Records, Historical and Antiquarian, of Parishes Round Horncastle

by J. Conway Walter

The benefice formerly paid a pension to the abbots of Croyland of £1 6s. 8d. At the Reformation the tithes were seized by “the Merry Monarch,” and the patronage of the benefice now belongs to the crown. The late Geo. Walker, Esq., of Offord House, Spilsby, owned an estate in this parish, also Admiral Buckle, who now resides at Gunby Hall. There is a free school here for the poor children of Raithby, Mavis Enderby, Hundleby, and Sausthorpe, founded and endowed by Thomas Lawford, in 1683, and besides his endowment, the teacher has the dividend of £204 1s. 8d. left by Elizabeth Kirkbridge, of Hull, in 1813, and the interest of £100 left by John Dawson, in 1839.

The Church is dedicated to the Holy Trinity. It consists of tower, nave, with south porch, north and south aisles, and chancel. The tower is of 3 tiers, and has 3 bells. The church was thoroughly restored in 1873, the chancel and nave wholly rebuilt, the architect being Mr. G. G. Scott. The porch has a very curious stoup in the western corner, with 3 Norman columns as supports. The north and south aisles have 3 bays, the columns being transitional Norman. In the north wall is a door and two square-headed, perpendicular windows with coloured glass; one of these has for its subjects St. George and St. Andrew, the other, St. David and St. Patrick. There is also a two-light window in the east wall of the north aisle. In the south wall, west of the porch, is a coloured two-light window, the subjects being, above, the Good Shepherd and the Presentation in the Temple, and below, Christ blessing little children, and our Lord’s baptism. Next to the porch, eastward, is a memorial two-light window to John Coleridge Kennard, the subjects being, the Resurrection, and the Ascension. The window at the east end of the south aisle is a two-light one, with coloured glass, by Kemp, the subjects being, Works of Mercy; it was put in in memory of Mrs. Rawnsley, by friends. The font is modern, also the lectern and the rood screen, which is coloured red, gilt, and blue. The east, north, and south windows in the chancel were given by the late Mrs. Rawnsley, who lengthened the chancel to its original dimensions, and gave the screen. The east window has three lights, the subjects being, in the centre, the Crucifixion, in the northern light, Gethsemane, in the southern light, the Saviour’s baptism. The walls of the chancel are painted with various devices. The reredos has three compartments, the centre, showing the Crucifixion; on the right (south), the Saviour and the Magdalen, Noli me tangere; on the left (north), the angel appearing to Mary, Ave Maria. Two other windows have the following subjects:—In one, in the centre, is the Lord in glory, with St. Michael, on the one side, St. Gabriel, on the other, by Milner; in the other, of four lights, put in by members of the Rawnsley family, in memory of their mother, the subjects are, in the lower part, one scene throughout, the birth at Bethlehem; above, the compartments show the Annunciation, with the Presentation and Visitation on either side. The south chancel window of three lights, with coloured glass, has the three subjects, St. Alban, St. Agnes, and St. Catherine. There is a piscina in the south wall of the chancel. The material of the structure is Spilsby green sandstone. The tower is of the Perpendicular period, other parts being a mixture of the Perpendicular, Decorated, and Transitional styles. The church is unusually rich in coloured glass, although all of it modern. The benefice, a rectory, is held by the Rev. George Ward, who lives at Mavis Enderby, of which parish he is also rector. Of the church plate, the chalice is of the date of Cromwell; the paten and former cover of chalice are of the date of Elizabeth. A modern paten has been presented by the Rev. E. Rawnsley. The register dates from 1558. It contains a note by a former rector, stating that a number of pages had been lost in the waste paper basket of his predecessor, but that, from other sources, he had himself supplied the deficiency. Then follows a long series of entries, all in one handwriting, the curious part, however, is that his own death is recorded in the same handwriting. We leave it to the reader to solve this puzzle of a posthumous record. The sandstone, which prevails generally throughout this district, disappears at Raithby, but about half-a-mile north-east of Raithby church, numerous phosphatic nodules are found scattered about the surface. The nodule bed can be traced across the fields to the south-west, and the phosphates lie generally in patches. The hill, south of Raithby, consists of the formation known as Tealby clay, capped with chalky boulder clay, blue clay appearing on its western slope. These clays rest upon a floor of hard calcareous ferruginous rock, full of brown oolitic grains.

Ranby.

Ranby is situated on the old Roman road to Caistor, northward, rather more than 7 miles from Horncastle. The vicar, the Rev. G. S. Lee, resides at Benniworth, rather more than 3 miles distant, of which he is rector. Letters, via Lincoln, arrive at 10.30. Ranby is probably a contraction of Ravenby; as we have near Louth, two parishes, Ravendale, east and west, and the hamlet of Raventhorpe, in the north of the county, in the parish of Appleby, near Brigg. Ravendale is contracted into the patronymic Randell; and so Ravenby becomes Ranby.

Ranby Hall, the seat of the Otter family, who have been located here and at Clayworth, Notts., more than a century, is a handsome residence in well-wooded grounds. One of the family was Bishop of Chichester, and another Archdeacon of Chichester.

In Domesday Book, the manor of Ranby is reckoned among the possessions of Odo, Bishop of Baieux, who was half-brother of William the Conqueror, and Earl of Kent. He became Bishop in 1049, and died at Palermo, on his way to the Holy Land, in 1097. Besides being Earl of Kent, he was Count Palatine and Justiciary of England. His abilities and his influence were so great that writers of the day described him as being, “totius Angliæ, Vice-dominus sub rege.” He was, however, too arrogant, and aspiring to the Papacy, he was about to leave England for Rome, taking with him the wealth he had amassed, when he was apprehended by King William, and sent to prison in Normandy. On the death of the Conqueror, he was liberated by William Rufus, but never acquired his former power, and being concerned in a conspiracy, had to abjure the realm. He held at one time 76 lordships in Lincolnshire, besides many in other counties. Another Norman, Ralph de St. Valery, a town in Picardy, also had a grant of land in Ranby, to the extent of 360 acres with 14 socmen holding 7 oxgangs, and 2 bordars with 240 acres between them. A Saxon thane, Godric, had some 604 acres. The church had a resident priest, owning a mill, worth 10s. 8d. a year, and 270 acres of meadow. At a later date, Ranby was an appanage of Tupholme Abbey. [156a]

The Church, dedicated to St. German, stands on an elevation, and would be a conspicuous object for several miles, but that it is embowered in lofty trees. [156b] It was restored in 1839 at the expense of Miss Alice Otter, who also presented three bells; and it was further improved in 1862, when the tower was incased with new stone, and the chancel re-built. The old chancel arch was at that time removed, and now forms the arch under the tower, the stone having been re-chiselled. The tower is massive, with four pinnacles, having two-light flamboyant windows in each face, and small lancet windows below them, in the west and south sides. In the north wall of the nave, there is one two-light flamboyant window, and in the south wall, two similar ones. A small north transept forms a vestry, in the west wall of which are preserved some small arches from an earlier fabric, and in its north wall is a two-light flamboyant window. In the north chancel wall there is a small one-light window. The east window has three lights with three trefoils above, and in the south chancel wall there is a two-light window with trefoil above. All the chancel windows have coloured glass. The south window is a memorial of Francis Otter, of Clayworth. The subject of the east window is the Ascension. The pillars of the new chancel arch have richly-carved capitals. The sittings are of plain oak. The font is octagonal, with plain shields and other devices on the faces. There is a Walesby tablet on the south wall of the nave, and large Walesby monuments in the churchyard. Weir, in his “History of Lincolnshire,” mentions a large ancient tumulus as being near the church. [157a]

Revesby.

Revesby is situated about 7½ miles from Horncastle, in a south-easterly direction; some 12 miles north-west from Boston, 8 miles south-west from Spilsby, and about 7 miles East, from the nearest railway station at Tattershall. Letters, via Boston, arrive at 7 a.m. The nearest telegraph office is at Mareham-le-Fen. One derivation of the name Revesby is from a Danish word meaning a “fox,” the Danes certainly at one time settled extensively in this neighbourhood, and “by” is a very common Danish termination. (Streatfeild “Lincolnshire and the Danes.”) Another and perhaps more likely derivation is from the “reeve,” or public guardian of the fen, [157b] who might well reside here, to look after the means of communication, roads and channels in the great tract of country southward, which was at one time almost a waste of morass, and subject to frequent inundation from the sea, and in connection with this, it may be mentioned that one of the recognised duties of religious houses, [158a] such as the Abbey of Revesby, was to keep roads and bridges in proper repair, and a portion of the Revesby property, named Stickney Wydale, was granted to the abbey, on condition that the monks kept in proper order the “Northdyke Causeway,” then a main road raised above the floods. [158b] And among the charters and deeds of Revesby, is one (No. 7b), by which William de Romara undertakes to compel the men of Holland to keep in repair a waggon-road from Sibsey. [158c]

The history of Revesby at that period is lost to us. No Saxon chronicles exist, as they do as regards some other places, to tell us of those early days. Yet we can, in a degree, connect Revesby with a great Saxon family, and one which is represented by a leading family in our county in the present day.