FAWLEY HUNDRED 



OWSLEBURY 



The church of ST. 4NDREW has a 



CHURCH chancel 28 ft. by 16 ft. 3 in., nave with 



aisles 33 ft. 8 in. long by 38 ft. wide, 



and west tower 10 ft. by 1 1 ft., all measurements 



being internal. 



The chancel appears to be the earliest part of the 

 church, dating from the first quarter of the fourteenth 

 century, and the building has at one time been cruci- 

 form, but in the latter part of the seventeenth 

 century the nave and tower were remodelled, and in 

 spite of later repairs a good deal of work of this date 

 yet exists. 



The chancel has an east window of three lights 

 with modern tracery of geometrical style, the rear 

 arch being old. On north and south are single 

 uncusped lights with modern heads, and below that on 

 the north a tomb recess, apparently of early fourteenth- 

 century date, as are the old parts of the windows. 

 The chancel arch is pointed, of two chamfered 

 orders, with seventeenth-century capitals of classic 

 design. 



The nave is covered by a central roof running east 

 and west, and pairs of gabled roofs on each side, 

 running north and south, a single cast-iron column on 

 each side supporting the wall plates. It is lighted by 

 two north and two south windows, of which all but 

 the south-east window are of three uncusped lights 

 with tracery, of seventeenth-century date, the remain- 

 ing window having trefoiled lights under a transom 

 and trefoiled tracery over. In the west wall on either 

 side of the tower is a doorway, that to the north 

 having a pointed head of two moulded orders and 

 a label, and that to the south a modern shouldered arch. 



The tower is of three stages, embattled, with a 

 west window in the ground stage of two trefoiled 

 lights, curious work which is dated by a panel over it 

 bearing the initials of the churchwardens for 1675. 

 The tower arch appears to be of the same date. In 

 the second stage and belfry stage are windows of four- 

 teenth-century style but modern stonework. 



The roofs of the nave are of the trussed rafter 

 form, and the panels from destroyed seventeenth- 

 century pews, with carved top rails, are fixed as 

 wainscoting round the nave walls. The altar rails 

 are eighteenth-century balusters, and in the chancel 

 is an ancient iron-barred chest with three locks, made 

 from a solid log. 



Below the east window are four quatrefoiled stone 

 panels inclosing blank shields, of fifteenth-century 

 date ; on one shield is a dent to which the tradition 

 attaches that it was made by a bullet which killed the 

 priest who celebrated the last mass here in the six- 

 teenth century. 



The font, at the west end of the nave, is octagonal 

 with a moulded base to the bowl, and perhaps of 

 fifteenth-century date, but much re-tooled. 



In the chancel are some large marble mural 

 monuments to the first and second Lords Carpenter, 



1731 and 1749 ; and to the last earl of Tyrconnel, 

 1853. 



There are six bells, the first three by Mears and 

 Stainbank, 1905 ; the fourth, formerly of 1674, 

 recast by Taylor in 1900 ; and the fifth and tenor, 

 of 1622 and 1619, by the founder i H (possibly 

 for John Higden), with the usual inscription, ' In God 

 is my hope ' ; on the fifth is the founder's mark of 

 Roger Landon, re-used. 



The church possesses a very fine and early com- 

 munion cup of 1552, inscribed 'The Communion 

 Cup of Owsylbury,' and an almsdish with the 

 inscription ' This with my soule I dedicate to God 

 Alice Mildemay, June the 8th, 1680.' 



The first book of the registers is of burials in 

 woollen, 16781812 ; and the second contains the 

 baptisms 1696-1812 and the marriages 1696-1704, 

 1722, and 1744-54. 



Bishop Henry of Blois founded a small college of 

 secular priests, called later a chantry, in the church 

 or chapel of Marwell Park, Owslebury, between 

 1129 and H7i, 48 to which were attached four 

 chapelries. 



The site of the episcopal house at Marwell Park is 

 marked by a square moat inclosing a large area, at the 

 north-east corner of which stand the remains of the 

 college buildings, now of little importance, and serving 

 as out-buildings to the present dwelling-house, which 

 though in itself of no architectural interest, is built 

 with fragments of the old work. No details appear 

 to be older than the fifteenth century. It was sup- 

 pressed under the Act of Edward VI for the dissolution 

 of such foundations. 



The earliest mention of the present 

 ADVOWSQN church of St. Andrew seems to be 

 in the year 1551, when the advowson 

 of the vicarage of Marwell, the site of the ancient 

 chapel in Marwell Park, and the manor, were granted 

 to Sir Henry Seymour. 49 The advowson was annexed 

 to the manor of Marwell until 1836, since which 

 date it has been in the hands of the vicar of 

 Twyford. 40 



In 1840 Mrs. Alice Long, by will 

 CHARITIES proved this date, directed (infer alia) 

 that sufficient stock should be pur- 

 chased to produce 30 a year to be applied by the 

 incumbent in payment of her usual subscriptions to 

 the parochial school, and subject thereto in the pur- 

 chase of fuel, blankets, clothing, or provisions for the 

 benefit of the deserving poor. 



1,000 consols was set aside in satisfaction of this 

 legacy, and forms part of a larger sum held by the 

 Corporation of Winchester in trust for this and other 

 charities founded by this donor. By an order made 

 under the Board of Education Act, 1899, a sum of 

 400 consols has been determined to be the pro- 

 portion of the charity applicable for educational 

 purposes. 



y.C.H. Hanti, ii, 211. 



48 Pat. 5 Edw. VI, pt. 5, m. 29. 



Clerical Guide, 

 Litt, 1845-1904. 



1836-41 ; Clergy 



335 



