Page:The Victoria History of the County of Surrey Volume 3.djvu/583

 GODLEY HUNDRED

��THORPE

��out of his private means, with this manor. The college was dissolved in I 54.7 and the manor became Crown property. In 1548 Hall Place, described as a capital messuage and tenement, and the land at High Graveney, was granted to Henry Polsted and William More and the heirs of Henry .** The latter died in 1555, leaving the manor as dower to his wife and after her death to his son Richard. 31 It was after- wards stated that Polsted had purchased the manor from John Avingdon for the sum of lj 14.1. It is probable that Avingdon had merely acted as trustee for the purposes of a settlement." Richard Polsted settled the manor on his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Sir William More, in I 569, and afterwards died there leaving no issue.** His widow married Sir John Wolley, and in 1 5 84 Brian Annesley, Richard Pol- sted's rightful heir, remitted to them and their heirs all his claim in half the said manor. On the death of Elizabeth, who married, as her third husband, Sir Thomas Egerton, the manor was therefore divided, one half going to Brian Annesley, the other half, in which he had remitted his claim, to Francis Wolley, son and heir of Elizabeth by her second husband.* 4 Sir Francis Wolley died in 1 609, and left his share of the manor to William Minterne his cousin, with remainder to Elizabeth, daughter of William. 35 She married Sir Francis Leigh, and their son Wolley Leigh inherited the whole of the manor of Hall Place in 1627, his grandfather, William Minterne, having acquired to himself and his heirs the moiety o r "' w ;manor left to Brian Annesley. 36 Wolley Leigh in'Jtrited also the principal manor of Thorpe (q.v.) froiTi his grandfather. Hall Place was henceforth held witjj, f he manor of Thorpe ; it apparently ceased to bi. re 8j).rded as a separate manor, and the whole was calJSu Thorpe and Hall Place in the division of 1768." Hall Place was the manor-house. It was pulled down, by the Rev. John Leigh-Bennett, owner between 1806 and 1 83 5, and the present house, called Thorpe Place, built.

The church of S3". MART consists CHURCH of a chancel 27 ft. by 17 ft. 6 in. with a small north vestry, a nave 35 ft. 4 in. by 21 ft. 3 in., north transept 1 1 ft. 2 in. deep, north aisle 8ft. 3 in. wide, south transept 13 ft. 10 in. deep ; south aisle 8 ft. 3 in. wide, and a west tower 1 1 ft. 8 in. by 1 1 ft. 3 in., all measurements being internal. The early history of the church has been greatly obscured by drastic restorations of a fairly recent date, and it is evident that at various late, though not modern, dates the fabric has been allowed to fall into disrepair and has then been clumsily restored. The chancel arch is in part of 12th-century date though much repaired. The aisles and transepts seem to have been added in the 1 3th century, and about the middle of the I4th century the chancel was rebuilt to its present dimensions. The tower is of 1 7th-century date, and the north vestry modern. The old walls are of chalk and flint, most of the new facings being in Heath stone.

The east window of the chancel is modern and of three lights with geometrical tracery of 14th-century

��design. On the north is a modern door to the vestry with a hood-mould formed by breaking over it a string- course which, passing round three sides of the chancel, is in part of 14th-century date. West of this is a much restored 14th-century two-light window with flowing tracery, containing in the head some original 14th-century glass, and following on this is a single cinquefoiled light of which the internal splay is old. The window itself is in two stages, both having cinque- foiled heads and the upper one simple cusped tracery. At the south-east are a trefoiled piscina and double sedilia of one design and mid- 14th-century date. The piscina has a double basin and the sedilia are separated by a shaft with moulded capital and base, and their heads, of ogee form, are moulded. At the west, a modern niche has been placed in exact imita- tion of the piscina, but lacking the drain. The string-course noted above is broken square over the piscina and sedilia, and above it, over the sedilia, is an old moulded bracket. Slightly west of this, and partly broken into by the modern niche, is a window of the same date and detail as that opposite to it on the north. The westernmost window on this side also corresponds exactly to that on the north, and be- tween this and the window last described is a small 14th-century door in which, externally, a badly fitting l 5th-century head has been inserted. The chancel arch, of distorted semicircular form, is of two square orders to the west and one to the east. The jambs are slightly chamfered and have hollow-chamfered abaci. On either side of it are two openings with segmental heads and sills at breast height, and on their eastern faces tracery of 15th-century date in two cin- quefoiled lights under square heads ; they have served the double purpose of squints and light for the nave altars. The nave is of three bays, the two arcades being of similar detail with two-centred arches of two chamfered orders towards the nave and a single order towards the aisles. These look like scraped-down i 3th- century work, the second column on the north being octagonal instead of round. All the windows in aisles and transepts have modern tracery of 14th-century style, but in the south transept is a 14th-century piscina. The nave roof is old, but hidden by plaster ; at the east end it is panelled in two bays and has formed the ceiling over the rood.

The church has very good modern fittings, and at the west end of the nave is a pretty 17th-century gallery with twisted balusters.

The tower is built of red brick in old English bond, and has round-headed pairs of belfry windows in brick, with a modern Gothic west window and door on the ground stage. It is embattled and much overgrown with ivy.

On the south wall of the chancel is a brass to Wil- liam Denham, his wife, five sons and ten daughters. He was a citizen and goldsmith of London, and died in 1583. Above are three shields ; the first has the arms of Denham ; the second, the arms of the Company of Goldsmiths : the third Denham impal- ing a cross paty with a bend over all and a ring for difference.

��80 Pat. 2 Edw. VI, pt. i, m. 32.

81 P.C.C. 6 Ketchyn ; Chan. Proc. (Ser. 2), cxxxix, 4 ; Chan. Inq. p.m. (Ser. 2), cvi, 56.

8a Chan. Proc. (Ser. 2), cxxxix, 4. Or possibly Avingdon and Aughton are the

��same name, and this conveyance was the surrender of claim by the Aughton family.

88 Chan. Inq. p.m. (Ser. 2), cclx, 118.

"Ibid.

u Ibid. cccxxxiv, 60 ; ccccxxxviii, 125.

439

��"Ibid. (Ser. 2), ccccxxxviii, 25.

"Feet of F. Surr. Hil. 14 Chas. I ; Chan. Inq. p.m. (Ser. 2), dxxiv, i ; xxxii, 10 ; dxxxvii, id ; Feet of F. Surr. Hil. 2 Anne ; Recor. R. Hil. 2 Anne ; Mich. ; i Geo. III.

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