"LAMP POST 1997

This cast iron lamp post is a replacement for the original which once stood in the center of the very wide junction of Long St. with High St.

The brass plaque comes from the original 1911 lamp post"

DB 11 March 2019

Original brass plaque attached to a replacement lamp post.

"THIS LAMP WAS ERECTED BY VOLUNTARY SUBSCRIPTION TO COMMEMORATE THE CORONATION OF KING GEORGE V AND QUEEN MARY. JUNE 22ND 1911"

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St Sebastian's Church of England Primary School.

Date stone reads 1841.

Kelly's Directory of Lincolnshire 1919 states :-

"Public Elementary School (mixed), built in 1841 at a cost of £300, enlarged in 1872, with the addition of a teacher's house, at a cost of over £1,000, and further enlarged in 1896, at a cost of £300 ; it is supported in part by a small endowment of £11: the school will hold 224 children ; Edward Lloyd Davies, master"

DB 9 March 2019

In "Brief Details of Chapels in the Grantham Circuit" Revised August 1998 Colin Sheperdson and Allen Griffin state :-

"i) The first chapel was built in 1836.

ii) The stonelaying for a second chapel, in Green Street, took place on the 9.10.1857 and the chapel opened on the 18.2.1858.

This chapel was demolished and a larger one built on the same site, in Green Street, with the stonelaying held on the 11.4.1873 and the chapel opened in mid October 1873.

The foundation stone for a new Sunday school, built across the road, was laid on the 22.2.1886.

Following the merger of the two Societies a new room was added to the chapel and opened on the 6.4.1990.

This was funded by the sale of the 1886 Sunday school site and also the Spring End ex-WM chapel.

The chapel is still in use with a membership of 15"

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Kelly's Directory of Lincolnshire 1919 states :-

"Here are Wesleyan and Primitive Methodist chapels"

Unfortunately the Wesleyan Chapel was demolished in February 1997. 

A Wesleyan Reform Union Chapel was erected in 1850 but no further information available.

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Detail of the signboard inside the porch.

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Former Sunday School directly across the road from the chapel in Green Street.

Date stone reads 

"PRIMITIVE METHODIST SUNDAY SCHOOLS 1886" 

Now a private house.

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Mentioned in White's Directory of 1856

"Marrart Thos. vict. Recruiting Serjt."

Other public houses mentioned in Great Gonerby were

"Coverley Thomas, vict. Swan"

"Linnell James, vict. Rutland Arms"

Two Beerhouses were also mentioned. 

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Detail of pub sign.

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"Parish Church. c1200, C13, C14, C15, some C19 restoration"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

See parish website for building history :-

http://www.great-gonerby-church.uk/public/building.php 

Peter Kirk Collection, 8 April 1990

Kelly's Directory of Lincolnshire 1919 states :-

"The church of St. Sebastian, conspicuously situated on one of the steepest hills traversed by the old north road, is a building  of stone in the Early English, Decorated and Perpendicular styles, with some fragments of Norman and Transitional work, and consists of chancel, clerestoried nave of four bays, aisles, south porch and a Perpendicular embattled western tower with spire, containing a clock and 3 bells:

the north aisle is Perpendicular, the south aisle Early English, and the east end of each formerly constituted a chantery chapel:

both aisles and the nave are finished with enriched Perpendicular parapets and have pinnacles at regular intervals:

the south aisle retains a piscina, and the chancel retains an aumbry, three plain sedilia and a piscina:

the lower part of a very beautiful Perpendicular screen remains:

the font of the Decorated period, has an octagonal panelled basin enriched with carving"

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Kelly's Directory of Lincolnshire 1919 goes on to state :-

"the church was restored in 1874-5 at cost of over £1,500, when it was new roofed, reseated and the windows reglazed:

in 1890 a new organ was erected at a cost of £100:

there are 250 sittings: 

The register dates from the year 1560.

The living, formerly a vicarage united to Grantham, but separated therefrom in 1846, was constituted a rectory in 1865, net yearly value £285, with residence, in the gift of the vicar of Grantham, and held since 1917 by the Rev. Henry Longley Woffindin M.A. oi St. John's College, Cambridge"

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White's Directory of 1856 states :-

"The Church (St. Sebastian) is a handsome building, with pointed arches and an embattled tower, crowned by a crocketted spire, and containing three bells and a good clock.

An altar-tomb is in memory of Robert Tyling, who died in 1500.

The pulpit and the remains of the screen are handsomely carved.

The vicarage, valued in K.B. at £2. 4s. 8d., was united with Grantham vicarage till 846, when it was made a separate perpetual curacy, in the patronage of the vicar of Grantham, and incumbency of the Rev. Wm. Chas. Inman, for whom a neat parsonage house was built in the same year.

The living is now valued at £150 per annum"

DB 9 March 2019

"Late C13 chancel"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

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More detailed view of the altar.

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"North wall contains aumbry with C19 doors"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

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"South wall of chancel has 3 very plain ogee headed sedilia and plain ogee headed aumbry to east"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

Piscina rather than an aumbry? There is an aumbry in the north wall of the chancel.

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Dedicated December 1919.

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Looking east towards the chancel.

No sign of the beautiful screen mentioned in both White's & Kelly's Directories. 

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Looking west towards the tower arch.

"C15 tower arch has semi-circular responds on high plinths, polygonal capitals and a plain chamfered pointed arch.

Similar arches lead from the west tower into the north and south aisles"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

DB 11 March 2019

"C19 pulpit, lectern and pews"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

DB 11 March 2019 

"C15 nave roof with tie beams and ornate bosses"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

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Early C14 north aisle. 

Looking east.

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East wall retains a piscina.

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Makers plate states

"C.Lloyd & Co. Nottingham"

"Charles Lloyd (8 September 1835 - 8 October 1908) was a pipe organ builder based in Nottingham who flourished between 1859 and 1908"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Lloyd_(organ_builder) 

"In 1890 a new organ was installed for £100. The present organ which cost £510 in 1925 was fully restored in 1997 for £8000"

http://www.great-gonerby-church.uk/public/building.php 

Max Tonson Ward (1918-2015) composer and violist was organist here 1996-2012.

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"Eastern most bay of c.1200 with 2 semi-circular responds with ornate capitals carved with palmettes and incipient volutes"

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"Early C14 south porch with slate roof"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

DB 9 March 2019

"early C13 south doorway with filleted roll mouldings, single columnar and rectangular jambs on each side with plain capitals and pronounced abaci, head label stops"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

DB 11 March 2019

Looking east.

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Looking across the church, through the nave and into the north aisle.

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Altar is dated 1840.

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At the west end of the south aisle in a former vestry.

"In 2006 the tower area was refurbished, creating a crèche room and toilet/kitchen facilities from the two former vestries"

http://www.great-gonerby-church.uk/public/building.php 

Kelly's Directory of Lincolnshire 1919 states :-

"The charities are as follows :- Robert Kelham, in 1808, left £286 6s. 8d. now producing £9 yearly, which is given to, the school ; Mrs. Ann Roberts, in 1817 , left £120, now £165 6s. 5d. of the interest of which £1 is given to the school and the remainder is distributed to the poor widows and widowers, on condition that they attend church.

The poor's land of 3a. 1r. 15p. yields £6 8s. which is distributed to the deserving poor annually"

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"C14 octagonal font with traceried panels, each divided by a mullion and each with variant forms of reticulated tracery"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

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"IN REMEMBRANCE OF OUR

EVER GLORIOUS DEAD

1914-1919"

"MAY THEY REST IN PEACE" 

There is also a Second World War memorial plaque nearby.

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" C15 west tower of 5 stages with moulded plinth and clasping buttresses, embraced by north and south aisles"

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1062882 

"The tower contains three bells - the treble and tenor bells are from the medieval Nottingham foundry of Richard Mellows, about 1500, and the second bell was cast by Thomas Hedderly at Nottingham in 1765"

http://www.great-gonerby-church.uk/public/building.php 

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"An area of meadowland where cattle were gathered before being walked to the local market.

DB 11 March 2019

The scene bottom middle shows children attempting to pelt the church clock.

"The local inhabitants are known as 'Clockpelters', from the habit of trying to strike the face of the church clock with stones or snowballs.The clock dates from 1897"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Gonerby 

The scene bottom right is a reminder that highwaymen used to frequent Gonerby Hill - stagecoaches travelling very slowly up the hill were an easy target.

http://www.great-gonerby-church.uk/public/village.php

DB 11 March 2019