THE OLD TOWN OF MILTON ABBEY. - 7 



obstinate opposition. For over twenty years his lordship was 

 involved in considerable trouble and expense while gradually 

 getting all the houses into his own possession, in order that he 

 might level them to the ground. Mr. Harrison, a resident 

 solicitor, refused to sell his lease, although he was offered three 

 times its value ; so Lord Milton let the water from the " Abbot's 

 Pond" (a small pond which then lay just below the Abbey 

 Church) creep around the premises. Mr. Harrison at once 

 entered an action against his lordship for flooding his house, 

 and the lawyer won the case. A few days afterwards Lord 

 Milton went to London, and on his way to Blandford he heard 

 the Abbey bells ringing. This he interpreted as a sign of 

 parochial joy at his defeat and departure ; and nothing would 

 satisfy him but the sale of the offending bells. The bells were 

 really ringing to commemorate Guy Fawkes' Day ; it was 

 November 5th. But the bells had to go, for "the autocrat" 

 had spoken. And his friend, the Dean of Norwich, had said 

 that " bell-ringing caused much idleness and drinking." There 

 is a record that, when the parishioners saw their bells carted 

 away, they stood at their house-doors weeping, even though two 

 of the bells were saved for the new church of St. James. 



In pulling down the old town, Lord Milton preserved the 

 Abbey Church, and employed James Wyatt to restore it. A 

 comparison of the first and second edition of " Hutchins" will 

 show the havoc which was then wrought in portions of the 

 interior, although it must be added that at the same time the 

 vast building underwent a thorough repair, which it needed very 

 badly. There is a tradition that this restoration cost Lord 

 Milton no less than ^"60,000, but this seems a fabulous sum. 



With the materials obtained from the demolished buildings 

 of the old town Lord Milton built the present village of Milton, 

 now one of the most picturesque of Dorset villages. And, as 

 one wanders down the quiet main street into the Abbey Park 

 around the peaceful Abbey Church, it is hard to realise that the 

 stirring events recorded in this paper happened little more than 

 a hundred years ago. 



