Ardingly

ARDINGLY is a parish and small village, 6 miles north-east from Cuckfield, 3 south-east from the Balcombe station, 4 north from the Hayward's Heath station, and 36 from London, on the Brighton Railway in the Eastern division of the county, Buttinghill hundred, Cuckfield union and county court district, Lewes rape, archdeaconry and rural deanery, and diocese of Chichester. A Roman road, and a branch of the river Ouse, pass through this parish. The church is very ancient, containing several curious brasses, and has a low square tower and 5 bells: the architecture is strictly Gothic. The register dates from the reign of Queen Elizabeth. The living is a rectory, tithes commuted at £588, with residence in the gift of J.J.W.Peyton, Esq.; and held by the Rev. William Philip Haslewood, M.A., of Trinity College, Cambridge; the Rev. Morris Edgar Stanbrough, M.A., of Caius College, Cambridge, is the officiating curate. There is a National school; also a chapel for Independents. John Joseph Wakehurst Peyton, Esq. (lord of the manor), and Joseph Esdaile, Esq., are chief landowners. The population in 1861 was 626; area, 3,817 acres.
HAPSTEAD is a hamlet, half a mile east from the church. Wakehurst, the residence of Joseph Esdaile, Esq., J.P., is a mile and a half north.
[Kelly's Post Office Directory of Essex, Herts, Middlesex, Kent, Surrey and Sussex, 1867.]