Sancton Parish information from Bulmers' 1892.

SANCTON:
Geographical and Historical information from the year 1892.

Wapentake of Harthill (Holme Beacon Division) - County Council Electoral Division of Market Weighton - Petty Sessional Division of Holme Beacon - Poor Law Union and County Court District of Pocklington - Rural Deanery of Weighton - Archdeaconry of the East Riding - . Diocese of York.

This parish lies on the verge of the Wolds, and consists of the township of its own name, with the hamlet of Houghton, and included until recently the township of North Cliffe, now transferred to North Cave. The total area embraced within the present parochial boundary is 3,410 acres, of which 2,984½ acres are under assessment, and are rated at £3,171. The population in 1891 was 326. The surface is hilly, attaining in one place an elevation of 475 feet, and the scenery varied and picturesque. The soil is a light loam on the higher grounds, and sandy in the valleys; the subsoil is chalk; wheat, oats, barley, potatoes, and turnips are the chief crops. Charles Langdale, Esq., J.P., D.L., who is also lord of the manor; William Henry Harrison-Broadley, Esq., J.P., D.L., Welton, Brough; exors. of the late John Wells, of Booth Ferry House; and Mr. Thomas Campbell, Sancton, are the principal landowners.

Sancton is an ancient manor mentioned in Domesday Book as Santun and Sautune, that is Sand town, and it had then both a church and a priest. William Malet had in demesne seven carucates and a half, and three knights held the remainder of Sautune under Gislebert Tison. The manor was in the possession of the ancestors of the present owner before the year 1459.

The village is pleasantly situated in a valley on the road from Market Weighton to Hull, two-and-a-half miles south-east of the former place, whereat is the nearest railway station. The church of All Saints, or All Hallowes, stands on the slope of a hill on the north side of the village, and was given by one of the early lords of Sancton to the Gilbertine monks of Watton. It is a neat structure of cur stone, rebuilt, with the exception of the tower, in 1869-71 and consists of chancel, nave, south porch, and a western tower containing three bells. The tower is octagonal, and each angle is guarded by a light buttress terminating in a crocketed pinnacle. In the south wall of the chancel is a piscina, and the ancient octagonal font stands under the tower. Several of the windows are stained-glass memorials. The pulpit is a diminutive structure of wood. In the chancel floor are several memorials of the Langdale family; amongst them is one to Sir Marmaduke Langdale, the famous Cavalier General, created Baron Langdale, of Holme-on-Spalding Moor, in 1658, and died in 1661. The living is a discharged vicarage, net yearly value £270, in the gift of the Archbishop of York, and held by the Rev. Richard William Hiley, D.D., of St. Mary's Hall, Oxford, who succeeded the late Rev. Edward Kaye Holt. There are 11 acres of glebe. The tithe of the parish amounts to £92; Charles Langdale, Esq., is the lay impropriator. A new Vicarage House will be erected shortly, towards which the Ecclesiastical Commissioners have given £1,500.

There is a small Wesleyan chapel here, built in 1815, and enlarged in 1840. The Church school was founded in 1610 by Marmaduke Langdale, Esq., of Dowthorpe, who left £20 to this school, and the one at Wighton (Weighton), if such should be by the laws allowed. The school was rebuilt in 1870, at a cost of £700, as a memorial of the Rev. Thomas Jackson and his two brothers, who endowed it with £20 per annum.

HOUGHTON, is a hamlet and separate manor, adjoining Sancton on the west, belonged, in far-off times, to a family styled de Houghton, and was conveyed, by the marriage of Helena, an heiress, to Patricius de Langdale, in 1369. The present owner is the grandson of Charles Philip, 16th Baron Stourton, who married the Hon. Mary Langdale, second daughter and co-heiress of Marmaduke, fifth Baron Langdale. Charles, the third son of this marriage, assumed, in 1815, the surname of Langdale only, in compliance with the will of Philip Langdale, Esq., of Houghton, the senior branch of the family of Lord Langdale. He married, first, Charlotte Mary, daughter of Lord Clifford, of Chudleigh, who died two years afterwards, leaving two infant daughters, and secondly, Mary, daughter of Marmaduke Constable-Maxwell, Esq., of Everingham Park. He died 1868, leaving, besides other issue, Charles, his eldest son and successor, the present owner of Houghton. He married in 1852, Henrietta, the eldest daughter and heiress of the late Henry Grattan, Esq., M.P., of Celbridge Abbey, Co. Kildare. He is a J.P. & D.L. for the East Riding, a Magistrate for Co. Kildare, and was High Sheriff of Co. Monaghan in 1869.

Houghton Hall, the seat of Charles Langdale, Esq., is a handsome mansion, standing in an extensive and well-wooded park, ornamented by a fine sheet of water, divided in the centre by a cascade. Adjoining the hall is a Catholic chapel, built in 1829, and very handsomely decorated. The Rev. Canon Wells, the priest. in charge, resides at the presbytery in the park. There is also a school in connection with the chapel, supported by Mr. Langdale, and attended by about 40 children. The Catholic cemetery, adjoining Sancton churchyard, was consecrated in 1862.

Near the hall is a curious old building of stone, with flat roof and embattled parapet, called Castle farm.

[Description(s) from Bulmer's History and Directory of East Yorkshire (1892)]

Directories

• Transcript of the entry for the Post Office, professions and trades in Bulmer's Directory of 1892.

Scan, OCR and html by Colin Hinson. Checking and correction by Peter Nelson.