Walberton

WALBERTON is a village and parish, 3½ miles south-west from Arundel, and 7½ east from Chichester, in the Western division of the county, Avisford hundred, Arundel rape, county court district and rural deanery, West Hampnett union, diocese and archdeaconry of Chichester. The church of St. Mary is of Saxon architecture, and has a small wooden belfry with 3 bells, and a neat spire. The register dates from 1556. The living is a vicarage, with that of Yapton annexed, joint commuted rent-charges £557, with 26½ acres of glebe here and residence, in the gift of the Bishop of Chichester, and held by the Rev. Thomas Stuart Lyle Vogan, M.A., of St. Edmund Hall, Oxford. Here are National schools for about 90 boy and girls; and also a girls' school supported by Miss Pack. Walberton House, the seat of Richard Prime, Esq., J.P., is a handsome mansion, built about the year 1817 by Sir Robert Smirke, it stands on the site of a former manor-house: the hall and staircase, as also the library, are very beautiful and costly. Avisford House and estate, situated near the northern boundary of the parish, is the property of Mrs. Reynell Pack, and gives name to the hundred: it stands on an elevated site, tastefully adorned, commanding extensive views of the sea and surrounding country. Richard Prime, Esq., is chief landowner. John Nash, in 1732, bequeathed a house and land, with a rent-charge of £12, for teaching the poor childrenof this parish. The Arundel and Chichester road crosses the northern boundary of the parish. The area is 1,722 acres, and in 1861 it contained 588 inhabitants. [Kelly's Post Office Directory of Essex, Herts, Middlesex, Kent, Surrey and Sussex, 1867.]