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what3words location - ///paces.vegans.hissing |
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Hempstead church and its parish are a member of the Matlaske benefice, which is a benefice containing seven churches in the Holt Deanery within the Diocese of Norwich. |
Hempstead church is a Grade ll listed building, originally dated as late Saxon or Saxo-Norman but was almost entirely demolished and then rebuilt slightly to the south around the year 1300. The new church included the original Saxon tower, a Norman doorway and another doorway built in the 1200s. The chancel was then rebuilt in 1475 and the south porch was constructed in 1500s. The nave windows were replaced in the 1600s. The original and much taller church tower collapsed between 1728-1743 and was then rebuilt as a much lower construction in 1744. Somewhat unusually, the apse, which was added in 1925, has a thatched roof, which was rethatched in 2019. The chancel was built in 1930 funded by public subscription. The original tower contained three bells but the present, lower tower now contains one bell. The register is said to date from 1558. |
A Saxon-Norman church with west tower, and perhaps a slightly later Norman south doorway stood to the north of the present building. It was mostly demolished, after it had received a new north doorway in the 13th Century, and the present church erected around 1300, perhaps following an attempt to make a nave with two aisles had failed. |
Please note - Church Services are virtual only until Covid-19 is under control Letter from Rev David Longe detailing Church News and Services w/c 14th Feb 2021 |
Latest edition of our Church & Village News magazine
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Rector | Revd. Canon David Longe - 01263 577252 |
Lay Minister | Gill Peat - 01263 734226 |
Lay Minister | Judy Rosser - 01263 587584 |
Authorised Worship Assistant | Dr. Alain Wolfe - 01263 577292 |
Acting Church Warden | Airlie Inglis - 01263 577440 |
Church website -
https://www.achurchnearyou.com/church/10333 Church Instagram account - https://www.instagram.com/hempsteadallsaints/ |
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The Church has a brick tower, built in 1744, and is a vicarage . . . White's 1836 |
The stained east window is a memorial, and was inserted in 1876 by the Rev. Charles Louis Rudd M.A. vicar 1873-89, who also presented a carved oak reredos and massive brass lecturn Kelly's 1892 |
In 1915 a memorial window was inserted to Richard Hardy, sometime churchwarden Kelly's 1916 |
The chancel, which is of flint with brick facings, and which has a thatched roof, was erected in 1930 by public subscription Kelly's 1933 |
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c.1963 |
Nativity play - c.1963 Back row - ?; Linda Gidney; Gloria Baker Front row - Sally Gee; ?; Gwen Baker; ?; ? |
Church history |
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Sometime between the 1728 Corbridge map of Green Farm, which shows the Church with quite a large tower and 1744 when the (reduced) tower was put in order, there was a major collapse. This led to a decision by the Parish to rebuild the partially collapsed tower and to pay for the repairs by selling two of the three bells. In 1743 a Petition was prepared in the name of the Reverend John Grey the Vicar, John Staines the Churchwarden, Daniel Abill the Overseer and other parishioners. (This is exceedingly curious since according to the Revd Auden's researches the Vicar from 1742 was one Richard Chase!). For reasons unknown, the Petition did not proceed in its then form, there being endorsed on the outside of the Petition “Mr John Grey Vicar of the Parish of Hempstead having refused to sign, this Petition was prepared and signed by Robert Britiffe Esq Impropriator”. Furthermore his signature was supported by other parishioners, including John Wood, Gent of Green_Farm who was then almost certainly the most influential village resident. Despite the Vicar's refusal to support the Petition, the faculty was granted (NRO 23240 Z 92). The faculty of 1743 (NRS12994) partly reads as follows - There is a detailed account signed by John Staines and Daniel Abill listing the cost of the demolition and rebuilding which came to £67 - 02 - 9½ John Staines
In notes left by Mr Auden appears the following: - The sad shortage of memorials came to an abrupt end with the arrival as Vicar of Charles Louis Rudd in 1873 who must have been a man of enormous energy and, presumably, wealth. John Trohear Rudd Capt HM 59th Rgt died 27.6.75 WM Frederick John Rudd Lieut Colonel Royal Scots died 13.8.68 (this window was executed by W C Constable FSA of Cambridge)'' The Reredos is equally uninformative saying that it “is erected to the memory of three sisters by their brother Charles L Rudd MA Vicar of this Parish 1886''.
It is curious that the Vicar's memorials do not list the names of those commemorated (ie “three sister”) while Mrs Rudd's memorials are more explicit. Charles Rudd also gave the harmonium in memory of his brother Captain John Rudd. He had died just after the Vicar was inducted when maybe a harmonium was urgently required. But why was John Rudd given a second commemoration in the window? The Revd A. M. Auden had a son Jack who emigrated to Canada. Jack's sister Rachel later commemorated him with a flower stand (first given to Sheringham Church but later removed and given to Hempstead Church). The inscription reads - |
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17th February 2020 |
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Font and balcony - 11th March 2020 |
Church chancel and apse - 11th March 2020 |
Vicars and Vicarage |
Where did the earlier vicars and curates live - if indeed they lived in the Parish at all? In East Anglian Archaeology Report No 8 (Norfolk) Andrew Rogerson and Nick Adams have written a fascinating report on the excavation of the moated site to the south-west of the church which they concluded was the site of the lost medieval Lose_Hall. ln that report they considered also the possibility of the site being that of the original vicarage and recorded the following information:- Rogerson goes on to state ''The Glebe Terrier of 1613 places the vicarage to the south of the church and between the road and the manor close and described it as "a dwelling house and a barne with one little outhouse . . .'' So somewhere underground to the west of the village playground there must still be the foundations of the original vicarage, its “barne'' and outhouse. Presumably it was Robert Watson, vicar between 1599 and 1649 but also Vicar of Bodham and Baconsthorpe, in one of which villages he may have lived, who let the former vicarage fall down so that since the mid-l7th century to 1876 there was nowhere in the village for the vicar or (unless he took lodgings) for the curate to live. Historically many parishes were held in plurality - a practice increasingly under criticism in the middle of the 19th Century as can be seen in Trollope's Barchester novels. In any event, before that, it was commonly said that “In the 18th Century the Church slept”. Hempstead seems to have been typical with the tower being allowed to fall down in the seventeen-thirties. At the time of its rebuilding in 1744 the Vicar was conspicuous by his absence with the responsible churchwarden being permitted to record his own success in rebuilding it with his own named and dated plaque so prominently displayed. Oxford Movement and the great wave of reform that so changed the Church of England in the latter part of the 19th Century, Nowhere else did this wave operate more spectacularly than in Hempstead with the arrival of Charles Louis Rudd in 1873 after the death of the Rev. J. C. Leak who had been Curate of Hempstead for 14 years but Rector of Birmingham Parva for no fewer than 45 years. Within three years, in 1878, the new vicarage, built by public subscription, was erected on the Glebe Land adjoining the Church. The architect was J. B. Pease of Norwich and the builder R. Cornish of North Walsham. The whole of the Church was furnished at the expense of Mr. & Mrs. Rudd with pulpit, reading desk, lectern, font, chandelier, reredos and harmonium as memorials to members of their family. Not content with their achievements the Vicar, one year after building the vicarage, built the infant school (later to become the Reading Room). In the parish magazine for October 1877 it was recorded that “a room capable of holding 80 people has just been erected by public subscription. It is built of stone and red brick and has a neat appearance. The want has been long felt in the parish of a building which would answer the two fold purpose of an infant school and Parish Room. Mr. West of Holt is the builder'' A hundred years later Mrs. Diana Spalton when converting the school (bought from the Diocese) into a house for herself discovered a number of letters from former pupils thanking the Rev. Rudd for educating them there. Mrs. Claudine Fuller (1916-1998) who lived in Hempstead all her life, recalled the Vicarage in her childhood - particularly the much loved Gleave family. They organised for the village children tableaux and picnics in the woods. All the village took part in the money-raising for the Apse in 1925 and 1926. The Sunday School every year had its outing at Sheringham, being taken in Mr. Hagen's Waggon. The vicarage then went into limbo. It was let for a number of years. Colonel Philip Shirley was a tenant and was Church Secretary and Treasurer from before 1960 until 1977. At one stage it was occupied by schoolmasters at Gresham's. It was really sold in the late nineteen-seventies and became owned by Mr. John Thomson. |
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Church cottages backing directly onto the churchyard - 11th March 2020 |
Incumbents |
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Ralph de Birstin | 1301 |
William M. Marcon Curate of Hempstead and Rector of Edgefield | 1814 |
Simon de Eggefield | 1332 |
John Gunton Curate of Hempstead | 1833-1839 |
John Chatres | 1338 |
John William Methwold also Vicar of Wighton and curate of Wetheringsett | 1835 |
John Wright | 1351 |
J. C. Leake Curate of Hempstead for 45 years | 1859 |
John | 1370 |
Charles Louis Rudd | 1873-1889 |
Michael Crow | 1385 |
Thomas Webster Whistler | 1889-1911 |
Record lost. | 1385-1520 |
James Robert Hamilton | 1913 |
John Estmond | 1520 |
Claude Tennant Eastman | 1923 |
Henry Yarham | 1523 |
Paul Rogers Cleave | 1924 |
John Walett (deposed 1553) | 1543 |
Francis John Prior Wallis | 1932 |
John Cooke | 1544 |
Alfred Millington Auden | 1933 |
Robert Watson also rector of Bodham & Baconsthorpe |
1610 |
John William Leneve Norman Curate in charge | 1944 |
Nicholas Bacon | 1662 |
Walter Percival Tippen also Rector of Baconsthorpe with Plumstead | 1947 |
John Gray (Instituted) | 1694 |
Charles Scott Little also Rector of Baconsthorpe with Plumstead | 1953 |
Richard Chase | 1742 |
Francis C. S. Allen also Rector of Baconsthorpe with Plumstead | 1960 |
John Custance Curate of Hempstead | 1744 |
Stanley F. Hooper also Rector of Barningham, Matlaske, Baconsthorpe & Plumstead | 1979 |
William Pierce | 1746 |
Piers W. E. Currie lPriest in charge, also of Baconsthorpe | 1983 |
Thomas Meux Curate of Hempstead | 1766 |
David C. Candler also Rector of Barningham, Matlaske, Baconsthorpe & Plumstead | 1985 |
Edward Tilson | 1768 |
Paul J. Bell | 1995 |
William Tower Johnson Curate of Plumstead, Rector of Beeston ministered more or less frequently |
1770 |
Michael L. Banks | 2003 |
John Smith Rector of Holt ministered at Hempstead from time to time |
1772 |
Philip W. Butcher | 2006 |
Francis Bransby Curate of Hempstead and Rector of Edgefield |
1778 |
Michael Cartwright | 2009 |
John Ambrose Tickell | 1787 |
Marion J. Harrison | 2015 |
Stephen Frost Rippingale Curate | 1814 |
Michael Cartwright | 2018 |
John Lang Girdlestone Curate of Hempstead and Rector of Baconsthorpe | 1814 |
Rev. Canon David Longe | Present |
1385-1520 - at that time vicars were often laymen. Such vicars appointed priests as chaplains whose names were not always carefully recorded. |
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Website copyright © Jonathan Neville 2020 |