A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



£9 4J. 4W., when the hundred paid £10 lis. 8a'.' 

 For the "county lay of 1624 the townships were 

 arranged somewhat different!}-, in the following four 

 quarters: I, Croston and Rufford ; 2, Tarleton, 

 Much and Little Hoole ; 3, Mawdesley, Bispham, 

 and H«keth-with-Becconsall ; 4, Bretherton and 

 Ulnes Walton. Each of these quarters paid equally, 

 contributing a total of /^^ ¥• 1^-^ "'^^" j£'°° "'^' 

 required from the hundred.' 



The landowners of the undirided parish contribut- 

 ing to the subsidy in 1525 were Robert Hesketh, 

 Thomas Ashton, Henry Banastre, Edward Beconsaw, 

 Roger Dalton, Bartholomew Hesketh, Henry 

 Charnock and William Chorley.' 



The history of the parish shows little of interest to 

 record. The principal resident families were those 

 of Ashton of Croston and Banastre of Bank. In 

 1533 one of the priests living near Croston, James 



ft. 6 



. with north and 

 ft. 6 in. 



chancel 41 ft. 6 in. by 14 It. b in 

 south aisles and north vestry, nave 49 ft. by i 5 

 with north and south aisles, south porch, and west 

 tower 16 ft. 3 in. square, all these measurements 

 being internal. The tower stands almost entirely 

 within the church, its west front projecting only 4 ft. 

 beyond the end walls of the north and south aisles, 

 and is open to the building on all three sides under 

 lofty pointed arches. The oldest parts of the church 

 other than the piscina mentioned later seem to be 

 the east end of the chancel and the lower part of the 

 tower, which are probably of 15th-century date, at 

 which period the church may have been built on the 

 present plan, and to which date some other portions 

 of the building may belong. There was so much 

 rebuilding and restor.ation, however, in the following 

 three centuries, of which no exact record has been 

 kept, that it is now very difficult to assign the actual 



Map of Croston Parish 



Harrison, had the boldness to express the general 

 feeling of the people as to the king's repudiation of 

 Katherine of Aragon, on which an inquiry was made 

 there.' Some compositions for recusancy were made 

 in 1630-2.' 



In 1800 an Act was obtained for draining the 

 low lands of Croston, Mawdesley, Bispham, Brether- 

 ton, Rufford and Tarleton. 



The church of 5T. MICHAEL = is 



CHURCH situated at the south endof Croston village 



close to the River Yarrow, which bounds 



the churchyard on the south side, and consists of a 



date to the greater part of the building. It seems, 

 however, to be largely 16th-century work on a 

 15th-century basis, altered in the 17th, partly re- 

 built in the 1 8th, and restored in the 19th century. 



Baincs ' states that an inscription in the north side 

 of the steeple purports that the church was rebuilt in 

 the 1 6th century, but this, if it existed, is no longer 

 visible. The Banastre chapel in the north aisle was 

 'beautified' in 1682, and there were rebuilding? of 

 parts of the structure in 1708, 1 710, 1715 and 1768.' 

 In 1823 a new roof was erected and the whole 

 church ' beautified,' but a more thorough restoration 



* Gregson, Fragments (cd. Harland), 19. 

 ^ Ibid. 17, 22. Rules were made as to 



the subdi\ision of the quarter's contribu- 

 tion among the various townships ; thus 

 when Mawdesley paid %J. Bispham paid 

 \J. and Hesketh-with-Becconsall 2d. 

 ' Subs. R, Lanes, bdle. 130, no. 86. 



* E;iis, Orig. Ltttiri (Ser. l), ii,4l-5 ; 

 Ch. Gcods (Chet. Soc), 68. 



' These were for the two-thirds of 



their estates legally sequestered for re- 

 ligion. In CrostonThomas Ashton com- 

 pounded by jTiS a year, Thomas Werden 

 by £^ or. ^. ; in Mawdesley Henry 

 Finch by ^-^ and Michael Nelson by 

 £2 13/. 4i/. ; Tram, JlisC, Soc. (new 

 ser.), xxiv, 173-8. 



** The invocation was St. Michael as 

 early as 1291. See Cal. Papal Lelttrt, 

 >, 5M- 



82 



^ Hiit. af Lanes, (ed. 1836), iii, 398. 



" The following extracts from the 

 parish books, now at the rectory, have 

 been communicated by the Rev. W. G. 

 Procter. They will show the txtent of 

 the various works : — 



1708, Aug. 3. It was agreed that the 

 arch that leads into the Rufford chancel, 

 being dangerous and visibly decayed, should 

 be repaired by William Bellingham, esq. 



