A HISTORY OF HERTFORDSHIRE 



The communion plate consists of cup, paten and 

 Sagon, 1714, and another paten, 1847. 



The registers are in four books : (i) baptisms from 

 1607 to 1668, burials 1607 to 1668, marriages 

 1607 to 1669 ; (ii) baptisms and burials from 1673 

 to 1770, marriages 1673 to 1753 ; (iii) baptisms 

 and burials from 1700 to 181 2, marriages 1700 

 to 17+8; (iv) marriages from 1792 to 18 1 z. It 

 will be seen that book iii is largely a repetition of 

 book ii. A book containing marriages {1754-92} 

 was accidentally burnt in 1792. 



The patronage of the church of 

 JDFOIf'SON St. Mary the Virgin was originally 

 vested in the lord of the manor, the 

 earliest recorded presentation being made by William 

 Basset in I220, 15 Soon after he granted the church 

 to the Prior and convent of Dunstable. 16 On the 

 living falling vacant in 1241, however, William 

 Basset, probably his son, disputed the presentation, 

 but the prior succeeded in securing the living to his 

 own nominee. In 1272 a similar dispute took 

 place between the prior and Peter Basset, who 

 presented his brother John. This ended in a com- 

 position made between them by which Basset quit- 

 claimed all right to the prior. 17 In 13 10 the Prior 

 t of Dunstable received a confirmation of 



the church from Robert Basset, and in the same year 

 obtained licence to appropriate the church, 18 which 

 in 1 310 they alienated in mortmain to the Chapter 

 of Lincoln. 19 To this alienation Robert Basset gave 

 his consent. 20 The advowson of Rushden remained 

 with the Dean and Chapter of Lincoln until 1908," 

 when an exchange was made by which the Dean 

 and Chapter of Lincoln became patrons of South 

 Res ton, co. Lincoln, and the Chancellor of the 

 Duchy of Lancaster became patron of Rushden." 



The living was formally declare] a vicarage in I 336. 

 A terrier of 1709 shows th.U besides the small tithes 

 the vicar had half the tithes of hay and the tithe of 

 wood excepting Shingay Wood, which was tithe free. B 

 In 1815 William Love by his 

 CHJRITIES will gave £180 3 per cent, consols, 

 the dividends thereon to be applied 

 towards providing a master or mistress of the Sunday 

 or any o:her school for the instruction of poor children 

 and for purchasing books and other necessaries for the 

 use of the school. This stock was sold in 1819, and 

 with the proceeds and from part of the residue of the 

 personal estate a sum of £233 61. BJ. consols was 

 purchased. 



The dividends, amounting to /j 16s. 8</., are 

 paid to the mistress of the Sunday school. 



Sandona (x cent.) ; Sanduna (nil c 

 (xiii cot.). 



Sandon is a parish of 4,060 acres 1) ing high on the 

 chalk. The level of the land over the greater part 

 of the parish ranges upwards from some 400 ft. above 

 the ordnance d.itum to 528 ft. in the immediate 

 neighbourhood of the village, from which there is a 

 gradual descent in a north-westerly direction to a level 

 of only 240 ft. The soil is light, containing a 

 considerable quantity of chalk, of which the subsoil 

 is wholly composed. Arable land covers rather 

 more than 3,000 acres, pasture nearly 700 acres, 

 and the extent of woodland, which comprises small 

 plantations at Roe Wood, Tichncy Wood (possibly 

 the 'Tichcnho' Wood of izn) ' and Park Wood, is 

 about 1 1 5 acres. 2 The Cat Ditch, a tributary of the 

 Ivel, flows northwards through the parish. The 

 village itself stands on the high ground at some 

 distance from the main road. It consists of a few 

 farms and cottages grouped irregularly about the 

 church. There are several outlying hamlets. Roe 

 Green, 3 * three-quarters of a mile to the south-west of 

 the village, may be identical with ' the green at le 

 Rothe' mentioned in 13th-century court rolls. 3 

 There is a Congregational chapel at Roe Green 



SANDON 



) ; Saundon d.iting from 1 868, 1 and representing ; 



mty 

 which existed in the parish in the latter half of the 

 1 7th century. 5 In 1 809 the house of Thomas Smith 

 at Roc Green was licensed for worship. 6 The chapel 

 was licensed for marriages in 1877.' The same 

 minister serves the chapel of Red Hill, a hamlet in the 

 extreme south-west of the parish. 8 The first chapel 

 was built her^ in 1720, and in 1805 a new building 

 was erected on ground given by Mr. Fordham. 8 



There are no important roads passing through the 

 parish, but that part of the Icknield Way which forms 

 the high road from Hiichin to Royston separates this 

 parish from that of Ashwcll, where the nearest railway 



The open fields were inclosed in 1842. 10 

 There are moated sites at Daniels Farm and at 

 Hankins, about a mile to the south-west of the 

 church, and a thickly planted moated tumulus on the 

 east side of the village. Traditions are attached to 

 the two latter. That relating to Hankins is that the 

 owner, who has probably been wrongly identified 

 with John Fitz Geoffrey, whose brass, dated 1480,1s 

 in the church, on his arrival from London one night 

 found his home in flames and his wife and children 

 slain by robbers. The other legend, which refers to 



