A HISTORY OF SURREY 



merchant of London, hac vice. According to Man- 

 ning and Bray, Parsons devised the rectory to his 

 daughters, Sarah wife of James Dunn, and Anne, 

 who married John Hynde Cotton, afterwards 

 knighted." 9 Sir John Hynde Cotton presented in 

 1771,'* and sold the advowson to Sir Charles 

 Talbot in 1786,"' and Lady Talbot, the widow of 

 Sir Charles, presented in 1800 and 1802. In 1813 

 Mr. Henry Burmester presented his son, having bought 

 the next presentation from Sir George Talbot. 12 ' 

 It passed with the manor till 1899, when Mr. H. H. 

 Gordon Clark of Mickleham Hall bought the ad- 

 vowson from Mr. Praed. 



Smith's Charity is distributed as 



. TO i T of 



m other Surrey parishes. In 1586 



Richard Woodstock left 5/. annually charged on land 

 in Mickleham common fields for the repair of the 

 church. It appears that the fields were by the river. 

 After the parish was brought into the Dorking 

 Union by the Poor Law of 1834 the old poor- 

 house at Bytom Hill became useless, and proposals 

 were made for converting it into an almshouse. The 

 matter was delayed till the old building fell down, 

 and it was not till 1851 that the almshouses were 

 actually opened, built chiefly by the generosity of 

 Sir George Talbot, and endowed by Miss Talbot. 

 They were burnt down in 1864, and were rebuilt 

 by Mr. H. P. Grissell of Norbury, whose family 

 further endowed them. They accommodate eight 

 persons. 



NEWDIGATE 



Newdegate (xiii cent.), Newedegate and Neudegate 

 (xv cent.), Nudgate (xvi cent.). 



Newdigate is a village nearly 6 miles south-east of 

 Dorking, i\ miles from Holmwood Station, on the 

 London, Brighton, and South Coast Railway. The 

 parish is on the borders of Sussex, and is bounded 

 on the north by Leigh, on the east by Charlwood, 

 on the south by Rusper in Sussex, on the west by 

 Capel. An outlying part of Charlwood is in the 

 southern part of it, surrounded by Newdigate and 

 Rusper. It measures about 4 miles from north to 

 south and 2 miles from east to west, and contains 

 4,732 acres. The soil is the Wealden Clay. The 

 parish is still thickly wooded, and is purely agricul- 

 tural, except for brick and tile works. A branch of 

 the Mole in the parish is called the Rithe. The 

 only commons are some strips of roadside waste. No 

 main road leads through the parish, but there was an 

 old way from Ockley, through Capel, and past Eutons 

 into Newdigate, and by Parkgate towards Reigate. 

 The name Rodgate Field appears upon its course ; and 

 though Parkgate may be named from the park at 

 Ewood, this road marked in old maps as the only one 

 across this line of country, although now in places no 

 more than a bridle-road, suggests an exception to the 

 alleged non-use of the word 'gate' for a road in 

 southern England. Gatwick in Charlwood is on 

 another old way to Reigate and Gatton. 



Newdigate is for the most part in the hundred of 

 Copthorne, forming an outlying portion of it. But 

 the hamlet of Parkgate and the part of the parish near 

 it are in Reigate Hundred. The place does not appear 

 at all in Domesday, and the connexion with Copthorne 

 is a probable result of the holding by the Montfort 

 family of Newdigate together with Ashtead Manor, 

 while Parkgate was held with Reigate and Dorking 

 by the Earls of Warenne and Surrey. 



In the 1 6th century Ewood, or Iwood, was the 

 seat of an important iron forge and furnace. 1 New- 

 digate was among the parishes excepted by name from 

 the Act I Elizabeth against cutting of timber, and the 

 works at Ewood were excepted by name from a later 



Act on the same matter owing to the good manage- 

 ment of the woods. 



Ewood Pond, an extensive sheet of water, arti- 

 ficially dammed for the use of these works, long 

 survived the industry. It was drained circa 1850-60, 

 but was marked on ordnance maps long after that date. 



In the older farms and cottages there is much 

 massive timber-work. The tower of the church (q.v.) 

 is one of the finest examples of oak building in the 

 county. Cudworth Manor House is a moated house 

 apparently of the 1 6th century, though considerably 

 altered at different times. Newdigate Place, the 

 house of the family of that name, was a large house 

 standing round a courtyard, but was almost entirely 

 demolished near the end of the 1 8th century. In 

 1807 the Duke of Norfolk began to build a house at 

 Ewood, but it was never completed, and the part 

 built was pulled down after the duke's death in 1815. 

 Traces of it, however, still remain. 



Of modern houses Newdigate Place, close to the 

 site of the old house, is the property of Mrs. Janson ; 

 the Red House of Mr. Leopold Goldberg ; Cud- 

 worth Manor of Mr. H. Lee-Steere. Lyne House (see 

 Capel) is on the border of that parish and Newdigate. 



At Parkgate, a hamlet north-east of the village, 

 there is a Congregational mission room. 



The old poor-house was between the village and 

 Parkgate. The whole labouring population were in 

 receipt of out-door relief in the earlier I gth century, 

 and the rates reached 19;. in the pound.' 



There is no mention in the Domes- 

 MJNORS day Survey of the manor of NEJfDI- 

 GATE ; it probably then formed part 

 of Dorking. In the 1 2th century the overlordship 

 belonged to the Earls Warenne and Surrey,** whose 

 descendants continued to hold it until the end of 

 the 1 6th century. 3 In 1347 the male line of 

 the Warennes died out, and Richard, Earl of 

 Arundel, the son of Alice de Warenne, succeeded to 

 the title and estates.' In 1415, on the death of 

 his grandson Thomas, the Warenne and Surrey 

 estates were divided between his three sisters, 6 Newdi- 



119 Manning and Bray, Surr. ii, 659. 



" Inst. Bks. (P.R.O.). 



131 Manning and Bray, Surr. i!, 659. (The 

 date by a misprint is here given as 1766.) 

 In 1788 a fine occurs between Daniel 

 Vandewall and Sarah his wife and La- 



zarus Venable of the rectory of Mickle- 

 ham. 



122 Inst. Bki. (P.R.O.), and private 

 information. 



1 V.C.H. Surr. ii, 269-70 ; Surr. Arch. 

 Coll. xvii, 28. 



3 IO 



a Churchwardens' account!. 



" Cott. MS. Nero, C. iii, fol. 188. 



Chan. Inq. p.m. 43 Edw. Ill, no. 19 ; 

 (Ser. 2) clxxix, 76 ; ccxxxiii, 74. 



4 Berry, Gen. Pierage, 88 ; G.E.C. Peer- 

 age, Arundel. s Ibid, 



