a few months at the time of her husband’s death on June 25th 1685, aged 54.  It was she who put up this fine monument to his memory.  What the inscription does not say is that he was killed by a fall from his horse.  His son, Edward, the third and last baronet, seems to have had a feckless and extravagant character.  He sold his Wolverton estate to Dr. John Radcliffe in 1713.  Curiously enough he died in the same way as his father, breaking his neck when he fell from his horse at Bicester races.  The back panel of the memorial is sur­mounted by his father’s coat of arms and an urn with a flame finial.  The figure of Sir Thomas shows him in the garb of an ancient Roman knight, or equites, gazing heavenward, with hand on heart. 

In the old chancel the monument stood on the oppo­site side against the south wall so that the figure of Sir Thomas faced the east window.  This explains his pose, for he would have originally been looking towards the light of the rising sun.  The east window was glazed with clear glass.  On a fine summer morning the light would have played dramatically on the white marble figure of Sir Thomas evoking his resurrection at the Last Judgement. 

This outstanding monument is not signed but it is certainly by a leading London sculptor.  There is a monument by the same hand in Loddon church near Norwich to a Lady Williamson who died in 1684, which also figures a semi-reclining life size figure of the deceased, but in contemporary dress.  The sculp­tor may have been Thomas Stayner.  He Signed a similar monument to Richard Winwood who died in 1689 in Quainton church and another in Steeple Bumpstead church, Essex, to Sir Henry Bendyshe, baronet, who died in 1717.  All feature finely carved life­size semi -reclining figures of people who belonged to the same level of society. 

Quite apart from its artistic merit, which is considerable, the Longueville monument is virtually our sole tangible reminder of the Longueville family, for generations lords of the manor of Wolverton and successors of the barons of Wolverton. 

On the east wall of the chancel is a wall painting by Daniel Bell of around 1870 depicting the Worship of the Lamb, inspired by the Book of Revelation.  The adoring angels either side of the window bear instruments of the Passion.  The painting was cleaned and conserved in July 1995 by Tobit Curteis Associates. 

The figurative wall painting was originally complement­ed by stencilled decoration on the walls and the vault, recorded in the photograph of around 1900.  The pre­sent decoration of the vault, of angels on a green ground with wave patterns at the springing of the vaults and large angels on the side walls, all holding texts, dates from around 1907 when the church was restored by Charles Harrison Townsend.  This decoration is in a very different spirit to Bell’s, with hints of Art Nouveau.  The paintings are on canvas glued to the wall, a technique known as marouflage. 

The oak communion table with blank intersecting arcading to the front, is normally covered with one of a fine set of nineteenth century altar frontals.  With the matching vestments they have been restored by Watts and Co. of Westminster. 

The brass altar cross is all that survives of the rere­dos designed by Edward Swinfen Harris.  A detailed description of the new reredos was given in the contem­porary account of the work going on at Wolverton and Calverton churches in the Records of Buckinghamshire:

“This is divided by cusped arches into three compartments, with shafted pinnacles flanking the whole on either side.  The central arch con tains a panel enriched with angels censing and adoring around the cross, which is of polished brass, raised upon a base of wood.  The two side arches contain a representation of the AnnunCiation, St. Gabriel occupying the north panel, and the Blessed Virgin the south.  These paintings are executed on slabs of very old mahogany on a ground of gold, which has been toned with a luminous brown colour, in the man ner of ancient work, and diapered down with appropriate patterns.” 

The chancel, indeed the whole church, is dominated by the spectacular circular east window with eight lobes round a large central circle.  It holds outstanding stained glass by Nathanial Westlake of 1888.Westlake’s signature, his initials, can be seen behind one of Eve’s feet.  The diagram provides a key to the subject of each panel.  This stained glass was the final element of the scheme of decoration carried out under Edward Swinfen Harris’ supervision from 1870 onwards.  It forms a mag­nificent climax to the interior of Holy Trinity, unfailingly drawing the worshipper’s and visitor’s attention to the high altar above which it hovers like a great rising sun. 

After the death of Samuel Hale in 1794 the Trustees appointed Henry Quartley, a nephew of their former land agent, as Vicar.  Quartley was a man of some energy, although his approach to the ministry was closer to that of an 18th century squire rather than a 19th century churchman.  He enjoyed hunting and sat on the bench as J.P., where he was fairly unforgiving in his sentencing of the miscreants brought before him. 

He re-opened the case for the lost tithes in 1797 and put his case that the living had no glebe to produce income nor tithes.  The Trustees were willing to listen but would not take the matter further until there was proper documentation.  Accordingly they authorized the secretary to the Trust, Thomas Wall, to inspect the ancient documents held in the Radcliffe Library.  As a goodwill gesture, they doubled the stipend to £100. 

The tenant farmers on the estate were less happy.  What they foresaw was the likelihood of any imposition of tithes for Quartley as an additional tax on their own earnings and accordingly, when the matter was considered by a court it was expressed as a complaint between Henry Quartley and the principal farm tenants, Thomas Battams, Thomas Gleed, Thomas Ratcliffe and William Wilkinson and the Trustees as lay rectors.  The Trust, as far as was possible, tried to stay impartial.  The case was eventually heard on August 20th 1805 before a panel of 24 jurymen.  They decided against the complainant and ruled that Henry Quartley was not entitled to receive any tithes. 

This was the end of the matter.  For those interested in the detail of this case, Edmund Escourt.  the solicitor for the Trust, prepared the following summary. 

Dear Sirs,

Battams ats.  QuartIey, Clk. 

I have much pleasure in informing you that the Issue directed in this Cause by the Court of Exchequer came on for Trial on Tuesday last at Buck­ingham before the Lord Chief Baron and a full and very respectable Special Jury of the County, when after a Hearing of upwards of seven hours a verdict was given in favour of the Trustees by which theyr Right as Lay Impropri­ator to all Tythes arising within the parish of Wolverton is fully established. 

From the manner in which this Cause was conducted the Chief Baron took occasion to observe that the Trustees had acted in the most candid, open and liberal way, as well as having produced an old Terriar of the date r639 which was found amongst their manuscripts in the Radcliffe Library (and which as far as it went was evidence against themselves), as also in admitting copies of antient Papers of the Claim set up by the Vicar, instead of putting him to the expense of producing the originals extracted from the proper custody.  He also observed that it was a very extraordinary Circumstance that in the year 1805 they should be called upon by the Vicar to enforce an Endowment of 1209 (but which was in fact no endow­ment but a mere Memorandum found in an antient Book without date or title, and by whom made, on what occasion, or when did not appear), when the constant usage had run counter to that Endowment ever since the Dis­solution of the Monasteries, at least except in one or two instances at the beginning of the last century, at which time by the depositions taken in a suit instituted by the then Vicar it appeared that two old men had once paid some small tythes to a former vicar.  The acquiescence of the predecessor of the present vicar to the perception and enjoyment of the tythes of hay, as well as of the small tythes within this extensive parish by the Lay Rector for such a length of time, if there was any pretence for the Vicar’s being entitled to them, he thought must appear also very extraordinary, when it was proved (as had been that day done by Mr Harrison) that the annual value of these tythes was considerably more than £200.  He likewise com­mented on other parts of the evidence produced by the Vicar, observing that some documents contradicted others, and upon the whole he said he thought that upon such papers, such memorandums and such scraps as had been produced in this case, the Vicar had been rash or ill advised in commencing this suit, constant usage having been in the Lay Rector. 

The Jury, when they delivered their verdict, said they very much lamen­ted that the Vicar had not made out a case, and as the stipendiary payment was so very small and insignificant they had unanimously agreed to express their most earnest wish that the Trustees would place him in such a situation as would enable him to support the character which he held in the church with that respect which belonged to it, and that they had thought it their duty to make this representation to His Lordship not doubting but that it would be communicated by him to the Trustees. 

Mr Wilson (who led the cause for the Trustees) then informed His Lord­ship and the Jury that the Trustees were so well aware of the inadequacy of the stipend to the support of the Vicar that they had for several years past gratuitously made him an allowance of £100 per annum in addition to it, and that Mr Quartley was at that moment in the receipt of it, notwith­standing the pendency of the suit, but that he had abstained from making this observation to them before from motives of delicacy as well as from a wish that nothing should fall from him which could in the most remote degree interfere with the merits of the question to be decided by them.  The Jury seemed very much pleased with this information, and the Chief Baron observed that the conduct of the Trustees and of those concerned for them in the management of their business deserved the highest encomions and that the Jury might rest perfectly satisfied from the high and dignified char­acters of the gentlemen in whom this property was vested, as well as from the specimen which they had had of the great liberality which had been already evinced by them (and particularly as the property so vested in them was for the benefit of an University) that they would do what was right and proper for the support of the Vicar and for the dignity of the church.  I shall only add that I shall leave it to you to communicate the contents of this letter to the Trustees in such a manner as you shall think proper. 

I remain, etc. 

E.E.

L.I.F. 24 July 1805

Beneath the delicacy of phrasing in this letter we can read that the Court was unimpressed with Quartley’s case and that he would have been better advised not to have wasted the court’s time.  It is interesting to note that the Court felt that Quartley’s predecessors had been content with the arrangement, and when it had been raised a century before by Thomas Evans, all the evidence they could summon was that of two old men with dim recollections. 

The episode tells us something about Quartley’s character which certainly contrasts with the meek and accommodating Edmund Green. 

Quartley did, however, spearhead the building of the new church, about which, more in the next post. 

In addition to the Wolverton post he was also Rector of Wicken and in 1832 became Rector of Stantonbury.  The last-named parish was very under-populated but still had the church of St Peter at Stanton Low.  Presumably this extra benefice brought additional income to the Reverend Quartley without too much extra work. 

In 1712, the Wolverton Manor was sold to Dr John Radcliffe.  He died a year later and all his interests, including Wolverton, were managed by a Trust.  The Trust then entered into a very long period of ownership and, it has to be said, responsible management of the estate and there was a gradual improvement in the fortunes of the church. 

When they took over, Thomas Evans was the incumbent and had been there since 1702.  He was much aggrieved because he was paid £10 per annum less than his predecessor and he claimed that he had found a rent roll that proved that the tithes in the 17th century did indeed amount to £50.  The Trustees were not unsympathetic but felt that the case should be presented in a proper legal context.  Proceedings were instituted at Stony Stratford in 1718 and witnesses were heard who testified they they or their fathers paid tithes to the Vicar at one time.  However, the case foundered because the Deed of Composition from 1656 could not be found.  It had been lost and the case petered out.  The unfortunate Evans died in 1720 – apparently destitute. 

The trustees then appointed a young clergyman by the name of Edmund Green.  He was of a more humble disposition and was prepared to accept the £30 without dispute – and there the matter rested for some years. 

In the meantime, the church and the rectory were in extremely poor condition and these matters had to be addressed.  In 1724 he asked the Trustees to repair the chancel, to add rails round the communion table and seat for communicants.  While he was doing this, the virtuous Reverend Green was trying to live with his family in a rectory that was liable to fall down.  He tried to effect repairs out of his own meagre income but by 1727 the condition of the rectory was desperate and the Bishop’s Court declared it a ruin. 

Green approached the Trustees for help, and they were sympathetic.  The Longueville Manor had been partly demolished in 1720 but there were materials that could be used to build a new rectory.  However, this was as much help as the unlucky Reverend Green got because the Trust at this time was committed to building the Radcliffe Library at Oxford and had no funds to spare.  The poor man was obliged to build the new rectory out of his own resources.  It cost him:

the full sum of £300 which was the whole fortune I had with my wife & which has obliged me to Preach at two place more to enable me to support myself and my Family with dignity as a clergyman. 

It was only in 1750 that the Radcliffe Trust, free of its own projects, were able to help the Reverend Green.  They paid £200 into the Queen Anne’s Bounty fund, which was matched by an equal figure by the Bounty.  This enabled an improved income to Reverend Green in his last years, which were under four.  He died on 11th April 1754. 

The stipend limped along at this level until 1770 when the Trust raised the stipend to £50 per annum – the level at which it had been 110 years earlier. 

Green was succeeded by Edward Smith, who benefited from Green’s efforts and self-denial.  He was able to inhabit a newish rectory and enjoy an improved stipend.  He died in 1782 and his successor was Samuel Hale.  Their years, which took up the last half of the 18th century were quite uneventful.  This 18th century placidity changed on the arrival of the thrusting Henry Quartley, whom I will discuss tomorrow. 

In 1155 Baron Meinfelin founded Bradwell priory in his will.  He provided land to the south of Bradwell Brook in the area now known as Bradwell Abbey and the church at Wolverton was part of its endowments.  This history of Bradwell Priory has been discussed in this post, and again here. 

The fortunes of Holy Trinity Church were therefore tied to the priory until its dissolution and it has to be said that after the Black Death of 1349 the Priory went into a long decline which must have had its impact on the church.  When the Priory was dissolved in 1526, the property and the church fell into the hands of Cardinal Wolsey, who gave the revenue to New College Oxford.  A few years later, at the General dissolution of the monasteries, the Priory was acquired by Arthur Longueville and thus the church was reunited with the Wolverton Manor for the first time since the 12th century. 

The Rectory, and the land associated with it, had a different and slightly more intricate history of ownership.  It came into crown ownership in 1531 and was leased to various parties.  The rectory was granted to Sir John Spencer in 1599.  His daughter and heir, Elizabeth, married William Compton who became Earl of Northampton.  The Earls of Northampton owned an interest in this property until 1737, when it was sold to Brazenose College, Oxford.  The lease of the property was sold to Henry Longueville in 1601 and this lease was conveyed to Dr John Radcliffe on the sale of the manor in 1712. 

The 16th and 17th centuries may not have been prosperous ones for the vicars of Holy Trinity with revenues from the rectory and the church being siphoned off by other interests.  Some attempt to simplify matters was agreed in 1656.  The Earl of Northampton assigned his rights to the Lord of the Manor in return for a perpetual rent charge of £100 per annum.  The Lord of the Manor allotted land to the value of £50 to the Vicar in exchange for his abandoning rights to the tithe.  Six years later, the Longuevilles, in their continued zeal for land enclosure, went back on the agreement and appropriated the land allotted to the Parson and paid him instead £40 per annum.  The vicars were now entirely dependent for their income on the Lord of the Manor.  This income was reduced to £30 when Thomas Evans became incumbent in 1702.  In the meantime, the Lords of the Manor, the Longueville family, were busy enclosing land and depopulating Wolverton Manor. 

You can also see the disruption of the 17th century Civil War in the dates of the vicars.  In 1645 the incumbent was Robert Ladbroke, who was replaced in that year by Gilbert Newton.  Newton, presumably, was acceptable to the Puritan regime, but not to the High Church Anglicans because he was replaced in 1660, the date of the Restoration, by Robert Bostock.  He only lasted a year due to some unwise remarks about MPs before his succession by Robert Duncumbe, who had greater longevity. 

The Longuevilles were Royalist supporters, but these dates suggest that they had to yield to puritan pressure during the Commonwealth years. 

The 16th and 17th centuries may have been a low point in the long history of the church.  The manor was largely depopulated through the enclosures of the Longuevilles, and as we have seen these enclosures even extended to the land attached to the church – the parson’s piece.  ThePriory was no longer close by to look after the interests of the church and the Bishop of Lincoln, under whose jurisdiction Wolverton came, was remote.  Wolverton went into decline to become a very insignificant parish.  The Longueville family appear to have maintained their ancient obligations at the lowest cost to themselves. 

Oliver Ratcliffe, in his History of the Antiquities of the Newport Hundreds, compiled a list of the Vicars of Wolverton, which I reproduce here with one amendment. 

VICARS OF HOLY TRINITY

1240 Alan

1260 Thomas

1260 William Bullingham

1274 Robert de Buckingham

1298 Ralph de Wolverton

1298 John de Ely

1334 Richard Ordwy

1361 Henry

1361 Adam Vincent de Caldecote

1370 John Waite

1371 John Syward

1390 John Napper

1394 Richard Dey

1404 Thomas Wychewode

1405 Robert Gornesthorpe

1405 John King

1411 Robert Bengrove

1417 William Dalby

1431 Thomas Legeley

1435 Richard Stacey

1438 Simon Fitzralph

1438 Nicholas Pardon

1447 Thomas Spencer

1452 Nicholas Pardon

1452 John Daventre

1457 William Camyle

1477 John Hancock

1517 William Herose

1543 John Rawlinson

1546 George Turner

1587 Ralph Langford

1596 Robert Reynolds

1631 Thomas Pen

1645 Robert Ladbroke

1645 Gilbert Newton B.A.

1660 Robert Bostock B.A.

1661 Robert Duncumbe

1673 Alexander Featherstone M.A . 

1684 Joseph Dogget M.A.

1686 Edward Chebsey

1702 Thomas Evans

1720 Edmund Green

1754 Edward Smith MA. 

1782 Samuel Hale L.L.B.

1794Henry Quartley

1838 Henry Reade Quartley M.A.

1856 William Pitt Trevelyan

1871 John Wood M.A.

1895 Francis Edward Rooke

The amendment to his list is the date of Henry Quartley’s incumbency.  Samuel Hale died in 1794 and Quartley, who was a nephew of a former Radcliffe Trust estate manager, was appointed thereafter.  e was certainly the incumbent in 1797 when he began to make representations to the Trust for a building and repair program.  Ratcliffe says that he was also appointed to the living of Stantonbury in 1832, which he was, but this date is shown as his appointment to Wolverton in a history of Holy Trinity, when by this time he was fully entrenched.  Quartley died in 1838 and was succeeded by his son, Henry Reade Quartley. 

I have also come across some references in the 13th century Wolverton deeds held in the Bodleian Library.  These all relate to the the time when William FitzHamon was Baron, so as they are undated, they could relate to any time between 1220 and 1247. 

In one deed (No: 49)

William son of Hamon grants and confirms to William Capellanus of Wolverton with 1/2 virgate in Wolverton which Hugh Capellanus once held. 

In another deed (244) he is a witness as William the vicar of Wullverton, and in another (474) the grant of a piece of land is described as between the land of Master William Vicar of Wlverton. 

The deeds clearly describe William as Vicar of Wolverton and the first deed identifies a half-virgate of land (15 acres) which was probably assigned to support the vicar. 

This would suggest a line of Hugh, followed by William, before Alan becomes the incumbent circa 1240. 

For the most part these vicars maintained a living by having a piece of land attached to the church, usually known as glebe land, and through tithes – payment in kind of a fraction of the yield of the peasantry.  Some of this was used to maintain the church and support the Priory.  After the dissolution of the monasteries these practices continued until the church and rectory came back into the hands of the Longueville family in the 17th century.  For about 100 years after that the income of the vicar was a matter of dispute until it was finally put to rest through a court hearing in 1805.