Visit to Wootton, Oxfordshire

On a sunny September day, around 28 Society members gathered at the church of St Mary the Virgin, Wootton. Secretary, David Elvins, led us from the warm sunshine into the cool but beautiful building. The guide booklet says in its introduction ‘Like so many country villages there are no records of the earliest days of the Church of Saint Mary. The church was probably a squat, stone building consisting only of the nave. However, from an order to the custodian of the King’s houses at Woodstock, we know that in 1273 King Henry III made a gift of oak trees for building the tower which may well have been a timber structure at this time.’ David gave a short talk about the wedding of Francis Kilvert to Elizabeth Rowland which took place on 20 August 1879 at St Mary the Virgin in Wootton, Oxfordshire. He was 38 and she was 33. Elizabeth’s father, John Rowland, had trained as a doctor but gave it up to become a gentleman farmer.The family lived by their motto ‘Piety Strengthens Families’, doing many good works in Wootton. It is thought that Francis and Elizabeth met in Paris in 1876 – a meeting engineered, perhaps, by Kilvert’s friend Mayhew. Elizabeth’s mother, Anne, was connected to the Prattenton family who would probably have been known to Maria Kilvert of Worcester, sister of Robert Kilvert, the diarist's father. Although not much is known about the wedding, we do know it was wet, spoiling some of the evergreen arches so lovingly made by the villagers. From his book ‘Francis Kilvert’ Rev David Lockwood thinks Elizabeth would have been a kind and thoughtful woman, though not a very fashionable one. He notes that in the photograph taken at Dora and James’ Pitcairn’s wedding, (Kilvert’s sister), Elizabeth is wearing a bonnet whilst the other ladies are wearing hats. Following a honeymoon in York, Durham and Edinburgh, the happy couple returned to Wootton on 1st September 1879. On the 7 September they were at Langley Burrell, returning to Bredwardine on 13 September 1879. The Hereford Times gives a lengthy description of the homecoming. The next day, Francis took services at Bredwardine and Brobury. The following Sunday he was too ill to carry out his duties so his father did the service at Bredwardine whilst Pope covered Brobury. By Tuesday Francis’s condition deteriorated. Sadly, the young man who had given so much and still had much to give, died. The burial was on 27 September, two weeks after returning home. David read the last diary excerpt that we have and concerns Kilvert’s visit to Credenhill.: Thursday 13 March. ‘A lovely cloudless day….’ David pointed out several interesting items around the church, the memorial tablets on the front wall to commemorate Anne and John Rowland and in one corner, 8 wooden crosses, (see photograph below), from northern France, marking the fall of local men in the first world war. A figure of Christ, found by a Capt Dashwood in the ruins of a church in Menancourt in 1917, had been erected on one wall, just three days before his death on the battlefield. In the churchyard, we were shown the graves of Elizabeth’s parents and also of Mr and Mrs Perfect who had both been head teachers in Radnorshire. Rev Tim Shepherd, from Wootton, gave a short talk about the village. After lunch at Killingworth Castle, we trouped off to Holly Bank, home of Elizabeth Rowland. David explained that William Wilkinson, the architect, had also designed a lot of properties in North Oxford. In 1870 there were 1000 people living in Wootton, today there are just 600. In 1872 Wootton was the centre of agricultural unrest. Christopher Holloway, a Wootton Methodist, encouraged farm labourers to join a recently formed trades union to raise wages of farm labourers from 11 shillings a week to 16 shillings a week. John Rowland and John Bowford formed a farmers’ defence association and soldiers were brought in to gather the harvest.The rebellion eventually fizzled out. In 1875 there were 47 boys and 45 girls with 45 infants in the village school. A short walk from the inn brought us to the lower part of the garden of Holly Bank owned by Lord and Lady Kerr. It stood, glowing in the warm autumn sunshine. Lord and Lady Kerr appeared and waved to their visitors. To our delight, we were invited into the house to look at plans of the original design. Like children in a sweetshop, bemused at this very unexpected and very generous invitation, we gazed around, determined to absorb every little detail. We were led into the dining room to look at the plans spread on one of the tables. The large Victorian room with its stone fireplace and high ceilings, its broad oak floorboards and ornately carved dressers seemed borrowed from a time long past but fondly remembered. From here we went into a passage; we saw the huge larder, the butler’s pantry and the biggest kitchen with an enormous island in the middle. The double sinks were the biggest I have ever seen, but then in Victorian times there was a lot of washing up to do and no electric dishwasher! A huge airing ‘maid’ hung from the ceiling and an enormous dresser stood at one side of the room. Everything was so big! We saw the scullery and noted several servants’ bells and wires on the corridor wall; we admired photographs of the grandchildren, and old family photographs and gazed in wonder at the beautiful stone staircase. The drawing room was large and elegant (and I worried about the mess we might make on the beautiful cream carpet). The large sash window opened onto a sunny terrace and we admired a portrait of Lord Robert Kerr, ‘son of the Marquis of Lothian slain at the battle of Culloden.' Another of the Lothian family, a bearded man known affectionately as ‘uncle Billy’ gazed down on the ‘intruders’. A portrait of Lady Kerr’s grandmother also hung in the drawing room. She was a beautiful woman, Marion the Hon Lancelot Carnegie, daughter of Henry Ford Barclay. Sadly, at the age of 30 she lost her hearing but Lady Kerr said 'it didn’t stop her from doing things’. The library was also fascinating room – so many books! We were all thrilled to be able to look around this house and we are so very grateful to Lord and Lady Kerr for their kind hospitality. Waving goodbye to our kind hosts, we walked to the village hall through meadows purchased from the Duke of Marlborough. We crossed a quaint wooden footbridge over the river Glyme. The bridge had been physically hauled into position by two men. The fields, known as 'Jubilee Meadows', were purchased by the village in 2003 to mark the Queen’s jubilee. They were bought to protect wildlife and for public enjoyment. At the village hall, we were treated to a wonderful tea, courtesy of Mr and Mrs Todd, whose son is a friend of Miss Muriel Kilvert. Miss Kilvert gave a very short talk about Francis, saying that he was ‘a man before his time’ in the way he cared for poor people in providing them with blankets, coal etc. It was a wonderful day and we express our gratitude to David and Marjorie for their hard work in planning it all. It was a day those present will never forget. Ann Dean