THE
PEOPLE AND PARISH
OF
FOOTS CRAY
RESEARCHED BY
JOHN R. M. ACWORTH B.A. CERT. FIELD ARCH.
JOHN ACWORTH
BEXLEY ARCHAEOLOGICAL GROUP
PREFACE
Within an urban community often the sense of continuity is lost. More so in these days of rapid change in electronics, discoveries, space developments and the expansion to a world wide economic framework. A sense of what was normal disappears and one is often amazed to look back even a few years and try to remember what it was like without this new machine or that. Computerisation has made this expansion even faster. History is being created faster, in a way that four hundred years ago current events would have been seen as the work of the devil and unbelievable.
Bexley Archaeological Group decided originally to compile a history of the church of All Saints, Footscray and when the church was redecorated in 1996 an opportunity was taken to measure the church both inside and outside and write a history of the development of All Saints over time. From this came my idea that the social history of the village was not really known, nor did we have an idea of the population served by the church or the original registers or early vestry minutes as these were stolen from the church in 1948. What we did have was a copy of the registers typed in 1916 which had been put on microfische as part of a series of Kent registers.
There are 1135 baptisms, 925 burials and 251 marriages in the parish registers over the period 1559 and 1812. These have been listed together in date order and surname order to ascertain an approximation of the population of the parish over time. I hope the following social history will inspire a higher awareness of the story of Foots Cray. Its history is still there, under our feet if you know where to look and what to look for.
Good hunting.
John R. M. Acworth
Treasurer
Bexley Archaeological Group
2007
INTRODUCTION
A study of old maps of Foots Cray shows a village on the western side of the River Cray valley, as a collection of houses around a cross roads with a church and a manor house 400m (0.25 mile) to the north.
The 1805 First Edition Ordnance Survey map shows 28 black rectangles as houses around these cross roads. Some 1.5km (1 mile) to the north east is North Cray with 15 houses on the map and 1.5km (1 mile) to the south is St. Paul’s Cray with 16 houses. On top of the hill 1km (5/8 mile) to the north west is the hamlet of Sidcup with 10 houses. Larger villages such as Chislehurst, 3.2km (2 miles) to the west, had 50 black rectangles and Bexley, 3.2km (2 miles) to the north east had 68 rectangles. and St. Mary Cray with 40 rectangles 2.7km (1.6 miles) to the south, surround Foots Cray.
Foots Cray, therefore has the appearance of a medium size village. It does have one advantage that the others do not. The main road from London to Maidstone, county town of Kent, is the High Street and there are two Inns, the Seven Stars and the main coaching Inn, The Tigers’s Head to take care of passengers.
But in fact the situation on the ground was not as it looked. The earliest map showing the actual parish boundary was the 1840 Tithe Map and the parish and village were shown at an administrative impasse. Most of the village was actually in Chislehurst parish. All of the parish was to the north and west of the High Street but the north eastern section of the village between the cross roads and the river was the only part in the parish.
The parish of Foots Cray on the Tithe Map had a main part of 3.6km (2.3 miles) east to west and 0.8km (0.5 mile) north to south with the Foots Cray Manor estate at the eastern end. This included the hamlets of Sidcup and Pound Place with outlying farms. But there were also three detached parts on the Tithe map to the south: 1)- next to the river beyond the shops on the south eastern side of the cross roads. 2)- A piece of land to the west of the Sidcup to Chislehust lane just to the south of Sidcup. 3)- A small piece of wood and field in between the other two detached pieces.
Foots Cray Parish, as shown on the early Ordnance Survey maps, was a strip of land that seems to have been a block west of Foots Cray manor lands probably originally under one ownership. To the north is the low lying village of Halfway Street in the part of Bexley parish known as Lamorbey around the valley of the River Shuttle. This main part of Foots Cray Parish, 3.2km x 0.7km (2 miles x 1/2 mile) is on the northern facing slopes of the Chislehurst Hill which rises to the south with St. Nicholas Church and the village of Chislehurst on the top around the 100m contour. The top of this hill extends from Elmstead in the west to Scadbury Park in the east.
Three streams rise south of Foots Cray Parish and flow north down the slope, through the parish to meet the River Shuttle. In modern day terms, the north western corner of the parish is roughly on the northern end of Chartwell Close, off Foots Cray Road, just south of Dulverton School. From here the old boundary went east, over the ridge on which Longlands Farm stood between Wyncham Stream and Longlands Stream and then followed the 40m contour east. The boundary went between Longlands Road and Manor Road, along Alma Road then across Waring Park between Melville Road and Lewis Road to the wide grassy area of Bexley Lane just south of the railway bridge, then south east through the Royal Park Estate to the northern entrance gates of Foots Cray Place.
The southern edge of North Cray Wood was the boundary to the River Cray where there is a 'Foots Cray' boundary stone where one of the original strands of the braided river meets the canalised river dug to straighten this part of the river through the Foots Cray Estate in the latter part of the eighteenth century. Between this north eastern point and the present bridge over the River Cray at Foots Cray High Street, the old boundary follows the original stream, now well silted but visible in the Foots Cray Meadows as a line of willows and other trees to the west of the present river, south towards Penny Farthing Bridge, so named due to the large and small arch over the river.
On the edge of the Meadows below All Saints church, which stands in the top of the second terrace above the river, is a track down to Penny Farthing Bridge. This crosses a small brick built bridge where on the northern side of the path it is possible to see the broken edge of this bridge. From this point the land has now been completely changed due to modern development south to the Seven Stars Public House by the bridge at the eastern end of the High Street. In the Meadows between the Church and the river is another "Foots Cray" boundary stone hidden in the undergrowth on the edge of the grass.
From the river the old parish boundary is up the High Street to the cross roads then north along Rectory Lane, skirting All saints Church, along the edge of the Meadows and following Rectory Lane up the narrow high banks, and along the modern road to the junction with the eastern end of Sidcup High Street. West from here the old boundary follows Back Road, through the present Grassington Road Car Park and then south along the boundary fence of the houses in the Crescent, across Sydney Road Sports Ground, the southern point of Stafford Road, across the By-Pass, then west through the valley of the Wyncham Stream by Kemnal Manor to the high point known as Belmont to a boundary post on the border with New Eltham which is the south western point.
From here the boundary runs north east, across the A20 and between Mervyn Avenue and County Gate to the north western corner in Chartwell Close. This then was the major part of Foots Cray Parish as found on the 1840 Tithe Map, one of many drawn up by the ecclesiastical authorities to bring their Tithe Accounts up to date.
The reason for the production of the Tithe Map was an Act of Parliament in 1836 which required that "assessment shall be made on the net annual value of several herectaments" to comply with the Act for regulating parochial assessments. The Vestry minutes of September 13th 1838 stated that a new valuation of the parish was necessary. A survey was conducted by a Mr. R. P. Browne, Surveyor, of Greenwich and the Tithe Map was presented in 1840.
The main part of the parish, as stated was on the northern slopes of the hill and only in the Foots Cray Estate part, which faced the valley of the River Cray was there a south facing slope.
Of the three detached parts the most easterly was the pasture land in the valley south of the High Street between and including the present Schweppes Coca Cola site south to Cornwall Drive, now a track on the edge of the Nature Reserve to the south of the A20 viaduct. This was on gently rising land enclosing a stream from the west.
The south western detached part covered the eastern end of a promontory containing the highest point at over 80m south from The Park and including the present St. Mary and St, Joseph's School and south to and including Frogpool Manor Farm and the row of houses here on the other side of Perry Street. A spring just to the west of this detached part flowed through the farm lands and down the valley through the other detached part.
There was also a small detached part containg part of a meadow next to a tributary of the stream in the other detached parts, part of Little Wood going up the hill and the eastern third of a field situated on the ridge that was the eastern end of the top of Chislehurst Hill rising up towards Scadbury Moat on the top of the ridge.
Looking at the contours of the land in this area south of the main portion of the parish, they surround a little valley that flows east, eventually along Watery Lane to the River Cray. The later second edition of the Ordnance Survey map shows a Chislehurst - St. Pauls Cray boundary between the smallest part and the south eastern part.
Was all the area of land to the north, including Frognal, Sidcup Place and the rest of the village of Foots Cray, once in Foots Cray Parish. Was this a result of a Walsingham family schism as the family owned Scadbury Manor and Foots Cray Manor. Also, the farm in the odd south western detached part had some of the land south of the wood, Hoblands Wood which abutted the western side of this part on top of the hill. How much of this land was originally in the parish of Foots Cray.
To all of this the obvious questions are; what happened?, why? and when? as there is not another parish in West Kent where there is such a dismemberment of a parish.
Glossary
Measures
Acre:
Approximate measure of land a yoke of oxen could plough in a day. Standardised to 4,840 sq.yds. i.e. 220 yds.x 22 yds.
Rood & Perch:
There are 40 perches to 1 rood and 4 roods to 1 acre.
Centuration:
An area measure in Roman times used to mark out plots of land for settlement.
Chain:
Length of 22 yds. 80 Chains = 1 mile.
Furlong:
Length of 220 yds. The usual length of individual ploughed land within fields near to the village.
Hide:
Area of 120 acres. Area of land a yoke of oxen could plough in a year.
Hundred:
The administrative sub-division of the lathe and county. Usually 100 hides, named after Saxon meeting places of the early settlement.
Infield:
The immediate area surrounding the village including the main arable area, farmed in strips in rotation.
Lathe:
Originally used as the administrative territory surrounding the royal vills of the early Saxon settlement of which Hundreds were a sub-division.
Outfield:
Outer utilised land around the village used as pasture, and wood.
Parish:
The combined area of the landed estates surrounding the central church that became the administrative area of the parish before the Poor Law Statutes were set up in the reign of Elizabeth I.
Sulung:
Kentish land measure with possible Jutish origins eqivalent to 200 acres. Used in the Domesday Book to denote area of settlement.
Lists and Statistics
Estates.
Act of Settlement:
A poor person could claim to belong to a parish and this 1662 Act specified ways that this would be legal. Was repealed by the Poor Law Act of 1834.
Census:
First National Census of 1801 has been repeated every 10 years, except 1941. The first few, 1801 - 1831, gave only numbers and houses. From 1841 the Census came under the Registrar general and the amount of information requested increased. Enumerators were in charge of their own District and had to return information to the office by a certain date.
Certificate of Residence:
During the 16C & 17C, children had settlement where born. Apprentices and those in service could claim residence after 1 year and wives had husbands place of settlement. Issued by churchwardens and overseers. Those taken in under the Poor Law Acts would be taken back to their certificated parish.
Ecclesiastical Census:
Made in 1563 and 1603. Bishops returns of people in parishes in their diocese. Found in Harleian Manuscripts 280, 594, 595 and 618 in British Library.
Feet of Fines:
Judgements to titles of land, or record of title after purchase. Copy at Public Record Office PRO, reference CP25 and 27.
Hearth Tax:
1662-1688. tax payable on the number of fireplaces or hearths. Mainly a tax on the wealthy land owners of 2s, two shillings per year, paid half, half yearly. Exempt were the occupiers of houses worth less than 20s or those who owned proprty not above £10 who could petition to be exempt. Lists kept in PRO, reference E179.
Land Tax:
From 1693 was the major tax on property, land, buildings etc and is in PRO reference IR23
Lay Subsidy Rolls:
Tax levied on movable property, one/fifteenth in rural areas and one/tenth in towns in period 1290 - 1334. Prominent families are shown. Found, by Hundred in PRO with reference E179.
Parish Registers:
Lists of Baptisms, Marriages and Burials entered into the Registers by the Rector when they occurred. A copy was sent to the Diocese from 1597.
Poll Books:
From 1696 intil 1872, the Parliamentary election results by person, Parish and Hundred were recorded in Poll Books specially printed for a wealthy clientele.
Poll tax:
In 1377, 1379 and 1381, Richard II’s government requested everyone to pay a tax. Led to Peasants Revolt in 1381 and Wat Tyler meeting the King on Blackheath Common.
Rate Books:
For the assessment of the Poor Law Rate, Rate Books were kept by each parish. In 1894 they became the responsibility of the new Local Councils.
Recovery Rolls:
When property was transferred on acquisition, details were kept on rolls,From 15C to 1833. details in PRO reference CP43.
Tithes:
Usually 1/10th of the produce, which was produced off the land given to the Rector of the Parish. After the 1834 Poor Law Amendment Act the Parish powers were evolved to the new Poor Law Unions. These new authorities decided to change the previous produce to cash assessments and money rent payments.
Tithe Commutation Act:
In 1836 the Commissioners under the Act were appointed to instruct surveyors to map each parish and to accurately assess ownership of land. This gave accurate assessments for the new Poor Law Unions. Foots Cray was completed in 1840.
Commons:
1) Communal area of land that could be used by everyone in the centre of the village. 2) The waste land on the edge of the village, often with unproductive soils.
Enclosures:
First recorded enclosure 1604 but most were in the last half of the 18C. Last one 1914. Most enclosures decided on a voluntary basis. Parliamentary orders only occurred where no settlement could be reached. 5,341 enclosures made in England in that period. Where Parliamentary Enclosures overruled the small anti-enclosure groups.
Estates:
Over the millenia certain families have been able to acquire large acreages of land and enclosed them, or consolidated an area on which large houses have been built. Evidence of some estates show boundaries that were formulated during Roman times. With the increase in the country’s wealth after 1600 many estates were acquired by the ‘nouveau riche’ who enclosed, emparked and landscaped them and built a large house. Many 20C large urban developments still contain the boundaries of the original estates or are left as open spaces for the public to enjoy.
Gavelkind:
A peculiar Kentish division of estates on inheritance where all heirs received an equal portion. Some heirs came to agree not to split as they were in the army, navy or church, but many did not. Kent is a patchwork of small estates with a closer network of villages than almost all other counties, probably due to the operation of this ancient Jutish hereditary law.
Household:
Today is classed as a family unit. There may be more than one household in a house.
Ice House:
Somewhere was needed to store and preserve foodstuffs and often large houses had a hole dug which was then lined with bricks, diameter 15-20 feet with a drainage hole. Access was by means of a tunnel which curved round 180 degees to stop draughts and contained blocks of ice to keep the temperature low. Many are still around.
Manor:
Smaller than an estate which could have many manors within it if the estate was large. From Saxon times has been the locally farmed area under one lord, often given by the Crown who was the ultimate owner.
Moiety:
An equal half of a manor or estate on inheritance.
Vill:
On the Saxon settlement in Kent, the original leaders took separate parts of the territory as their estates. As over time these lands were acquired by the ruling King, they developed into Royal lands where the King would stay on his journey round his territory. Later when the Kingdom was assessed these became the administrative units called Lathes.
EARLIEST TIMES
Were the Romans in the area soon after the invasion in 43AD. There is evidence in Crayford and St. Mary Cray by the river of substantial buildings and on the edge of the present Ellenborough Road estate a Roman bath house was possibly found when the estate was built. There is more evidence of Roman occupation in both directions along the river valley, especially on the eastern bank to the north of Five Arches Bridge, at North Cray, where part of a Roman building was found, when first a water line went through the valley in 1990, then in 1995 a sewer line cut through further more substantial Roman remains. Nothing has been found within the Foots Cray parish boundaries that can definitely be claimed as Roman.
The first mention of Foots Cray is in the Domesday Book of 1086. The reason for the Domesday Book is stated within the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. An extract from the Peterborough Chronicle known as the E Version kept in the Bodleian Library has it thus:
1085 In this year men reported and declared it to be true that Cnut, King of Denmark, son of King Swein, was on his way hither, determined to conquer this country, with the help of Count Robert of Flanders, since Cnut had married his daughter.
When King William heard of this he was then residing in Normandy, because he owned both England and Normandy - he returned to England with a vast host of horse and foot from France and from Brittany which was greater than any that had ever come to this country.....................
When, however the King learnt for a fact that his enemies had been hindered, and that it was impossible for them to carry out their expedition, he alloed one part of his host to return to their own country, but retained the rest in this country over the winter.
Then he spent Christmas with his Councillors at Gloucester and held his Court there for five days which was followed by a three day synod held by the Archbishop and his clergy. After this the King had important deliberations and exhaustive discussions with his council, about this land, how it was peopled and with what sort of men.
Then he sent his men all over England into every Shire to ascertain how many hundreds of hides of land there were in each Shire, and how much land and livestock the King himself owned in the country, and what annual dues were lawfully his from each Shire.
He also had it recorded how much land his Archbishops had, and his diocean bishops, his abbots and his earls, and though I may be going into too much detail - and what or how much each man who was a landholder here in England had in land or in livestock, and how much money it was worth.
So very thorougjhly did he have the enquiry carried out that there was not one single hide or one virgate of land, not even - it is shameful to record it, but it did not seem shameful for him to do - not even one ox, nor one cow, nor one pig, which escaped notice in his survey. And all the surveys were subsequently brought to him.
The Domesday Book, the result of all these enquiries was written by one writer in an abbreviated Norman French which had a standardised format when taken from all the returns submitted. Kent (Chenth) is classified after listing the Dover possessions in order from the King through the most important landowners and listed all manors by Lathe, and by Hundred within the Lathe and by tenant of the manor. Some locations appear more than once and so do some occupiers throughout the county.
William, son of Odger held Foots Crai, and the translation of the shorthand Norman French is shown next to each line.
IN HELMESTREI HUND. IN RUXLEY HUNDRED
Isd Wills ten de epo CRAI William also holds CRAI from the bishop
p dimid solin se defd. It answers for ½ sulung
Tra.e In dnio.e una car . 7 Land for In lordship 1 plough
viii.uilli cu.i.car 7 dimid. 7 iiii . cot . 7 8 villagers with 1½ ploughs, 4 cottagers
I . molin de . x . solid. 1 mill at 10s
Ibi . un serv . 7 silva . vi . porc 1 slave, woodland, 6 pigs
T. R. E . valub . iiii . lib . 7 Value before 1066 £4
post: iii . lib . Modo: iiii . lib . later £3; Now £4
Goduin Fot tenuit de rege . E . Godwin Fot held it from King Edward.
The Hundred administrative area, shown in the Domesday Book was an Anglo-Saxon creation. It is not known when they were introduced into the Saxon Realm but by around 854 AD there were so many variations that a Hundred Ordinance was then issued. One has to remember that the Danelaw was finally conquered around that date so a unified code of laws was probably set up prior to acquisition by conquest.
The Ordinance was issued to unify the types, arrangements and current practices that differed over the newly formed English Kingdom. It was laid down that a Hundred Court Assembly was to be held every four weeks on a specified day to deal with all the problems and duties of the previous period. Ruxley Hundred was part of the Half Lathe of Sutton at Hone. The other half being the half lathe of Wallington, now in Surrey and lost at some point on the formation of the Saxon Kingdoms.
William, son of Odger is an important person. He is shown as having a house in Dover under the protection of Bishop Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, half brother to King William. He also held a monastery from the Bishop and seems to have held land in Charlton, a short distance inland from Dover. He also held the only other Charlton in Kent, near Greenwich, and Foots Crai. Why Foots Crai.
Here we have an important knight who held two prominent places in Kent. Charlton on the River Thames is the site of the Thames Barrier, a well known football team and a most impressive iron age hillfort, now gutted out for sand and gravel over recent centuries. Was William, son of Odger, in the Norman signalling corps in charge of communications between London and Dover.
The only prominent position near Foots Cray is a mile (1.5km) to the east at Chalk Wood. From here the City of London can be seen and also the high point of the North Downs, west of Rochester. A year after the compilation in 1087, Odo was arrested for plotting against the new King William. Did William, son of Odger fall as well.
Foots Cray was one of several manors mentioned in the Domesday Book that follow the River Cray south to Orpington. It was in Helmestrai Hundred, later called Ruxley, central in the area of the Hundred but now a deserted medieval village near a garden centre.
The size of the manor of Foots Cray was about 100 acres - ½ sulung and there was land for 2½ ploughs, 1 for the lords domain and 1½ for the villagers. There were 8 villagers and 4 cottagers, one mill, no church, one slave? and woodland with 6 pigs. Compared with some of the other local manors in the Domesday Book this was a very small manor, but similar to North Cray and St. Pauls Cray. Yet Ruxley on the other side of the River Cray also had a mill, had 10 villagers and 10 smallholders and was worth more. The nearest large town was Dartford, owned by the King.
To show the relative small size of Foots Cray the following list is of the major landowners in west Kent by number of households.
| Landowner | Manor | Households | Ploughs |
| The King | Dartford | 152 | 53 |
| | Lewisham | 59 | 17 |
| | Westerham | 49 | 30 |
| | | | |
| Archbishop of Canterbury | Otford | 146 | 49 |
| | Orpington | 76 | 23 |
| | Bexley | 56 | 10 |
| | Brasted | 40 | 12 |
| | Eynsford | 38 | 15 |
| | Sundridge | 36 | 8 |
| | Crayford | 29 | 8 |
| | Darenth | 29 | 7 |
| | Farningham | 18 | 3 |
| | | | |
| Bishop of Rochester | Bromley | 56 | 11 |
| | Southfleet | 34 | 12 |
| | Stone | 32 | 11 |
| | Fawkham | 18 | 4 |
| | Longfield | 16 | 2 |
| | | | |
| Abbot of St Augustines | Plumstead | 23 | 6 |
| | | | |
| Hamo The Sheriff | Woolwich | 11 | - |
Foots Cray can be seen to be small in comparison and was one of the holdings of the Bishop of Bayeux like everywhere else in the west Kent lathe of Sutton as shown overleaf.
| Landowner | Manor | Households | Ploughs |
| Bishop of Bayeux | Lessness | 66 | 15 |
| | Eltham | 54 | 11 |
| | Seal | 45 | 16 |
| | Swanscombe | 36 | 13 |
| | Beckenham | 30 | 8½ |
| | Horton Kirby (3) | 26 | 3 |
| | West Wickham | 24 | 4 |
| | Chelsfield | 24 | 8 |
| | Cudham | 21 | 6 |
| | Ash | 20 | 3 |
| | Plumstead | 20 | 4 |
| | Ruxley | 20 | 2½ |
| | Sentlinge | 20 | 2 |
| | Darenth (2) | 18 | 1 |
| | St Mary Cray | 17 | 4 |
| | Lullingstone | 17 | 4 |
| | Hawley | 17 | 4 |
| | Hartley | 15 | 3 |
| | North Cray | 13 | 1 |
| | Foots Cray | 12 | 1½ |
| | St Pauls Cray | 12 | 1 |
| | Wricklemarsh | 11 | 2 |
| | Ridley | 11 | 2 |
| | Lee | 11 | 2 |
| | Maplecombe (2) | 10 | - |
| | Farningham (3) | 9 | - |
| | Howbury | 7 | 1½ |
| | Crofton | 7 | - |
| | Pinden | 6 | - |
| | Keston | 4 | 1 |
Did all these manors revert to the King once Odo was exiled in 1087.
The next mention of Foots Cray in the records was when it was part of the manor of East Hall, passing through the Crevequers (Crevecoeur) family, cousins of King William, (who rebuilt Leeds Castle in stone in 1119 and were large landowners) and the Eynsfords of Eynsford. Both these families revolted against King John in 1215 and then lost their lands at the time of King Henry III.
Foots Cray seems to have fallen out of the sphere of the larger county landowners as a moiety had been created of the Manor of Foots Cray with the Crevequer part passing to William Bardorf before reverting to Henry III. The other part was given to the Priory and Convent of St. Mary Overy, presently Southwark Cathedral, who held it until 1538 on the dissolution of the monasteries.
The reclaim of the King was given to the Archbishop of Canterbury who leased it back to the tenants of Eynsford Castle, Ralf de Sandwich and Nicholas de Criol. The latter then sub-let Foots Cray to Gregory de Rokesle, an influential London courtier, who was Lord Mayor 1274-1285 and Keeper of the Exchequer. When he died in 1290, the manor of Foots Cray comprised :-
a capital messuage with garden, worth 18d per annum £0 1 6
rents of assize, worth 11s “ “ £0 11 0
two watermills, worth 30s “ “ £1 10 0
161 acres of arable land worth 4d per acre per annum £2 13 8
6 acres of meadow land worth 6d “ “ “ “ £0 3 0
10 acres of woodland worth 2d “ “ “ “ £0 1 8
a total of 177 acres with the estate worth a total of £5 0 10
He also had 177 acres of arable land worth 2d per acre per annum £1 9 6
plus 60 acres of the moiety of a knight’s fee at 3d per acre per annum £0 15 0
Giving a total value to the Foots Cray estate of Geoffrey de Rokesle £7 5 4
According to the history of Eynsford castle, Ralf de Sandwich, who had never lived at Eynsford, allowing the Criol family full occupation, sold his moiety to William Inge who did wish to share. This led in 1312 to Criol and his supporters ransacking Eynsford and other Inge properties throughout Kent and the castle at Eynsford, though repaired was never inhabited again. William Inge took Nicholas de Criol to court and probably in order to fund his actions, the moiety on the Foots Cray estate was sold in 1314 to John Abel, another wealthy local landowner.
It is during the occupation by the Abel family that there is first mention of All Saints Church, Foots Cray when John Holden, Rector was brought to account in 1333 by William Vaughan, husband of John Abel’s daughter Joan, accused of failing to keep the rectory in repair. Joan Vaughan later inherited the manor and in 1346 William was assessed for aid to the Black Prince in France. The battle of Crecy was fought this year.
It is not recorded anywhere in the records how the plague known as the Black Death in 1349 affected Foots Cray. The estate passed to Grand-daughter Alianore Vaughan in 1398. She had married William Warner and their son John Warner was sufficiently active in court to become Sheriff of Kent in 1441.
Son William followed by his son Humphrey Warner held the estate but let it to various tenants but as before when Humphrey died, his sister who was married to John Heron was allotted the estate in the inheritance. The Heron family held their moiety of the estate until Christopher Heron sold it to Edmund Walsingham in 1529.
In 1535 King Henry VIII officially split from the Pope and had proclaimed himself the Absolute Head of the Church of England. He appointed a Commission to look at the smaller monasteries and their report of wickedness and immorality resulted in the suppression of the houses where the incomes were less than £200 per annum. He also began to raise new taxes. This caused a general revolt in the more catholic shires in the Midlands and North of England known as the ‘Pilgrimage of Grace’. This was ruthlessly put down by the army under King Henry VIII and in 1538 as he began to supress the remaining larger monasteries services were required to be said in English, instead of Latin and he had printed in Paris large editions of the English Bible to be put in every Parish Church. In 1539 after the rest of the larger monasteries were suppressed, the high nobility, the wealthy gentry and others who saw a chance for rich pickings, bid for these religious sites. Many new houses were built from the stone available, probably even Foots Cray Manor, the nearest monastery being at Lessness. Edmund Walsingham, at the time Lieutenant of the Tower of London, saw a chance for acquisition of the moiety held by the Priory and Convent of St Mary Overy, acquired it and the Manor was all in the possession of one family.
But where did Edmund Walsingham come from. In 1424 the Walsingham family had acquired Scadbury in Chislehurst and the sons were usually Thomas, Francis or William. Edmund was the youngest brother.
It is not known how much land in Chislehurst was owned by Edmund Walsingham at the supression of the monasteries. Much of the land north of Chislehurst was part of the Eltham Royal Estate. It is also not known the exact area of the parish of Foots Cray at this time. Edmund’s son Thomas III inherited in 1550. The family must have been well known to the Elizabethan Court. Queen Elizabeth I’s palace was at Greenwich, the naval base was Deptford and later Woolwich and in local circles Thomas of Scadbury was already a large landowner from family acquisitions.
Perhaps that is how William’s son, Francis Walsingham (1526 - 1590) a proto Puritan, exiled in the reign of Queen Mary I, in his twenties, entered the diplomatic corps when young and was English Ambassador in Paris in the late 1560’s. He had inherited the estate in 1556, at the age of 30, and immediately sold some of the land to John Ellis of Chislehurst and had fled the country. He acquitted himself well over foreign catholic plots against England and became the Queens second in rank Minister of State behind Cecil from 1574 until he died in 1590.
Being high in Government also meant that capital was required. In about 1579 Francis Walsingham sold the manor to John Gellibrand of Chislehurst. The manor lands did not include Foots Cray manor house also known as Pike Place and the land surrounding it which reverted to Thomas Walsingham III. When Thomas Walsingham V married Elizabeth Manwood in 1615, they were given the house previously rented and occupied by a John Collens who had died that year.
The Manorial Estate had meanwhile been sold to the Perkins family, then by marriage to the Edward Townsend who moved to Sidcup hamlet. On his death the manor was sold to a John Calcraft, then a Charles Minshaw, his daughter Mary and her niece Mary Ann Philpott and the title lapsed under the Property Acts of the 1920’s.
FOOTS CRAY HOUSE ALIAS PIKE PLACE
In about 1579 Francis Walsingham sold the manor lands but kept the house and the surrounding land of about 106 acres, and not being able, through Government business to keep the house on, passed it back to his cousin Thomas Walsingham.
This 106 acres is still visible today as the area of Foots Cray Meadows open space plus the land of Cleeve Park Secondary School and the Dower House lands at the southern end of Bexley Lane, and has come down through 400 years as an enclosed park. However within the park the land was emparked in the 1750’s when the small field system gave way to open parkland.
There are many villages in Kent that the normal traveller does not pass through. Passes by, maybe, on the side road to escape the modern traffic, without noticing the church amongst the trees, somewhat off the road. Many Kent villages exist off the main roads with the church and manor house at the end of the village street with the churchyard and the gates to the manor blocking further progress for today’s modern vehicles.
Foots Cray used to be one of this type of Kent village. We can surmise this because of the relative positions of the church and manor house at a distance of 400m from the main road.
Many of the local people who use the park know of Foots Cray Place on the terrace with an avenue of trees to the river. Not many can spot the outlines of the original house. The foundations, however, are visible on the surface between the extended churchyard and the fence of the edge of the old STC property. Those who walk the Cray Riverway will cross the flint and tile walls without realising that history was made where they tread.
From 1573 to 1579, Foots Cray Place was the centre of intrigue as Francis Walsingham was involved with exposing the plot to murder Queen Elizabeth I and replace her with Mary, Queen of Scots, by the Spanish conspirators.
The ridge and farrow is still visible in the field south of the avenue when the sun is low. We can also see the lines of the hedges created when the open field system was enclosed, by looking for the raised banks. There is one of these banks running north from the bend in Rectory Lane west of the church towards the avenue of trees.
Just south of the Avenue running up from the river is the main dividing hedge ridge with 20 acres of arable land to the north and south of this boundary . It is, unfortunately, not known when the enclosure happened. The most obvious time is at the dissolution of the monasteries when the new owner would have been able to request permission to enclose from the Crown. From this time and for the next 200 years the estate was a working farm using each field in turn to feed the animals. The layout of the fields and possibly how the open fields were originally divided is shown in the earliest plan of the estate drawn for Joseph Lem in 1683. An Elizabethan E type three storied manor house similar in size and shape to the Tudor frontage of Hall Place onto Bourne Road, Bexley does not exactly leap from the page when surrounded by 100 acres.
The fields are named after their sizes and position within the estate. By 1683 the marsh lands, known as the Brooke Meades in North Cray Parish on the other side of the river to the park are also part of the estate and may have been from the start of the single ownership, as an acquisition made pre 1538.
The plan also shows a track from the upper terrace across the marsh area, liable to flood, to allow the workers and farm animals across the river to the pasture in the Brooke Meades.
.
On the 1683 plan of the estate the field area immediately south of the church is called Stony Croft and there is also a strip of land which connects this field with the main road. Stony Croft is known locally as the ‘humps and bumps’ due to the uneven surface. The south western part of this field next to what is now Rectory Lane was used to extract gravel and the top 2m has been removed. East of this pit in the section of the field running south of the space between the church and where the manor house used to be, are some very regular ridges in the grass running east-west which, when mown by the Council mowers show up as barer areas than the surrounding lower surface.
The river is shown as braided on this map, with a track possibly known as ‘Fish Lane’ though the writing is indistinct, going down the terrace to a split in the river. Could this be a position of one of the original mills of the Domesday Book.
I believe that this area south of the church with various indications of multi-occupancy shows evidence that the original village of Foots Cray sat beside a track that led from the main road to the church.
From the history of the owners as listed on previous pages there is much activity in the records up to the Black Death year of 1349 and the establishment of a chantry chapel in 1351 by William Vaughan, then Lord of the Manor was stated in the Calendar of Patent Rolls and also ‘for the use of rents from properties in Foots Cray and West Tilbury in Essex to pay for three chaplains to celebrate divine service daily in All Saints’ as he intended to endow a college of chantry priests.
This seems to imply that the Black Death struck severely in the village leaving many properties empty. Possibly the only way for William Vaughan could raise money was to start a College of Priests with help from rents at his other holdings. There does not appear much activity recorded until William Warner became Lord of the Manor in 1398.
If the humps and bumps do denote a deserted medieval village, was the 1349 Black Death one of many visitations in the area. When son John Warner became Sheriff of Kent he may have had the original manor house embellished to enhance his status and it is probably from this date that the building has stone or brick added to the structure. The alterations to All saints Church may also stem from this time of wealthy ownership.
Edmund Walsingham acquired the Foots Cray estate in approximately 1530. Did he also own by inheritance parts of the Scadbury estate which came over with him. Would this account for the detatched parts aroumd Scadbury Park in Chislehurst.
In 1579 Francis Walsingham passed the estate back to his cousin Thomas and the 1583 Will of Thomas Walsingham left his house in Foots Cray to his wife Dorothie. It passed to the son Thomas IV who gave it to Thomas V on his marriage in 1616.
The later Walsingham family were more involved with the affairs of the village but we are not really certain where the village was. A suggestion is that after the acquisition of the property in 1579 by Thomas Walsingham the Foots Cray House estate was cleared in the area of Stony Croft and the villagers moved to the cross roads west of the ford. The Thomas Walsinghams’ had built up an extensive estate of property in Chislehurst and Foots Cray and it could be that the rent of property on the Foots Cray Estate did not go to the house but to the manor which the Walsingham family had sold to the Gellibrands of Chislehurst. certain lands within the original parish of Foots Cray were transferred to Chislehurst, but still under the ownership of the Walsinghams.
There are signs of old houses on the southern side of the Foots Cray High Street but their age is a mystery. The growth of the village around the crossroads must have occurred before the parish boundary was altered as it seems inconceivable that a local lord of the manor and the rector would have forgone all the tithes and rents to a church in Chislehurst 2 miles away. unless Thomas Walsingham was indeed the major owner of the land in and around Foots Cray. There are so many conjectures to be made of the reasons that a searchin the records for some hint of reason is the only way to solve the quest.
Francis Walsingham was living with his wife and 5 children in Foots Cray Place during the 1660’s and 70’s, the last entry being 1676. By 1683 a Joseph Lem had acquired the property, but which Joseph Lem.
On the plan of the estate in 1683 previously mentioned, within a cartouche, are the words ‘A Mapp of Pike Place with the lands thereunto lying in the parishes of Footes Cray North Cray and Chesilhurst, in the County of Kent, the inheritance of Joseph Lem Gent survey’d MDCLXXXIII’
Pause for a moment and read it again. Not Foots Cray Place but Pike Place. Why Pike? Does this relate to the western branch of the river as a fish pond with pike right next to the house, or did it relate to a place where the long pike, used by infantrymen in the medieval period.
In the parishes - why Chesilhurst, on the wrong side of the road or were there parts in Chislehurst such as the detatched parts not shown. And why ‘the inheritance’ -was there a Mr. Lem before Joseph who had acquired the property from the Walsinghams.
What was this “capital messuage or farm house with 1 acre, dovehouse, barns, stables and orchards, gardens, pastures, closes and hop-grounds” that made up the estate. The 1683 plan shows the house with garden between it and the churchyard on the top of the terrace, with the Pond Close immediately to the east around the river, the farm yard directly to the north of the house with the orchard to the north of the garden. To the north of the church is Church Field with a barn in one corner of this field. Was this the Tithe Barn.
In the early 1700’s the house was bought by George Smyth who died intestate and the registers show the burial of George Smyth in July 1742. The house was passed to three brothers and in 1744 George acquired the sole rights to the house. The registers showed that he married Mary Burt in All Saints in September 1740 and they had 5 children baptised in the church.
By 1747, however, George Smyth (Smith as alternates in the record) had sold the property to William Skinner who sold it to William Boothby in 1751. By this time the house may have required renovation which the new owners could not do. In 1752 Bourchier Cleeve acquired the house and decided to do what the previous three owners had found to be too big a task.
.
Bourchier Cleeve was a wealthy London Pewterer who did the unthinkable. He built a new house, called it Foots Cray Place and placed it on the brow of the ridge of the estate. But from there he could see the valley, but not see the river so he created one with a use. A Canal was dug from the western strand running along the 25m contour alluvial terrace taken from a sluice at the millpool by the main road. Here the Canal was some 4m higher than the river which had flowed further down the valley to due east of the new Place. But it was not just the new house, the estate was changed with the old field system grassed over and new orchards, stables and a kitchen garden.
A sluice on the Canal below the house will have flowed over a waterwheel that turned and pumped water up a pipe to a large 3m x 3m x3m water cistern above the house. When the grass is dry the position of the pipeline is visible running up through the park towards the cistern now in the Cleeve Park School grounds. From here there was naturally flowing running water to the house.
The Foots Cray Place that was finished in 1754 was to the design of the Palladian Villa in Vicenze and consisted of a square on a cross where the cross overlapped the square at which end of each arm was a Greek style pillared pediment. The central hall of the house was topped with a dome.
Bourchier Cleeve did not live long enough to enjoy his new home dying and being buried in Footscray in 1760 with his wife Mary followed him the following year. Their daughter, Ann Cleeve married Sir George Yonge and a few years later in 1773 the estate was sold to Benjamin Harenc. Like John Warner in 1442, Benjamin Harenc was Sheriff of Kent in 1777. His son, also Benjamin, and wife Sophia had four children, all baptised at All Saints Church before Benjamin the elder died in 1812.
Benjamin Harenc, the younger, sold the estate to Sir Nicholas Vansittart in 1822 and on his death in 1851 it was left to his nephew, Arthur Vansittart, who sometime later let the property. When he died Robert Vansittart inherited it. The 1871 census shows that there were only 9 servants in the building but in 1876 Sir John Pender took a letting.
In 1897 Lord Waring acquired the property after renting it and lived there until 1934, followed by the the Countess of Dufferin renting from the Waring Trustees. It was empty from 1936 to 1939 at which date the training ship H.M.S. Worcester moved in for the duration of the Second World War.
In 1946 the estate was acquired by Kent County Council Education Committee. The original idea of was for a conversion to a museum, but standing empty, the house burnt down on October 18, 1949 and was razed in 1950. It is now visible during hot summer days as marks in the grass.
Today by checking the plan against 19C Ordnance Survey maps, it is also possible to identify where the Canal flowed past Pike Place. The Canal was filled in with bricks and rubble from the bombed areas around and this area is always left as an unmown stretch of grassland on the edge of the river terrace. It is also possible to follow the 1773 plan on the ground as not much has changed in over 200 years.
Within the area known as the modern day Footscray Meadows it is still possible to see the 1773 plan of the Estate. The kitchen garden between the farm and the stables; the Stable Block itself, its various remodelling showing in the change in roof line, repositioned adzed solid beams, extensions and upgrading of space for carriages; in the enigmatic cross on a square foundations in the grass of the palladian villa exactly to the dimensions of the plans held in the Local Studies Library at Hall Place, especially visible after a dry spell; the cistern in the school playing field; the icewell, visible only as a concrete raft on the ridge above the house; the laundry and other outhouses and the drains that run through the small wood that abutts North CrayWood.
All these show the workings of a wealthy landowner and the house that stood there until one autumn night in 1949. There are, however, still visible signs within the park of how this wealth was spread.
The canalisation of the river north of Penny-Farthing Bridge within the public open space shows how the natural look of the marshy riverside land is an artificial effect brought about by years of careful management of the environment. At the lower river level the view of the park is suddenly revealed by walking north from the little bridge opening out into the wider flatter land of the Footscray Meadows and Five Arch Bridge Lake just beyond the old Parish where the boundary stone delineates the edge of the old estate.
Footscray Meadows is our one link with the past in the area as almost everywhere else has been built on, altered, hidden and generally lost to the historian and the archaeologist. In the Meadows the past is visible.
NOTES FROM THE REGISTERS
In the parish registers there were various notes relating to events of the day. Some are straight lists of monetary payments, some relate to decisions made by the vestry. During the reign of Elizabeth I, the vestry took on responsibility of parish decisions that used to be decided by the manor courts. The Poor Law Acts of 1597-1601 brought all the various laws together and until 1834 the vestry of the local church was the meeting place of the important people of the parish.
The notes in the registers were probably put down at the meetings and those in attendance signed against their position on the committee. The Rectors during the period from 1559 to 1812 totalled 16 with one reinstated after the Commonwealth and the Restoration in 1660. They presided over a small agricultural community which included arable, pasture and woodland. The notes also show that land ownership was not static, there was constant movement among the ‘elders’ of the parish for the main committee posts with the owner of Pike Place, Foots Cray Place from 1754, who was in effect the Lord of the Manor, being the Chairman of the Vestry Committee.
But first, the list of Rectors from the start of the registers:--
1557 John Smyth
1561 Nicholas Packman
1604 John Blankes
1608 George Holt
1633 Adam Wilson
1634 Edward Foliatt
1634 John Rowland (displaced)
c.1650 John May
1660 John Rowland (reinstated)
1680 Peter Metcalfe
1687 Isaac Hunt
1691 John Hancox
1700 John Whittel
1726 Richard Lucas
1747 William Smith
1766 William Gwyn
1768 Thomas Moore
The original parish registers were stolen in 1948 but they had already been transcribed. The Registers were typed copied in September 1916 by Mr. Thomas Colyer-Fergusson of Ightham Mote, Kent. The names from the registers and the notes are taken fron the three microfische sheets to be found in the collection of Kent Parish registers at Hall Place Local Studies Centre, Bourne Road, Bexley.
The notes in the Register confirm the Inductions of the new Rectors.
18 July 1604
Memorandum that Mr John Blanks Parsone of the rectory of Foots Cray hath within three weeks after his induction, read his articles at three severall tymes, the Sabaoth before his induction, the day of his induction and the Sabaoth after in the audience of the whole parish.
In witness thereof we the churchwardens et the rest of the inhabitants of the saide parishe have sett too our handes and names this XVIIIth day of July Anno Domini 1604.
John Hall his marke
January 11th 1607
Mem. that George Holt was inducted into the rectory of Foots Cray the 9th daye of January 1607 being Saturday and did read his articles the daye followings in the audience of the whole Congregation in the Parish Church then present. In witness thereof wee the churchwarden and parishioners haue here vnder subscribed and sett our handes and names the 10th daye of January 1607
Hugh Mannins X mark Edmond Wood Churchwarden
Thomas Wood X mark John More X mark
Thomas Smyth X mark Robeart Spenser
June 22 1634
Mem. that John Rowland was inducted into the rectory of Footscray the 22 of June 1634 and did read the Articles of Religion the Sunday following at morning prayer in the audience of the Church wardens and other parishioners who in wittnes thereof have here subscribed there names.
The mark of John Marshall Edward Bluet churchwarden
Thomas Woodley The mark of John Moore Churchwarden
Edward Watford his mark John Hall his mark
Also included are assessments for church repair:--
1662 March 31 To pay Antony Ellis Churchwarden for repair of the church and bread and wine and books for many years at 4d per acre -- £12 0 0.
1662 March 31 To pay Thomas Woodley Overseer 5s 10d and for the poor of Footscray at 2d per acre came to above £6 0 0.
1670 April 4 The repair of Foots Cray Church at 4d per acre - Nicolas Manning Stephen Frith Churchwardens the sum of £11 6s 4d and 15s remaining in the churchwardens hands total £12 5s 4d. Item due from Richard Baker for his farm 17s which at the request of Michael Pitman Nicolas Manning was forgiven him as they say.
The following notes where a . represents a illegible letter / number, start in 1622 under George Holt, Rector.
Herbage (or commonly known as pasture or grassland)
Herbage 1622
Thomas Hu..page 27 1 14 0
Mr Johnson 10 6 8
Widow Gelibrand 7 4 8
John Chapman 16 10 8
that anno 1623 Mr ..........seaven acres ..........payde vnto me for ............
eyght pence only vpo the ....... John Chapman
Herbage 1622. Acres
Thomas Hu..page 21 14 . As line should read above at 8d per acre
Mr Johnson 19 12 8
James Deane 3 2 0
John Dalton 3 2 0
Tho: Croucher 10 6 8
Henry Wright 3 2 0
Rich: Geal 5 3 4
................ 6 4 0
Herbage in Acres 1628 Herbage 1629 Herbage 1630
Sir Tho: Walsingham 29 34 30
Sir John Dingley 33 33 21
Mr Johnson 8 18 16
Mr Warren 11 11 11
John Stainesmore 3
John Gelibrand 6 8 6
Rich: Geale 9
Will Staynesmore 8 8
Wid Croucher 10 10 13
Wid Dalton 3 3 3
...... Curde 3 3 3
Thomas Watson 16 12
Mr Gelibrand 20
Christopher Comport 10
Thomas Tappie 1 3
Edward Watford 2
William May 10
Wid Delver 10
The smaller acreages seem to be constant whilst the larger landowners vary their pastureland. these lists obviously gave the Rector, George Holt, an idea of likely tithes for the annual assessment. Rector George Holt was sworn in as Rector on 9 January 1607 in the notes to the register and the Tithe Dues are quoted at length in the notes.
The auncient and laudable customes of the parish of Footes-craye deliuered vnto George Holt Rector the nynth daye of Januarye 1607 by Hugh Manninge Edmond Wood Thomas Wood wyth other auncient parishioners.
1) The parishioner payeth for a new melch cow 1111d
and for a fore melch cow 1111d
the parson hath no calf.
2) Lambes is the owner haue ten hee takes vp two, and the parson the third, if the owner hath but seauen the owner takes vp two and the parson the third allowinge the owner three groates for the lack of ten etc.
3) And so of pigs allowinge the owner for the lack of ten, for euery lack or want (obolus).
4) And so of geese allowinge for the lack of euery goose a fathinge.
5) For every henn two eggs and for the cock three? payd at Easter.
6) Wooll euery tenth pounde.
7) Wood viz bauin fagott talwood etc the tenth is payd in kinde the tenth load makeing for allowance for workmanship as commonly they do in other parishes, but this doth vex both owners and farmers of woodland in this parish.
8) Hoppes are payd in kinde, vnless they desire (?) and come to Compo (sic).
Here followed the signatures of parishioners. There then follows an addendum.
Concerning hopps at the first I compounded for a small matter viz VIs VIIId the acre to encourage them to plant But being once planted ( by the consession of hopments) they are better worth then 26s 8d the acre to the church. Therefore eyther take your hopps in kinde or make the owners to paye well for your tyth. Per me George Holt.
9) Euery out bounder and owner alloweth a ..... payd to the Church of Footescraye for euery acre he doth pasture or feed within the parish eyght pennies and the former out bounder accordinge to the rent.
In Confirmation of this custome wee whos names are subscribed saw in an old booke of accounts left by Mr Packman who was Parsonn here for ...... fower years That Sir Thomas Walsingham K.... payd vnto the Church of Footescrate Anno Domini 1574 for the herbage of fourteen acres nyne shillinges and four pence and for the herbage of sixteen acres Anno 1575 ten shillinges and eyght pence viz eyght pence for euery acre. And in witnesse that these are the Customes of Footescraye and haue so continued aboue three score years wee whose names are subscribed haue herevnto sett our handes Anno 1630.
Robert Spenser William Cripps John Moore XX his marke Barnard Elles.
It is possible from the notes to compile a list of Parish posts:--
Year Churchwarden Overseer Surveyor Bosholder
1664 Antony Ellis
Robert Marshall
1665 Robert Marshall
Nicolas Manning
1666 Robert Marshall
Nicolas Manning
1667 Robert Marshall
Francis Walsingham
1668 Francis Walsingham
Richard Pitman
1669 John Canon Thomas Bagfield Thomas Woodley
Nicolas Manning Martin More
1670 Nicolas Manning
Stephen Frith
1671 Stephen Frith Jeremy Cotes
Martin More
1672 Martin More John Winter
Edward Bluet
1673 Edward Bluet Mr. Francis Walsingham
John Winter Capt. Samuel Manning
1674 John Smith Stephen Frith Capt. Samuel Manning
Jeremy Cotes Michael Pitman
1675 Jeremy Cotes John Serles
Robert Marshall
1676 Robert Marshall Edward Bluet John Smith Moses Driver
Richard More Peter Furlonger
1677 Richard More Nicolas Manning John Smith Moses Driver
John Serles Peter Furlonger
1678 John Serles Jerome Cotes Edward Bluet Michael Pitman
Peter Furlonger Thomas Bagfield
1679 Peter Furlonger Richard More John Marshall John Streeter
Robert Hobbs (JM NO James Ellis)
1680 Peter Furlonger
Robert Marshall
1681 Robert Marshall
John Smyth
1693 John Smith John Terrill Hugh Manning Thomas Coates
Richard Manning John Serles
1700 Richard More John Smith
Nicolas Manning
1701 Richard Moore Barnard Wood Edward Blewett
Nicolas Manning
1702 Richard Moor James Tayler Richard Manning
Nicolas Manning (of Black Horse)
1703 Edward Blewett James Tayler Joseph Lem
Barnard Wood John Smith
1704 Barnard Wood
James Tayler
1705 James Tayler John Adelson John Moor
William Pittman
On the second page of the front cover of the register is what appears to be part of the answer to a major question that has surfaced when looking at the old maps and wondering why the parish is in one large and three small pieces at the time of the 1840 Tithe Map. Nothing seems to have changed on the ground for over two hundred and fifty years before the Tithe Map was drawn and it did not finally disappear until the formation of Chislehurst and Sidcup Urban District Council in 1934.
On 2nd page: 1620 June 23. Certaine parcells of Land lyinge within the parishes of Paules-Craye and Chiselhyrst belongeinge vnto the parish of Footes craye
1) The lower ende of Squire field belongeth to the parish of Paules craye and the vpper ende Contayninge about the quantitie of an acre doth belong to the parish of Footes craye.
2) In a wood adjoyninge to the vpper ende of Squires field commonly known by the name of Will Kittells Springe wee demande the quantitie of 2 acres more or lesse, the boundes are markt on the north syde vpo a oken pollard with an X vnder it F for Footescraye and on the south syde wee haue sett or mark vpo an old maple within the park pale of Sir Thomas Walsingham, both these were Confirmed vnto the Parish of Footes Craye by the Testimonie of Robt Spenser aged 66 there present and a booke of Mr Frith somtymes Parson of Paules Craye. All this was done the 23rd day of June 1628. At which tyme both Mr Snellinge and myselfe together with John Frith Robt Spenser John More Robt Hobbs and others mett at the place aboue mentioned to ende some difference betweene Paules Craye and Footes Craye.
Per me Georgius Holt Rectore de Footes Craye
3) We haue aboue the quantitie of an acre in parke field neere vnto Skodbury belonging to Sir Thomas Walsingham.
4) We haue about an acre in hill field belonging to Sir John Dingley (viz the necke adjoyning to parke field.
5) Barnard Ellis his cherry orchard and the close belowe it together with an acre of meadow below of Sir John Dingleyes below ellesis lande.
6) Barnard Elles yard barne and thos lande on the backe of his barne is in Footes Craye parish.
7) At the lower ende of Mr Mannings Brooke there is a neck about half an acre in Footes Craye parish.
The Register Notes - a discussion
In 1538, the same year as the dissolution of the monasteries, the Vicar-General, Thomas Cromwell ordered all parishes to keep registers of the baptisms, marriages and burials. Many did not during the years of intolerance between this year and 1558 when Elizabeth I became Queen. Foots Cray registers for baptisms and burials start in 1559 and the first marriage is 1567. In these early years all that is listed is the name and date of the event as in 1597 ministers and churchwardens were instructed to put the details down in a bound register and to copy out any documents in their possession as far back as 1558. The rector of All Saints at this date was Nicholas Packman, who died in 1604.
The earliest Register notes start with the Induction of the Rectors, with John Blankes being the first one to be inducted since the 1597 edict. It is of interest to follow the slow disintigration of the congregation in the memorandum of Induction--
1604 and the rest of the inhabitents of the said parishe
1607 and parishioners hereunder subscribed
1634 other parishioners
There are lists of herbage assessed at 8d per acre. The five years assessed show that pasture or grassland varied each year amongst the large landowners. None of these except Thomas Walsingham and Edward Watford lived in the parish, or to be more correct, had family baptisms, marriages or burials which would have covered the years shown.
The tithes are self explanatory i.e. 4d for a new cow, every third lamb and piglet and every hen two eggs, a cock three and for every tenth pound of wool.
George Holt states that he charged hops at 6s 8d per acre but the rate should be 26s 8d. It seems that the parish had some good producing hop fields and George Holt felt that he had been wrong on first assessment.
As stated before in the history of the owners of the manor, Thomas Walsingham of Chislehurst, had land in Foots Cray. An addendum to the tithes note quotes a note that had been found in an old Rector’s book that Thomas Walsingham was to be charged as an outbounder at 8d to the acre in 1574 and 1575, some sixty years earlier than the witnessing of the customs in 1630.
This note was signed by Robert Spenser, William Cripps, John More and Barnard Ellis, all but William Cripps had families as noted in the registers and could be at a time when George Holt was dying and the matter of tithes needed to be clear in the minds of the vestry committee.
The list of church wardens gives dates when these men were living in the parish and would be a useful guide for helping to identify families to help the population count.
By the time of this list over eighty years have passed since Francis Walsingham sold the manor. There appears to be some friction with St. Pauls Cray over boundaries. From the descriptions is it possible to identify the area on the ground today using the known positions of the detatched parts and the 1840 Tithe list of acreage size of fields. A full description of the tithe map is discussed in a later chapter.
Up to 1752, the year commenced officially on 25 March. The day after September 2 1752 was September 14 as England lost 11 days to fall in to line with the rest of Europe. At the same time the the first day of the year was officially changed to January 1. Up to this time the days between January 1 and March 24 would have been written 1607 or 1607/8 so that George Holt was actually inducted on January 11 1608.
THE PARISH REGISTERS
The object of the research into the Parish Registers of Foots Cray was to ascertain an approximate population of the Parish and at the same time to produce a list of families that were born, married and died over the 254 years from 1559 to 1812. Also to extend the names into the 19th Century up to the time that the Parish changed from an static agricultural community to a more urban environment would be a later chapter.
In 1538, King Henry VIII's secretary Thomas Cromwell, requested that all parish churches should keep a copy of the baptisms, marriages and burials undertaken within the parish. Due to the religious upheavals that followed not many of the parish records from this year survived.
In 1597 an edict from the new ecclesiastical authority, The Registrar-General, requested that all of these activities be put into Registers. Consequently parishes put all their records, as they had them, into these bound books, at least from 1558. The Registers for Foots Cray start from 1559 but until 1604 they only give the date and name under the baptism, marriage or burial.
From the commencement of the rectorship of John Blankes in 1604, relationships of the person named are also noted. However, the visitation of the plague in 1603 which seems to have affected Foots Cray severely caused a note 'plague' to be entered against the burial.
This was not the first return of the plague in Foots Cray as between April and June 1578, ten were buried from six different families.
These were the first impressions when collating the data from the fiches held at the Local Studies Centre at Hall Place, Bexley. As the original registers were stolen in 1948, the only reference we have to these early years is the typed copy done by Mr. Thomas Colyer-Ferguson of Ightham Mote, completed in 1916. The transcription from these fiches took me four days over a period of four months in writing down the names. Many of the details also stated that the person was not of the parish and these were noted 'nf' alongside the name.
I still have the Full Parish Register List in a very thick folder on a Lotus 123 file printed in 1998.
THE BAPTISMS
There were 1135 baptisms over 254 years, an overall average of 4.5 per year. Over the first 50 years there were 130 baptisms, an average of 2.6. Over the last 50 years, from 1763, there were 432, an average of 8.6 per year, but the annual rate increased from the late 1770’s. There were, however, years in the 1630’s when the total was much higher.
A noticable fact of the first period from 1559 to 1603 is the way the names are actually spelt. The first baptism, for instance is of a Jonne Davie. Is it male or female with the surname first. The first two burials clear this point as the mother, or assumed to be the mother, buried was Alse Davie. Therefore the Registers show the first name followed by the surname. Unfortunately these are the only two 'Davie' mentioned in the lists. Later on, after 1604, a Jonne is shown as a daughter and the sons as Jhon.
From 1604 this discordance gradually disappears but the first entry of a surname in the lists is often at variance with the following ones. Often the only way to be sure is that the name of the father is the same within a year or so of the original mention.
From 1559 to 1603 as stated, only the date and name is known. From 1604 to 1629 the name of the father is shown but lapses a few times until 1632 at the end of the George Holt rectorship. This is similar in time to the notes on the register where the churchwardens are putting down the payments of outbounders.
From 1633 to 1671 the father is shown and from then to 1677 the father and mother are indicated and from 1677 to 1687, the maiden name of the mother is sometimes shown. From 1687 the father and mother names are shwn through to 1812.
There are a few travellers mentioned. Strangely, the movement of travellers through the Parish is only recorded over the period 1720 - 1750 with 5 of these noted on the baptisms register.
Being a small community engaged in farming as a main occupation, it is not surprising that there are cases shown in the register records of couples marrying, raising a family for one of the partners to die, the other to soon remarry, have more children, and then die, and a further marriage with the original children now with step parents.
THE BURIALS
There are 925 burials in the burials register over the 254 years covered by the period under survey, an average of 3.6 burials per year. The burials follow a similar format to the baptisms with the only reference pre 1604 to two of Captain Murtons soldiers in 1588 and the victims of the 1603 plague.
From 1604 there is detail of the relationships, infant, son, daughter, wife or widow, with the male head details hardly ever shown with a relationship, unless to distinguish the name from a same named relative.
There are, however, annotations to outsiders such as 'a strange boy who died in the Parish', an Irish child, pedler, 'a strange maid who died at Mrs. Mauden's' . Also 'Cornelius Vanderlain of the Hague buried in Walsingham Chantry'. Most of the relationships are noted between 1604 to 1733. Also noted are important people such as the Physitian, Parish Clerk and Rector.
As with the Baptisms, the period 1649 to 1700 has a less number of relationships and there is also a break from 1685 to 1690 when no burials are shown. This was in the latter half of the Rectorship of Peter Metcalfe and the whole of the tenure of Isaac Hunt.
The following Rector, John Whittel gives more relationship details which the succeeding Rector, Richard Lucas does not maintain except for the burials of the important people. From 1733 to 1747 there are again no references to relationships of most of the burials and this situation is carried through the Rectorships of William Smith, William Glyn and Thomas Moore through to 1804. From 1805, references again appear through to the end of 1812.
From 1559 the number of burials follows the trend of the baptisms through to 1752. The peaks in the number of burials are 1578, 1603, 1617, 1625, 1639, 1647, 1673, 1700 and 1731 when the burials are more than double the average rate.
It is known that the plague was the cause of the rise in burials in 1578-10 burials; 1603-14; 1617-10; 1625-11; 1639-8; possibly 1642-9; and 1647-8. The plague of 1665 in London does not seem to have touched Foots Cray. There were other periods of higher than average burials later in the 1600's where evidence from other sources indicates periods of famine and dearth in the countryside due to poor harvests and extremely bad weather. For most of the early 1700's the average is above the 194 year average.
During the 1750's however there was a large increase in the number of burials and from that point to 1812 there would appear to be many changes in the poulation with many new familes in the parish.
THE MARRIAGES
Due to the close proximity of All Saints Church, Foots Cray to the parish of Chislehurst, the church catered for many out of parish resident marriages. There are 251 marriages in 254 years, of which 89 record no marriages including 1650 to 1661 and 1680 to 1692 when no marriages are recorded. During the Commonwealth of the Cromwell's the Rector, John Rowland was displaced and Preacher John May was resident and no marriages took place. The reason for the later blank period is not known.
Of the 502 names on the marriage register some230 were residents of Foots Cray Parish or married and stayed to raise familes. Only 69 of these were males of which there is no record of previous residence of 14 of them.
There is certainty of three females who remarried after death of their spouse.
Annis Linboroweed married Wylliam Austin 1582 and Wylliam Addesson 1590
Margaret Hobbs married Jorge Houdson 1601 and Thomas Bird 1605
Susanna Nott married Robert Hobbs 1628 and then Thomas Bagfield 1630
There are no males who remarried at All Saints Church.
There were a few years in the earlier period when there were more than the usual number of marriages but many were of out of parish residents.
With the advent of the mill and the inceased population there is an increase in the level of marriages but in no period does it exceed more than 4.
THE RESIDENTS OF FOOTS CRAY - 1559 TO 1812
Is it possible to approach a figure for the total households and resident population of Foots Cray in the period 1559 to 1812. With the aid of the registers, a guesstimate of households and population has to:--
1) take out of the equation the number listed as 'not of this parish' from the registers.
2) The resultant list has to be sorted into alphabetical order and also date order to find the longevity of the names of the residents over the 254 years under research.
3) To match the burials against the baptisms to erase name duplication.
4) To check that similar sounding names were connected, i.e. Gervis, Jervoyce; Blesit, Blisit; Plomer, Plumer, Plummer.
5) To separate the sequence of same name families into different time periods.
6) To separate the single name burials and list them.
7) To separate the single name baptisms and list them.
8) To separate those marriages where there was no subsequent activity on the registers, unless they were part of a family already listed.
Finding the population
After all the deductions had been made as outlined, the resultant combined baptisms, burials and marriages listings were printed in alphabetical order and date order. All 1775 names over the 254 years; 3 baptisms, 3 burials and 1 marriage per year on average meant that the Rectors could get on with other duties for most of the time.
Having established the number of names as they appeared in order in the alphabetical listings, I created a date matrix and entered each surname onto this blank date order list from the alphabetical list. This produced a total of 424 surnames.
This date order list was then annotated with the last date on the register of that name. If it was a single entry of burial a vertical line was placed after the name. If it was a single entry of baptism the name was ringed. All other names had the last date of entry with a vertical line if it was a burial.
The next procedure was to create a spreadsheet. The Lotus 123 Spreadsheet has 256 maximum columns which gave me one column for the name, one column for the first date of entry on the register and 254 columns for the years 1559 to 1812.
The 256 column spreadsheet format had been originally noticed when producing other lists and was a very convenient number for this research as it meant that I need only use the one file to add into when compiling. The surnames to be listed on the left hand column were given ample space for the full name with the original date entered in the second column. The date was spaced across the first four lines in a vertical format as the columns were a width of two characters. This gave ne a range of some 40 years on screen at a font that was easily readable.
The names, except for the one baptism entries, were then listed in order of sequence of first mention in the left hand column and the date of first mention in the second column. For each year between register mentions of a surname, a figure 1 was put under the stated year and transposed across the number of years that the family was mentioned.
This procedure took a large amount of time as many of the surnames were in evidence for a considerable period. The one baptisms entries were then listed in date order giving them 10 years for entry.
On completion I summed the totals for each year and found that from 1559 to 1761 the number of family households ranged between 27 and 50. After 1761 the surnames increased so that by 1812 there could have been as many as 76 family households. However, many of the later entries would have been residents of the village, but not of the parish.
To find the number of residents this first list was then copied and the alphabetical listing was then searched for the surnames in the order that they appeared and the number of residents were entered. This assumed that every marriage was 2 inhabitants and for each subsequent baptism an extra resident was there at the end of the year, the total being the number in that family at the end of December each year. If the child died in the same year the total was not increased. If it was evident that older members of the family were also in residence due to later burials or marriages the family totals were adjusted to reflect their earlier presence.
Marriages between out of parish residents who then had children baptised were treated as villagers from the year of marriage, If the new wife was a resident she would be part of the new family from the year of marriage and taken off the old family total that year. If she was the only parishioner with that maiden surname that name does not appear on the list. If the husband was part of an existing family, the new wife would be added into that family.
In some cases there were only burials of a name, sometimes more than one of the same name. In all these instances a period of ten years was entered before the first burial and the number adjusted dependent upon the relationship. If there was a marriage between non residents and no subsequent register mention except burial of either then 2 residents were shown until date of burial. There were only a few of these cases.
On completion of this mammoth task of entering the register listings the totals produced gave a surprising result. The Parish of Foots Cray had a total of about 100 residents at the start of the reign of Elizabeth I and in the 1750's was around 150 residents. After this period the total increased to 360 by 1812 but we know that houses were built in the village to accommodate the mill workers and all these extra houses were built in the Chislehurst Parish part of the village as is shown on the first editions of the Ordnance Survey maps.
FOOTS CRAY SOCIAL HISTORY
In the following records the population stated is that as ascertained from the reconstruction of the families based on the criteria already stated as should be treated as an accurate figure as far as the records can be judged. Residents that come into the village and never enter the record books before departing cannot of course be counted or be recorded.
To set the scene, Edmund Walsingham, of Scadbury, Lieutenant of the Tower of London from 1526 to approximately 1548 bought land around the manor over time and was probable instrumental in acquiring Foots Cray Manor for younger brother William in 1529 from Christopher Heron. Edmund’s youngest son Thomas and Francis, youngest son of William were both born in 1526. Francis Walsingham, aged 8 on the death of his father William, inherited the Pike Place estate at the age of 30 in 1556, having married Anne in 1552, sold some lands to pay for a period abroad and by the late 1560’s was the English Ambassador in Paris.
In 1573 Francis Walsingham was in a position of power in the Government of Elizabeth but was always short of money. He had to sell the only asset he had, land. He sold Foots Cray Manor and other lands to Thomas Walsingham III by 1579 but kept the house and the surrounding 106 acres where his second wife Ursula, called Mrs. Frances Walsingham in the Burial Register, lived unto February 1584. Sir Francis Walsingham sold the estate back to Sir Thomas Walsingham who died later that year. Edmund Walsingham, the eldest living son inherited but died in 1589 aged 32 and youngest son Thomas Walsingham IV, aged 21, inherited Scadbury and other lands, but does not seems to have lived there. A year later, Sir Francis Walsingham, Secretary of State, Chief Spymaster to Queen Elizabeth I, died in 1590.
There is an assumption in all the family activity of the Walsinghams that the ownership of land within the family also implied that the advowson of the Parish Church and ultimately, the Parish went with the ownership of land. Sometime in the 1580’s Francis sold certain lands but kept the parts that were probably his original inheritence, which were marked in the Scadbury Estate. Thomas Walsingham IV, according to the family tree in “The History of Chislehurst“ by E. A. Webb et al 1899, acquired the tenure of Scadbury in 1597 only acquiring the Estate in 1611.
Meanwhile, the edict by the Registrar-General in 1597 to put all baptisms, burials and marriages into registers may have severely tested the resources of the Rector Nicholas Packman. We shall never know also how many he missed putting in order into the registers.
He seemed set in his ways after 36 years as Rector and had entered the names as he had written them originally; Jonne, Annis, Alsie, Elysabeath and Margarit for the females; and Jhon, Rycharde, Wyllyam, Mathie and Tymothye for the males.
During the reign of Elizabeth I from 1558 to 1603, England, an insignificant little island on the edge of mainland Europe groped its way out of the middle ages and took central place on the European stage. Stephen Inwood in his book “A History of London” states that the population of London boomed from 50,000 in 1520 to over 500,000 in 1700. This expansion beat the ability of the City to cope and disease was rife in the overcrowded tenements and one of the probable reasons for the resurgence of the plague every generation.
In the parish of Foots Cray in 1559, which was a plague year in the City, there are 5 known burials in a total population of 100 in 36 families. Over the forty years to the end of the century many of these households only consist of 1 person and also there are 12 single baptisms in families where that baptism is the only record of that family name. Is this an result of the population explosion in the City or are local marriage records missing, or is it that they lived in the part of the parish that reverted to Chislehurst when Francis sold the estate to Thomas III.
Baptisms in the 1560’s and 1570’s were gradually increasing and the population was suddenly struck by the plague between April and June 1578 when 11 burials took place. The depth of despair within the local population is evident in the high number of baptisms (7) in the following year, 1578, a annual total not topped for 60 years.
The weather, however, was an unknown quantity; the bad wet years of the 1590’s are reflected in the lower register entries for baptisms, burials and marriages. The years 1596 to 1598 were known as the famine years at the end of a number of years of bad harvests and high prices.
It is not generally remembered that Spain launched a further Armada in 1597 to take advantage of the distress in England. Fortunately the Armada was scattered and sunk in a gale in the Bay of Biscay whilst on passage. Spain never again had the power to mount another invasion from its homeland.
From the start of the Stuart reign of James I in 1603 the names in the registers assume a modern appearance as if the country was more in control of itself. After the famine years there seems to be a few years of plenty with marriages and baptisms on a higher level. But these regenerative years with population up to 120 were interrupted by the worst visitation of the plague in Foots Cray; in the City it is estimated that there was a 25% death rate (56,570 people in total). In Foots Cray there are 12 recorded burials between August and October 1603. This equates to a 10% death rate and was the highest number of burials until the Napoleonic War.
The country was now definitely protestant but there were the disaffected catholics still prepared to upset, as in the 1605 gunpowder plot. After the 1603 plague visitation, Foots Cray seemed to stagnate as there were baptisms but not to the same extent as 25 years earlier. From 1610 there seems to be a general inprovement with the number of baptisms on a higher level. Thomas Walsingham IV acquired Scadbury Estate in 1611, but what is not known is what was sold elsewhere to buy the estate. But he still owned the Foots Cray estate and when John Collens, the Elder, who was renting Pike Place, died in January 1615, the building became vacant. The Estate had been given to Thomas Walsingham V and he was married to Elizabeth Manwood later in 1615.
For 15 years from 1610 Foots Cray boomed as a parish, maybe as a village, young couples were married, probably given accommodation on the estate and there was a steady flow of new children to the young couples. A new Rector from 1607, George Holt and the Hobbs, Nott, Barker, Wacrell and Ellis families all contributed to an increase in population to 50 families and 150 souls.
In 1625 the plague struck again, in the City, with the deaths of 20% of the population (35,417). In Foots Cray in October 1625 there were 10 burials and none were from the above 6 families. Over the course of the next 10 years there were almost equal burials and baptisms averaging 3 to 4 per year but there was also an increase in marriages. The new generation of the post 1603 plague were now of marriageable age.
In 1634 John Rowland became Rector, Thomas Walsingham V had a new wife and a year later his second son Francis was born. Perhaps this was the occasion for a call to start new families. There must have been a realisation that the population was declining, the major families were getting older and there had been some marriages within the parish young members. In 1636 there are 10 baptisms spread throughout the year, not topped until 1780. 1636 was the year of another London City plague but the only person to die was Ann Manning the 88 year old matriarch of one of the major families.
For the next few years there are many burials of young children in the parish. Whether this was the result of people escaping from the bulging City and infecting the local population or gereral famine conditions, the Griffin, Marshall and Manning families particularly lost a succession of infants and young children and quite a few of the elderly widows and old men also were buried in this period.
Over the period of the Civil War from 1642 - 1648 and during the following Commonwealth and Protectorate, the Parish seems to have stagnated, down to 28 families and 100 population. Rector John Rowland was displaced from 1650 to 1660 and in 10 years the Registers were only opened 14 times, 5 baptisms and 9 burials.
With the Restoration of Charles II the Convention that restored previous forms of Government, gave the King a fixed income and abolished all military tenures, feudal dues and purveyances in operation, John Rowlands reinstatement followed and Foots Cray Parish came alive again and from 1661 to 1670 there were 9 residential marriages, 42 baptisms but countered by 21 burials, none but a child of John Hatcher is noted of being buried due to the plague of 1665.
By this time Thomas Walsingham V, Knight of Scadbury, MP for Rochester, and Vice Admiral of Kent during the Commonwealth, and obviously in need of cash, sold Scadbury and moved to Little Chesterford in Essex, where Thomas Walsingham VI was running the estate.
Younger brother Frances had been given the Foots Cray Estate and moved into Pike Place, newly married to Elizabeth Farley and had 5 children all registered as baptisms. This is the period of the list of Churchwardens, Overseers and Surveyors in the notes to the registers.
The population and families were rising slowly but bad weather conditions created famine, spread diseases and were the cause of massive influenza, smallpox and typhoid outbreaks in Kent from 1677.
Joseph Lem acquires Pike Place and has an estate map drawn in 1683 including a drawing of the House. We do not know how accurate it is above ground but we do know it is still where it was drawn and of the size shown, under the grass. But from which direction was the church drawn and where is the North Chapel.
This is a peculiar period in the registers. Up to 1671, only the head of the family was mentioned in the Baptism Register, father most of the time but mother when the father had died. From that year the mother is occasionally mentioned as well as the father. From 1676 the father and the maiden name of the mother is also shown almost exclusively until 1680. There were no marriages in the Parish from April 1676 to August 1693.
This was the period of the poor harvests, famine, disease and the last 4 years of the Rectorship of John Rowland to 1680. who was buried a fortnight after the last shown maiden name, Sarah Caustin, in the register. The following Rectors, Peter Metcalfe and from 1687 to 1691, Isaac Hunt, also buried no one from July 1684 to August 1691. Was there a reason they could not marry or bury the residents.
One thing is certain - the notes to the registers are also blank from 1682 to 1692 with the Junior Churchwarden in 1681, John Smith, (whose first wife, Martha died in 1678 and whose second wife, Sarah, nee Caustin, had 3 further children from 1679 to 1682), becoming the Senior Churchwarden in 1693. Was the church closed for these 11 years, with baptisms only recorded. 1690 was the year commonly known as King William’s Dearth, with scarcity and shortage of food, and like 1687 had no baptisms, burials or marriages. 1690 is usually stated to be the last low point of the English population. From that time population has continued to rise. And so it was in Foots Cray.
By 1691 when a new Rector arrived at All Saints, the families and population were down to minimum levels of 30 and 110 respectively. New families are in the parish, this time with stronger parents and children who survive their early years such as the Hobbs, Sarles, Wood, Peek, Richardson and Wood families. The population does not increase as burials outnumber baptisms in the last decade of the 17th Century and many of these burials are of established members of the community.
One of the happenings noticed whenever a new owner is installed on the estate is the increase in marriages and baptisms for a period. The date of George Smith’s purchase of the estate is not known as a fact, even Edward Hasted writing in the latter part of the century has no date, but do the registers indicate a possible date. I think George Smith acquired the estate around 1711 when there was an increase in infant deaths, perhaps another famine, but in 1714 all the main child producing families had their children baptised - the Pittman, Wood, Peek and Richardson families added to their broods.
Studying the Parish Family Chart there is a definite turn of the corner for the Parish in this period, but it is not sustained and by the late 1720’s there is another fall in the population with many of the older parishioners being buried.
The 1730’s are a problem for the social historian. More burials than baptisms, 6 marriages in ten years, yet there is an increase in the number of families as the ratio of population per family drops below 3. This is the beginning of the agricultural / industrial revolution appearing in Foots Cray, where the two are combined and indistinguishable. Many of the wealthy families were getting wealthier, and the feudal ties that welded the community together were breaking down as land was acquired for large estates.
Many of the estates around the parish were now a smooth drive from London. There was, therefore, more time for the wealthy landowners to plan their large new houses:- Mount Mascal, North Cray 1740; Sidcup Place 1743: Lamorbey- rebuilt 1744. Perhaps the new owner of the Estate, George Smith, looked at Pike Place and wondered what he could do with it. Part of the problem with Pike Place was the location by the river. He may have decided he was too old and not rich enough. Nothing happened.
His nephew, another George Smith who was married in All Saints Church in 1740 was probably living in Pike Place. When his uncle died in 1742 without issue, the estate was left to his three nephews and in 1744 George Smith bought out his two brothers. He may have had a building that he knew was in need of renovation as the estate was almost immediately put on the market.
George Smith II may have owned property in the Parish as his family were in the locality until the late 1750’s in the registers. He may have also been instrumental in bringing in new families as the period from 1738 to 1743 saw no less than 15 new family names, and an increase in baptisms to an average of 4 per year for the decade of the 1740’s.
In 1747 the estate was bought by William Skinner, who lived there for four years before he sold it to William Boothby, and perhaps was living nearby after he sold it, as a Mary Skinner was buried at All Saints in 1754. Mr. Skinner was employed by the army, HM Ordnance, those days based in Woolwich Arsenal, so he may still have had local connections when this Mary Skinner, the only one of that surname in the registers, was buried.
Did William Boothby, who acquired the estate, in 1751 ever see it before purchase. Perhaps, once bought, he saw that the capital messuage or farm house with 1 acre, dovehouse, barns, stables, orchards, hopgrounds, gardens, meadows, pastures, closes and the Tigers Head Inn was too much to upkeep. He sold it to Bourchier Cleeve in 1752.
Bourchier Cleeve was a wealthy London pewterer who had designs to have a house to show how wealthy he was, at the expense of the local population. The old field system, as shown on the 1683 plan made for Joseph Lem, was swept away. The population was about 148 in 46 families but in 1753 and 1754 there were 5 baptisms and 20 burials, of which only 3 of the burials were infants. Was this high number a result of displacement from the land. A total of 8 of these burials were single male name mentions in the registers, i.e. no baptisms, marriages but only burials. This meant that there was a reduction in the parish population to about 136.
Bourchier Cleeve died in 1760 having changed the landscape around the manor. The acre field system was grubbed up as a new palladian vlla was erected on the terrace at the highest point on his land from where the river could not be seen, so he had a canal built on the edge of the first terrace above the river. With a little white bridge across it and a wheel pumping water up the hill to a cistern above the house, the original house, next to the canal may have become waterlogged.
It is from the death of Bourchier Cleeve in 1760 and his wife Mary in 1761 that the population begins a steady increase with Ann Cleeve the owner of the estate. It is not known when George Young came on the scene, but it is known that after he married Ann Cleeve in 1767 and took over the estate, they moved out and let the house.
In 1767 a mill was built over the River Cray for papermaking. The population by register - which was by this time above the physical limits and must now include residents of the new houses of Foots Cray village in Chislehurst Parish - had increased to 176 in 53 families. The weather for the period did not help, 1768 to 1774 are recorded as very, very, wet years now known to have included 3 of the worst autumns on record. This could be the reason for the failure of the paper making business by 1770. By 1772 when the estate was sold to Benjamin Harenc the register total was up to 200 people in 63 families.
Benjamin Harenc had a survey drawn up for him in 1773. This details in acres, roods and perches the exact area of each of his lands and fortunately for the historian gives a snapshot of the land, as did the 1683 plan and the later 1840 tithe map. Benjamin Harenc later acquired the failing mill as it does not appear on the 1773 map in his ownership.
We must, therefore, come to a conclusion that, after 1760, the Parish Registers are recording the expansion of Foots Cray village and are no longer relevant for a social history of the parish. Forty years later in 1812 the total current population of the Registers of All Saints had risen to 86 families and 383 people.
Foots Cray as a village with the appearance of rusticity, disappeared in the year 1752, never to return, The land was in-parked, new agricultural methods tried and the aspects of control held by the lord of the manor were forgotten. In the rush to make money new industries were created and more people resided in the village but not in the parish. Those trying new ideas have to have one eye on the weather which played a part in the state of health of the nation. The 1780’s were cold winters and wet summers and in 1788 the crops rotted in the fields across Europe bringing on the French Revolution in 1789.
In Foots Cray registers the 1780’s were times of only one marriage between 1783 and 1791 of an out of Parish couple, and 1784 was a high year of burials of the adults. But with new family names entering the registers at 3 on average a year, the baptisms of young children continued unabated.
When the country went to war with France in February 1793 the parish registers were experiencing a booming baptism rate of 9 baptisms a year, twice the average rate over the whole 254 years. In the same period burials were averaging 7, twice the full period average, whilst the marriage was joined by 2 more in 1791.
This war affected Foots Cray, from the start of the war, to the famine years of 1799 to 1801, at times the baptisms equated to a fifth of the total households but 18 of the 33 new families had their only appearance in the registers as one baptism in this 9 year period. There were119 baptisms, (average 12 per year), 64 burials (7), and 14 (3 every 2 years) marriages in this period.
As the war dragged on prices began to climb as trade was disrupted. Foots Cray experienced a dramatic downturn in baptisms and burials in the first decade of the nineteenth century. But marriages were booming as the children of the 1780’s and 1790’s incoming families used All Saints Church, Foots Cray as their natural local church and took the natural village away from its parish roots.
In 1811 the National Census recorded 239 in Foots Cray Parish. The registers record another 140 in families that used the church. The toll road had been there for 30 years, the village now looked to passing trade along the toll road from London and from Maidstone and turned its back on the history in the fields of Foots Cray Place.
There were some families that had multi-generations in the village. It is impossible to know whether these different generations lived in different houses or whether the house grew to accommodate the extra bodies. Consequently, I have treated each household as one family. There are over 20 families over the period that have for a considerable time, more than 9 family members alive at any one time. Some of these families have over 20 members and could not be all in one house, but they may have been in the village.
There was a constant stream of people in and out of the Parish, using All Saints Church as the local church for the village. The fact that it was in another parish, did not stop the population from marrying, having theirchildren baptised, and eventually being buried. But there were very few members of the parish who were baptised, wed and buried within the Parish.
The census details for the 19th Century for the six local parishes were:--
Foots Cray Eltham Chislehurst Bexley North Cray St. Pauls Cray
1801 151 1627 1217 1441 192 263
1811 239 1813 1450 1774 235 290
1821 221 1883 1586 2311 245 364
1831 308 2005 1820 3206 342 411
1841 358 2186 1792 3950 517 564
Acres (805) (3782) (2748) (5329) (1484) (1654)
Persons / acre
1801 .19 .43 .44 .27 .13 .16
1841 .44 .57 .65 .74 .35 .34
From the above table the larger villages of Eltham, Bexley and Chislehurst are shown also to be the largest in area but also have overall larger densities. The rate of increase from 1801 to 1841 is fastest in Bexley, but Foots Cray is the next fastest as even though the population is small it has also the smallest size of parish.
The 1841 census lists 64 households. The 1805 Ordnance Survey map does not show any houses in the area known as Pound Place between Longlands and Sidcup. This hamlet had 13 houses in the 1840 tithe map therefore the maximum houses was approximately 50.
However, the mill on the River Cray had accommodation for the workers, but it is not known from the earlier statistics how many families were resident at this mill or if they were actually included within the census details in 1801.
A major surprise from the resultant list of residents is that over the 254 years there were 424 family names of which 86 may be shown to have been on the register in 1812. There could be in this figure multiple occupation, maybe in the mill. Of these families only 11 were there, pre 1752, when Bourchier Cleeve acquired the Foots Cray Estate and only 18 were there in 1773 when the Estate was bought by Benjamin Harenc. Isolation of the early surnames from the registers shows 34 different names were resident around 1559 and only two, the Brooker and Manning families were there during the whole period through to 1812. Only the More, Smith, Weeks and Durling familes had been other residents in 1812 for more than 100 years.
Foots Cray, therefore has always had a transient population during the period of the registers which is a major surprise. Many families did not stay for more than 20 years before moving on. This was even more apparent once the mill required workers in the late 1700's.
CONCLUSION
Foots Cray Parish was always a poor parish even in the early Norman times when the estate was a small part of a much larger almalgamation of lands of the major Kentish families. From the way All Saints church was endowed, rebuilt and enlarged, there were many Lords of the manor who strived to meet their god by adding to it.
It is surmised that the Black Death dealt very harshly with Foots Cray. On the 1683 plan of the estate there is a track of land leading south of the church to the present High Street known as Stony Croft with undulating regular bumps in the grass. Is this the original site of the village from the ford to the Manor House and Church.
The records are silent for the next 50 years until the Warner family appear, and one John Warner is Sheriff of Kent in 1441. Perhaps it is in this period that the house known as Pike Place begins to take shape. The River Cray is braided here and perhaps it is a good fishing ground, hence the name.
The moiety of St. Mary Overy created a problem with the development of the parish and the part given to the priory covered the slopes of the hill facing the valley of the River Shuttle. In the eastern part of the parish the slopes facing the River Cray belonged to the Foots Cray estate.
Thomas Walsingham acquired the tenancy of the neighbouring small estate of Scadbury in 1424 and proceeded to be a significant part of the future history of the area as he, and his descendants, bought up land.
William Walsingham, youngest son of Thomas Walsingham II, was the Deputy Sheriff and Common Sergeant of the City of London, and was probably well placed to acquire the Foots Cray Estate moiety when put up for sale by Christopher Heron in 1529. Francis Walsingham was the youngest of William’s children when William died in 1534. Being on hand and an avid land buyer, elder brother Edmund acquired the St. Mary Overy moiety which may be the land that passed to Francis on his 30th birthday. With the sale of monastic lands in 1539, one must remember that Eltham, the next parish north west of Foots Cray and Chislehurst was a Royal Estate and the Walsinghams did have access to the Court.
We know about the history of the major families but not on the administration of that land. Hence we do not know if the dismemberment of Foots Cray Parish was tied up with the ownership of the land and the right to appoint a Rector to oversee the collection of tithes.
One of the oddities of the local parish boundaries is the Scadbury Manor itself. Why should the St Pauls Cray Parish have this wedge cut out which contains the Scadbury House and Moat and part of the wood on the top of the hill. Owning the future area of Frognal may have given the Scadbury Walsinghams access to the streams that flowed from the springline below the chalk down to the River Cray and also the River Cray, and the ability to merge his estates on the Foots Cray / Chislehurst Parish boundary and in time change the Parish boundary itself.
But none of the Thomas Walsinghams’ could take away an inheritance and William’s youngest son Francis, born 1526 was destined to be a great player on the international stage. As a young boy he probably knew the young Princess Elizabeth, seven years his junior, grew up to belong to the Puritan Tendency, came into ownership of Pike Place in 1556, sold parts of the estate and escaped to France with his wife of 4 years, to avoid the Queen Mary insurrections and was ideally placed in Paris to offer to listen to foreign whispers when Elizabeth succeeded to the throne.
It is probably his need of money that made him sell Cray Wood with two springs to his cousin Thomas III. Is this the present area between Kemnal, Foxbury and north of Beaverwood School on top of the hill, and how many other parts of the parish were sold to keep Francis solvent. He was, after all the youngest son of the youngest son and could not rely on any of the family money.
With the death of Francis Walsingham in 1590 and Thomas IV reclaiming the Foots Cray estate we arrive at the time that the people of the parish emerge from the mists of time, with over thirty houses in the Parish and 100 souls, it was not enough to fill the church of All Saints.
In 1536 all parishes were told to keep records of the baptisms, burials and marriages, only some 60 years later in 1597 with the creation of the Registrar- General, were they obliged to put all they had from the reign of Elizabeth into a register, hence the registers start from 1559. The registers record over the next 200 years a steady increase and decline and increase and decline dependent upon the infectious diseases, plagues and famines that the residents of the parish had to cope with. There are certain plague years that match the big city 12 miles away, 1578, 1603, 1625 but not 1665. There are periods of bad weather 1591-1598, dearth 1596-1598, dearth 1688-1690, and the period called the little ice age between 1768-1785 when the in 1784 the River Thames froze at London Bridge. These are recorded as high burial years with the dearths having low baptisms.
But there were also periods when the village celebrated, with new lords of the manor, plentiful years when the baptisms rocketed, marriages increased and there were fewer burials.
And also the fearful years of the Civil War, the Interregnum, the rise of the Puritanical preachers. The period when there were no records kept of the 1690’s.
Through all these celebrations and tribulations the population ebbed and flowed between 100 and 150, never more and sometimes a few less until the 1740’s when the estate went though five ownerships in twelve years, from ridge and farrow furlong strips under the old feudal system to landscaped parkland, with probably houses removed from the land and the people dispersed.
Do statistics lie, was Bourchier Cleeve perceived as a wealthy land and house clearer who did not care for his tenants and consequently they suffered hardship. Over 5 years from 1752 to 1757 there were 35 burials, many more than any previous 5 year period since 1559, and this excess of period total burials over baptisms continued for 11 years from 1753 to 1763, during the period of the Cleeve ownership. Many of the burials are of single men and women of which this is the only mention of the name. From this period, however, there was a slight dip in the number of annual burials and the population steadily increased as baptisms outpaced burials
In 1767 when George Young married Ann Cleeve a papermaking mill was set up by the river crossing and many small tenements were built for the mill workers in the Chislehurst Parish side of the village of Foots Cray Village. George Young was an absentee landlord and soon was looking for someone to buy the imposing palladian mansion.
With the acquisition of the estate by Benjamin Harenc, the building of houses for the millworkers in that part of the village in Chislehurst Parish and the popular use of All Saints Church for all the villagers, the creation of the Toll Road from New Cross to Foots Cray transferred the focus from the estate to the village and the focus became dissipated as the village was split between two parishes.
Some 150 years later, after Sidcup town had emerged from Foots Cray village, in 1934, the inevitable finally happened as Chislehurst and Sidcup Urban District Council was created from the two parishes, all because Queen Elizabeth’s spymaster was always short of money being the youngest son of the youngest son. Somehow the original pre-Francis Walsingham boundary between Chislehurst and Foots Cray had survived in the records as this was the ward boundary created chosen in 1934.
