CLIFTON HUNDRED 



CAMPTON 



In the southern range, which also retained its cen- 

 tral wall, the main staircase occupied the west end, 

 and the chapel the east, the space between being cut 

 up into chambers, whose use is not otherwise specified. 

 On the first floor was the dining-room, probably the 

 old frater, just as the 'hall' in the eastern range 

 represented the dorter. 



At the south end of the western range were the 

 ' lyme house ' and the garden house, and at the north 

 end the outer parlour had become the passage to the 

 garden, the next two bays of the subvault being 

 devoted to what was perhaps their original use, a store 

 house. The later additions to the house date chiefly 

 from the early part of the nineteenth century, and 

 are of no great importance. The most notable is a 

 large octagonal room, north of the quadrangle, pur- 

 porting to be copied from the chapter-house at Peter- 

 borough — a statement which has no foundation in 

 fact — and containing a splendid state bed with its 

 hangings and embroideries, formerly known as the 

 ' Warming pan Bed,' in reference to the story of the 

 supposititious son of James II. It seems to have come 

 into the Osborn family through a marriage vyith the 

 widow of the Lord Molyneux, who was an officer of 

 the bedchamber to James II. 



The present chapel is fitted with high wooden pews, 

 painted white, and is entered from the quadrangle by 

 a door at the north-east. Over the altar is a fine 

 piece of early sixteenth-century Flemish tapestry. 



The series of pictures, portraits and otherwise, in 

 the house, is an interesting one, the most notable 

 being a very fine portrait of Edward VI, attributed 

 to Holbein ; there are also portraits of Cromwell, 

 Sir William Temple and Dorothy Osborn, George 

 Montagu, earl of Halifax, Sir Kenelm Digby, and 

 many members of the Osborn family. One of the 

 rooms in the south wing has a fine eighteenth- 

 century Oriental wall paper. 



In a wood on the high ground north-west of the 

 house are the remains of a ' chapel,' obviously one of 

 the sham ruins, in this case largely composed of really 

 old fragments, which the taste of the eighteenth-cen- 

 tury Gothicist delighted to construct. To complete 

 the illusion, several genuine mediaeval gravestones 

 have been set near to it, two of them on imitation 

 altar tombs. One of these is a very fine and inter- 

 esting slab with the effigy of an abbot in mass vest- 

 ments, with the marginal inscription : ' Hie jacet 

 Frater T(homas de C)otgrave abas de Pippewel' cui' 

 ale ppiciet' Deus.' "'" 



Pipewell was a Cistercian abbey in Northampton- 

 shire, and there is nothing to show how the slab came 

 to Chicksands. 



The other manor in CHICKSJNDS mentioned in 

 Domesday was held by Germund of Ralph Langetot an 

 undertenant of Walter GiiFard.'^' The overlordship 

 passed from the Giffards to the Pembrokes as in the 

 case of Dunton (q.v.). No documentary evidence for 

 the existence of the manor during the next two centuries 



has been found, but in 1 302 Margery Dagnel held 

 the manor for half a knight's fee,'^* and in 1 3 1 6 Peter 

 Dagnel was joint lord of Meppershall, Chicksands, and 

 Stondon with Nicholas Meppershall."'' In 1 3 1 7 this 

 manor was given to Chicksands Priory by John Blundel 

 at the instigation of Aymer de Valence, earl of 

 Pembroke ; '" and having become amalgamated with 

 the manor then held by the priory, it has had 

 from this date a descent analogous to the one already 

 traced. 



The abbey of Warden held half a hide of land in 

 Chicksands which had been conveyed by fine to Payn, 

 abbot of Warden, by Robert son of Olympeas in 

 1197.'^" This grant was confirmed by Richard I in 

 1 198, and by Edward I in 1286.'*' No further trace, 

 however, of this holding can be found. 



Other lands in Chicksands were held by Marina de 

 Bcseville, who, with her tenants, held half a knight's 

 fee in Chicksands in 1302.™ Matilda, the widow of 

 John Botetourt, alienated lands in Chicksands to 

 William le Latymer and Elizabeth his wife in 

 1328,'" and in 1388 John de Neville of Raby and 

 Elizabeth his wife had a fee in Chicksands."" 



The dukes of Norfolk also possessed a small estate in 

 Chicksands, and John de Mowbray, duke of Norfolk, 

 died in 1433 seised of the quarter of a fee in Chick- 

 sands ; "' his son John died in 146 1, and in 1 470 

 Eleanor his widow was assigned the quarter fee in 

 Chicksands as part of her dower."* 



On the estate belonging to Chicksands Priory was 

 a farm called the Dayre House, which was leased out, 

 and at the Dissolution the amount of the rent was 

 _^j_i33 When Thomas Wyndham in 1540 obtained 

 a lease of the house and site of Chicksands Priory, 

 there was included in the lease the rent of the Dayre 

 House, which amounted annually to 100 quarters of 

 malt, 20 quarters of corn, 20 quarters of wheat, and 

 20 of pease, which the farmer used to pay to Chick- 

 sands Priory."* This rent was granted to Richard 

 Snowe at the expiration of the lease, "° and it passed 

 to the Osborns with the manor."^ Sir John Osborn 

 died seised of the house called the Dayre House in 

 1628,"' and there is no further mention of the farm 

 or rent. 



There is a mill mentioned in Domesday on the 

 land which Walter held of Azelina, wife of Ralph 

 Taillebois, it was worth 10/."* This mill came into the 

 possession of Chicksands Priory, which owned it in 

 1535 ; "' it was then mentioned as a water-mill, and was 

 worth, together with a rabbit warren, £^. In 1540 

 the rent of the mill had risen to ^5 61. Sd.,"" and 

 Thomas Wyndham was granted the use of it ; the 

 miller was to grind all Wyndham's corn, when he 

 wanted it, and to ask no fee as he had done before 

 from the priory."' Richard Snowe obtained a grant 

 of the reversion of the mill in the same year,'" and 

 died seised of it in 1553.'" The mill was conveyed 

 by Edward Snowe to Peter Osborn in 1587,'" and 

 was held by the latter's grandson in 1 640 ; '" it is last 



121a Engraved in Fisher's Collections, pi. 

 xxi, -where it is said to be in the cloisters. 

 122 F.C.H. Beds, i, 232. 

 123Fea</. ^/Vs, i, 13. 12^ Ibid, i, 20. 



125 Pat. lo Edw. II, pt. 2, m. 29. 



126 Feet of F. Beds. 8 Ric. I, No. 2. 

 This J hide may perhaps be identical with 

 that mentioned in Domesday as held by 

 William de Caron of Bishop Remigius of 

 Lincoln, of which no further trace can be 

 found. {r.C.H. Beds, i, 227.) 



127 Cal. of Chart. R. 1257-1300, p. 335. 



12a Feud. Aids, i, 103. 



129 Cal. of Pat. 1327-30, p. 337. 



i»° Cal. of Inq. p.m. (Rec. Com.) iii, 

 102. 



181 Ibid, iv, 147. 



"2 Chan. Inq. p.m. i Edw. IV. No. 

 46 ; Cal. of Pat. 1467-77, p. 191. 



133 Dugdale, Mon. vii, 951. 



IS* i. and P. Hen. VUl, xv, 555. 



"5 Pat. 31 Hen. VIII, pt. 7, m. 10. 



275 



"« Chan. Proc. Eliz. S.s. 6, No. 32. 

 187 Chan. Inq. p.m. vol. 451, No, 106. 

 iss V.C.H. Beds, i, 262a. 

 "2 Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.),iv, 195. 

 "0 Dugdale, Mon. vi (2), 951. 

 1" L. and P. Hen. Fill, xv, 555. 

 l« Pat. 31 Hen. VIH, pt. 7, m. 10. 

 "B Chan. Inq. p.m. i & 2 Phil, and 

 Mary, vol. 102, No. 4. 



l« Recov. R. Trin. 29 Eliz. rot. 86. 

 i« Ibid. 16 Chas. I, rot. 65. 



