Page:The Victoria History of the County of Surrey Volume 3.djvu/366

 �A HISTORY OF SURREY

��In 1703 Mr. John Levingston, the quack doctor mentioned above, built almshouses for twelve poor widows in East Street on a piece of land granted by the parish. The almshouses were rebuilt about 1863. They are further supported by the Church Haw rent, by that of 'Workhouse Field,' the site of the old parish workhouse, and by the bequests of Samuel Caul (.500) in 1782, Mr. Langley Brackenbury (j3) in 1814, Mr. Story (100), 1834, Mrs. Margaret Knipe (300), 1834, the last to be de- voted to this purpose after providing for the upkeep of vaults and monuments in the church.

In 1728 Mrs. Mary Dundas left copyhold premises in Epsom for providing coals.

In 1790 Mrs. Elizabeth Culling left 150, part

��of which was to be set aside to accumulate, for the church, vicar, sexton, churchwardens, and the surplus for apprenticing children and for bread.

In 1803 Mrs. Mary Rowe left 188 1 8*. lid. for bread and meat and firing.

In 1835 Sir James Alexander left 200 for cloth- ing for five men and five women, who had to appear in church.

In 1884 Baron De Teissier left 90 for six poor communicants.

Mittendorf House was presented to the National Incorporated Society for Waifs and Strays (Dr. Bar- nardo's Homes) by Miss Mittendorf.

Epsom and Ewell Cottage Hospital was built in 1889 by public subscription.

��EWELL

��Etwelle (xi cent.) ; Awell (xii cent.) ; Ewell (Testa de Nevill).

Ewell is a village a mile north-east of Epsom and 5 miles south-east of Kingston. The parish is nearly 4 miles from north to south, and almost a mile wide, and contains 2,427 acres. This is the compact parish of Ewell, excluding the detached liberty of Kingswood, which is treated separately. The parish lies in the ordinary position of the neighbourhood as regards soils. The southern part is on the chalk downs ; the old village was on the extremity of the chalk, on a tongue of that soil extending into the Thanet Sand, and the parish crosses the Thanet and Woolwich Beds, reaching on to the London Clay. There is a strong spring, one of the principal sources of the Hoggsmill River, which rises in the village and has good trout ; other springs feed the same stream. There are extensive brick, tile, and pottery works, called the Nonsuch Works, and two flour mills worked by water and steam. There were formerly also gun- powder mills, which have now ceased to exist.'

The roads from Kingston to Epsom and from London to Epsom meet in Ewell. The Wimbledon and Letherhead branch of the London and South- Western Railway and the Portsmouth line of the London, Brighton, and South Coast Railway, opened respectively in 1859 and 1847, both pass through the parish, the stations being about a mile apart.

Ewell was a market town when Speed's map was made (early 1 7th century) and when Aubrey wrote. In 1 6 1 8 Henry Lloyd, lord of the manor, was granted licence to hold a market in Ewell. 1 A curious entry exists in the parish registers for 1654 of banns pub- lished in Ewell Market, preparatory to a marriage before a justice of the peace, Mr. Marsh of Dorking. The market was held on Thursdays. It seems to have died a natural death early in the 1 9th century, the small market-house which stood at the intersection of Church Street and High Street having been removed at a slightly earlier date. The old watch- house, however, is still to be seen, facing the place where the market-house stood. Fairs are said to have been held on 1 2 May and 29 October in a field near the Green Man Inn.' The village of Ewell still

��retains some of the picturesque appearance of an old market town.

Pits have been found in Ewell containing Roman pottery, bones, and a few other remains, which have been taken to the British Museum. Ewell lay possibly on the Roman road from Sussex to the Thames, diverted at Epsom from the British trackway, though it is matter of inference rather than proof.

It was probably once a place of some importance, as it gave its name to one of the old Surrey deaneries, but in Domesday there is no church named. Lether- head Church, however, we are told was annexed to the king's manor of Ewell. Shelwood Manor in Leigh was also part of Ewell Manor. 4

Richard Corbet, Bishop of Oxford from 1628 to 1632, and of Norwich from 1632 to 1635, was born at Ewell in 1582. He was the son of a gardener, but became a Queen's scholar at Westminster, and then a student of Christ Church. As a bishop he is said to have had 'an admirable grave and reverend aspect,' but it is told of him that after he was a Doctor of Divinity he disguised himself as a ballad singer in Abingdon market. He was certainly a wit, and to some extent a poet ; his Iter Boreale and Journey into France show the former, the Fairies' farewell the latter character.

Amongst the modern houses is Ewell Castle, built by Mr. Thomas Calverley in 1814 in an imita- tion castellated style. It is now vacant. The grounds, which extend into Cuddington parish, cover part of the former Nonsuch Park, and include the site of the Banqueting House, which stood apart from the palace of Nonsuch, and the remains of the pool called Diana's Bath. Ewell Court is the seat of Mr. J. H. Bridges, J.P. ; Tayle's Hill of Major E. F. Coates, M.P. ; Rectory House of Sir Gervas Powell Glyn, bart. ; Purberry Shot of Mr. W. M. Walters.

The inclosure of common fields (707 acres) and of waste (495 acres) was carried out in 1 80 1. 6 The common fields lay east of the village.

There is a Congregational chapel in the village, with a school and lecture hall adjoining, built in 1864. Archbishop Sheldon's Returns in 1669' show that there was a Nonconformist congregation of fifty, ministered to by Mr. Batho, the ex-rector of Ewell.

��1 In connexion with the industries of the parish may be noted an inquisition taken in 1390 on the death of Thomas Stapelton, which records that he held in Ewell one messuage, 12 acres of land and

��' unum instrumentum pro textoribus voca- tum Handwork'; Chan. Inq. p.m. 14 Ric. II, no. 69.

3 Cal. S.P. Dam. 1637, p. 40.

8 Local Information.

2 7 8

��1 Testa dc Nevill (Rec. Com.), 225 ; Coram Rege R. 10 Hen. Ill, rot. g. 6 Act 41 Geo. Ill, cap. 41. V.C.H. Surr. ii, 39.

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