Elvaston St. Bartholomew
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Derbyshire abbeys. In 1379, a large endowment of lands, consisting of fifteen messuages, 240 acres of arable land, four acres of meadow, one rood of pasture, and 20s. in rents, situate on the manors of Elvaston, Thurlston, and Ambaston, was conferred upon the abbey of Darley by Sir Thomas Franceys and others* And in 1391, we find that the abbey was seized of five messuages, one hundred acres of arable land, and thirteen acres of meadow, in Elvaston, Thurlston, and Ambaston.† In the reign of Henry VI, the abbeys of Darley and Dale are each mentioned as owning one knight's fee within the parish of Elvaston.$ The lands of these two establishments overlapped in the different townships, and neither Thurlston nor Ambaston exclusively pertained to one or the other, but it seems that the monks of Dale had a grange at the latter place,§ and those of Darley at the former.
The church, which is dedicated to S. Bartholomew, consists of nave, south aisle and porch, chancel, and lofty western tower. There is also a shallow north transept—a memorial chapel of the Stanhopes. Of the church that was standing here at the time of the Domesday Survey there are now no apparent remains. The earliest work of the present fabric is of the Early English period of the commencement of the thirteenth century. To that date belong the tall lancet window at the west end of the south aisle, and the three small lancet windows (now blocked up) on the north side of the chancel. The string course of this chancel wall is also Early English.
To the Decorated date, circa 1800, pertain the two three-light windows, with intersecting mullions, in the south wall of the aisle; the chancel arch; and the arcade of three pointed arches, supported on octagon pillars, between the nave and the aisle. The south porch seems also to belong to this period; it is evident that it was originally roofed with stone slabs.
The church underwent extensive repairs, and a general restoration, towards the end of the fifteenth century, when the Perpendicular style was in vogue. To this period belong the three clerestory south windows, the east window of the south aisle, all the windows of the north side of the nave, the tower, the roof of the nave, and
* Inq. post Mort., 3 Ric. II., No. 127. See also Darley Chartulary, Cott. MSS., Titus C. ix., ff. 92-4. With respect to an arrangement between the abbey of Darley and the priory of Shelford respecting the tithes due to the latter as rectors of EIvaston, see the same Chartulary, f. 30.
† Inq. post Mort., 15 Ric. II., No. 86.
$ Inq. post Mort., 10 Hen. VI., No. 30.
§ There is much more about Ambaston than about Thurlston in the Dale Chartulary.—Cott. MSS., vesp. E. xxvi. For Dale possessions in this parish, see ff. 8-19.
29 February 2004