Walk Notes – Sunday 1st September 2024
Starting at the church there was a Wooden Saxon Minister on this site before the existing church was built and mentioned in the Doomsday Book of 1086.
Peter De Wintonia (Peter of Winchester) was keeper of Henry III’s wardrobe and a clerk in the Royal Household who became Rector of St. Firmins Church. The King gave him 7 good oaks from Salcey Forest for the church he used 4 of the oaks to build the rectory at Broadmead just north of the ford, with 18 rooms, 2 barns and an array of outhouses.
St. Firmins was dedicated to the Bishop of Amiens, who was martyred in 287AD. The East Window is dedicated to the Lowndes family who dominated the village for 200 years. The Rood Screen inside the church is said to be the best in East Anglia and subject to a special study and talk by David Critchley.
We start at footpath 25 off the High Street passing the Rectory built in 1800 (where Major Chester lived) on the site of Hollows Manor or Haudlo Manor with fishponds. We have seen the purchase documentation when William Lowndes bought Hollows Manor and the Manor of Great Crawley which include some documents from the Elizabethan period yet to be transcribed by the Historical Society.
Footpath 25 was a funeral footpath from Little Crawley, residents preferred North Crawley Church to their own Chapel or Chicheley Church. We pass the back of the new estate built in the 1970’s following a change in policy by North Crawley Estates who recognised that the village was literally dying and needed expansion to support the pubs, the school and the shop.
Kilpin Green is named after Michael Kilpin who is mentioned in Manorial Court Rolls.
Hackett Place is named after a famous North Crawley family, the first of whom was Roger Hackett a Doctor of Divinity who became Rector of North Crawley in 1590 and whose father was Lord Mayor of London. Roger was recorded as having bought several Estates and putting them together. He built the Principal House in the village later named Crawley Grange.
We then enter Maslins Orchard, Bill Maslin entertained the village with a free firework display every year on Nov 5th for more than 50 years. He told the story of one of his relatives joining the 1849 Californian Gold Rush and coming home with enough money to buy land in North Crawley.
Over to the left Moat Farm House was built on the site of Broughtons Manor in the 1500’s. William de Broughton gave the Manor to his daughter Elizabeth in 1182 on her marriage to Robert de Broi of Bletsoe Castle. The moat is filled by its own spring and is always well filled. There is a date 1660 carved on a wall inside.
We go over the stile into Top Crofts, note NOT Top Croft because Chibnalls map shows a number of small crofts in this field, this is part of the village plan for development and was in the large open field of Mill Field of 251 acres. Then moving into Bottom Crofts at the hedge line we enter Lye Field another open field of 53 acres and into Bacchus, a field named after a past resident. In a field over to the right is Bakers Bushes where Henry Higgins one of Arnold’s ancestors had a house.
We then enter Little Crawley Green, which is a village Green in private ownership. On enclosure in 1773 it was awarded to Catherine Lowndes-Stone an heiress from Brightwell Baldwin in Oxfordshire near Thame and the Chilterns who owned Little Crawley Farm.
Crossing the road, we enter via the kissing gate onto footpath 3(b) this was part of a big open field before enclosure called Garden Field of which Home Close (The Home Close of Little Crawley Farm) is the first field we enter moving through a second kissing gate we enter Clamp Close this dates from 1580 and may allude to potato storage. A clamp is a large heap of potatoes covered by straw and earth for storage. Entering Hartwells a thirty-acre field named after Thomas Hartwell on a zigzag we enter Middle St. Turins (this odd name could refer to Saint Trunions alluding to the Holy Trinty on Trinity Sunday the first Sunday after Whitsun, a one-time feast). We then cross an ancient stream called Wolfey’s Brook (circa 1300) a place where wolves lurked. Middle Turins and Bottom St Turins these were both awarded to Thomas Lowndes the vicar of Astwood and rector of North Crawley. At the corner of Middle St Turins where we turn left, away to the right is Patershull Manor which was moated with fishponds but always went with “The Chesters” of Chicheley whose original ancestor was a Lord Mayor of London. As we pass a gap in the hedge , the path enters what was one of the big open fields before enclosure named Chicheley Park Field which was awarded to Charles Chester at Enclosure.
Following through Bottom St. Turins emerging onto the road at Griggs Piece (Thomas Grigg was awarded land on enclosure but not in this part of the parish, he got married at 19 and had numerous children). Where we turn left onto Starkers Lane (Chicheley Road). Ahead we can see Midsummer Ground A piece of open land only recently hedged which may have been used as summer grazing. The Rector Charles Cole mediated between small land owners and the large estates. We turn right onto Bridleway number 1 on the village footpath map into a field named Jedders which has now been merged with another field to make 13 acres. These fields are part of another large pre-enclosure open field named Mill Hill Field. We pass through a kissing gate on the left into Sand Field another 13-acre field and through the next kissing gate to Brook End Farm.
We go across the road past the bus stop and turn left into Bridleway number 21 known as Moores Lane as we walk up the hill, we see a small paddock on the left now known as Goodmans Field, this was in fact awarded to Elizabeth Brandon one of John Brandon’s direct ancestors who gave it to her daughter in contemplation of marriage to John Goodman. The Moore Field was the largest open field (369 acres) mainly to the south of the village and we pass through on the right fields named First Moores and Second Moores before turning left on footpath 20 into a field named Brownsells and walking up Clay Hill, beside a field named Volles (old English for clump of tree on a crest of a hill) to emerge onto Folly Lane.
We then cross the road and continuing on footpath 20 across a field called Houghtons (the named dates from 1128AD after William De Houghton King David of Scotland’s under tenant) and cross the stile and eventually up a steep field called “The Rolles” to emerge by the school.
The Rector Thomas Lowndes with the blessing and consent of the Bishop of Lincoln donated the land and the approval for the school to be built took place in the High Court on 28th May 1844. The National School of North Crawley was jointly built by The Reverend Thomas Lowndes and Thomas Alexander Boswell and received a subsidence of a Parliamentary Grant in 1845.
Following the path, we end on the Waste Ground where we started.