LOCAL WORKMANSHIP
An avenue of elms, planted by the Rev. T. H. Rawnsley about 1830, starting from the “Church Wongs,”[24] leads past the tower at the west to the Hollow-gate road, close to where a pit was dug by the roadside to get the sandstone for repairing the tower; and to-day, as we pass along to Spilsby, we shall see a wall of sandstone rock exposed on the right of the road, and a lot of blocks cut out and hardening in the air preparatory for use at Little Steeping, and we shall naturally be reminded of the words of Isaiah, “Look unto the rock whence ye are hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence ye are digged.”
We have said that the restoration of Halton Holgate church was carried out by the Rev. T. H. Rawnsley about 1845, and it is remarkable that it was done so extremely well; for at that particular time the art of architectural restoration was almost at its lowest. As far as they went there were no mistakes made by the restorers at Halton, and the carved work for the seats was copied from the best models to be seen in any Lincolnshire church, and executed under the eye of the rector and his son, Drummond Rawnsley, by a Halton carpenter. That is just as it should be, and just as it used to be, but it is not often possible of attainment now.
Jesus College chapel at Cambridge underwent a much needed restoration at the same bad period, i.e., in 1849, and here too, by the genius of the architect, excellent work was done, some good old carving being preserved and very cleverly matched with new work well executed, and by a very curious coincidence, the shape of some of the poppy-heads and the plan of the panel carving is almost identical with that which was executed at Halton, after the Winthorpe pattern.
CHAPTER XXX
SPILSBY AND ITS BYWAYS
Spilsby Market-town—The Churches and Willoughby Chapel—The Franklins—The Talk of the Market—Lincolnshire Stories and Others—Byways—Old Bolingbroke—Harrington Church—The Copledike Tombs—The Hall—Bag-Enderby—Remarkable Font—Somersby—The Churchyard Cross—The Brook—Ashby Puerorum.
SPILSBY CHURCH
Spilsby is the head of a petty-sessional division in the parts of Lindsey. The name is thought by some to be a corruption of Spellows-by, to which the name of Spellows hill in the neighbourhood gives some colour. The old gaol, built in 1825, had a really good classic portico with four fluted columns and massive pediment. Most of the buildings behind this imposing entrance were pulled down after fifty years, and all that it leads to now is the Sessions House and police station. The long market-place is interrupted in one place by a block of shops, and in another by a mean-looking Corn Exchange; but at one end of it still stands an elegant, restored market cross, and at the other a bronze statue by Noble of Sir John Franklin, the most famous of Spilsby’s sons, the discoverer of the “North West Passage.” His hand rests on an anchor, and on the pedestal are the words: “They forged the last link with their lives.” Just beyond the town a fine elm-tree avenue leads to Eresby, the seat whence the Willoughby family take their title. In Domesday Book, 1086, Spilsby and Eresby are said to belong to the Bishop of Durham. His tenant Pinco, or one of his sons, the Fitz Pincos, acquired it; and about 1166 a Pinco heiress married Walter Bec, whose grandson has a sepulchral slab in Halton church, c. 1243. In 1295 a John, the son of Walter, was created Baron Bec of Eresby, the younger brothers being Antony, Bishop of Durham, and Thomas, who was consecrated Bishop of St. David’s at Lincoln in 1280. Lord Bec died in 1302, in which year Sir William of Willoughby (near Alford), who had married his daughter and heiress Alice, obtained a charter for a market at Spilsby every Monday. Their son Robert was the first Baron Willoughby De Eresby, who died in 1316. His son John fought at Crécy 1346, and in 1348 founded the College of the Holy Trinity at Spilsby, and the chantry which, when he and his successors in the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries with their huge altar tombs filled up the chancel of the old church, even blocking up the entire chancel arch with the stone screen of the Bertie monument, became eventually the chancel of the parish church. For the old church consisted of a nave and chancel into which the west door opened direct; it had probably a narrow north aisle, and certainly a large south aisle was added with the Trinity chapel at the east end of it. This aisle and chapel are now the nave and chancel of the church, which was restored in Ancaster stone in 1879, and a new south aisle added, the tower alone remaining of green-sand with lofty hard-stone pinnacles. In this the bells have just been re-hung, in December, 1913. John, second Baron Willoughby (1348), also the third (1372), who fought at Poictiers, and the fourth, with his second wife, Lady Neville, at his side (1380), have huge altar tombs with effigies in armour; he died 1389. A brass commemorates his third wife (1391), and another fine one, said to be Lincolnshire work, the fifth baron and his first wife (1410). Both these ladies being of the family of Lord Zouch. The gap between the fifth and the tenth Lord Willoughby is accounted for thus:—
WILLOUGHBY D’ERESBY