634

MONKS KIRBY PARISH. MONKS KIRBY is an extensive parish, 7 miles N.N.'V. from Rugby, comprising the following scattered places and hamlets :­ Brockhurst, Little Walton, Street-Aston, Mazzle Leays, Cesters Over, Streetfield, , Cloudesley Bush, Easenhall, , Newnham Paddox, Stretton-under-Foss, and Newbold Revel. The entire parish contains 9,640 acres of land, and in 1871 there were 2,000 inhabitants. The parish is in the Northern Division of the county. MONKS KIRBY is a pleasant and well-built village, 7 miles N.N. W. from Rugby, 10 E. from , and 5 E. from , and is near the Brinklow Railway Station on the Trent Valley Railway. Itis in the Northern Division of the county, Lutterworth Union and County Court district, Rural Deanery of Monks Kirby, Archdeaconry of Coventry, and Diocese of Worcester. William ~he Conqueror gave this manor to Geoffrey de Wirce, one of his followers, who rebuilt the church and dedicated it to the Blessed Virgin and St. Edith, and granted it to the monastery of St. Nicholas, founded at Angiers in 1020. In the 12th year of King William he also gave the land and tithes out of various lord­ ships in to the monks. After experiencing the various "icissitudes attending alien priories in England, the manor was granted by Henry VIII. to Sir Charles Brandon Duke ofSuffolk, from whose family it came by purchase to Basil, Lord Feilding, after­ wards , and continues in that noble family. The Carthusians originally possessed the great tithes and rents of par~ ticular lands in the villages of the locality, and were included in tho endowment of Trinity College, Cambridge, by Henry VIII. The lands, &c., are still held by the college. Their annual value is about £3,500. We read in Camden's History of that there" are certain tokens of a Roman Station" here, and he adds "For by digging the ground near the church, there have been discovered the foundations of old walls and Roman bricks. There are also three or four heaps of earth in an adjoiniug pasture, apparently the monuments or sepulchre of some military persons in those days;