England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
East Grinstead St Swithin

The Parish

The parish of East Grinstead lies in the extreme north of Sussex forming an extensive part of the border with not only neighbouring Surrey but also with Kent. East Grinstead is one of the major market towns of the Sussex Weald and lies roughly 30 miles south of the City of London on the A22 road which connects the capital with Eastbourne on the Sussex coast. East Grinstead's market was granted not long after the Conquest and persists to this day, at the time of this transcript the Thursday market dealt mainly in cereals with a livestock market monthly. Further growth to the town came with the arrival of the railway line which once connected the town through to Lewes, the southern portion has been dismantled but a stretch functions as a heritage line, the Bluebell Railway; East Grinstead now forms the terminus of the line from London's Victoria. The parish was extensive and covered a broad area of the northern Weald, an area with rather poor soils where crops were difficult to grow and pastures dominated, the local ironstone was often exploited either for mere building stone or in the past from its iron content. Today East Grinstead is a growing market town spreading widely, almost 3 miles from northwest to southeast and an important centre for light industry and technical services - it has undoubtedly benefited from its proximity to nearby Gatwick Airport. East Grinstead is drained southwards where nearby Weir Wood Reservoir forms an import water source as well as being important for nature, water then heads east as the infant River Medway running through to Kent and the outer Thames Estuary through Chatham. East Grinstead is sited at around 120 metres above the sea, quite high for the Weald, but land continues to rise northeastwards to reach just over 140 metres in nearby Ashplats Wood. For a southern parish East Grinstead covered an immense area, some 15,000 acres in extent, reminiscent of a northern upland parish and reflecting the poor soils of the Weald, within that parish area some 3,600 parishioners would be found, much greater today. Despite East Grinstead's origins it doesn't merit a mention in Domesday Book which is particularly sparse in its coverage of The Weald, the small manor of Warley, now lost from modern maps, is within today's spread of the town and was held by Count Robert of Mortain with just 3 ploughs and small pastures and wooded patch.

The Church

St Swithin's church sits within the core of the old town just to the north of the High Street but screened from that road by fronting properties and occupying an extensive "close" behind those commercial properties. Whilst St Swithin is big as befits a market town it is not medieval as the church that once stood here met with a disaster in 1785 when its tower collapsed causing significant damage such that the church was replaced by the late 18th century edifice that stands today. The church shows the style of the 15th century, Perpendicular, and Pevsner speculates that perhaps this followed the prior church's style or even reused some of its fabric. Beyond those details the church obviously did not have significant architectural interest for Pevsner as his account is short and merely descriptive. Parking may be found in an extensive church car park accessed via St Swithun's (the spelling does vary) Close or if on foot through the lychgate on Church Lane or through a gap in properties off the High Street. The church sits fairly close to those southern properties removing those favoured aspects from the photographer's portfolio and making for a challenge to adequately capture the church on a sunny day.