REIGATE HUNDRED
��MERSTHAM
��and their heirs. 70 Casley seems to have quitclaimed his right to Lechford. The latter predeceased his father Sir Richard, who, already possessed of the advow- son, 71 held the rectory also after his son's death," probably during the minority of his grandson Richard. Henceforth the rectory and advowson were presumably held together, the benefice reverting to its original curacy, for which the lay rectors were responsible. 73 Sir Richard Lechford conveyed in 1610 to Richard Dallender, 74 who in 1627 sold to Sir Ralph Freeman
- the rectory and parsonage impropriate of Leigh with
the capital messuage called the parsonage house.' 75 After this time the property frequently changed hands, passing from Freeman to George Smith in l63O, 76 and from the latter to Edward Bathurst in 1638."
The Parliamentary Surveys of Church Lands made during the Commonwealth record in 1658 that 'the parish of Leigh ... is an impropriation. That Mr. Anthony Bathurst of Dogmershfield in the county of Southampton is Impropriator thereof. That Tithes and Gleabe Land thereof are worth threescore pounds by the yeare. That John Bonwicke Clerke is Curat there to whome the said Mr. Anthony Bathurst giveth of his free will (five pounds everie quarter of the year.' 78
In 1691 members of the Bathurst family conveyed to Mary Tainturier, widow, and Daniel Tainturier, 79 and from the latter the rectory passed to Thomas Scawen in lyii-iz. 80 James Scawen held it in
��I 779>
��conveyed it in that year to Cartwright, 8
��from whom it passed in 1790 to the Duke of Nor- folk. 83 It passed from trustees of the duke in 1819 to the Rev. Joseph Fell. 84 Fell conveyed to Joseph Hodgson in 1823, and the latter, in the same year, to R. C. Dendy, of Leigh Place, 84 in whose family the patronage remained for many years. After the death of Stephen Dendy it passed to his third daughter and co-heir, Elizabeth wife of John Watney. 88 She died in 1896 ; her husband, who was knighted in 1900, still holds the advowson. 87 The living was created a vicarage in 1 869. The benefice, as has been said, had previously been a perpetual curacy, the impropriator of the rectory holding both great and small tithes. 88
Smith's Charity is distributed as in CHARITIES other Surrey parishes. In 1786 three houses, with orchards, from one bene- faction, and one house, with no orchard, from another, were held for the poor ; but the donors were un- known. Two houses on the road from Leigh to Charlwood were called the Poor's Houses in living recollection, but they have been long in private hands, and were probably sold after l834. 89
Earl's Charity, date unknown, was l I z/. charged on land for the poor. This is not known to exist at present.
In 1637 the Rev. Thomas Bristowe, by will, left a schoolhouse with 5 acres of land for the education of four poor children. This is lost apparently.
S. Dendy, by will, proved 1 86 1, left stock pro- ducing 11 01. id. yearly for the school.
��MERSTHAM
��Merstan (xi cent.) ; Mestham and Merstham (xii cent.) ; Meyrstham and Merystham (xiv cent.)
Merstham is a village 3 J miles north-east of Reigate, 8 miles south-by-west from Croydon, on the road be- tween the two. The parish is bounded on the north by Coulsdon, on the east by Chaldon and Blechingley, on the south by Nutfield, on the south-west by Gatton, on the north-west by Chipstead. It mea- sures 3 miles from north to south, and z miles from east to west, and contains 2,015 acres.
In 1 899 ' a small readjustment of boundaries was made between Merstham and Gatton, part of each parish being transferred to the other. Merstham is in situation one of the typical parishes of the southern side of the chalk range. The parish runs from the chalk across the Upper Green Sand and Gault, into the Lower Green Sand, the outcrop of the Gault being unusually wide. The church and old village stand on the Upper Green Sand, at the foot of the chalk. The chalk is generally here crowned with an unusual thickness of clay with flints, but in the south- ern escarpment the chalk is on the surface.
Alderstead Heath is still an open common, and Wbr- stead Green, or Wood Street Green, as it was anciently called, is a long strip of roadside waste. The Wellhead,
��at the foot of Church Hill, was a valuable spring feeding one of the branches of the Mole, but has been much diminished by the workings of water companies and by the railway tunnel. An intermittent burn used to issue from the foot of Merstham Hill in wet weather, as at Croydon, on the other side of the chalk. But though both still flow occasionally, the water com- panies have permanently lowered the level of water in the chalk and interfered with all such natural over- flows.
The Merstham quarries are in the Upper Green Sand formation, and though the parish was and is agricultural for the most part, the stone quarries are the most striking industrial part of Merstham, particu- larly on account of the general scarcity of good build- ing stone in the county.
The Upper Green Sand yields stone of varying qualities throughout the whole of the outcrop of the bed. Lingfield had its quarries at the time of the Domesday Survey, but Godstone and Merstham have been more famous since as sources of supply. It is often called firestone, for it used to be in request for the beds of furnaces, especially in glass-houses. In West Surrey the same stone is called Malm stone. It is a calcareous sandstone, containing green silicate of
��71
75
Hil.
��Pat. 42 Eliz. pt. XT, m. 34 ; Cal. Dom. 1598-1601, p. 237. Vide supra.
Feet of F. Surr. Mich. 4 Jas. I ; ibid. 7. Jas. I. ~ 8 Vide infra.
Feet of F. Surr. Hil. 7 Jas. I. Close, 3 Chas. I, pt. ix, no. 22. Feet of F. Surr. Trin. 6 Cha. I. Ibid. 14 Chas. I.
��78 Surr. Arch Coll. xvii, 97.
79 Feet of F. Surr. Trin. 3 Will, and Mary.
80 Feet of F. Surr. Hil. 10 Anne.
8 > Ibid. East. 19 Geo. III. 8a Ibid.
88 Manning and Bray, Hiit. of Surr. ii, 185.
" 4 Braylcy, Hist, of Surr. iv, 283 ; Inst. Bks. (P.R.O.).
213
��85 See preceding note. 88 Clergy Lists ; Burke, Peerage, &c., Landed Gentry. 7 Ibid.
88 See note 82 ; Clergy Lists.
89 Information from Sir John Watney. 'Loc. Govt. Bd. Order 39880; Mark
Hedge Shaw is an existing name on the boundary between Merstham and Gatton.
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