Castor Village – Overview 1066 to 2000

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Castor Village – Overview 1066 to 2000 Chapter 5 Castor Village – Overview 1066 to 2000 Introduction One of the earliest recorded descriptions of Castor as a village is by a travelling historian, William Camden who, in 1612, wrote: ‘The Avon or Nen river, running under a beautiful bridge at Walmesford (Wansford), passes by Durobrivae, a very ancient city, called in Saxon Dormancaster, took up a great deal of ground on each side of the river in both counties. For the little village of Castor which stands one mile from the river, seems to have been part of it, by the inlaid chequered pavements found there. And doubtless it was a place of more than ordinary note; in the adjoining fields (which instead of Dormanton they call Normangate) such quantities of Roman coins are thrown up you would think they had been sewn. Ermine Street, known as the forty foot way or The Way of St Kyneburgha, now known as Lady Connyburrow’s Way must have been up towards Water Newton, if one may judge from, it seems to have been paved with a sort of cubical bricks and tiles.’ [1] By Camden’s time, Castor was a village made up of a collection of tenant farms and cottages, remaining much the same until the time of the Second World War. The village had developed out of the late Saxon village of the time of the Domesday Book, that village having itself grown up among the ruins of the extensive Roman villa and estate that preceded it. The pre-conquest (1066) settlement of Castor is described in earlier chapters. The purpose of this chapter is to give a general overview of the history of Castor’s development between 1066 to date, in order to set the context for the later chapters. In some cases the statistics used include Ailsworth and the other villages, as they were all in Castor Parish. Most of the land for much of the village’s history was owned by two great landlords, the Church and the Fitzwilliams of Milton. Castor had probably been relatively a more important place in the early medieval period, with its impressive church, four daughter ‘chapelries’ at Ailsworth, Sutton, Upton and Milton, and the important baronial court as well as the manor courts [2]. The church, as the landowner, was granted a charter to hold a market and summer fair in 1340, [3] the lineal descendant of which is the Church Summer Festival and Fete. It never developed into a late medieval market town, like Oundle or Uppingham, for which it had the potential in the early Middle Ages – possibly because it was too close to a larger rival, Peterborough. The Original Saxon and Medieval Village Nucleus The village of Castor developed around two core areas; firstly, the church with the cluster of buildings surrounding it, including the original rectory – now Vine House, and the Glebe Farm - now the Old Rectory, and secondly the farms around the area of the Green. From the plan in Fig 5b, which shows the cluster of old farms huddled cheek-by-jowl, with the fields surrounding them, the early village nucleus is readily identifiable. The original Saxon and medieval green, around which the farms clustered, was probably much larger, being rectangular in shape and incorporating all the land between the present Green and The Cedars. The dotted lines on the plan show the probable original extent of both the Green and the churchyard, for there are no pre-18th century buildings in that rectangle, whereas the farm buildings surrounding it are earlier in origin. The Elms and Duro Lodge were, it seems, built in the Fig 5a. Castor Green: view looking North towards Clay Lane before nos 18th century on what was the central part of the 4 & 5 The Green were built (pre 1914). 57 former Green, as were the smaller cottages and outbuildings surrounding them. The Village Cross was also on the Green. We know from old photographs that it was at one stage beside the shop on the North East corner of the Green. Its socket and stump are still to be seen on the Green today. The stump of another old cross on Love Hill, beside the wall of Fig 5b. Castor Historic Centre: This map is an extract from ET Artis’ map; super-imposed Castor House, was dug up dotted lines show probable outline of the original Green and Churchyard. The hatched buildings and stolen in the early 1990s. in the area of the churchyard are the Roman buildings Artis excavated. Note the pre-18th We also know from an old century farms round the Green. map that the village stocks were on the corner of Stock’s Hill (hence its name) and the Peterborough Road, near the Royal Oak. The stocks were still being used in the 1830s for we read that on 30th January 1830 ‘a sharp, frosty night, Thomas Glithero, John Spendlove and William Chamberlain, came home from Peterborough very fresh. Wm Chamberlain was afterwards found set in the stocks’ [4]. The Abbey Lands The village that Camden Fig 5c. Castor: Church Hill looking East towards The Cedars; the Old Chapel on the right is visited was still very much a now Bothamley and Ellington Engineers’ Office. product of the feudal system, under which the King, in essence, owned all the land, and granted it to about 150 Tenants-in-Chief, one of which was the Abbot of Peterborough. The Abbot in turn sub-let some of his land to others, knights and so on, and kept some for his personal use. The Abbot’s land was the ‘honour’ or ‘barony’ of Peterborough, but the ‘court baron’ for the whole of the barony during much of this period was based at Castor, not in Peterborough. This estate, held by the Abbot, comprised the whole of the present Fig 5d. Village Farm House, photo 1920s. The house dates from 14/15th century. Benefice of Castor and 58 Ailsworth with Sutton and Upton with Marholm, including Milton. It was divided into a number of manors each with its own manor court. Castor itself, in addition to the baronial court, consisted of two major manors, with a fledgling manor in the parish at Belsize, and a further manor at Milton. The feudal lord of all the manors in the early days was the Abbot, some of these being ‘in demesne’ (kept for his personal use), other manors being leased to feudal sub- ordinates. King Edgar’s charter gave Castor to the Abbot in AD972 [5] and the grant was renewed in many subsequent charters by later monarchs. The Manors in Castor Castor or Berrystead Manor By the time of the Domesday Book [6] in 1086, the abbot held one manor in Castor ‘in demesne’, later known as the Castor or the Berrystead Manor. In 1146, a Bull by Pope Eugenius III confirmed that Castor and all its appurtenances belonged to the abbey [7]. Abbot Alexander of Holderness (1222-1226) [8] built a hall for his manor at Castor. The site of this hall may be the moat South West of Village Farm at Grid 119985 - now a Scheduled Monument in the ‘Empties’. It seems possible that the site of the manor farm was the farmstead now called Village Farm or perhaps Manor Farm. When Abbot Godfrey died in 1321, part of his property ‘in demesne’ included a manor-house with garden, dovecote, woodland and fisheries in the Nene. This remained a church manor until the 20th century. Thorold’s or Butler’s Manor In addition, the abbot also had a further secular manor in Castor sub-let to five knights, later to be known as Thorold’s or Butler’s Manor. Part of this eventually descended to the Fitzwilliams. By the time of Richard I [9] in 1189, this manor was in the hands of one Thorold, the Abbot still being the Tenant-in-Chief. It was partitioned by his sons after a court case for which we still have transcripts [10]. Thorold’s elder son Richard, the priest of Castor, gave his share to the Abbot as part of his dowry for becoming a monk. This included the advowson of the church at Castor. The rest of the manor descended to the younger son Geoffrey, and this family remained Lords of the Manor for some generations. In 1460 Sir Guy Wolston held the manor, now also described ‘as the Manor of Castor, otherwise called the Manor of Butler’s and Thorold’s’. This manor passed to his son-in-law Thomas Empson, then in 1515 to Richard Fitzwilliam. In 1534 William Fitzwilliam died, holding this manor from the Abbot. It is still held by Milton today. Milton Manor The manor of Milton, in the parish of Castor is described in the Domesday Book as being ‘of the fee of the Abbey and held by Roger’. By the 12th century, Thorold held it from the abbot and it was then held successively by different families until 1391 when John de Wittlebury leased it. The manor remained with his descendants until Robert Wittlebury and his wife Anne granted it to William Fitzwilliam. Milton Manor seems, in practice, since the time of the Domesday Book, to have included Marholm as well. Milton was clearly a small village at one stage, and was granted a charter for a market in 1304. The villagers probably moved to Marholm when Milton was ‘emparked’. The later history of Milton is described in Chapter 22. Belsize It would seem that there was also a sizeable hamlet at Belsize, growing up around the grange farm. In 1214 Abbot Robert built houses here and drained the land.
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