Castle Thorpe is a village and parish separated from Northamptonshire by the river Tove, with a station on the main line of the London and North Western railway, 54½ miles from London, 5 miles west-north-west from Newport Pagnell, 3½ north from Stony Stratford, 11 from Northampton and 2½ north from Wolverton, in the Northern division of the county, hundred, petty sessional division, union and county court district of Newport Pagnell, rural deanery of Newport Pagnell, archdeaconry of Buckingham and diocese of Oxford. The church of the Virgin Mary stands in and elevated position on the border of the old Castle yard and is an ancient edifice of stone, consisting of chancel, nave of three bays and aisles, west porch and a low embattled western tower with pinnacles containing one bell: the church has been restored: the font is large and ancient, with two human heads at the western corners: there is a monument in the chancel to Sir Thomas Tyrrell knt. a justice of the Common Pleas, who died 8 March, 1672, erected by his 3rd wife and widow, Dame Bridget (Harrington): there are 200 sittings. The register dates from year 1530. The living is a chapelry annexed to Hanslope, joint net yearly value £135, including 21 acres of glebe, in the gift of the Bishop of Oxford, and held since William Jardine Harkness M.A. of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, who resides at the vicarage house, Hanslope. An inscription on the monument above mention records that Dame Bridget Tyrrell gave £10 yearly to the poor of the place, which has been invested in the purchase of 18 acres of land, producing £36 yearly, and by a scheme of the Charity Commissioners this sum is applied as follows: half for keeping in repair the nave of the church, £1 for an annual sermon to be preached in the church on March 8th, in memory of Sir Thomas Tyrrell, and the remainder in doles for the poor. Here is a Wesleyan chapel restored in 1888. The estate of Castlethorpe, granted by Charles II in 1663 to Sir Thomas Tyrrell, is now held by Edward Hanslope Watts esq. of Hanslope Park, who is lord of the manor. Earl Carrington is the principal landowner and the Corporation of Lincoln are the tithe owners. The parish was inclosed in 1793 by Act of Parliament. The soil is mixed; subsoil, stone and gravel. The chief crops are wheat, barley, oats and roots. The area is 1,361 acres of land and 11 of water; assessable value, £10,085; the population in 1891 was 441.

Parish Clerk Joseph Compton

Post & M.O.O., S.B. & Annuity & Insurance Office William Rainbow, sub-postmaster. Letters arrive from Stony Stratford at 6.30 a.m. ; dispatched at 12.55 & 8.15 p.m. The nearest telegraph office is at Cosgrove, 2 miles distant.

A School Board of 5 members was formed 6 Dec 1888, T. Osborne, clerk to the board.

Board School, built in 1891, or 140 children; average attendance, 118; Harry H Middleton, master; Miss Annie Gregory, infants’ mistress

Railway Station, Richard Filgrave, station master

Grant Mrs
Whiting Charles

COMMERCIAL

Amos Elizh. (Mrs.) farmer & maltster

Compton James, greengrocer

Compton Joseph, butcher

Gregory Susan (Mrs) shopkeeper

Harris Henry, gardener

Harris John, blacksmith

Masterman Arth. Carrington Arms P.H.

Pike Joseph, farmer

Stubbs & Brown, coal & bldrs’. Mers

Tooth Jane (Mrs), butcher

Whiting Bros. millers (water) & frms