| ECCLESIASTICAL
HISTORY OF THE PARISH OF TITCHFIELD |
| The market-town of Titchfield stands on the
west bank of the River Meon. The river flows past the east end of
the churchyard and makes its way placidly to the Solent some two
miles to the south. However, to understand the history of
Titchfield it is important to realise that for many centuries
Titchfield was a port at the head of an estuary. It was not until
1611 that a bank was built at the mouth of the Meon, and the
estuary drained. In the fifth and sixth centuries A.D. the south-eastern part of Hampshire was settled by a Jutish tribe called the Meonware, who took their name from the River Meon. The circumstances in which the Meonware became Christian are unknown, but it seems likely that they were converted some time between 648, when a church was founded at Winchester, and 686, when the Isle of Wight was evangelised. In the seventh and eig-hth centuries the province of the Meonware was a part of 'the kingdom of Wessex, except for a short period from 661 to 686 when it was annexed to the kingdom of Sussex. Sussex was converted between 681 and 686 by the great Northumbrian prelate St. Wilfrid and his campaign may well have extended to include the Meonware. Certainly the Meon Valley was within his sphere of influence at this time. This fact will be of interest later when we come to examine the earliest parts of Titchfield church, which display features characteristic of the early churches in Northumbria. In Anglo-Saxon times Titchfield was with little doubt a 'minster' church, an establishment responsible for the pastoral care of a wide area. There is no surviving reference to Titchfield in the early part of the Anglo-Saxon period, but a charter of King EtheIred dated 982 refers to the members of a religious establishment here. The architectural evidence also indicates an important church in Anglo-Saxon times. The importance of the church in this period was reflected in the vast size of the parish down to comparatively recent times. Until the last century the parish covered an area of about 24 square miles, stretching some seven miles along the foreshore of the Solent and about five miles up the Meon Valley. Originally it also included Wickham and probably much of Fareham. We do not know the fate of the establishment which existed at Titchfield in the tenth century. In view of the size of the parish it is not likely that it was served by a single priest in the Norman period. What we do know is that there were a number of subordinate chapels in the outlying parts of the parish to assist in the work of the clergy. One such chapel was at Wickham, four miles further up the Meon Valley. In the twelfth century Wickham was granted the status of a separate parish bv Bishop Henry de Blois (1129-71). Other chapels were at Crofton (first mentioned in Domesday Book in 1086) and at Chark, both in the south-eastern portion of the parish. In 1231 Peter des Roches, Bishop of Winchester, chose Titchfield as the site of the Premonstratensian monastery which he intended to found. The monastery was sited about half a mile to the north of the town. Peter gave to the monastery the church of Titchfield together with its chapels and substantial income. As a general rule medieval monasteries were not concerned with pastoral work in the surrounding areas, but the Premonstratensians were perhaps the principal exception to this rule. In 1283 the canons of Titchfield were given the right of nominating one of their own body as vicar, and from this time to the Dissolution the vicars of Titchfield were canons of the Abbey. Several of the vicars became abbots of the monastery. At Titchfield church the fourteenth-century chapel on the south side of the chancel pertained specially to the canons. At the Dissolution in 1537, Titchfield Abbey was granted by Henry VIII to a subordinate of Thomas Cromwell called Thomas Wriothesley, who was later created Earl of Southampton. With the monastery he acquired the patronage of Titchfield church and the chapel on the south side of the chancel. This chapel was converted into a mausoleum for the Earls of Southampton and the result is the magnificent Wriothesley monument which now occupies this part of the church. From the Dissolution to the nineteenth century, the huge area of the parish of Titchfie'ld was served by a single vicar, sometimes assisted by a curate. Finally, in the nineteenth century, the vastly increased population of the outlying parts of the parish made new arrangements necessary. Between 1837 and 1933 the parish of Titchfield was divided into six separate parishes, the following new parishes being created: Sarisbury with Swanwick (1837), Grofton (1871), Hook with Warsash (1872), Lock's Heath (1893) and Lee-on-the-Solent (1930). The old mother parish is still the largest in extent, covering an area of about 7 square miles. There has been much modern development throughout the ancient parish of Titchfield. The post-war period has seen the construction of much new housing, particularly in the western and south-eastern parts of the ancient parish. Modern industry too makes its presence felt, most strikingly in the huge Plessey works about a mile to the north-west of the town. But fortunately all this modern development has not encroached to any great extent on the Meon Valley itself. The valley remains an oasis of calm between the eastward spread of Southampton and the westward spread of Fareham and Gosport.
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