GeeBeePhoto Fawsley Northamptonshire

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Fawsley Northamptonshire

This is the first sight of Fawsley village, or rather where the village is. Around the end of the 15th century the village was abandoned on the orders of the Knightley family and the land was requisitioned for sheep grazing. In the 18th century the village was drowned under this lake as part of the landscaping by Lancelot 'Capability' Brown.		Fawsley Hall, the home of the Knightley family was obviously immune from the rising damp. The church of St Mary the Virgin, by virtue of being on the higher ground with Fawsley Hall, also escaped the flood.

The church dates from the 13th century and stands isolated on raised ground. It is surrounded by a ha-ha which keeps the sheep out of the graveyard and church surround. The church is entered by a side door via a small bridge and double gate to keep the sheep out of the church. This side door, blissfully unaware of the changing shape of modern mankind is very low and very narrow, tall people can duck to get in, extra heavy people can wait outside and snack.		Just inside the door thin people can read a list of the 'Vicars of Fawsley Parish'. Given that the list starts in the year 1209 and that my perception is that a large chunk of the intervening 800 years were filled with plague and pestilence, I am amazed that the list is so short. John Wilkins married Oliver Cromwells' sister. John Dod preached a sermon in Cambridge against the drinking habits of the university students who set upon him, forcing him into a hollow tree and ordering him to preach a sermon on 'malt'. Which he promptly did.

The church organ was built in 1839 by James Walker who was known world wide for the quality of his instruments. The organ, operated by tracker action, has four ranks of pipes controlled by six stops and swell and a pedal board. The bellows can be filled by lever or pedal action.		The bell tower behind the pews has four bells cast by a London firm in the 1450's. The diamond shaped items are hatchments and show the armorial bearings of the deceased. When the hearse took a body to the church it was preceded by the hatchment which was returned to the house after the service where it was hung for a period of mourning.

The church has box pews which feature medieval carvings. Many of them seem downright sinister to me.		The view from the pulpit showing various monuments and brasses in the main aisle, the Knightley familys' private, high sided, pews behind the tomb and a Billingham camera bag left there by a rank amateur while he takes a photograph :-)

	This 16th century effigy capped tomb is the last resting place of Sir Richard Knightley and his wife Jane Skenard. The figures along the side of the tomb are the 'weepers' - four girls and eight boys, representing their twelve children. The Knightleys came over to England with William the Conqueror and settled in the village of Knightley in Staffordshire, from whence the name comes. In 1416 Richard Knightley became Lord of the Manor of Fawsley. He was a successful Staffordshire lawyer and the family were hard sheep farming landlords. Richard Knightley later became the King's Sergeant and Teller of the Exchequer. They developed the sheep farming at the expense of their peasant tenants, who were all evicted by the turn of the 15th century. Thus the Knightley family wealth was assured for the next 300 years. Richard Knightley's son, also Richard, was twice Sheriff and his grandson, also Richard, who through marriage acquired extensive estates, set about building the earliest part of the house, the south wing, that exists today. source: http://www.fawsleyhall.com/content/page/7.htm


The Knightley family had their own spacious high sided pew in the south aisle so they were hidden from the rest of the congregation. They had a clear view of the pulpit but when the priest moved to the altar they had to look through a squint to follow what he was doing.		Three members of the Knightley family are commemorated in this monument. It is inscribed 'Dust thou art and to dust thou shalt return'. The font to the left of the monument is 13th century and uniquely looks its' age, the carving having deteriorated.

This is where it gets contentious. The stained glass coat of arms pictured right is in Fawsley church and came from Sulgrave Manor which is a few miles away (still in Northamptonshire). Sulgrave Manor is the ancestral home of the Washington family and that is their coat of arms. John Washington, great grandfather of George Washington (1732-1799), emigrated from Northamptonshire to Virginia in 1656. The resemblance of the coat of arms to a certain flag has sparked many a debate.		In the distance is Fawsley Hall, now a hotel. If you make a booking as a result of the link above then give me a credit they may give me some commission.

The exterior of the church which seems so ordinary as it is approached seems to gain something once I have seen the 'treasures' within.		A last glimpse. For the time being.......