LITTLE HARROWDEN
Hargedone (xi cent.); Little Harudone, Harewedone (xiii cent.).
Little Harrowden is an agricultural parish and village
lying to the north of Great Harrowden and 3 miles
north of Wellingborough on the road from Wellingborough to Kettering. In its eastern districts it is liable
to floods from the River Ise, which for some distance
forms its eastern boundary. Hill Top, near the centre of
the parish, reaches a level of about 300 ft.; and about 350
ft. is reached in the west. It has an area of about 1,575
acres, of which a considerable proportion is arable
land. The soil is of a good fertile mixed character;
substratum loamy, Great Oolite, limestone, sand, and
ironstone. The chief crops are cereals. The population, which in 1801 was 284, in 1931 was 698. It is
mainly engaged in agriculture, but some shoemaking
is done.
In the extreme north of the parish are Big Covert
and Ashpole Plantation with Frisby Lodge between
them. Finedon Iron Works on the eastern border of
the parish were established in 1866 by the Glendon
Iron Ore Company, and at one time had six blast
furnaces in use, but now are disused. There are two
good gravel pits, the soil, partly clay, being gravelly in
the lower lands.
The village lies along a road branching from the
main road to Kettering from Wellingborough, where
the parish narrows to a mere strip. At its centre is St.
Mary's Church, lying to the east of the road, with the
manor house opposite it on the west. To the north of
the church is the school, built in 1851, and enlarged
in 1876 and 1899 to hold 220 children. South of it is
the Methodist chapel and the infants' school. The
chapel was built in 1882.
Manors
In the Domesday Survey LITTLE
HARROWDEN was entered among the
Harrowden properties included in the
lands of the Bishop of Coutances. One and a half hides
'in another Hargedone' held of the bishop by Wakelin,
valued with 2¾ hides which Wakelin held of him in Great
Harrowden (q.v.), and 1 hide 1 virgate in the hands
of Hardwin, a man of Wakelin's, which Siuerd had held
freely in King Edward's time, and whose value had risen
from 20s. to 40s., (fn. 1) appear to have corresponded, roughly,
to Little Harrowden. The bishop's Harrowden lands
had been forfeited and redistributed before the taking of
the 12th-century Northamptonshire Survey, but the first
property previously mentioned was apparently represented by lands still held with Great Harrowden (q.v.),
and the second by a hide of the fee of William de Curcy
which Reygold held, (fn. 2) and which seems to have been
the origin of the manor of Little Harrowden, whose
first recorded owner was William Raymond. (fn. 3) The distinctive appellation, Little Harrowden, was already in
existence in 1227; (fn. 4) and Henry de Raunds, who succeeded William Raymond in the manor, made a conveyance of land in Little Harrowden to Robert son of
Henry of Northampton in 1237. (fn. 5) In 1316 William de
Raunds was entered with John de Leuknor as holding
in Harrowden by knight service, (fn. 6) and his share included
evidently the manor of Little Harrowden, for which in
1329 William de Raunds claimed view of frankpledge
as appurtenant to this manor, of which his great-grandfather Henry de Raunds had been enfeoffed by William Raymond. (fn. 7) He stated that the manor was held of
the honor of Huntingdon.
Shuckbrough. Sable a cheveron between threepierced molets argent.
Little Harrowden descended with the manor of
Raunds (q.v.) to the Gages until 1553, when George
Gage and Cecily his wife conveyed it to Anthony
Shuckborough. (fn. 8) Thomas Shuckborough senior and
Bridget his wife were dealing with the manor of Little
Harrowden alias SHUCKBOROUGHS in 1611 (fn. 9) and
1619, (fn. 10) and Thomas Shuckborough junior and Eleanor
his wife in 1623 granted it to John Sanderson, (fn. 11) who
with his wife Cecily and John
Sanderson junior in 1632 conveyed it to Edward Vaux, Lord
Harrowden. (fn. 12) In 1646 he settled
all his Harrowden property on
his wife with remainder to her
son Nicholas Knollys, Earl of
Banbury; (fn. 13) and at the marriage
of the latter with his second wife,
Anne Sherard, he settled these
manors in jointure on her with
Orlingbury, Boughton (q.v.),
&c. (fn. 14) Anne, his eldest daughter
by his first wife Isabel, eldest
daughter to Mountjoy, Earl of Newport, married Sir
John Briscoe, who, according to Baker, purchased
Little Harrowden Manor from his wife's half-brother
Charles, called Earl of Banbury. (fn. 15) He mortgaged it
with Boughton to John Lord Ashburnham, with whom
and with others in 1718 he conveyed it with court leet,
court baron, view of frankpledge, and free fishing to
Richard Young, esq. (fn. 16) Since that date it has descended
in the family of Young of Orlingbury (q.v.). (fn. 17)
The other manor of Little Harrowden previously
referred to can be traced back to the fee and a half in
Little Harrowden and Clipston which was held in 1242
with a fee in Great Harrowden of Isabel de Brus, of
the honor of Huntingdon, by Geoffrey de Leuknor, (fn. 18)
and in 1284 by Ralf de Leuknor. (fn. 19) This manor was
a member of the manor of Great Harrowden (fn. 20) and has
always been held with that manor (q.v.). In the 14th
century the Greens of Green's Norton appear to have
been already tenants in the manor under the Simeons,
as a messuage and 3 virgates in Little Harrowden,
which Sir Thomas Green had settled on his son
Thomas, were delivered to the latter after his father's
death in 1391. (fn. 21)
On 9 July 1607 Robert Syers, a recusant, being
seised for term of his life of the manor or chief messuage
of Isham and Little Harrowden, in the tenure of several
persons and of a yearly value of £10, two-thirds of the
same were granted to Edward Haselrigge or Heselrigg
of Theddingworth (Leics.). (fn. 22)
A fee in Orlingbury and Harrowden which Simon
de Loges was holding in 1242 of the barony of Margaret de Rivers (fn. 23) must have included land in Little
Harrowden, as Richard de Loges was in 1227 in conflict with the Abbot of Sulby about the advowson of
Little Harrowden; (fn. 24) and in 1282 a grant of land in
Little Harrowden was made by Richard de Loges of
Orlingbury to Roger atte Chyrche of Isham and Alice
his wife. (fn. 25) It presumably descended with Orlingbury
(q.v.), as messuages in Little Harrowden were held by
Thomas Beavys with his manor in Orlingbury in 1469. (fn. 26)
Church
The church of ST. MARY stands on the north side
of the main street and consists of chancel, 23 ft. by 18
ft.; clerestoried nave, 45 ft. by 18 ft.;
north and south aisles, and west tower,
10 ft. 6 in. square, all these measurements being internal. The north aisle is 10 ft. wide
and the south aisle 9 ft. 6 in., the width across nave and
aisles being 41 ft. 8 in. The south aisle is continued
eastward for about two-thirds the length of the chancel,
its east end, formerly a chapel, being now used as a
vestry and organ-chamber. The north aisle dates only
from 1850, but takes the place of one demolished at
some unknown date. The tower was originally surmounted by a spire, which fell in a storm in 1703, and
has not been rebuilt.
The chancel and nave are under a single low-pitched
roof with continuous plain parapets, and the chancel is
faced with local ironstone. The south aisle is almost
entirely covered with ivy, which completely hides a
blocked doorway formerly opening to the chapel.
The oldest part of the building is the main south
doorway, which dates from c. 1195, but is not in its
original position. It was the south doorway of an aisleless 12th-century church, the nave of which covered
the area of the existing two western bays and whose
south-east angle is represented by the masonry pier of
the south arcade. The doorway has a semicircular arch
of four moulded orders, one of which is ornamented
with chevrons, and has three jamb-shafts on each side
with carved capitals and moulded bases. As rebuilt the
doorway stands in front of the face of the wall, forming
a kind of shallow porch. (fn. 27)
To this early building a south aisle was first added, and
early in the 14th century the nave appears to have been
extended eastward, a new chancel built, a north aisle
added, and the tower and clerestory erected. The south
aisle and arcade seem also to have been remodelled about
this time, the aisle being shortly after extended eastward,
the church then assuming substantially its present aspect.
The chancel has diagonal angle buttresses and a
pointed east window of four lights with uncusped intersecting tracery and a sexfoiled circle in the head. At the
west end of the north wall is a window of two trefoiled
lights with quatrefoil in the head, and in the south wall
near its east end an inserted 15th-century four-centred
window of three cinquefoiled lights. The piscina is
contemporary with the east window and has a trefoiled
head and fluted bowl. At the west end of the south wall
the chancel is open to the aisle by a 14th-century arch
of two orders, the inner hollow-chamfered on halfoctagonal responds with moulded capitals and bases.
The restored chancel arch is of two chamfered orders
springing from half-round responds.
The 14th-century north nave arcade was left standing when the aisle was pulled down and was opened
out when the present aisle was built. It consists of
three pointed arches of two chamfered orders, springing
from octagonal piers and corresponding responds with
chamfered bases and moulded capitals similar to those
of the chancel arch. On the south side the two western
arches and the pier are of the same type but spring from
a moulded corbel at the west end and from a halfround respond at the east attached to the masonry pier.
The eastern arch is of two chamfered orders on halfoctagonal responds with moulded capitals.
At the east end of the south aisle, now within the
vestry, is a trefoil-headed piscina similar to that in the
chancel. The parapet of the aisle has a band of quatrefoils its full length and up the rake of its east wall; the
windows are of two lights with forked mullion, but
both end walls are blank.
The tower is of three stages, with clasping buttresses
and battlemented parapet with gargoyles at the angles.
The west doorway is a later insertion, or may take the
place of a former opening; above it is a two-light 14thcentury window. The two lower stages on the north
and south, and the short middle stage on the west, are
blank. The bell-chamber windows are of two trefoiled
lights with quatrefoil in the head, and above the hoodmoulds is a blank shield. Below the parapet is a band
of quatrefoils enclosing sculptured faces and foliage.
The lower part of the tower arch is filled with an oak
screen erected as a War Memorial (1914–18). There
is no vice.
The late-15th-century chancel screen has been much
restored. The altar rails are of the 18th century, and
the font is late in the same period. The pulpit is
modern.
There are four bells, the first, third, and tenor cast
by Hugh Watts of Leicester in 1624, and the second
dated 1732. (fn. 28)
The plate consists of a silver cup and cover paten of
1569, and a paten and flagon of 1883. (fn. 29)
The registers before 1812 are as follows: (i) births
1654–61 (May), baptisms 1661 (November)–1722,
marriages 1654–7, 1662–3, 1681–1720, burials 1653–
1727; (ii) baptisms and burials 1727–94; (iii) marriages 1754–1812; (iv) baptisms and burials 1795–
1812. There are churchwardens' accounts beginning
in 1783.
Advowson
The church, as a chapel originally
annexed to Great Harrowden, and
now forming one vicarage with it, has
no separate history for its advowson, having always been
held with that manor.
Charities
On the inclosure of Little Harrowden in 1781 an allotment of about 2
acres was awarded, out of lands belonging to the Marquess of Rockingham, to the churchwardens and overseers in lieu of an annuity of 20s.
payable to the poor by the marquis. The allotment is
let for 18s. yearly, which is distributed in cash to the
poor by the Parish Council.
An allotment of 44 a. 1 r. 33 p., now let for £19 2s.
annually, was set out on the inclosure to the churchwardens in lieu of their rights in the common fields in
the parish. The rent is applied to church expenses.
William Aylworth's Endowed School for Great and
Little Harrowden and Orlingbury was founded in
1661, to commemorate the restoration of King Charles,
under the will of William Aylworth, which directed
that £20 a year should be paid towards the maintenance
of this free school from the testator's estate at Gumley
in Leicestershire, and his house and land in Little Harrowden conveyed for a habitation for the schoolmaster,
who was to be a graduate in one of the two universities,
a member of the Church of England, and of a sober,
peaceable, and discreet behaviour and conversation. (fn. 30) It
is attended by the children of Great and Little Harrowden.