11 Nov 2006
Transcribed by Stacey Gardner
Ashburnham is a parish, on the river Ashbourne, and near the road from Battle to Hailsham, 5 miles west from Battle station on the Tonbridge & Hastings lines of the South Eastern & Chatham railway, and 11 north-west, from Hastings, in the eastern division of the county, Foxearle hundred, Hastings rape and county court district, petty sessional division and union of Battle, rural deanery of Dallington, archdeaconry of Lewes and diocese of Chichester. The church of St James is of stone in the Perpendicular style with some Decorated portions, and has a tower containg 4 bells; the church was entirely rebuilt with the exception of the tower, in 1665, by John Ashburnham, and there are 2 marble monuments, one to Jane, Countess of Marlborough and her husband, William Ashburnham, cofferer to Charles I. & II. and the other with life size effigies, to John Ashburnham, groom of the bed-chamber to Charles I. & II. (d. 1671), and his 2 wives. The is also a monument with marble bust to Bertram, 4th Earl of Ashburnham (d. 22nd June, 1878), and a bras memorial to the Rev. John Read Munn B.A. 38 years vicar of Ashburnham and rector of Penshurst (d. 1878). The church was restored in 1894 at a cost of £1,000 and affords 198 sittings. The register dates from the year 1538. The living is a vicarage, consolidated with the rectory of Penhurst, joint net income £272, with 65 ¾ acres of glebe and residence, in the gift of Hon. John Ashburnham, and held since 1904 by the Rev. Horace Sturt M.A. of Pembroke College, Cambridge. The reading and recreation room, built in 1908, was the gift of the Earl of Ashburnham. Ashburnham Place, the seat of the Earl of Ashburnham, lord of the manor and chief landowner, is a noble mansion of red brick, situated in a fine and well-wooded park of 1,000 acres, 500 of which are stocked with dear; here are preserved the shirt in which Charles I. was beheaded, his silken drawers and watch, a locket containing a lock of his hair, and the sheet in which his body was wrapped. Attached to the house is a domestic Catholic chapel served from Battle. The soil is sandstone; subsoil, clay. A large proportion of this parish consists of grassland, but the chief crops are wheat and oats. The area is 4,051 acres of land and 28 of water, rateable value £2,682; the population in 1901 was 570 in the civil and 577 in the ecclesiastical parish.
Buckwell, a detached part of Dallington, has by Local Government Board Order 19,651, dated 24th March, 1887, been transferred to this parish, and a detached part of this parish has been annexed to Ninfield by Order 96.652 of the same date.
Post Office – Mrs Hepzibah Gates, sub-postmistress. Letters arrive from Hastings via Battle at 8.30am; dispatched at 5.30pm; Sundays, 10.15am. The nearest money order office is at Boreham Street; nearest telegraph office at Dallington, 3 miles distant. Letter box at Stevens Crouch, cleared at 7pm week days & 11.45am on Sundays. Pillar box, The Pound, cleared at 5.45pm week days; 10.30 Sundays.
Public Elementary School (mixed), erected in 1878, for 165 children; average attendance, 85; James Holdroyd, master; Miss E. Price & Miss Muddle, assistant mistresses.
Police Station, Ernest Willard, constable
Private Residents
Ashburnham Earl Of, D.L., J.P. Ashburnham Place; Barking Hall, Needham Market, Suffolk; & Pembrey, Carmarthenshire; & Athenaeum & Travellers’ Clubs, London S.W.
Ashburham-Clement Sir Anchital P. bart. J.P. (land steward to the Earl of Ashburnham), Agmerhurst
Sturt Rev. Horace M.A. (vicar) Vicarage
Commercial
Akehurst Albert Edward, farmer, Thornden Farm
Akehurst Charles Jenner, farmer, Lattenden
Ashburnham Reading & Recreation Rooms (B. T. Hobday, sec.)
Barden Joseph, woodreave to the Earl of Ashburnham
Beale William, farmer, Lakehurst
Bourner Walter, farmer, Frankwell Farm
Braban Seth Charles, farmer, Glyde’s Farm
Christian Charles William, farmer, Red Pale
Christian William, farmer, Silvericks Farm
Cook Walter, wheelwright, Church Street
Dawes George, painter
Funnell Owen, farmer, Pont’s Green
Gates Hepzibah (Mrs), shopkeeper, post office
Grigg George, head gardener to the Earl of Ashburnham
Hobday Charles, farmer & Ash Tree Inn
Holroyd James, assistant overseer
Honeysett William, farmer, Wilson’s Farm
Jenner Tom, farmer, Brigden Hill
Kemp Jabez, farmer, Buckwell Farm
Lovell George Robert, farmer, Thorndale
Marchant James, farm bailiff to the Earl of Ashburnham, New Buildings, Church Road
Norris Joe, farmer, Kitchenham
Parsons John, poultry dealer, Pont’s Green
Peters John, blacksmith, Pont’s Green
Saunders Samuel, farmer, Agmerhurst Farm
Stevenson Henry John, farmer, Linghams
Sutton John, butcher, Brownbread Street
Venner John, farmer, Brownbread Steeet
West Robert, farmer, Gardener Farm
White Charles, farmer, Court Lodge Farm
11 Nov 2006 | Transcribed by Stacey Gardner |
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