A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE 



battled image bracket, and at the south-east a piscina 

 with a shelf and two sedilia of the same date as the 

 windows. The nave is lighted by a single two-light 

 window in the north wall and another in the south, 

 the latter having curious tracery of a flamboyant 

 character. The north door of the nave, of plain 

 fourteenth-century work, is blocked, the south door, of 

 the same character, being now the only entrance to the 

 church. Over it is a niche with a shield beneath bear- 

 ing a bend within an engrailed border. Lysons says that 

 there was a porch over this door, but no traces of it now 

 exist, nor is it shown in Fisher's view, taken 1812.''* 

 The tower, which has a low pyramidal roof with 

 a large wooden cross, is of three stages with an embat- 

 tled parapet and two-light belfry windows, and has a 

 stair turret at the south-east angle and a three-light 

 west window on the ground story. The tower arch 

 has half-octagonal responds and moulded capitals with 

 an arch of two chamfered orders. The roof of the 

 church is in the main original, having moulded king 

 posts on the tie-beams with struts to the collars and 

 pole plate. The pulpit is made up with some fifteenth- 

 century panels, the remains of a seventeenth-century 

 pulpit and sounding-board having been made into cup- 

 boards and a table for the vestry under the tower, 

 i There are a certain number of mediaeval oak benches 

 in the nave with some later imitations, and the south 

 door is ancient and perhaps original. There are traces 

 of the former existence of a west gallery, the south end 

 of which was carried on a fourteenth-century corbel 

 which remains in the wall near the south door. 

 There are several fragments of the original stained 

 glass in the north window of the nave, and the west 

 window of the tower. The altar stands on a thirteenth- 

 centurj' altar slab with a moulded edge, all five crosses 

 being preserved, though the two on the east are more 

 lightly cut than the others. On the south wall of the 

 chancel close to the eastern angle is the inscription 

 plate from the grave of the founder, the inscription 

 running thus :— ' Robert de Bilhemore chivaler qe fist 

 faire ceste eglise de nouvele gist icy dieu de salme eit 

 merci Amen.' Below this inscription was formerly a 

 shield with helm and mantling, the indent of which 

 existed in Fisher's time (18 1 2). On the north wall 



of the chancel is a large marble monument consisting 

 of an altar-tomb with a panelled front carrying a cano- 

 pied recess, on the back of which are inlaid several 

 brasses representing Benjamin Piggot, 1 606, with his 

 three wives, Mary (Astrey), Anne (Wiseman), and 

 Bridget (Needham), with their children. There is 

 a long genealogical inscription, and the arms of Piggot 

 with various alliances are blazoned on the monument. 

 There is a plain octagonal font 





Piggot. 

 ficki sable. 



Argent three 



probably of early fifteenth 

 century date. 



There is one bell by Lester 

 & Pack of London, 1758. 



The church possesses an un- 

 usually interesting chalice with 

 a cup-shaped bowl and slender 

 baluster stem covered with 

 raised and incised ornament. 

 It is English work oi c. 1600, 

 but bears no mark except that 

 of the maker on the bottom of 

 the bowl, a swan between the letters L D. It has a 

 cover paten which matches it and on both is an in- 

 scription in dotted letters of the seventeenth century 

 ' B. C. Nether Gravenhurst. ' 



The oldest register book for the parish runs from 

 1706 to 181 1. 



The church and rectory of Lower 

 /IDVOWSON Gravenhurst were bestowed upon 

 Newnham Priory by Simon de Beau- 

 champ, its founder, in the reign of Henry 11.'^ The 

 church remained in the gift of the priory until the 

 Dissolution, and in 1255 the rectory was worth 3 

 marks." In 1535 Newnham Priory received 10/. 

 from the rectory, while Elstow Abbey had 6s. %d., a por- 

 tion of the tithes.'' The land from which Elstow 

 received its portion became known as the Elstow Tithe, 

 and came into the possession of the Whitbread family, 

 who were holding it in 16 12." The value of the 

 rectory in 1535 amounted to £-j 12/. io<j'.," and at 

 the Dissolution, the right of presentation devolved on 

 the crown, in whom it has been vested up to the 

 present day.*' There are no endowed charities in 

 the parish. 



HAWNES OR HAYNES 



Hagenes (xi cent.) ; Haunes (xiii cent.) ; Haine 

 (xiv cent.) ; Haunce (xv-xvii cents.). 



Haynes is a small village one mile east of the Bed- 

 ford and Luton main road, and stands on high ground 

 on the southern boundary of Haynes Park, most of 

 the houses of the village lying along the road which 

 branches ofFfrom the Bedford Road, and being known as 

 Church End. Other groups of houses are Northwood 

 End and Silver End, in the north-east of the parish, 

 and West End on the Bedford Road, in the south- 

 west. The church is close to the south entrance to 

 the park, with the vicarage near by on the south, 

 between it and the road. The open grass land of 

 the park slopes down from the churchyard to the 

 stream, a tributary of the Flitt, which flows eastward 

 and forms a small lake. 



"* Collections for Beds. pi. xlvii. 

 " Dugdale, Mon. Angl. vi, 373 ; V.C.H, 

 Beds.;, 380;!, 315,11.3. 

 '? Cal. Tap. Letters, i, 3 1 8. 



^^ Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.), iv, 187; 

 ibid, iv, 188. / . / . 



" Blaydes, Beds. N. and Q. iii, 302. 



338 



The area of the parish is 2,606^ acres, of which 

 1.649J are arable land, 1,2774 permanent grass, and 

 72 J woods.' The soil is of clay and sand, and the 

 subsoil is of Lower Greensand formation. The chief 

 crops are wheat, barley, beans, and turnips. The 

 ground is very undulating ; the highest point, 373 ft. 

 above ordnance datum, being found in the south of 

 the parish, while the lowest point, 193-8 ft., is at 

 Appley Corner, on the border of Southill parish. 



Haynes Park is well placed on the northern slope of 

 the valley through which the stream runs, but the 

 house IS in itself of little architectural interest, having 

 been much modernized. It is at present occupied by 

 Mr W. B. Greenfield. The collection of portraits 

 of Grenvilles, Carterets, and Thynnes, is a notable 

 one ; among others are Sir Richard GrenviUe, dated 



<» Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.), iv, 214.. 

 « Inst. Bk.. P.R.O. 

 ' Inf. from Bd. of Agric. (1905). The 

 details include land in other parishes. 



