Known as the ‘Queen of Holderness,’ is one of the most beautiful village churches in England. It was almost entirely built in the Decorated period, and has aisles to its transepts and much beautiful carving.
from the tomb, with an angel on either side swinging a censer, and below the recess are slumbering soldiers.
Patrington village is of fair size, with a wide street; and although lacking any individual houses calling for comment, it is a pleasant place, with the prevailing warm reds of roofs and walls to be found in all the Holderness towns.
On our way to Hedon, where the ‘King of Holderness’ awaits us, we pass Winestead Church, where Andrew Marvell was baptized in 1621, and where we may see the memorials of a fine old family—the Hildyards of Winestead, who came there in the reign of Henry VI. The well-wooded acres surrounding the old Hall of the Hildyards, although the male line died out nearly a century ago, seem still to be haunted with the memory of that redoubtable soldier, Sir Robert Hildyard, also known to history as ‘Robin of Redesdale,’ who, with Sir John Conyers, led the successful Lancastrian rising which resulted in the defeat and capture of the Earl of Pembroke at Edgcote.
Further on we come to Ottringham, where there is a restored stone reading-desk in the church, as at Pocklington. The tower has a spire, and so also has the church at Keyingham adjoining, making, with Patrington, three conspicuous landmarks along the Humber.
The stately tower of Hedon’s church is conspicuous from far away; and when we reach the village we are much impressed by its solemn beauty, and by the atmosphere of vanished greatness clinging to the place that was decayed even in Leland’s days, when Henry VIII. still reigned.
The father of English topography found the town insulated by creeks where ships lay—
‘but now men cum to it by 3 Bridges, where it is evident to se that sum Places wher the Shippes lay be over growen with Flagges and Reades; and the Haven is very sorely decayid. There were 3 Paroche Chirchis in Tyme of Mynde: but now there is but one of S. Augustine: but that is very fair.’
Also we are told that not far from the church garth there were remains of a castle for the defence of the place, and that