Highways and Byways in Lincolnshire

by W. F. Rawnsley

Continuing northwards for two miles we find ourselves at Market Rasen.

CHAPTER XIII
ROADS SOUTH FROM LINCOLN

The Foss Way—The Sleaford Road and Dunston Pillar on “The Heath”—The Ermine Street and the Grantham Road on “The Ridge”—Canwick—Blankney—Digby—Rowston—Brant-Broughton—Temple Bruer and the Knights Templars and Hospitallers—Somerton Castle and King John of France—Navenby—Coleby—Bracebridge.

Besides these three roads going east from Lincoln, there are three great roads which run along “the ridged wold” northwards, and two going south; but these two, as soon as they are clear of Lincoln, branch into a dozen, which, augmented by five lines of railway, all radiating from one centre and all linked by innumerable small roads which cross them, form, on the map, an exact pattern of a gigantic spider’s web. Of this dozen the three trunk roads southwards are the Foss Way to Newark in the flat country, and the Sleaford road over “the heath,” both of which roads avoid all villages (though the Sleaford road passes through Leasingham, described in Chap. [VIII.], about two miles north of Sleaford, and has that curious erection, the Dunston pillar, at the roadside about eight miles out from Lincoln, described in the chapter on Nocton); and thirdly, the Grantham road, on the ridge between the two, which has a village at every mile. Others run, one to Skellingthorpe, one to Doddington with its interesting old Hall, which we will revert to shortly; one all down the Witham valley to Beckingham on the border, going by Basingham with its ninth-century Saxon font, and Norton Disney with its fine Disney tombs and remarkable brass, also to be described later; and one to Brant Broughton.

CANWICK

ROWSTON

A sign-post in Lincoln points to this village, because, though twelve miles distant, there is nothing on the way; indeed you may follow up the valley of the Brant River another six miles to its source near Hough-on-the-Hill, and then go on another six as it curves round into Grantham, and not pass through anything but Marston, and there is nothing to see there but the old seat of the Thorold family, Marston Hall, now a farmhouse. All these are on the low ground to the west. Then on the ridge itself is “the Ermine Street,” and east of the Sleaford highway is a desolate road over “Lincoln Heath” to Scopwick, where a stream, crossed by several single planks, runs right through the village. East of this, another somewhat important road goes across the low and once swampy ground south of Lincoln, where the Witham gets through the gap in the cliff ridge to Canwick. Here the church, which has a rich Norman chancel arch and arcade, and an Early English arcaded reredos in the vestry, once a chantry chapel, rises, without any other footing, from a Roman pavement; here, too, from the grounds of Mr. Waldo Sibthorp’s house, Canwick Hall, where the cliff begins again, you get a most beautiful view of the minster about two miles distant; indeed, those who live near Lincoln and can see the minster may boast of a view which for grandeur has few equals in the land. This walk from Lincoln is a favourite one, and passes a well-planted cemetery of twenty-five acres, part of which was taken from the common, which rejoices in the delightfully bucolic name of “the Cowpaddle.” The road is really the continuation of the Wragby road, and, curving down Lindum road passes into Broadgate, then crossing the Witham and the Sincel dyke and the intersection of the Midland and Great Northern Railways, crosses yet two more lines before it reaches the cemetery. After Canwick the road goes through Branston and passes, near Nocton, Dunston, and Metheringham, to Blankney. The hall here, the home of Mr. Henry Chaplin, than whom no Lincolnshire man is better known or more popular, is now occupied by Lord Londesborough. The church has a curious tomb-slab to John de Glori, with a bearded head looking out of a cusped opening, and a beautiful sculpture by Boehm of Lady Florence Chaplin. This is one of the few churches in which the ringing of the Curfew-bell still obtains. After Blankney the road passes Scopwick and curves round through Digby, Donnington and Rushington to Sleaford. Of these villages Digby is worth seeing, and so is Rowston, lying one mile north of it. At Digby the village cross has been restored, but with a very indifferent top, and at the other end of the village is a curious stone lock-up, like a covered well-head, and hardly capable of holding more than one man at a time. Lingfield in Surrey has a larger one called ‘Ye Village Cage’; it has two steps up inside, and is capable of holding a dozen people. The tower has three stages, Early English, Decorated and Perpendicular. The south door is transition Norman, the north arcade aisle and chancel Early English, the south arcade and aisle Decorated, and the font, screen and clerestory Perpendicular. In this the six tall two-light windows are distributed in pairs. Rowston, which is dedicated to St. Clement, has a spire rising from a tall tower, so little wider than itself that it may safely be said to cover less ground than any tower in England, for it measures only five and a-half feet inside; it is blank except for a rather heavy window in the upper stage. The first thing that strikes you on entering is the extraordinary loud ticking of the clock. It has to be stopped during service, as no one can compete with it. The next thing is that the thirteen windows are all filled with painted glass and of the same type, striking in design, though not of quite first-rate excellence. One window has figures of the three Lincolnshire saints—St. Guthlac, St. Hugh, and St. Gilbert. The church is in very good order, having been recently restored, and some Saxon stones with interlaced work have been built into the outside wall of the chancel. It would have been better to have put these inside. But there is inside a very good head of a churchyard or village cross, and the base and broken shaft of one, possibly the same, is just outside the churchyard. This head is of the usual penthouse form, with a carved figure on either side; it was found quite recently built into a cowshed. In the nave the pillars are all different. The vestry was over the burial chapel of the Foster family; later it was, as was so often the case, used for a school. A beautiful bit of an old carved oak screen separates it now from the north aisle. A heavy timber floor cuts across the top of the tall tower arch, and below a very curious pillar stands against one side of the arch. An Early English priest’s door, with a flat-arched lintel, is in the south wall of the chancel. It is impossible to walk round the slender tower, as a garden wall runs into it on both the north and south sides, leaving part of the tower in a neighbouring garden, the owner of which once claimed half the tower as his property, and considered that he had a right to pierce a door through it for easier access to his pew.

GRANTHAM ROAD

We have now but one road south of Lincoln to describe—for what we have to say about Norton Disney and Nocton can come afterwards; this is the Grantham road, a road curiously full of villages mostly perched on the western edge of the ridge, whilst the Ermine Street running so near it on the east has no villages at all on it, and the Sleaford road over “the Heath,” a little to the east of the Ermine Street, is, as we have said, just as bare. The number of roads in Lincolnshire which have no villages on them is very remarkable, though not hard to explain. We have already, in treating of the roads from Grantham, through the villages of Manthorpe, Belton, Syston, Barkstone, Honington, Carlton Scroop, Normanton, Caythorpe and Fulbeck, brought the account of this road northwards as far as Leadenham. Here the Sleaford and Newark main road crosses it, and Leadenham spire is a fine landmark for all the neighbourhood. It is to be noted that, common as the Danish termination ‘by’ is in all parts of the county, the Saxon ‘ton’ just about here and on the west side generally, is even more frequent.