A HISTORY OF DURHAM 



He granted the manor of Stotfold to Master William dc 

 Kilkenny about i 245 to hold for half a knight's fce.^' 



William de Kilkenny, lord of Stotfold, witnessed 

 the charter by which Philip de Burntoft granted 

 Burntoft to John de Hartlepool, probably soon after 

 1268.''^*' William de Kilkenny was lord of Stotfold 

 in 1327 and was a commissioner of array for Stockton 

 Ward.'"" He was apparently succeeded by the John 

 de Kilkenny who between 1333 and 1345 granted 

 the manor except one messuage and one carucate to 

 William de Kilkenny for life, with remainder to 

 Robert dc Kilkenny and Joan his wife and their issue 

 and the right heirs of Robert.' In 1340 it was 

 found that William de Kilkenny had died seised 

 jointly with his wife Agnes of the messuage and 

 carucate excepted from this settlement. His son and 

 heir was Robert, probably the Robert already 

 mentioned." Before i 349 Robert de Kilkenny, tenant 

 under the settlement of the manor, had died without 

 issue, and his widow Joan had become the wife of 

 William Claxton.' The reversion of the manor was 

 the right of William de Kilkenny, brother and heir of 

 Robert.'' He settled it in the spring of 1353 on his 

 son William and Katherine his wife and their issue.* 

 In 1357 Joan and William Claxton, with the consent 

 of the younger William, granted to Sir John de Nevill 

 a bondman in the manor of Stotfold.'^ William died 

 before 1373, when his heir was found to be his son 

 Richard. Both Joan and William's widow Katherine 

 survived.' 



In 1382 Richard de Kilkenny the younger granted 

 the manor of Stotfold to John de Neville of Raby in 

 exchange for the Yorkshire manor of Hooke,'* and 

 before 1426-7 it had been granted by Ralph Earl 

 of Westmorland to Richard 

 Neville Earl of Salisbury." 

 The manor reverted to the 

 Westmorland family, and fol- 

 lowed the descent of Elwick 

 until I 564,' but on i 5 August 

 1569 Charles Earl of West- 

 morland, before the attainder, 

 sold it to William Selby ot 

 Newcastle-upon-Tyne. "J 



William Selby died in De- 

 cember 161 3 and George 

 Selby, aged 57, was his son 

 and heir." George Selby, who 



was knighted in 1603,"'' left six daughters, but he 

 settled the reversion of his manor of Stotfold, subject 



Selby. Barry or atjd 

 hU of eight piecci. 



to provision for his wife Dame Margaret for life, on his 

 brother Sir William Selby of Shortflatt and his heirs 

 male ;'- he died in 1625." 



Dame Margaret survived Sir William Selby, her 

 nephew and heir of his father Sir William,'^ but after 

 her death in 1650 the parliamentary sequestrators 

 seized Stotfold on the plea that the heir-at-law, 

 George, son of the younger Sir William, a boy of 

 fifteen, was being brought up as a Roman Catholic. 

 His guardian John Southey, a barrister of Gray's 

 Inn, petitioned against the sequestration on 27 March 

 1651, on the ground that he was educating the boy 

 as a Protestant, and on 31 January 1653 the 

 sequestration was discharged with arrears." George 

 Selby made a conveyance of this manor to uses in 

 the spring of 1654," but revoked it in the next year 

 under a clause in the agreement." Mark Milbank 

 and William Carr were associated with him in a 

 further deed of 1656, but Sir George seems to have 

 been in possession in 1670.^'^ Mark Milbank and 

 Ralph Carr paid the subsidy of 1670 upon it.'" 

 After the death of Ralph Carr in 1709" High 

 Stotfold was purchased from his executors by Ralph 

 John Fenwick, M.D., who sold it to Jonathan 

 Backhouse of Darlington, and it now belongs to 

 Mr. W. O. Backhouse.2" Middle Stotfold was sold 

 by the Milbanks to the family of Shepperdson, who 

 held it in about 1823.-' It is now the property of 

 Mr. Nicol of Wingate. Low Stotfold is held by 

 Mr. M. B. Hutchinson. 



The church of ST. PETER consists 

 CHURCH of a chancel 29 ft. 3 in. by i 3 ft. 3 in. 

 with north vestry, nave 44 ft. 4 in. by 

 1 6 ft. with north and south aisles and tower on the 

 south side forming a porch 6 ft. 8 in. by 9 ft. 8 in., 

 all these measurements being internal. 



The site is an ancient one and two sculptured 

 stones of pre-Conquest date on either side of the 

 ch.mcel arch -- suggest the existence of an early 

 building. The present structure, however, with the 

 exception of the tower and vestry, dates from about 

 I 195-1200, though very much restored and altered 

 in later times. About the middle of the 14th 

 century a chantry or mortuary chapel was built on 

 the north side of the church by the Kilkenny family 

 or by Walter de Cumba, who founded a chantry in 

 the church in 1327. The building was then or 

 subsequently reroofed.--" The date of the original 

 tower must now remain a matter of conjecture, no 

 portion of the original work having apparently 



™ FcoJ. Prior. Dunrlm. (Surt. Soc), 

 197 n. Master William de Kilkenny 

 was archdeacon of Coventry in 12^1-2 

 {^Rievaulx Chartvl. [Surt. Soc], 400). 



'™ Surtees, op. cit. iii, 88 n. Henry 

 de Kilkenny was presented to the church 

 in 1237 [Cat. Pat. 1232-47, p. 207). 



'""» Surtees, op. cit. iii, 89 ; Lansd. 

 MS. 902, fol. 94. 



' Dur. Rec. cl. 3, no. 2, fol. 90. 



» Ibid. fol. 20. 



^ Ibid. R. 30, m. 4d.; R. 32, m. 2; Anct. 

 D. (P.R.O.), D 1231. 



* Dur. Rec. cl. 3, no. 2, fol. 90. 



'■' Ibid. no. 12, fol. 78,94 (she is called 

 Agnes on fol. 94). William Danyell, the 

 trustee for the settlement of 1353, after- 

 wards married Katherine (ibid. no. 2, fol. 

 90). 



» Anct. D. (P.R.O.), D I 23 1. 



' Dur. Rec. cl. 3, no. 2, fol. 90. 



'a Madox, Formulae Anglic. 168. They 

 also sold his land in Sunderland Bridge 

 (q.v.) in this year. 



■^ Dur. Rec. cl. 3, R. 58, m. i 3 d. ; R. 

 36, m. 4 ; cf. Ibid. no. 206-11. 



'' Ibid, file 168, no. 14 ; no. 6, fol. 18 

 and 42. 



'" Ibid. R. 84, m. 6 ; R. 85, m. 2 ; 

 R. 156, m. 32; cl. 12, no. i (2). For 

 this family see also Winlaton in Ryton 

 (Chester Ward). 



" Dur. Rec. cl. 3, file 183, no. 64. 



"a Shaw, Kn. of Engl, ii, 115. 



'* Dur. Rec. cl. 3, file 189, no. 142 ; 

 Pat. 7 Chas. I, pt. xix, no. 3. The 

 daughters of George Selby conveyed the 

 manors of Winlaton and Stotfold to Sir 

 Ralph Delavale, kt., and Robert Delavale 

 in 1627 (Dur. Rec. cl. 12, no. 4 [2]). 



240 



'^ Dur. Rec. cl. 3, file 189, no. 142 ; 

 Pat. 7 Chas. I, pt. xix, no. 3. 



" Cal. Com. for Comp. iv, 2763 ; cf. v, 

 3223 i Rec, Com. for Comp. (Surt. Soc), 

 332-3. '•' Ibid. 



'« Dur. Recov. R. Hil. 1654, m. 52. 



'" Arch. Ael. (Ser. 3), v, 144. 



'^a Ibid. ; Com. Pleas, D. Enr. Mich. 

 16^6, m. 104. 



"'Subsidy of 1670, Spearman MSS, 

 D. and C. Lib. Dur. 



'" See Cocken in Houghton-le-Spring 

 parish. 



^^ Surtees, op. cit. iii, 88. 



»' Ibid. 



" y.C.H. Dur. I, 229. 



^2» Some of the materials from this 

 chapel, including two canopies of a 

 piscina, have been incorporated in a farm- 

 house at High Tunstall. 



