A return visit to Tickford Abbey in search of the Comberford family’s lost links with Newport Pagnell

Tickford Abbey was built with the ruins of Tickford Priory … a reminder of Comberford family links with Newport Pagnell and Tickford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

Since moving to Stony Stratford over three years ago, I have been fascinated to find how the Comberford family had so many links with these parts of north Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire in the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries.

These links have included a share in the Manor of Watford, and a manor and properties in the neighbouring villages of Stoke Bruerne, as well as some high-profile engagement with Church life in this area.

As a judge and the Bishop of Lincoln’s commissary, John Comberford held the courts of the Archdeacon of Buckingham, probably from 1497 until at least 1507, and he died in 1508. At the time, the Bishop of Lincoln was William Smith, previously Bishop of Lichfield, where he had re-founded Saint John’s Hospital in Lichfield.

The connections between Smith and the Comberford family were far-reaching, for in 1507 John Comberford, as patron, presented the bishop’s nephew, also William Smith, as Rector of Yelvertoft. Later, John Comberford’s grandson, Canon Henry Comberford (1499-1586), Precentor of Lichfield Cathedral, was appointed Rector of Yelvertoft by his brother Humphrey Comberford in 1546.

John Comberford had acquired extensive interests in Northamptonshire and Buckinghamshire through his marriage to his father’s ward, Johanna or Joan Parles, the only daughter and heir of John Parles of Watford Manor and of Shutlanger Manor, near Stoke Bruerne, five miles south of Northampton.

Quite separately, John Comberford’s father, Judge William Comberford, had bought properties in Newport Pagnell and Tickford in 1470-1471. I was reminded of these connections on a recent afternoon when I was in Newport Pagnell and Tickford. When I first visited Tickford three years ago, it was a dull and dreary afternoon. So, I decided to revisit Tickford Abbey last Friday and to recall once again the Comberford family links with Newport Pagnell that go back almost six centuries, to 1442 or earlier.

A sign for Newport Pagnell close to Tickford Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Newport Pagnell is one of the towns in north Buckinghamshire that have been absorbed into Milton Keynes. Newport Pagnell is separated from the rest of Milton Keynes by the M1, and the Newport Pagnell Services was Britain’s second motorway service station.

Newport Pagnell is first mentioned in the Domesday Book in 1086 as ‘Neuport,’ an Anglo-Saxon name meaning the ‘New Market Town.’ The suffix ‘Pagnell’ was added later when the manor passed into the hands of the Pagnell or Paynel family.

This was the principal town of the ‘Three Hundreds of Newport,’ and at one time Newport Pagnell was one of the largest towns in Buckinghamshire, with the assizes of the county held there occasionally.

William Comberford (ca 1403/1410-1472), along with Humphry Starky and Thomas Stokley, was granted lands and other properties in Newport Pagnell and Tykford (Tickford), Buckinghamshire, by Geoffrey Seyntgerman (St Germain), in 1471-1472. By then, William Comberford was in his 60s, but already he had substantial property and political interests in the area.

From 1442 or earlier, William was a key political ally of Henry Stafford (1402-1460), Earl of Stafford and later 1st Duke of Buckingham. Stafford was the key political figure in Buckinghamshire at the time, and they shared a political ally in John Talbot, 2nd Earl of Shrewsbury.

William was an important landowner in south Staffordshire in the mid-15th century, with land in Comberford, Wigginton and Tamworth, and he was also a trustee of the manors of Whichnor, Sirescote and other estates. He built Comberford Hall, a new house at Comberford, between Tamworth and Lichfield, in 1439. He may also have been one of the early members of the Comberford family to own the Moat House on Lichfield Street, Tamworth.

Three years after he built Comberford Hall, William Comberford became one of the two MPs for Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, on 27 March 1442, on the nomination of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. He was a judge and one of the Duke of Buckingham’s retainers, and h e remained an MP until 3 March 1447.

William was first appointed to the Staffordshire bench in 1442, and was a Justice of the Peace (JP) until 1471. He became an attorney for the Duchy of Lancaster in the Court of Common Pleas in 1446. Soon afterwards, through the patronage of the Duke of Buckinghamm he became the second protonotary or chief clerk in the Court of Common Pleas.

The Duke of Buckingham was killed at the Battle of Northampton on 10 July 1460. Nevertheless, Comberford continued to play an important role in the political, civil and judicial life of Staffordshire. In addition, as ‘Will’s Combford,’ he was admitted to membership of the Guild of Saint Mary and Saint John in Lichfield in 1469, along with Ralph FitzHerbert, father-in-law of William’s grandson, Thomas Comberford.

From 1452, William Comberford’s ward was Joan Parles, the daughter of John Parles (1419-1452) of Watford and of Shutlanger, near Stoke Bruerne, five miles south of Northampton and about 13 miles north-west of Newport Pagnell, Stony Stratford and Milton Keynes.

Roses seen on Tickford Street, Priory Street and Priory Close … John Comberford bought out the lands, tenements and rents in Newport Pagnell and Tickford in 1487 (Photographa: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Joan Parles came of age in 1461 and she later married William’s son and heir, John Comberford (ca 1440-1508). The marriage was so important for the Comberford family, both politically and financially, that the Parles coat-of-arms, with its cross and five red roses, was quartered with the Comberford arms, and sometimes even substituted for the arms of the Comberford family.

Meanwhile, Henry Stafford (1455-1483), 2nd Duke of Buckingham, and Richard Plantagenet, Duke of Gloucester and later King Richard III, met the uncrowned 12-year-old ‘Boy King’, Edward V, at the Rose and Crown Inn in Stony Stratford on the night of 29 April 1483.

From Stony Stratford, the young King Edward was taken by the two dukes to the Tower of London, and it is there, it is believed, he and his younger brother, ten-year-old Prince Richard, Duke of York, were murdered. Their disappearance has given rise to many of the stories and legends about the ‘Princes in the Tower.’

In 1487, John Comberford bought out Thomas Stokley’s interest in the lands, tenements and rents in Newport Pagnell and Tickford that had been acquired by Stokley and John Comberford’s father in 1470-1471. In 1504, after his wife had died, John Comberford, along with his son Thomas and daughter-in-law Dorothy (Beaumont), sold the former Parles estates in Stoke Bruerne, Shutlanger, Alderton (about 10 miles north of Milton Keynes), and Wappenham to Richard Empson of Easton Neston. The estate then consisted of eight messuages, six tofts, one mill, 200 acres of land, 24 acres of meadow, 100 acres of pasture, 40 acres of wood and 14 shillings rent.

John Comberford died in 1508, but the Comberford family’s interest in lands in the Watford area continued for some decades later, as told by Murray Johnson in his book, Give a Manor, Take a Manor: the rise and decline of a medieval manor.

The Priory of Tickford owned some property in Aston, outside Birmingham that seems to have constituted a rectorial manor. It seems more than coincidental that at the same time John Comberford’s sister Margaret was married to William Holte (ca 1430-post 1498) of Aston Hall. The tomb of their son, William Holte (ca 1460-1514), in Saint Peter and Saint Paul Church, Aston, displays one of the earliest known heraldic depictions of the Comberford use of the Parles family’s arms, with its cross and five roses, as their own coat of arms.

After the suppression of the priory in 1525, its possessions were said to have included ‘the manor of Tickford in the parish of Aston’, and this manor in Asston was granted to Christ Church, Oxford, in 1532. The estate included the advowson of the vicarage and a pension of 40 shillings from Aston church. The rectorial estate seems to have passed into the possession of the Holte family between 1535 and 1552, and was united with the manor of Aston.

Humphrey Comberford (1496 -1555) of Comberford owned significant estates, including Watford Manor. He left most of his manors to Thomas Comberford (1530-1597), and he specified in his will that his Manor in Watford was to be held by his second son, Humphrey Comberford, from the elder son, Thomas, at an annual rent of one red rose for 60 years. In the event, Humphrey had died unmarried in 1545, before his father’s death. Thomas Comberford the probably sold the manor and lands of Watford shortly after 1555.

Looking from Tickford Abbey across Castle Meadow towards Saint Peter and Saint Paul Church in Newport Pagness (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The name of Tykford or Tickford, which was part of the Comberford property interests in the Newport Pagnell area in the 15th century, is found in Tickford Priory, a mediaeval monastic house in Newport Pagnell.

Tickford Priory was established in 1140 by Fulconius Paganel, the lord of the Manor of Newport Pagnell. The priory belonged to the Cluniac Order, with their French headquarters at Marmoutier Abbey in Tours.

Cardinal Wolsey annexed ‘the superfluous house of Tickford’ and its wealth to Christ Church College, Oxford, in 1524. Later, King James I sold the abbey to his physician, Dr Henry Atkins, in 1621.

Some of the former buildings of Tickford Priory were still standing in the early 18th century, but they were in poor condition. Tickford Abbey was built on the site of the prory ca 1757 for John Hooton, a lace merchant, and much of its fabric is believed to have come from Tickford Priory. It is said members of the Hooton family are buried in a a private vault with the grounds of Tickford Abbey.

The house was altered and added to in the early-mid 19th century and again in 1881-1889 by the Stony Stratford rchitect Edward Swinfen Harris for Philip Butler, JP. Futher internal alterations were made in the late 20th for its use as residential home. Tickford Abbey is now a residential and dementia care home and a Grade II listed building.

Tickford Bridge, built in 1810, is one of the last 21 cast iron bridges in Britain that continue to carry modern road traffic, and is the oldest bridge in Milton Keynes (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

As I walked through the grounds of Tickford Abbey that late sunny afternoon, I found myself on Castle Meadow, looking across the River Great Ouse and the Ouzel or Lovat River towards the tower and pinnacles of the parish church, Saint Peter and Saint Paul.

Despite the name of Castle Meadow, historians today debate whether there the evidence for a castle at Newport Pagnell is meagre. Although there are references to Castle Meadow dating back to the 12th century, there is no specific documentary reference to a castle, and there was no castle in Tickford or Newport Pagnell by 1272.

The main house, with whatever remains of Tickford Priory, it is the nearest I can find to any remains of the Comberford properties in late mediaeval Newport Pagnell and Tickford. My great-grandfather, James Comerford (1817-1902), continued to use the Comberford coat-of-arms quartered with the arms of the Parles family on his bookplate.

From Tickford Abbey, I returned along Priory Street to Tickford Street, close to the home of Aston Martin and by the Bull Inn, and continued my afternoon stroll along to Tickford Bridge. It was built over the River Ouzel in 1810, is one of the last 21 cast iron bridges in Britain that continue to carry modern road traffic, and it is the oldest bridge in Milton Keynes. A plaque near the bridge recalls its history and construction, and it is Grade I listed by Historic England.

From there, I continued to walk on into the centre of Newport Pagnell, where I wanted to photograph another building by Edward Swinfen Harris and where we had dinner in Apollonia, the Greek restaurant on High Street.

My great-grandfather James Comerford (1817-1902) continued to use the Comberford coat-of-arms quartered with the arms of the Parles family on his bookplate (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Towcester has Roman origins and it claims to be the oldest town in Northamptonshire

Towcester in Northamptonshire, like many towns along Watling Street, has Roman origins (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

Many people know Towcester in Northamptonshire because it is close to Silverstone or because of the racecourse. Towcester is only 14 km from Stony Stratford, further north along the A5, but – despite an hourly bus link – I only visited the market town for the first time earlier this week.

Like many towns along the route of Watling Street, Towcester too has Roman origins: think of St Albans (Verulamium) in Hertfordshire, Fenny Stratford (Magiovinium) in Buckinghamshire, Mancetter (Manduessedum) near Atherstone, or Wall (Letocetum) outside Lichfield.

Towcester is a growing market town with a population of 11,500 that is growing to 20,000 with new housing. It claims to be the oldest town in Northamptonshire and one of the oldest continuously inhabited settlements in England.

As a former coaching town along Watling Street, Towcester has many similarities with Stony Stratford. But I was interested too in seeing the remains of the motte and bailey or ancient castle known as Bury Mount, visiting Saint Lawrence’s Church, which has Norman, Saxon and possibly even Roman roots, and learning a little more about the town’s associations with Charles Dickens.

Bury Mount is the site of the motte-and-bailey castle built by the Normans (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Towcester was the Roman garrison town of Lactodurum on Watling Street, and it was enclosed by a wall and a ditch. The name Towcester indicates the town’s Roman origins, referring to a Roman camp or settlement by the River Tove.

Saint Lawrence’s Church is said to stand on the site of a large Roman civic building, possibly a temple, and there was a bath house in the area too. There are two possible sites for the Battle of Watling Street, fought in 61 CE, close to the town: Church Stowe 7 km (4.3 miles) to the north, and Paulerspury, 4.8 km (3 miles) to the south.

When the Romans left in the fifth century, the area was settled by Saxons. In the ninth century, Watling Street became the frontier between the kingdom of Wessex and the Danelaw, and Towcester became a frontier town. Edward the Elder fortified Towcester in 917.

The Normans built a motte-and-bailey castle on the site in the 11th century. Bury Mount is the remains of the fortification and was renovated in 2008.

The Saracen’s Head, the best-known coaching inn in Towcester, was known to Charles Dickens as the Pomfret Arms (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Sir Richard Empson (1450-1510), who owned the Manors of Towcester and Easton Neston, was a powerful political figure in Tudor Northamptonshire. He was MP for Northamptonshire, Speaker of the House of Commons, High Steward of Cambridge University and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

After John Comberford’s wife Joan Parles had died, John, his son Thomas Comberford and his daughter-in-law Dorothy (Beaumont), sold the former Parles and Comberford family estates near Towcester, including Stoke Bruerne, Shutlanger, Alderton and Wappenham, totalling about 400 acres, to Sir Richard Empson in 1504.

Empson and Edmund Dudley made Henry VII very rich when they raised taxes using extortion, harassment, and other dubious though legal means. When Henry VIII became king, he had the two arrested; they were tried in Northampton for treason in 1509 and were beheaded on Tower Hill on 17 August 1510.

Empson’s estates were later bought by Richard Fermor, and they remained with the Fermor family – later the Fermor-Hesketh family and Earls of Pomfret – until 2005. William Fermor, who inherited the estates, married Jane, a cousin of Sir Christopher Wren, in 1671, and rebuilt Easton Neston to designs by Wren’s assistant Nicholas Hawksmoor. Work started in the 1690s, and the work was completed in the late 1720s.

Meanwhile, the Monastery, once the manor house of the Comberford estate in Shutlanger, outside Towcester, had become a farmhouse on the Fermor estate. It was included in an exchange between the trustees of the 5th Earl of Pomfret and the 5th Duke of Grafton at the time of inclosure in 1844.

Figures of Venus (left) and Apollo (right) on the façade of the Saracen’s Head in Towcester, said to have come from Easton Neston (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

When the stagecoach and the mail coach were in their heyday in the 18th and early 19th centuries, Watling Street became a major coaching road between London and Holyhead and the main route to Ireland, and Towcester flourished as a major stopping point. Many coaching inns were established in Towcester, and they provided stabling facilities for travellers. The coaching inns that remain include the Saracen’s Head, alongside older pubs in Towcester such as the Brave Old Oak and the Plough.

Charles Dickens refers to Towcester in The Pickwick Papers (1837). The Saracen’s Head, which was renamed the Pomfret Arms in the 1830s, dates from the18th century but has older origins. The central carriage arch typifies these coaching inns. The round-arched window above the arch is flanked by niches holding fine lead statuettes of Venus (left) and Apollo with a harp (right). They are said to have come from Easton Neston.

Sam Weller in The Pickwick Papers recommends it as a place where a ‘very good little dinner’ could be got ready in half an hour. It returned to the name of the Saracen’s Head in 1944.

A year after Dickens published The Pickwick Papers, the coaching trade came to an abrupt halt in 1838 when the London and Birmingham Railway was opened. It by-passed Towcester and passed through Blisworth, which is four miles away but near enough to result in Towcester quickly returning to being a quiet market town.

The Town Hall was designed by the Towcester-born architect Thomas Heygate Vernon (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Town Hall and Corn Exchange was designed by the Towcester-born architect Thomas Heygate Vernon (1837-1888) and built in 1865. Leading figures in Towcester formed a company, issued shares and raised the capital to build the town hall, and its Italianate frontage is a reminder of their confidence and enterprise.

Towcester was linked to the national rail network in 1866 with the first of several rail routes. In time, Towcester had rail links with Blisworth (1866), Banbury (1872), Stratford-upon-Avon (1873) and Olney and Bedford (1892). But these links closed one-by-one, and goods traffic finally closed in 1964 with the Beeching cuts.

The nearest station today is in Northampton, 16 km (10 miles) away, and the site of the old railway station is now a Tesco supermarket.

The Chain Gate was built by the Fermor family in 1824 as part of the Easton Neston estate (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Towcester Racecourse on the east side of the town is a venue for both horse races and greyhound racing. It was originally part of the Easton Neston estate. The Chain Gate, today the main entrance to the racecourse, was built in 1824 and was designed in the classical style as the entrance to Easton Neston House and Park. The Roman archway which is supported by Corinthian columns and flanked with colonnades and gatehouses.

When the Empress Elizabeth of Austria (‘Sisi’), who built the the Achilleion Palace in Corfu in 1888-1891, visited England in 1876, she rented Easton Neston House, with its fine stabling for her horses. During that visit she established a race meeting of her own, when a course was laid out in Easton Neston Park and a stand erected for guests. It was the first horse race at Towcester.

After Sisi left Towcester, a meeting at the Pomfret Arms decided to repeat the steeplechase meeting and Sir Thomas Fermor-Hesketh gave a 51-year lease to hold Easter Monday races at Easton Neston Park.

Three years later, while she was hunting in Co Kildare in 1879, Sisi strayed on her horse into the grounds of Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth. There she encountered the Acting President of Maynooth, William Walsh, a future Archbishop of Dublin. On her return to Ireland a year later, Sisi presented the college with a statue of Saint George and she later donated a set of vestments of gold cloth, decorated with gold and green shamrocks and the coats of arms of Austria, Hungary and Bavaria. While she was visiting Geneva, Sisi was assassinated at the Beau Rivage Hotel on 10 September 1898 by an Italian anarchist Luigi Luccheni. She was 61.

The Easton Neston estate was sold by the Hesketh family in 2005 to the Russian oligarch Leon Max, who was born Leonid Maksovich Rodovinsky.

Towcester is bypassed by the A43, but traffic on the A5 still passes through the town centre (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Although Towcester is now by-passed by the A43, traffic along the A5 still passes directly through the town centre. Towcester is twinned with Zhydachiv in the Lviv region in west Ukraine.

Towcester has sent five ambulance, filled with medical supplies and other aid, to Ukraine, and I heard this week about how the town is sending a sixth ambulance to charity workers in Lviv. The ambulances are filled with essential items, including warm clothing, blankets and disability aids.

The initiative is led by Saint Lawrence Church in Towcester and the Tove Benefice, which have been working to acquire and fill ambulances with supplies for Ukrainian paramedics. The Tove Benefice and the local Rotary Club continue to work to raise money through various events, including a Vicarage Fete and Open Gardens, selling ribbons and sunflowers, a concert and hosting families.

In Saint Lawrence’s Church on Monday, I saw yet another ambulance being filled with medical equipment. The ambulance is due to leave Towcester next Sunday (23 March), when Steve Challen from the Tove Benefice and Alex Donaldson begin a 1,350-mile drive to Lviv.

But more about Saint Lawrence’s Church in Towcester on another day, hopefully.

Signs of hope for Ukraine … Bansky-style street art in Whitton’s Lane in Towcester (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Daily prayer in Christmas 2024-2025: 38, Friday 31 January 2025

‘The earth produces of itself’ (Mark 4: 28) … fields at Shutlanger Road in Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire (Photographs: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

This is the last week in the 40-day season of Christmas, which continues until Candlemas or the Feast of the Presentation on Sunday (2 February 2025). This week began with the Third Sunday of Epiphany (Epiphany III, 26 January 2025).

The calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship remembers John Bosco (1888), priest and founder of the Salesian teaching order. I hope to find somewhere appropriate this evening to watch the opening match of the Six Nations between France and Wales. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:

1, today’s Gospel reading;

2, a short reflection;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;

4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.

‘The seed would sprout and grow’ (Mark 4: 27) … a mulberry tree in Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Mark 4: 26-34 (NRSVA):

26 He also said, ‘The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, 27 and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. 28 The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. 29 But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.’
30 He also said, ‘With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? 31 It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; 32 yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.’

Willow trees by the Monastery Lakes in Shutlanger, Northamptonshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Today’s Reflection:

Chapter 4 in Saint Mark’s Gospel is the ‘parables chapter,’ recalling parables that make this chapter the central teaching section of this Gospel. Christ is in a boat beside the sea teaching a very large crowd who are listening on the shore (see Mark 4: 1-2). In this morning’s reading (Mark 4: 26-34), Christ describe the ‘kingdom of God’ by explaining the parable of sower scattering seed on the ground, which we read earlier this week, in the hope and expectation of the harvest (verses 26-29) and of the mustard seed that grows into a great tree (verses 30-32).

We may ask why Christ decides to talk about a mustard seed, or in Saint Luke’s Gospel about a mustard seed and a mulberry tree (Luke 17: 5-6), rather than, say, an olive tree. After all, as he was talking in the incident in today’s Gospel reading, he must have been surrounded by grove after grove of olive trees.

But, I can imagine, he is also watching to see if those who are listening have switched off their humour mode, if they have withdrawn their sense of humour. He is talking here with a great sense of humour, using hyperbole to underline his point.

We all know a tiny grain of mustard is incapable of growing to a big tree. So, what is Christ talking about here? Because, he not only caught the disciples off-guard with his hyperbole and sense of humour … he even wrong-footed some of the Reformers and many Bible translators who make mistakes about what sort of trees he is talking about in the Gospels.

Why did Christ refer to a mustard seed and a mulberry or sycamine tree, and not, say, an olive tree or an oak tree?

Christ first uses the example of a tiny, miniscule kernel or seed (κόκκος, kokkos), from which the small mustard plant (σίναπι, sinapi) grows. But mustard is an herb, not a tree. Not much of a miracle, you might say: tiny seed, tiny plant.

In Saint Luke’s Gospel, he then mixes his metaphors and refers to another plant. Martin Luther, in his translation of the Bible, turned the tree into a mulberry tree. The mulberry tree – both the black mulberry and the white mulberry – is from the same family as the fig tree.

As children, some of us sang or played to the nursery rhyme or song, Here we go round the mulberry bush. Another version is Here we go gathering nuts in May. The same tune is used for the American rhyme Pop goes the weasel and for the Epiphany carol, I saw three ships.

Of course, mulberries do not grow on bushes, and they do not grow nuts that are gathered in May. Nor is the mulberry a very tall tree – it grows from tiny seeds but only reaches the height of an adult person.

It is not a very big tree at all. It is more like a bush than a tree – and it is easy to uproot too.

However, the tree Christ names in Saint Luke’s Gospel (Greek συκάμινος, sikámeenos) is the sycamine tree, which has the shape and leaves of a mulberry tree but fruit that tastes like the fig, or the sycamore fig (συκόμορος, Ficus Sycomorus).

Others think the tree being referred to there is the sycamore fig (συκόμορος, Ficus Sycomorus), the big tree that little Zacchaeus climbs in Jericho to see Jesus (Luke 19: 1-10).

The sycamine tree is not naturally pollinated. The pollination process is initiated only when a wasp sticks its stinger right into the heart of the fruit. In other words, the tree and its fruit have to be stung in order to reproduce. There is a direct connection between suffering and growth, but also a lesson that everything in creation, including the wasp, has its place in the intricate balance of nature.

Whether it is a small seed like the mustard seed, a small, seemingly useless and annoying creature like the wasp, or a small and despised figure of fun like Zacchaeus, each has value in God’s eyes, and each has a role in the great harvest of gathering in for God’s Kingdom.

Put more simply, it is quality and not quantity that matters when it comes faith and love.

The Sower and the Seed … an image in the East Window by Mayer & Co in Saint Michael’s Church, Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Friday 31 January 2025):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘A Reflection on 2 Timothy’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a Programme Update by the Revd Canon Dr Nicky Chater, Chair of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller Friendly Churches and Chaplain for these communities in the Diocese of Durham.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (Friday 31 January 2025) invites us to pray:

Holy God, we pray for people who cannot make use of many good things a society can offer because of our systems. We think of people who cannot prove their identity, or understand the necessary language, or fill in forms.

The Collect:

Almighty God,
whose Son revealed in signs and miracles
the wonder of your saving presence:
renew your people with your heavenly grace,
and in all our weakness
sustain us by your mighty power;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

Almighty Father,
whose Son our Saviour Jesus Christ is the light of the world:
may your people,
illumined by your word and sacraments,
shine with the radiance of his glory,
that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed
to the ends of the earth;
for he is alive and reigns, now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

God of all mercy,
your Son proclaimed good news to the poor,
release to the captives,
and freedom to the oppressed:
anoint us with your Holy Spirit
and set all your people free
to praise you in Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

‘World’s Smallest Seed,’ 40”x30” oil/canvas, by James B Janknegt

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Visiting two former Methodist chapels in Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger in Northamptonshire

The former Methodist Chapel on Chapel Lane in Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire, close to the Canal Museum (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

During my walks through the villages of Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger and through the Northamptonshire countryside last week and the week before, I also visited the former Wesleyan Methodist in both Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger.

A Wesleyan Methodist chapel was built at Shutlanger in 1844 and a chapel was built in Stoke Bruerne two years later in 1846. Both chapels were registered in 1854.

The chapel in Shutlanger had seating for 130 people in 1873, but the chapel in Stoke Bruerne could only accommodate 80 people.

The smaller chapel in Stoke Bruerne was replaced in 1879 by a new chapel, built at a cost of £250 on land given by George Savage, whose nearby brickyard supplied the bricks. It was built by local labour, mainly by men who worked on the land during the daytime.

The foundation stone for the chapel in Chapel Lane was laid on 13 August 1879, and it opened for worship on New Year's Day 1880. The new chapel in Stoke Bruerne which could hold 150 people. The façade displays the date 1879 carved in stone, although any other words that might have been around it have been obscured. The earlier chapel, built in 1846, was later used as a schoolroom.

The trustees of the Stoke Bruerne chapel in 1922 were drawn from Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger, and from neighbouring communities, including Blakesley, Greens Norton, Bradden, Hartwell, Silverstone, Alderton, Caldecote and Towcester.

Major repairs were carried out on the chapel and the schoolrooms in 1947-1952, including the installation of electricity. However, it was agreed in 1961 to sell the schoolroom and use the proceeds to improve the chapel.

The Methodist Chapel in Stoke Bruerne opened for worship in 1880 and closed in 1975 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The closure of the chapel in Stoke Bruerne and the transfer of members to Roade or Shutlanger was first suggested by the circuit quarterly meeting in May 1974. This was opposed by people who wished to keep a free church presence in what was an expanding village. But the decision to sell the building was carried by a majority of one, with two abstentions, at a meeting of seven trustees in November 1974.

The chapel closed as a place of worship in 1975 and was sold for £4,550 early in 1976. By then, the remaining members had moved to Shutlanger.

The former chapel was converted to a Farm Museum, displaying old farm equipment and live demonstrations of its uses. The Farm Museum was closed in 1993 and was converted into tea rooms and a café, expanding later into the fully licensed restaurant.

It is now called ‘The Old Chapel’ and offers boutique bed and breakfast accommodation. The property has been restored by the owners Elaine and Nadia Pieris and offers three individual suites. It boasts a garden and is next to the Canal Museum, and the Grand Union Canal provides a backdrop for exploring the local countryside and the local pubs and restaurants.

‘The Old Chapel’ in Stoke Bruerne offers boutique bed and breakfast accommodation (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The chapel in Shutlanger was enlarged in 1889, with seating for 160 people.

The trustees of the Shutlanger chapel in 1917 included trustees were from Shutlanger and Stoke Bruerne, as well trustees from Ashton, Roade, Silverstone, Towcester, Wood Burcote and Greens Norton.

The congregation moved for a time in 1922 to the school-chapel belonging to the Church of England while the chapel was closed for major repairs, costing nearly £100.

Further work on the chapel ceiling began in 1933 and was completed five years later. By 1938, all the trustees were from Shutlanger and none from neighbouring communities.

The roof continued to cause problems and in 1948 the congregation agreed to take down the 1889 extension, then used as a schoolroom, and to restore the chapel to its original size and shape. The interior was redecorated and electricity was installed. During these works, the congregation once again worshipped in the Anglican church room. The chapel reopened in June 1949, with seating for 100 people.

The chapel in Shutlanger continued in use over the following 30 years. It was joined by members of the former Stoke Bruerne chapel when it closed in 1975. A decade later, however, Shutlanger also closed. The carved communion table was presented to the Methodist Church in Roade.

The former Methodist chapel in Shutlanger was later used as a book repository, and is now a private house.

The former Wesleyan Methodist chapel in Shutlanger (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

A ‘Victorian Whimsy’ in the churchyard in Stoke Bruerne is a clue to curious tales

The gates at Saint Mary’s Churchyard in Stoke Bruerne with the enigmatic Vernon inscrtion from 1893 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

I was back in Shutlanger and Stoke Bruerne earlier this week, exploring the links of the Parles and Comberford families with the area in the 15th and 16th centuries. I was photographing the house they once owned that is known as the Monastery.

I spent much of Tuesday walking around this part of rural Northamptonshire, traipsing through the villages and small towns of Blisworth, Shutlanger, Stoke Bruerne and Roade, enjoying the fields and trees and the pathways along the banks of the Grand Union Canal as summer colours started to autumn.

From Shutlanger, I walked onto Stoke Bruerne, but was disappointed once again that Saint Mary’s Church was not open as I hoped to see inside the church building.

Out in the churchyard, however, I was curious about the unusual Victorian gate piers at the entrance to the churchyard from Wenworth Way, with a puzzling inscription that reads:

A 1893 D
PN ── GE
WN ── DE
CK ── ME
SE ── PD
GSTQ
TOOG

At first, the inscription appears indecipherable, and it has been described as ‘a Victorian Whimsy’ by a well-known local historian, the late George Freeston of Blisworth, and by the late John Grace of Stoke Park, who wrote about it in Grass Magazine in 2018.

Grass Magazine is the newsletter for the Grand Union Benefice or parochial union of Blisworth, Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger, with Grafton Regis, Alderton, and Milton Malsor. A transcription of John Grace’s short explanation is available on the noticeboard in the church porch in Stoke Bruerne.

John Grace relies on George Freeston’s interpretation of what they describe as a ‘Victorian whimsy’ in Stoke Bruerne churchyard. Grace and Freeston recall that the owner of Stoke Park, Wentworth Vernon, walked on Sundays to church in Stoke Bruerne on Sundays from Stoke Park along a well-maintained footpath.

On his way, he entered the churchyard through the gateway that now leads from Wentworth Way. The gate is flanked by two stone pillars, one of which bears this inscription. Freeston, who described this as a ‘Victorian whimsy’, offers this interpretation of the inscription:

Anno Domini 1893
ParsoN ── GavE
(permission for)
WardeN ── DravE
(carried the materials by horse and cart)
ClerK ── MadE
SquirE ── PaiD
God Save The Queen
To Our One God

The whimsical inscription at the gates in Saint Mary’s Churchyard in Stoke Bruerne dates from 1893 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

FWT Vernon Wentworth, who was the Squire of Stoke Park in the 1870s and 1880s, gave his name to Wentworth Way. He was one of the benefactors of Stoke Bruerne and gave the Village Hall to the villagers as the Reading Room in 1878. When he died in 1885, the Stoke and Hartwell estates passed for life to his kinsman, William Frederick Vernon of Harefield Park, Middlesex.

A year later, the mansion at Stoke Park was largely destroyed by fire in 1886. At the time Stoke Park was let for the hunting season each year to Valentine Lawless (1840-1928), 4th Baron Cloncurry, an Irish peer who also had large estates in Blackrock, Co Dublin, Lyons Castle, Co Kildare, and Abington, Co Limerick.

After the fire, Vernon announced he did not intend to rebuild the house but that he would offer the estate for sale to Lord Cloncurry. In the event, however, Stoke Park was not sold and when WF Vernon died in 1889, the estate passed to Vernon’s brother, George Augustus Vernon.

Then in 1889, GA Vernon assigned his life interest in Stoke Park to his eldest surviving son, Bertie Wentworth Vernon, who later succeeded to the Harefield estate in 1896.

Bertie Wh Vernon and his wife Isabella made Stoke Park their principal home until both died in 1916. They played the role of a resident squire and his lady in a village that had previously generally lacked such figures. He appears to be the squire responsible for the gate in the churchyard with its whimsical inscription.

During the Vernons’ later years, however, the estate became increasingly encumbered with mortgages. This may explain why their generosity to the parish declined and why they sold off their Hartwell estate sold in 1912.

What remained of the estate was inherited in 1916 by BW Vernon’s nephew, Henry Albermarle Vernon. He took up residence at Stoke Park, Vernon cleared the mortgages accumulated by his uncle, and then in 1928 sold Stoke Park to Captain Edward Brabazon Meade, a younger son of an Irish aristocrat, the 4th Earl of Clanwilliam. The contents of Stoke Park were sold separately later that year.

Meade borrowed heavily in his attempts to revive the estate. During World War II, the mansion and grounds were requisitioned by the army, and Meade moved to the Bahamas before selling off the estate in 1946.

The ‘Victorian Whimsy’ in Stoke Bruerne churchyard is a reminder of the Vernon family and their role in village life.

Cornfields between Stoke Park and Stoke Bruerne, with the tower of Saint Mary’s Church in the distance (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Shutlanger, a village in Northamptonshire once linked to the Parles and Comberford families

The Monastery in Shutlanger … the main house on the Parles and Comberford estate near Stoke Bruerne in the 15th and 16th centuries (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Patrick Comerford

One of my early reasons for wanting to visit Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger, neighbouring small villages in Northamptonshire, was a Comberford family connection dating from the 15th and 16th centuries. Three of visited both Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger last week, and so I decided to return again yesterday in search of those Comberford family links and to see whether there were any traces of the Parles and Comberford times there 500 yars ago.

William Comberford was entrusted with the Northamptonshire estates of Margaret Catesby, the widow of John Parles (1419-1452), when she died in 1459. Those estates included lands in Watford, Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger, and her daughter Johanna Parles became William Comberford’s ward.

Johanna Parles was an heiress and in time she married William’s son, John Comberford (1440-1508). The marriage added more land and wealth to the Comberford family estates.

Their son, Thomas Comberford, sold much of the former Parles estates, including almost 400 acres in Stoke Bruerne, Shutlanger, Alderton and Wappenham, to Richard Empson of Easton Neston. But the Parles family had a lasting influence on the fortunes of the Comberford family, reflected even in the changes made to the Comberford family coat of arms over the generations.

I had already been to Watford in search of the former Parles and Comberford manor there, and to Yelvertoft, where the families had exercised their patronage of the parish or the right to nominate the rector. The Rectors of Yelvertoft appointed by the Comberford family included Canon Henry Comberford (1499-1586) of Lichfield Cathedral, who was Rector of Yelvertoft from 1546 to 1560.

However, to explore any remaining signs of the former Parles and Comberford estates in the Stoke Bruerne area, I needed to spend some additional time in the small village of Shutlanger, just a mile west of Stoke Bruerne.

Shutlanger is part of the parish of Stoke Bruerne, half-way between Northampton and Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

I caught a bus from Northampton to Blisworth yesterday (3 September 2024), and then walked through the countryside, almost parallel to the canal route, to Shutlanger. The village is part of the parish of Stoke Bruerne and half-way between Northampton and Stony Stratford.

Shutlanger first developed on either side of a south-flowing stream but it may have shrunk in the late mediaeval period. Since it was neither a parish nor a lordship in its own right, it lacked both a church and a manor house in the Middle Ages.

Two houses in the village are associated with the story of the Parles and Comberford families and the history of the manor in Shutlanger: the Monastery on Water Lane has been identified as the home in the early 15th century of the Parles family, although it was first built in the 14th century; and the Manor House on Showsley Road has been a guest house until recently.

Apart from the Monastery, the older houses in Shutlanger appear to date from the period of the Great Rebuilding and are of coursed rubble limestone, presumably originally with thatched roofs.

Autumn apples on a tree in a garden in Shutlanger last week (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Shutlanger was always a smaller village than Stoke Bruerne and later in time it was without the visual focus and economic stimulus provided by the canal.

William Brewer, a prominent crown servant of the reigns of Richard I and John, held lands in Stoke and Shutlanger by 1210-1212 was found to as successor to Gerard de Mauquency, but by what service was not known. The Brewer family in turn gave their name to Stoke Bruerne, and William Brewer was succeeded by his son, also William Brewer.

When the younger William Brewer died in 1232, his heirs were his five sisters and their representatives. By the early 14th century, Robert de Harrowden held an estate in Stoke Bruerne, Shutlanger, Alderton and Shaw, described in 1315 as consisting of eight messuages, two mills, 17 acres of meadow, 6½ acres of pasture, 44 acres of wood, and various rents, including one for 7½ virgates of land.

Robert’s heir was his nephew, also Robert de Harrowden. The estate was sold in 1364 by Robert’s successor, John Harrowden of Chislehampton, Oxfordshire, to Ralph Parles of Watford, Northamptonshire, and his wife Katherine. It then amounted to nine messuages, two mills, 11 virgates of land, 18 acres of meadow, 10 acres of pasture, 100 acres of wood and 40s. rent in Stoke, Shutlanger, Shaw and Alderton.

Ralph Parles was living in Shutlanger in 1411 when he, his wife Alice, their son Ralph and daughter-in-law Alice were granted a licence to celebrate divine service in the chapel or oratory within his manor at Shutlanger.

Ralph and Alice Parles re-settled their estate in 1415, and when he died in 1420 his heir was his 11-year-old grandson, also Ralph Parles. As well as the manors of Watford and Byfield, Ralph had four messuages, three tofts, 200 acres of land, 30 acres of meadow, 40 acres of wood, 100 acres of pasture and a water-mill in Shutlanger; another messuage, 23 acres of land, 1 acres of meadow and a water-mill in Stoke; and two messuages, 30 acres of land and 2 acres of meadow in Alderton – an estate of 430 acres or more.

The younger Ralph Parles died a few years of his grandfather, and his brother William Parles, the next heir, was still under age when he died in 1430. The surviving heir of that generation, John Parles, who born in 1419, did not recover the estate from a lengthy wardship until 1440.

John Parles died in 1452, and was survived by his widow Margaret and a five-year-old daughter and heir, Joan or Johanna, who was to inherit the estate when her mother died death. Margaret remarried almost at once, but her second husband Robert Catesby died within a few years. Margaret died in 1459, and their son William Catesby was then aged seven.

The quartered Comberford and Parles arms were used in the 19th century by James Comerford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Manor of Watford and the Parles estates in Shutlanger and Stoke Bruene were to descend to Margaret’s daughter Joan Parles, who came of age two years later. Joan’s wardship and marriage had been granted in 1454 to William Cumberford of Comberford Hall and John Lynton. She then married William Comberford’s son John Cumberford, who witnessed a deed relating to Shutlanger in 1477.

In a complex legal arrangement in 1482, Joan and John Comberford conveyed the Manor of Byfield, with extensive premises there and in Watford, Murcott, Shutlanger, Stoke Bruerne, Shaw, Alderton and Wappenham, along with half an acre of land in Yelvertoft and the advowson of the church there, to feoffees or trustees. These trustees were to hold the estate for the use of John and Joan Comberford for their lives, and then for their heirs or the rightful heirs of Joan.

In 1504, after his wife had died, John Cumberford, his son Thomas Comberford and daughter-in-law Dorothy, sold the former Parles estate in Stoke Bruerne, Shutlanger, Alderton and Wappenham to Sir Richard Empson (1450-1510) of Easton Neston. The sale included eight messuages, six tofts, one mill, 200 acres of land, 24 acres of meadow, 100 acres of pasture, 40 acres of wood and 14 shillings rent.

However, the Comberford family held onto its other interests in Northamptonshire for another 60 years, including the Comberford Manor in Watford and the advosom of Yelvertoft. When Thomas Comberford sold the Comberford Manor in Watford to Sir John Spencer in 1563, the Comberford family interest in Yelvertoft parish came to an end.

The Manor House in Shutlanger … the Parles and Comberford families held the manor in Shutlanger in the 15th and early 16th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Meanwhile, Sir Richard Empson’s purchase of the former Parles and Comberford estate from the Comberford family in 1504 was one of a number of purchases he made in Shutlanger as he built up a large estate centred on his mansion at Easton Neston.

Earlier, Empson had bought lands in Shutlanger and the surrounding area from Henry Bacon in 1476-1480, from Thomas Bosenhoe in 1484, from John Claypole in 1488-1489, from John Shefford in 1492, from John Jones in 1499, and from Edmund Grey, Lord Grey de Wilton and John Grey, Lord Grey de Wilton.

Soon after he had bought the Comberford estate in Shutlanger, Sir Richard Empson was arrested with Edmund Dudley. He was convicted of treason in Northampton in October 1509, and was executed on Tower Hill on 17 August 1510.

Empson’s estates were granted to William Compton in 1512, when Shutlanger was described as a manor. The manor was said then to be ‘late Comberford’ and included 20 acres of coppice called Parles Park.

The Monastery at Shutlanger was surrounded by extensive grounds, with fishponds and a dovecote,and one of the fields was known as Parles Park (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The estate passed with Easton Neston to Richard Fermor, and Sir John Fermor of Easton Neston held a court for what was described as his Manor of Shutlanger in 1554. After his death in 1571, however, the family’s estate in Shutlanger ceased to be regarded as a manor. The ‘Manor of Shutlanger’ remained for generations in the hands of the Fermor family – later the Fermor-Hesketh family and Earls of Pomfret.

Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, most of the Fermor estate in Shutlanger appears to have been let in four farms. By the 1830s, the 5th Earl of Pomfret owned about 530 acres in Shutlanger.

Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger each had their own common fields and common meadow in the Middle Ages. Most of these survived until 1844, when the parish was the last in south Northamptonshire to be inclosed. They appear to have shared a large area of common woodland or wood-pasture in the north of the parish, which was gradually cleared.

A chapel licensed in 1411 was on the upper floor of the two-storey entrance porch to the Monastery (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The 14th century house in Shutlanger later known as the Monastery is an impressive house on Water Lane on the south-east edge of the village. It may have been built by one of the freeholders, and became known as the Monastery, through a supposed association with the Cistercian nunnery of Sewardsley in Easton Neston.

The house become the capital messuage, the principal house or equivalent of a manor house, of the Parles estate Although the original owner cannot be identified for certain, it was the home of the Parles familiy by the early 15th century. However, it is not clear whether the Parles family bought the house, built it, inherited it through marriage to a local heiress, or acquired it when they bought the Harrowden estate.

The house has an almost complete medieval roof structure and a two-storey entrance porch. This seems to have been added to the main building, which appears to date from the first half of the 14th century, although the windows in the south elevation of the main range, and also the porch, perhaps date from the late 15th century or the beginning of the 16th century. The house was modernised in the 17th century by inserting a staircase in the cross-passage and a fireplace in the service bay.

A chapel licensed in 1411 occupied the upper floor of the two-storey entrance porch to the Monastery that appears to be a later addition to the main structure.

The entrance porch to the Monastery in Shutlanger has an ecclesiastical appearance (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The house was surrounded by extensive grounds, with fishponds and a dovecote, while an adjoining close formed a small park, described in the 1540s as 20 acres of coppice known as Parles Park. The family name was still recalled in the 18th and 19th centuries in the field named as Parles Park.

The Monastery later became a farmhouse on the Fermor estate. It was included in an exchange between the trustees of the 5th Earl of Pomfret and the 5th Duke of Grafton at the time of inclosure in 1844.

When the Grafton estate in Shutlanger was sold off in 1919, the Monastery was bought by the sitting tenant and remodelled as a private house. The Monastery extended to 3½ bays, including a two-bay hall, with a half-bay below the spere truss containing the cross-passage and a service bay beyond. An east solar or parlour bay was demolished.

The Monastery was first listed Grade I in 1951 and was restored in 1965. In recent years, it was the premises of Monastery Stained Glass, dealers in antique stained glass and panels of glass from the Middle Ages to the 20th century. But when I visited it this week it seems to have returned to use as a family home.

The Plough on the Main Road in Shutlanger (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The layout of Shutlanger village was altered at inclosure when the new road to Heathencote at Towcester was built and older lanes running down to the Tove were stopped up. The avenue from Easton Neston survived inclosure, although it was severed by the new road and by the 1880s trees were beginning to be felled at its east end.

The only industrial development in Shutlanger came in the early 1870s, when Sir Thomas Fermor-Hesketh leased the ironstone and other minerals beneath most of the estate to Samuel Lloyd, the Birmingham ironmaster. Both the Grafton and Pomfret or Fermor-Hesketh estates built a few new cottages in Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger in the 19th century.

Today there are light industrial units on the Monastery Lakes Farm.

The Village Hall in Shutlanger was built as a school and a chapel of ease in 1884-1885 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

An infants’ school was built in Shutlanger in 1884 on land given by Sir Thomas Fermor-Hesketh. It was designed by Matthew Holding and opened in 1885. It had a reserved chancel that allowed the building to be used as a chapel of ease, and it was licensed for divine worship. A chancel with a stained glass east window was added in 1886.

The school closed in 1916, but the building, dedicated to Saint Anne, remained in use as a chapel of ease to Saint Mary’s Church. It is now the village hall.

A Wesleyan Methodist chapel built in Shutlanger in 1844 was extended in the 1870s and enlarged in 1889, but it had closed by the 1980s.

Shutlanger once had two pubs: the Horseshoe and Plough. The Horseshoe closed in 1917 when the number of pub licences was cut back during World War I. The Plough today has a good reputation as a gastropub, although it is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, so I had to walk on to Stoke Bruerne, where I had lunch once again at the Bavigation by the banks of the canal.

Meanwhile, services continue to be held in Saint Anne’s Chapel or the village hall at 9:30 am on the third Thursday of the month, followed by a coffee morning.

The former Wesleyan Methodist chapel in Shutlanger (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

A tranquil afternoon by the canal in Stoke Bruerne, enjoying the barges and searching for family links

Stoke Bruerne is a pretty in West Northamptonshire village along the banks of the Grand Union Canal, half way between Stony Stratford and Northampton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024; click on photographs for full-screen viewing)

Patrick Comerford

Stoke Bruerne in West Northamptonshire is a pretty village along the banks of a canal, half way between Stony Stratford to the south (13 km or 8 miles) and Northampton to the north (11 km or 7 miles). I had wanted to visit it for many years, mainly to explore its past connections with the Comberford family in the 15th and 16th centuries, and I finally got there last week.

Stoke Bruerne is a small village with a population of fewer than 400 people. Its pretty setting by the Grand Union Canal, the many canal locks in the area, the thatched cottages on the Green, the well-signed public walks, and its welcoming pubs and museum all combine to make it an attractive place for visitors throughout the year.

There are frequent short trips on barges on the canal, and the Blisworth Tunnel is a major attraction. The Blisworth Tunnel, which re-opened ten years ago (22 August 2014), is 2,812 metres (3,075 yards) long and is the longest wide, freely navigable tunnel in Europe.

The canal is busy with boats going through the locks constantly and in and out of the tunnel regularly. During the summer days, a variety of boat trips are available along the canal. The village attracts many visitors all year round and especially during the summer months, and there are two canal-side pubs in Stoke Bruerne – the Boat Inn on the west bank, and the Navigation on the east bank.

Three of us took a half mile barge trip on the ‘Charlie’ north along the canal as far as the south entrance to the Blisworth Tunnel, before enjoying lunch and the Navigation.

‘Charlie’ is one of the barges offering trips on the canal as far as the Blisworth Tunnel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The parish is divided into two hamlets, Stoke Bruerne in the east and Shutlanger in the west. Both hamlets were inclosed in 1844 and the modern boundary between the two was settled in the mid-19th century, with Stoke Bruerne civil parish containing 1,270 acres, and Shutlanger 1,363 acres.

Stoke Bruerne is named in the Domesday Book in 1086 as ‘Stoche’, meaning ‘an outlying farmstead or hamlet’. A water-mill, recorded in 1086, stood on the stream to the north of the village, alongside the lane leading towards Blisworth.

But Stoke Bruerne is much older, and a large Roman villa near the road from Stoke and Ashton was partially excavated in the 1960s. The site of the earliest post-Roman settlement in the parish is indicated by the position of the parish church, which stands on high ground on the west edge of Stoke village, near an Iron Age settlements and also close to a burial site, assumed to be Saxon, was found ca 1910.

A thatched cottage on the Green in Stoke Bruerne … the older part of the village is to the east of the church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The older part of the village lies entirely to the east of the church, on either side of a stream that flows south from Blisworth Hill to the Tove, where the four roads leading to Ashton, the London road, Shutlanger and Blisworth meet.

Earthworks on the east edge of the existing built-up area, to both the north and south of the Ashton road, suggest that in the Middle Ages settlement extended a little further in that direction than was the case by the early 18th century, when the community was mapped for the first time.

The name ‘Stokbruer’ is used in 1254, being a suffix by the ‘Briwere’ family of the Manor House. In 1301, 43 households were assessed to the lay subsidy in Stoke Bruerne and 40 in Shutlanger. The two townships remained much the same size in the 1520s.

The mediaeval lords of Stoke Bruerne including members of the de Harrowden, de Combemartin and Knightley families. But Stoke Bruerne lacked a resident lord, both in the Middle Ages and later, and there is no evidence for a capital messuage associated with the manor in the village.

The Old Dower House on the Green is dated 1636 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The older cottages and former farmhouses were originally all thatched, as a number are today.

A park was created to the south of the village in 1529-1530, and more land was added to it after the manor was annexed to the honor of Grafton in 1542. In the following years, crown tenants in both Stoke and Shutlanger were compensated for lost common arable and the rector offered a composition for lost tithes.

The manor of Stoke Bruerne descended with the rest of the honor of Grafton until 1987, when it was among the manorial titles from the honor offered for sale. The manor of Alderton was not included in this sale and was retained by the Duke of Grafton.

A house on the Green known as the Old Dower House is dated 1636, and many of the other older houses in the village seem to date from the same period.

The lane leading to Saint Mary’s Church is still recognisable as an ancient hollow way (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The lane leading to the parish church, Saint Mary’s, is still recognisable as an ancient hollow way. The church, was described in both 1254 and 1291, but dates mainly from the 14th and 15th centuries.

The church consists of a nave, chancel, west tower, north and south aisles and south porch. The tower, except for its Perpendicular top stage, seems to date from the early 12th century. The arch between tower and nave dates from ca 1200.

The nave and both aisles were rebuilt together in the later 14th century. The chancel screen is 15th century; there is a rood-loft entrance on the north side and external access by a staircase. Although the church was locked when we visited, I understand the interesting internal features include a late mediaeval squint, a piscina adjoins, and the nave clerestory.

The plain octagonal font is perhaps of the 13th or 14th century. The chancel stalls are 19th century, incorporating two late medieval bench ends and 18th century altar rails. There are several late mediaeval wall monuments and ledger-slabs.

The church was repaired in 1843 and restored in 1865. A new east window was installed in 1877 in memory of a former rector, the Revd Philip Henry Lee. A vestry and organ-chamber designed by the Stony Stratford architect Edward Swinfen Harris, were added on the south side of the chancel in 1881. A new baptistry designed by Matthew Holding was added in 1901, and the interior was restored.

Saint Mary’s Church dates mainly from the 14th and 15th centuries (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

There was a priest at Stoke Bruerne in 1086 who held land there of Swain son of Azor. The first-known incumbent, Richard de Rof, took office in 1217, when the patron was William Briwere. The advowson descended with the manor until the death of William de Combemartin in 1318 and the division of Stoke between his three daughters. Some of the medieval incumbents were drawn from local gentry families and on occasion were members of the same families as the lords of Stoke Bruerne.

The whole of the manor and advowson were acquired by the Crown in the early 16th century, and in 1551 the advowson was granted to William Parr (1513-1571), Marquess of Northampton, the only brother of Queen Catherine Parr, sixth and final wife of Henry VIII. It reverted to the Crown when he was attainted by Queen Mary two years later, and Queen Elizabeth I presented to the living in 1559.

The advowsons of Stoke, Blisworth, Cottingham and Great Billing were granted to Sir Christopher Hatton in 1579. These interests then passed through the Hatton family until 1676, when they were sold to Brasenose College, Oxford.

Saint Mary’s Church and the grave of the Revd Philip Henry Lee, rector for 40 years from 1836 to 1876 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The most notable Rector of Stoke Bruerne was probably Peter Gunning (1614-1684), rector from 1660 to 1669. He was a staunch royalist during the Civil War and both a noted theologian and prolific author. From 1660, he was also Master of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and was appointed Lady Margaret’s Professor of Divinity. He became Master of Saint John’s College, Cambridge, in 1661 and was elected Regius Professor of Divinity (1661-1674). During those years, he was also Rector of Cottesmore, Rutland, and a canon of Canterbury Cathedral. He became Bishop of Chichester in 1669 and Bishop of Ely in 1674.

Edward Cardwell (1787-1861), Rector from 1828 to 1831, was Camden Professor of Ancient History at Oxford (1825-1861). In 1831, he succeeded Archbishop Richard Whately of Dublin as the principal of St Alban Hall, later merged with Merton College. He edited Aristotle’s Ethica and wrote several works on Greek and Roman coinage and theology.

Cardwell’s successor, the Revd Philip Henry Lee, was rector for 40 years, from 1836 to 1876. During his lengthy incumbency, he established infant schools in Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger. A schoolroom was built in Stoke Bruerne in the late 1830s was enlarged in 1880-1882.

The parish of Stoke Bruerne was united with Grafton Regis and Alderton in 1953, and later with Blisworth. The parish is in the Diocese of Peterborough.

Canon Richard Stainer has been the Rector of Blisworth, Alderton, Grafton Regis, Milton Malsor and Stoke Bruerne with Shutlanger (the Grand Union Benefice) since 2019. Sunday services in Saint Mary’s are at 9:30 on the second Sundays (Family Eucharist) and fourth Sundays (Family Service).

The Old School House in Stoke Bruerne … a schoolroom was built in Stoke in the late 1830s was enlarged in 1880-1882 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The Grand Junction Canal, which began in 1793 as an improved trunk route between London and Birmingham, was completed in 1805. It enters the parish by an aqueduct over a tributary of the Tove half a mile north of Twyford Bridge and continues north to Stoke village. Beyond, it enters Blisworth Tunnel, through which the canal passes beneath the high ground between Stoke and Blisworth.

The arrival of the canal was important in both reshaping the layout of Stoke and bringing new economic activity. After the opening of the canal, Stoke continued to grow more modestly to a peak of 469 in 1851; Shutlanger’s 19th-century growth peaked at 403 a generation later in 1881. The canal continues to play an important part in the life of the community.

Stoke Bruerne once had its own railway station – which was misnamed Stoke Bruern. The station on the line from Towcester to Olney opened in 1891, but the line finally closed in 1958, and the former station building has been converted into a private house.

The Blisworth Tunnel is 2,812 metres long and is the longest wide freely navigable tunnel in Europe (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The nearby country estate of Stoke Park is on Shutlanger Road. Stoke Park was the first English country house to display a Palladian plan. The house was destroyed by fire in the late 19th century, and was replaced with a large Neo-Jacobean building.

It was bought in 1928 by an Irish aristocrat, Captain Edward Brabazon Meade (1878-1963), a son of Richard Meade, 4th Earl of Clanwilliam. He borrowed heavily to restore the estate, but found it a financial burden and left Stoke in 1937.

The mansion and grounds were requisitioned by the army during World War II. Meade later moved to the Bahamas, and sold the estate in 1946. The Neo-Jacobean mansion was empty and in poor condition and was largely demolished in the late 1940s.

The new owners refused to carry out repairs to the 17th century pavilions, instead offering to sell them to the National Trust or the county council. Stoke Park is occasionally open to the public in August, but all that remains of the main house are the two east and west wings known as Stoke Park Pavilions.

One of the many pretty thatched cottages in the centre of Stoke Bruerne (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

One of my reasons for wanting to visit Stoke Bruerne for so long is a Comberford family connection dating from the 15th and 16th centuries. William Comberford was entrusted with keeping the estates in Northamptonshire of Margaret Catesby, the widow of John Parles (1419-1452), when she died in 1459.

Those estates included lands in Watford, Stoke Bruerne and Shutlanger, near Stoke Bruerne, and her daughter Johanna Parles became William Comberford’s ward. Later Johanna Parles married William’s son, John Comberford (1440-1508), and the Comberford family estates and wealth were enlarged and enriched. Their son, Thomas Comberford, sold the former Parles estates, including over 364 acres in Stoke Bruerne, Shutlanger, Alderton and Wappenham, to Richard Empson of Easton Neston.

The Parles family had a lasting influence on the fortunes of the Comberford family, reflected even in the changes made to the Comberford family coat of arms over the generations.

However, to see any remaining signs of the former Parles and Comberford estates in the Stoke Bruerne area, I needed to visit the neighbouring small village of Shutlanger.

Four Minutes on the Canal at Stoke Bruerne (Patrick Comerford, 2024)