Parishes: Warlingham

WARLINGHAM

Warlyngham (xiii cent.); Werlingham (xiv cent.).

Warlingham is a village 4½ miles south-east of Croydon and 17 miles from London. It lies on the downs east of the Caterham Valley, into which the parish extends. It contains 1,702 acres and reaches about 2 miles in extreme measurement either way. Parochially it is united to Chelsham. The soil is chalk capped with gravel and clay. The Bourne, which is the overflow of the springs which feed the Wandle, occasionally appears in wet seasons, although not so frequently as formerly. It broke out near Bugshill Farm as lately as 1904 and 1910, when water ran down the Caterham Valley and Smitham Bottom to the Wandle at Croydon.

Flint implements are not uncommon, and reputed eoliths have been found in the pebble beds above the chalk. In 1909 several cinerary urns of late Celtic date were found near the road towards Worms Heath; one of them contained bones. In several places are depressions which may be but circles or pit-dwellings. Two of these are in the grounds of Bryn Cottage.

There is no distinct record of common fields in the parish, but there are three small separate strips of land belonging to the glebe on the west side of the village, and near one of them there are some other similar small strips, owned separately, which suggest holdings in common fields inclosed at some unrecorded date. Crewes Common in Warlingham and Chelsham was inclosed in 1808 (fn. 1) and Warlingham Common in 1866. (fn. 2) Warlingham Green is still an open space in the parish.

The village stands on high ground and contains some picturesque old houses. The vicarage is a fine old red brick house, with tiled roof, facing the common. It has Doric pilasters of cut brick on the front and dates from the latter part of the 17th century. There are old almshouses on the common and one or two cottages of some antiquity in the village, besides the two old inns, the 'Leather Bottle' and the 'White Lion,' the latter of which has some ancient oak in walls and ceilings. To the east of the church, and approached by a narrow lane, is the old manor-house—now a farm-house—of Crewes or Carews, which, though modernized, contains ancient portions. Warlingham Court, or Court Farm, and Westhall are other manor-houses on ancient sites which preserve traces of antiquity in their construction.

A great number of new houses have been built on the slopes of Caterham Valley on the top of the hill. Large houses are also being built further back upon the summit of the downs towards old Warlingham village, but beyond the village, in those parts which adjoin Farley and Chelsham, the rural character of the parish is still preserved. The Caterham Valley railway has a station called Warlingham, but it is in Caterham parish. When this line was first made a road was opened down the subsidiary valley in the chalk which joins the Caterham Valley to afford access to Caterham Junction. In 1884 the joint Brighton and South Eastern railway line from Croydon to Oxted came through part of Warlingham, and Upper Warlingham station was opened in the parish itself.

A school, formerly under a school board, was built in 1874 and enlarged in 1885 and 1894.

MANORS

No certain mention is found of WARLINGHAM in the Domesday Survey, but probably it is the unnamed manor of Robert de Watevile (mentioned before the second entry of Chelsham), which was held of Richard of Tonbridge. (fn. 3) It appears later in the Watevile family, and was held by William de Watevile in 1144, when he, with the consent of his sons Robert, William and Otwell, gave the manor of Warlington alias Warlingham to the convent of Bermondsey. (fn. 4) The convent held it under the Wateviles and the Godstones, their successors (see Chelsham), who held it of the honour of Clare. (fn. 5) In 1272 a suit took place between the Prior of Bermondsey and the Abbot of Hyde regarding the boundary between the lands of the priory in Warlingham and those of the abbot in Sanderstead. (fn. 6) This suit was still in progress in 1275, when the abbot appointed representatives to appear before the king in a plea of trespass against the Prior of Bermondsey, Walter le Bailif of Warlingham, and others. (fn. 7) In the following year the Abbot of Hyde impleaded the Prior of Bermondsey for setting up a gallows in his manor of Sanderstead, but the prior maintained that the gallows was not in Sanderstead, but in his own manor of Warlingham. (fn. 8) In 1318 the Prior of Bermondsey obtained the king's licence to demise the manor of Warlingham to Robert de Keleseye for life on the payment of 20s. (fn. 9) The priory in 1320 paid 40s. for one fee in Warlingham, an aid due for the marriage of Eleanor daughter of Edward I in 1293. (fn. 10) The manor continued with the monastery until 1538, when the priory of Bermondsey surrendered its estates to the Crown. (fn. 11) In 1544 a grant (fn. 12) was made to Sir John Gresham, kt., of the reversion of the manor of Warlingham and the rent reserved on a twenty-one years' lease made to Richard Wooden of Warlingham and John Cater of London, vintner, on 14 April 1541. (fn. 13) Sir John Gresham was a merchant of the staple and extremely wealthy, as is proved by his loan of £40,000 to the Crown in 1546. (fn. 14) He was sheriff in 1537 and ten years later was Lord Mayor of London. He married Mary daughter of Thomas Ipswell and had eleven children by her; after her death he married Catherine Sampson, widow of Edward Dormer of Fulham. (fn. 15) He died of a malignant fever on 23 October 1556 and was buried in the church of St. Michael Bassishaw. (fn. 16) By his will dated 12 February 1553–4 (fn. 17) he left the manor to his wife for life, with remainder to his youngest son Edmond in tail-male. Edmond, who is described as of Thorpe Market, co. Norfolk, held his first court at Warlingham in 1577. (fn. 18) He died on 31 August 1586, having bequeathed the manor to his son Richard, then aged twenty-one, and his issue, with remainders to his daughters Anne, Mary and Millicent. (fn. 19) Richard sold it in 1591 to John Ownstead, but, this being done without the queen's licence, it remained in the hands of the Crown until a fine was paid. (fn. 20) The licence was granted to Richard and his wife Anne on 2 March 1594 and the manor then became the property of John Ownstead. (fn. 21) The latter, who died on 9 August 1600 without issue, left two-thirds of his estate in Surrey to his cousin Harmon Atwood and the other third to his sisters and heirs at law, Ann wife of Robert Kneppe of Mitcham and Joyce wife of Alexander Holloway of Crowhurst. (fn. 22) Harmon Atwood died in 1653, having become possessed by purchase of the whole manor. (fn. 23) It remained in the Atwood family until Susanna Atwood, great-granddaughter of Harmon, married a Wigsell, and it then descended to her son the Rev. Atwood Wigsell, who married Susanna daughter of Henry St. John of the Inner Temple. (fn. 24) Their eldest son Atwood dying in his father's lifetime, the manor descended to his brother, the Rev. Thomas Wigsell, who married Jacobina daughter of Sir John Henderson. (fn. 25) He left no issue and on his death in 1805 his sister Susanna Wigsell succeeded him, and by her will dated 13 November 1805 (fn. 26) left all her estate to Atwood Wigsell Taylor, the natural son of her deceased brother Atwood by Mary Taylor, then Mary Russell, on the condition he took the name and arms of Wigsell, which he subsequently did by a grant of arms dated 12 February 1807. He held a court here under the name of Atwood Wigsell Wigsell in 1815. On his death in 1821 (fn. 27) the manor passed to his son Colonel Atwood Dalton Wigsell, who died in 1878, having left it to his half-brother Robert Wigram Arkwright for life, with remainder to the latter's son Captain Frank Wigsell Arkwright. On his death in 1893 it passed to his son, the present owner, Mr. Esmé Francis Wigsell Arkwright. (fn. 28)

A court baron and a view of frankpledge were held in Warlingham and a court is still held there. (fn. 29)

The first mention found of the manor of CREWES, or CAREWES, which was probably formed by subinfeudation from the Bermondsey manor, (fn. 30) is in 1352, and then under the name of the manor of Warlingham. In this year permission was given to Sir Richard Willoughby, kt., and his wife Elizabeth to grant to William and Nicholas Carew the manor of Beddington at a yearly rent of 20 marks, retaining to themselves the manor of Warlingham. (fn. 31) A further inquiry as to whether it was to the king's damage if Sir Richard Willoughby granted the manor to Nicholas Carew was held in 1359, and it was then stated that Richard held besides the manor £10 rent in Warlingham, and licence for the grant was therefore accorded him. (fn. 32) A grant of free warren in his demesne lands of Warlingham was made to Nicholas Carew in 1375. (fn. 33) This Nicholas, who was made Keeper of the Privy Seal on 27 July 1371, married Lucy daughter of Sir Richard Willoughby and widow of Sir Thomas Huscarl. (fn. 34) By her he had a son Nicholas, who on his father's death in 1390 inherited the estate. Nicholas the younger married as his second wife Mercy daughter of Stephen Delamere, and died in 1432, having left his lands in Warlingham to Joan, one of the three daughters of his son Thomas, who had predeceased him. (fn. 35) In default of Joan's issue the manor was then to descend to her sister Mercy, with contingent remainders to Nicholas and Isabel, son and daughter of the testator. Joan married William Saunders, together with whom she brought a suit against William Selman and William Bradford, trustees appointed by her grandfather, to oblige them to surrender the estate to her, she being more than fifteen years old, the age at which she was entitled to the estate. She deposed that in spite of this fact and of the will of her grandfather, produced by her grandmother Mercy, the trustees refused to give it up. (fn. 36) The lands were surrendered to her in 1451. (fn. 37) The manor, here called Cruses or Carewses, descended to William and Joan's grandson Nicholas Saunders, son of Richard, who died in his father's lifetime. Nicholas married Alice daughter of John Hungate and died in 1553. (fn. 38) On the marriage of his son Thomas with Alice daughter of Sir Edmund Walsingham, kt., he made over the manor to them, and on the death of Sir Thomas (knighted about 1549) (fn. 39) on 18 August 1565 it passed to the latter's eldest son Edmund, then aged twenty-three. (fn. 40) In 1589 Edmund conveyed this estate to his younger brother Thomas White Saunders of Estcombe, (fn. 41) who in the following year conveyed it to Edward Weston, gentleman. (fn. 42) The latter died on 3 December 1597 (fn. 43) and his widow Anne held it during her life; on her death in 1627 it passed to her son Garrett Weston. Garrett died on 4 April 1632, (fn. 44) and by his will, made two days before his death, devised Crewes to his daughter Frances, then aged ten years, and her issue, with remainders to his cousin Humphrey Gould and his son Humphrey. (fn. 45) Presumably Frances Weston married Michael Wilkins, as in 1644 the latter together with his wife Frances made over Crewes to Humphrey Gould. (fn. 46) In Easter term 1646–7 Humphrey Gould sold it to Richard Rochdale, citizen and brewer of London. (fn. 47) The latter by his will (fn. 48) dated 1 July 1657 devised the manor to his daughter Sarah in tail-male, and in default of such issue onehalf to his grandchild Mary wife of Thomas Byde and the other half to his grandchild Elizabeth Gould. Sarah Rochdale married Sir Thomas Nevil and had only one daughter and no sons. Elizabeth Gould died without issue and her moiety of the estate was divided between the female heirs of Sarah Rochdale and Mary Byde. These, together with Thomas Byde, conveyed the manor to John Pemberton, (fn. 49) from whom it passed to John Heathfield the elder, a brewer of Croydon. By his will dated 7 August 1742 Mr. Heathfield devised all his manors in Surrey to his son John. (fn. 50) The latter, who was a clergyman, died on 14 November 1776, and Crewes, descending to his son, was sold by him in 1804 to William Coles of Addington. (fn. 51) At the time of the inclosure of Crewes Common in 1808 Charles Pieschall was lord of the manor. It then passed into the hands of the Smith family of Selsdon, who still hold it, but no manorial rights are now exercised.

—On 1 February 1198 Ralph de Penhurst granted to William de Hames and his heirs, on payment of 100s., his lands in Warlingham, to be held by the service belonging to a fourth part of one knight's fee. (fn. 52) These lands must have come into the tenure of Odo de Dammartin, son of William de Dammartin, as he, about the reign of John, gave all his lands in Warlingham with the windmill (fn. 53) and other appurtenances, described as formerly belonging to Richard de Tonbridge, to the hospital of St. James in Tandridge for the support of the sick, poor and pilgrims staying in the hospital, free of all services due from him to William de Hames, reserving, however, the service of a quarter of one knight's fee. (fn. 54) In 1282 the king, by writ to the barons of the Exchequer, remitted to the priory the fifteenth due to him, because this manor had been let by the late prior to Charles, parson of Coulsdon. (fn. 55) The priory in 1291 was holding lands in Warlingham of the value of £2 6s. 8d. (fn. 56) These continued in the possession of the priory until its dissolution. In the Valor of 1535 £4 13s. 4d. was given as the farm of the lands and tenements called Westhall in Warlingham. (fn. 57) After the Dissolution Henry VIII gave Tandridge Priory to William Rede in exchange for Oatlands in Weybridge. William, however, died before the grant was completed, leaving as heir his infant son John, (fn. 58) to whom the king on 2 January 1538 granted the priory of Tandridge, including the manor of Warlingham or Westhall, in tail-male. (fn. 59) John Rede sold Westhall to Henry Hayward, fishmonger of London, (fn. 60) who by a deed dated 3 October 1562 settled it on his wife Agnes, and, after her death, on his sons Richard, Henry and John in tailmale successively. (fn. 61) By a later settlement dated 18 September 1594 he settled the remainder after the death of his second wife Katherine on his son John and Agnes his wife. Henry Hayward died at Tandridge on 24 March 1611. (fn. 62) After the death of Agnes, John in 1614 married Elizabeth (fn. 63) widow of William Watts and eldest daughter of William Angell, fishmonger of London, and settled the manor on her. By a deed dated 10 September 1630 he settled the lands appointed for Elizabeth's jointure on their son William. (fn. 64) John died on 1 March 1631, leaving a son and heir Humphrey, then aged twentyfive and designated 'a disobedient child.' (fn. 65) In 1658 Elizabeth Hayward, widow, and William Hayward with Martha his wife conveyed the manor to James Sherman, (fn. 66) who in 1674 sold it to Sir Robert Clayton (fn. 67) of Marden in Godstone and Blechingley. He died without issue in 1707, when his estates descended to his nephew William Clayton, created a baronet in January 1731–2. (fn. 68) The further history of Westhall follows that of Blechingley (q.v.).

CHURCH

The church of ALL SAINTS is built of field flints, with dressings of local green firestone in the old parts, and the roofs are tiled.

The present building is of about 1240, and down to 1893 it remained a small aisleless building under one roof, with no break internally between the nave and chancel save a timber and plaster tympanum above where the rood-screen had stood. It then measured 57 ft. by 19 ft. internally, with walls 2 ft. 6 in. to 2 ft. 10 in. thick, buttresses flanking the east and west gable-ends and an odd one at the junction of the nave and chancel on the north. To the south of the nave was a plain porch with lowpitched roof, lacking any evidence of greater antiquity than the end of the 17th century, and on the north was a vestry added early in the 19th century. It was evident from a stucco panel in the rough-east that entirely covered the walls externally (south side of chancel), with the initials O A and the date 1678, that Mistress Olive Atwood extensively repaired the church at that time, and, from his notes and sketches preserved in the British Museum, the celebrated antiquary John Carter supervised other repairs about 1800. In 1857 a Bath stone west doorway was inserted, from the designs of the late Sir Gilbert Scott, whose son, Mr. John Oldrid Scott, subsequently restored the east window. The church had also been repaved and reseated in 1857, and its curiously carved pulpit disappeared then or subsequently. The plastered tympanum before mentioned remained up to about 1884, when it was unfortunately removed on the insufficient plea of its being decayed—a loss the more to be regretted as it retained a 15th-century painting of vine-trails and angels. With these changes, however, the church remained substantially as built in the middle of the 13th century until 1893, when enlargement became necessary to meet the needs of a rapidly growing population. Six of the original well-proportioned lancets remained, two on either side of the chancel (fn. 69) and one in either wall of the nave. There were also the north and south doors, besides a small lowside window and part of the priest's door of this period in the south wall of the chancel, while in the latter a round-arched sedile and a piscina with trefoiled head remained beneath a string course of scroll section rising at the east wall. (fn. 70) In the eastern part of the nave a two-light window on either side had (c. 1450) taken the place of the original lancet. At the west end was a picturesque but much dilapidated timber bell-turret, partly tile-hung, its spirelet covered with painted boarding, having a vane with the date 1820, and supported internally on a construction of posts and braces rising from the floor. These posts had been shortened at the feet owing to decay, and rested on plastered piers, being also hidden by modern casing. There was a plain round-headed window in the west gable, perhaps dating from 1678, while the east window, originally of c. 1240, and still retaining its internal arch and jambs, had had tracery of three lights inserted, in place of three lancets, in about 1340. (fn. 71) The chancel roof was, and is, of good squared oak timbers, but remains ceiled.

In the enlargement and restoration in 1893–4 the west wall and two-thirds of the south wall of the nave were taken down, the church being extended to the westward 27 ft., and an aisle thrown out, 10 ft. wide, to the south, a north vestry being built on the site of the old. The only ancient features disturbed by these works were the bell-turret, the south door and the lancet to the westward. (fn. 72) The door and window were rebuilt, stone for stone, in the new walls, with inscriptions recording the removal, but the timbers of the turret were too much decayed for re-use, with the exception of the tie-beams on which it rested. The rough-cast was stripped from the walls, revealing the fact that the chancel was a few years earlier than the nave, as a battering quoin marked the western limit of the chancel, the toothing being left for the junction of the later work. The low-side window was found to have a circular niche or recess of peculiar character within its sill. Many putlog holes were found in the walls, and large square holes, bordered with stone to take the ends of the rood-beam, were found in the north and south walls, (fn. 73) also two 13th-century piscinae, with 'half-moon' dishings to the drains, one on either side of the nave, in a line with the site of the screen; and to the west of that in the southern wall a round-arched shallow sedile, similar to that in the chancel. Traces of an image niche to the north nave altar were also found. It was found that the ancient floor-level of the chancel had been 7 in. below that of the nave, and this level was restored by making a step down into the chancel. The low-side window and priest's door were opened and restored. (fn. 74)

The font is octagonal (c. 1450), the sides of the bowl being ornamented with sunk quatrefoils, within one of which is a grotesque head. (fn. 75)

In the spandrel pieces of the east window are some beautiful bits of yellow glass with foliage patterns of 14th-century date, and in the 15th-century window on the north side of the nave is some very rich coeval white and yellow canopy work showing angels' heads looking out of windows. Modern figures of the Blessed Virgin and St. Gabriel have been fitted to the old canopies by Westlake; while glass of similar character has been placed by Dr. Freshfield in the corresponding window on the south wall to record a tradition that the first Book of Common Prayer was first used experimentally by Cranmer in this church. There are a few panes of ancient green glass in the lancets of the nave. The modern glass in the east window, in memory of Lady Hodgkinson, and the grisaille in the chancel lancets, by Westlake, are harmonious and good.

Besides the former painting on the destroyed tympanum mentioned above, a similar vine scroll was found on the north wall of the nave, and to the west is a painting of St. Christopher, also of 15th-century date and of rude execution. The head of the Child Jesus has been defaced, but that of the saint is well preserved. He has the usual slouch hat or turban, cloak and uprooted sapling.

There are two fine late 17th-century chairs in the chancel; but otherwise all the furniture is modern, an oak reredos and panelling designed to commemorate the late Mrs. G. L. Hodgkinson, erected by her husband, being the latest addition. There are no ancient monuments in the church; a black slate slab to a former vicar in the nave floor and a wall tablet in the chancel, both of 18th-century date, are of no special interest.

Built into the wall of the modern porch is a tablet recording the burial-place of Christopher and Elizabeth Hayward, 1689. This was inserted in its present position by the writer, having marked till 1893 the brick tomb with iron railings which used to fill the angle between the west wall of the old porch and the south wall of the nave. There is a tombstone to a miller, Lionel Gregory, inscribed:—

'O cruel Death, what hast thou done,
To take from us our mother's darling son?
Thou hast taken toll, ground and drest his grist,
The bran lieth here, the flour is gone to Christ.'

On the east jamb of the south door is a small cross. Tool marks generally are very fresh on the inside face of all the stonework.

In the new turret is the quite plain old bell.

Among the plate are a silver cup and cover of 1569, a cup of 1817, and a tankard or flagon and other pieces of pewter dating from about 1690.

The registers date from 1653. (fn. 76)

There is a Wesleyan Methodist chapel in the parish.

ADVOWSON

William de Watevile in 1158 gave the advowson of the church of Chelsham and that of Warlingham to the priory of Bermondsey. (fn. 77) This grant was confirmed in the following year by the king. In 1299–1300 the priory obtained the bishop's licence to appropriate (fn. 78) and in 1315 that of the king. (fn. 79) A vicar was instituted in 1316, but rather later the convent's right to the appropriation was disputed, (fn. 80) and the monks were ejected by Bishop Stratford in 1330 and a rector instituted by him. The prior and convent appealed, and apparently received a confirmation of the appropriation, for vicars only were instituted from this date. (fn. 81) After the dissolution of Bermondsey the rectory was granted by the king in 1541 to Richard Wooden of Warlingham and John Cater, vintner of London, for twenty-four years on surrender of a twenty-seven years' lease made on 4 May 1526 by Bermondsey Abbey to Wooden. (fn. 82) On 3 June 1544 the reversion of the rectory and the advowson were granted to Sir John Gresham, (fn. 83) a fresh grant being made to his son Edmund in 1557–8. (fn. 84) Henceforth the advowson descended with the manor excepting in 1723, when Nicholas Hoskins presented under a grant for life, and in 1821, when it was in the hands of Richard Streatfeild. (fn. 85) In the reign of Elizabeth a suit was brought by John Torpley against William and John Parker concerning the advowson of the church of Warlingham, which William Parker was said to have sold to John Torpley. (fn. 86) William Parker was apparently holding on a lease from the Greshams.

The rectory descended with the manor until in 1675 Harmon Atwood conveyed the great tithes of Warlingham and Chelsham, with other sums of money, to trustees for the better serving of these churches, the better payment of a curate and for the maintenance of four poor persons in two almshouses he had built in Warlingham. (fn. 87)

CHARITIES

Atwood's Almshouses were founded by Harmon Atwood in 1675. They are for four widows: two from Warlingham, one from Chelsham, one from Sanderstead. Atwood also gave a house for the curate of Chelsham. The house, which was in the same block with the almshouses in Warlingham, was subsequently used as a school. The building still exists and is one of the few picturesque features, besides the church, in the village. Smith's charity is distributed as usual.