BUNBURY

This extensive parish is situated on the Cheshire Plain between Nantwich and Tarporley. It comprised eleven townships, Alpraham, Beeston, Bunbury, Burwardsley, Calveley, Haughton, Peckforton, Ridley, Spurstow, Tilston Fearnal, Tiverton and Wardle.

Although there was a priest here at the time of the Domesday Book, much of the surviving church fabric dates from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries with nineteenth century centoration.

During the reign of Richard II Sir Hugh Calveley founded a college in the church with a master and six chaplains, and the rectory was appropriated to the college. He died in 1394 and a monumental effigy of him survives in the church. This is said to be the earliest alabaster monument in Cheshire.

A colourful tomb commemorates Sir George Beeston, Admiral of the Fleet, who played a part in the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588. He is said to have lived to the age of 102.

The church is still based on the medieval plan, apart from the addition of the Ridley Chapel by Sir Ralph Egerton of Ridley on the south side of the chantry in the early sixteenth century. This chapel is separated from the chancel by a stone screen.

When the college was dissolved in about 1548 it was headed by a dean, with a staff of six chaplains and two ‘conducts’ according to the chantry certificate reproduced by Ormerod. The tithes were then leased for some time but Thomas Aldersey, a Londoner descended from a prominent Chester family, purchased the rectory and the advowson in 1594. He provided for a school and there is still a school in Bunbury which bears the family name. He also endowed a preacher for the parish, to be supported by a curate and appointed the London Company of Haberdashers as trustees. This resulted in the appointment of a series of puritan clergy, leading to conflict with those parishioners who sympathised with religious conservatives.

In December 1642 Civil War leaders of both sides met at Bunbury and drew up a declaration of neutrality in the hope of keeping Cheshire out of any further fighting. This declaration became known as ‘The Peace of Bunbury’, but it did not last, and the county was soon drawn into bitter conflict.

The church and village of Bunbury suffered bomb damage during the Second World War, which has led to the relocation of the village centre away from the church.

Sources:

R. N. Dore, The Civil Wars in Cheshire (Chester, 1966), p. 15

George Ormerod, The History of the County Palatine and City of Chester (second edition, revised and enlarged by T. Helsby, London, 1882), vol. ii, pp. 253-268 (black and white image of the church from this volume courtesy of HathiTrust)

Raymond Richards, Old Cheshire Churches (Revised and enlarged edition, Didsbury, 1973), pp. 74-82

R. C. Richardson, Puritanism in north-west England: A regional study of the diocese of Chester to 1642 (Manchester, 1972), pp. 128-130, 169-170

A. Wolfgang, ‘Ancient screens in Cheshire and Lancashire churches’, Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, vol. 64 (1912), pp. 20-42. Available online: https://www.hslc.org.uk/journal/vol-64-1912/

‘Bulbridge – Bundley’, in A Topographical Dictionary of England, ed. Samuel Lewis (London, 1848), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/topographical-dict/england/pp428-431 [accessed 1 February 2025]

Historic England
The church of St Boniface (1138626)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1138626  National Heritage List for England
North gates to St Boniface’s churchyard (1330103)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1330103 National Heritage List for England
West gates to St Boniface’s churchyard (1138628)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1138628 National Heritage List for England
The Chantry House (1138635)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1138635  National Heritage List for England
Bunbury Cottage Tudor Cottage (1138632)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1138632  National Heritage List for England

DODLESTON

This parish is situated about 5 miles south west of Chester, straddling the border with Wales. It comprised three townships, Dodleston, Higher and Lower Kinnerton. Higher Kinnerton was in the county of Flintshire in Wales.

The church had been granted to St Werburgh’s Abbey in Chester probably during the reign of King John and passed to the dean and chapter of the cathedral following the surrender of the abbey in 1540.

Although the lower part of the church tower survives from the early sixteenth century, most of the church was rebuilt in sandstone in 1870 to designs by John Douglas, who also added some height to the existing tower and probably designed the lychgate.

A motte and bailey castle, adjacent to the churchyard on the Welsh side of the River Dee, was probably built shortly after the Norman Conquest, forming part of a defensive network along the border to protect against Welsh incursion. A manor house was later built on the site. It was probably this hall which was the headquarters of the parliamentarian troops during the siege of Chester in 1644 to 1646 and the parish registers recorded several burials of soldiers including ‘a soulldier, from his horse fell and brake his necke’ (Ormerod, vol. ii, p. 851). A rectory succeeded the manor house on this site.

Another manor house, Dodleston Hall, was built in the middle of a moated site to the north of the motte and bailey. The hall was owned by Richard Grosvenor and was bought by Thomas Egerton, a Cheshire man, related by marriage to the Grosvenor family, who was Lord Keeper and Lord Chancellor for more than two decades until his death in 1617. Despite his work in London, he sometimes lived at the hall. This was a timber framed building which was demolished about 1788, and a farmhouse was built on the site. Sir Thomas Egerton died in London but chose to be buried in the parish church of Dodleston.

The parish remains largely agricultural, being both arable and pasture.

Sources:

George Ormerod, The History of the County Palatine and City of Chester (second edition, revised and enlarged by T. Helsby, London, 1882), vol. ii, pp. 844-852

Raymond Richards, Old Cheshire Churches (Revised and enlarged edition, Didsbury, 1973), pp. 145-148

Rachel Swallow, ‘Palimpsest of Border Power:  the Archaeological Survey of Dodleston Castle, Cheshire’, Cheshire History, (54), (2014-2015), pp. 18-44

‘Doddington – Donisthorpe’, in A Topographical Dictionary of England, ed. Samuel Lewis( London, 1848), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/topographical-dict/england/pp63-69 [accessed 22 January 2025]

Historic England
Dodleston motte and bailey castle (1012419)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1012419 National Heritage List for England
Church of St Mary, Church Road (1129915)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1129915 National Heritage List for England
Dodleston Hall moated site (1011786)
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1011786  National Heritage List for England