This website created by Valerie Martin, contains scenes from her home village of Findon, West Sussex, U.K.

LOST FOREVERMORE

Copyright Valerie Martin 2002

An interest in our village history and day-to-day news is not a modern concept with my website. 

Hugh Wyatt L.L.D., D.L., J.P., Barrister at Law, penned a series of articles dealing with the history of Findon in the Parochial Magazine at the end of the nineteenth century when he was 76 years of age.

Hugh Wyatt was born in 1814 and lived at the farmhouse called Cissbury in Nepcote.  He lived with his wife Sarah, she was also a Sussex girl, born in Seaford.  He started to think about writing his papers on Findon in 1889 and decided they might be of interest to his fellow parishioners.    The shock of an earthquake was felt in Worthing that year on 30th May 1889 (being only a couple of miles away, I guess it must have been felt in Findon too) but he did not get as far as mentioning this in this narrative.

The Editor of the Parochial Magazine cordially received the suggestion and Hugh Wyatt, entitled his work “Findon: An Historic Sketch”.  Appropriately, the first issue containing his writings that traced the story of our village, came out on the 1st of January of 1890.

Mr. Wyatt had lived in the village a long time and had a wealth of information to impart.  As well as being a Barrister at Law, he had held the office of High Sheriff for the county in 1884 and was obviously, a well-known figure.  Each month he presented a further article on Findon history for the Parochial Magazine.  He dealt with Neolithic Findon and passed on to the Roman occupation.  The terracing of the downs for vineyards and finds of local Roman remains in the area were recorded.

He then went on a few centuries to the de Braose family who were Lords of the Manor of Findon and occasional residents of the village, spanning a total period of 260 years.  I have done my own research into the de Braose dysnasty and discovered their men folk were a colourful bunch and more often than not were christened William.  

During the de Braose tenure of the Manor of Findon, the Findon downland stretched far and wide without fences or hindrance.  There were frequent patches of scrub, furze and juniper, thus affording the favourable sport of hunting and hawking.  It was a semi-barbarous age when these sports were the pleasures for any English baron disengaged from the odd crusade abroad or rebellion on the home front and the de Braose men were no exception.

The first William de Braose was a great Lord, and was a firm favourite of William the Conqueror.  Subsequently he was in line to receive a large handout of the confiscated lands from the evicted English proprietors.  In Sussex alone William held forty-one manors, including the whole Rape of Bramber, which also comprised the castle.  He died in the year 1087 at Bramber.

William de Braose junior celebrated his new lordships (including that of the Manor of Findon) in 1175 with a Christmas feast at Abergavenny castle.  The princes and chieftains of Gwent were invited and the Welsh laid down their weapons for the feast.  The drunken merry making came to a dramatic halt when William challenged them never again to bear arms in his domains and they refused.  William's men took this as the signal to slaughter all his Welsh guests.

Abergavenny Castle

A later Lord of the Manor of Findon (also styled William de Braose) is remembered because he was publicly hanged on 2nd May 1230 in the presence of some eight hundred gathered together to watch the spectacle. 

There is also an interesting account of yet another colourful William de Braose  who was a party to a lawsuit.  He is known for his outrageous  conduct and this gives some illustration of the unruly and lawlessness of the nobles during the reigns of the House of Plantagenet.   This gentleman was  tried in the Court of Exchequer when the judge, Roger de Heigham, unfortunately decided against him.

Upon hearing the verdict, Braose was furious and put caution to the wind and ascended the bar and stormed the most gross and contemptuous language against the judge. 

For this contempt of court, Braose was adjudged by the sovereign to present himself without a belt and walk with his head bare from “the Bench of our Lord the King in Westminster Hall” to the court of Exchequer.  Here he had to beg the pardon of the judge, and then to be committed to the Tower of London for an unspecified time — stated as during the royal pleasure.

Eventually Hugh Wyatt's monthly articles brought the village up to the year 1650.  All of his writings were of immense interest and value but it seems they passed completely over the heads of his fellow villagers of the day.

Unfortunately, Mr. Wyatt grew somewhat despondent when he received no feedback in the way of comments from his fellow villagers (I know the feeling sometimes!).   Alas, he considered that no interest in his efforts was being shown by the other inhabitants and he decided to cease his writings.

A notice appeared in the November 1890 issue of the Parochial Magazine to that effect, with the added words,

“we hope he will reconsider his decision”. 

Alas, it appears he did not, as I have been unable to find any continuation. 

Hugh Wyatt died in 1897.  If he had continued with his narratives, his personal recollections going back to the first quarter of the nineteenth century, would have been of immense interest and value to me.  Unfortunately, they are now lost forevermore.

Hugh Wyatt's Great Grandson, Hugh Wyatt, Lord Lieutenant of West Sussex in February 2002.

The Wyatt family continued to live at Cissbury House over the generations and farm the Cissbury Estate.

Continue if you would like to read about 1890 And All That.

This is Findon Village — www.findonvillage.com is a continually growing record created exclusively for documenting life in Findon.