Two miles to the south of Shalfleet lies the secluded and exceptionally picturesque village of Calbourne, hidden away amid fine elm trees, and with its cottages and houses scattered round an irregular green. On a grassy mound in its midst stands the still interesting church of All Saints, although it has suffered many things at the hands of restorers. Novel readers will remember that Calbourne is the scene of that vividly painful story The Silence of Dean Maitland.
Having certain personal connections with Calbourne, when plodding through the earlier episcopal registers of Winchester some ten years ago, I kept coming across references to this church and its rectors and jotted down summaries of the entries. Most of these will be found printed in the appendix to Mr Stone’s second volume on the Architectural History of the Isle of Wight. These entries, however, of the first half of the 14th century, are of no particular interest, as they chiefly refer to neglects on the part of rectors to duly maintain the ornaments and books necessary for devine service in the chancel, and to keep in proper repair the houses on the glebe.
There was a church standing here at the time of the Domesday Survey, when the parish was a large one, including Francheville or Newtown in one direction and Brighstone in another. Of this early Norman church nothing now remains except some of the masonry of the west wall. The arcading between the nave and south aisle, which was of this period, was most unhappily cleared away during a restoration of 1840 - 42. At the same time a round headed doorway was removed from the south wall. But the worst feature of the lavish expenditure of money on the fabric at this date was the demolition of the old north transept and the substitution of the present vainglorious Simeon chapel; it is a pretentious but poor imitation of Early English work, glaringly unsuitable to a homely village church.
In the first half of the thirteenth century the fabric underwent much alteration; a tower was added to the south aisle at the west end, deeply splayed lancet windows were inserted in the aisle, and the chancel was rebuilt throughout. The date of the work in the chancel and aisle is about 1250, or possibly 1260. The east windows of both chancel and aisle are similar and unusual; they are of interest in the history of the development of window tracery; the former is figured in the fifth volume of Britton’s Architectural Antiquities. They each consist of two fair sized lancets, separated by an interval of masonry, with a quatrefoil piercing above in the case of the aisle window, and a trefoil piercing in the chancel window.
The font is well worth attention. It is generally described as Early English, and the bowl is octagonal. But to my mind it is of late or Transitional Norman. It was undoubtedly in the first instance square in the bowl, and has had the angles chopped off, possibly in 1842, to improve it into an octagon; thereby destroying the arcading and other rude patterns with which the four faces had originally been carved.
In the church are two brasses of differing degrees of interest. The oldest of these is the finely engraved effigy of a knight in the armour of the close of the 14th century. Unhappily this beautiful brass has been broken and otherwise maltreated. As late as 1848, according to Bretell’s Handbook to the Isle of Wight, this effigy was attached to a raised slab supported on four marble columns. Tradition has it that this handsome, youthful-looking knight represents William Montacute, Earl of Salisbury, who died in 1397. The earl was, however, buried with great pomp in the conventional church of Bisham, Berks; but this circumstance does not necessarily invalidate the tradition, for cenotaphs were then as now occasionally erected to men of mark in places with which they were identified, apart from the site of the actual burial.
The other quaint brass is a good deal later. This small mural plate is to the memory of a Commonwealth minister, with an ingenious anagram on his name. On the right hand is the skeleton figure of Death bearing a barbed arrow in his right hand, whilst on the left is a winged figure of Father Time carrying a scythe and an hour-glass. The following is the inscription:-
Blest is the just mans memory
Both heere and to Eternity
Being dead he yet speaketh._Heb.xi.iii
IN MEMORY
OF THE REVEREND RELIGIOUS AND
LEARNED PRECHER
M. DANIEL EVANCE
Who was born at London March 2 1613
And dyed heere at Calbourne Decemb. 27 1652
This monument was erected by Hanna his mournful relict.
Daniel Evance. Anagram, I can deal even.
Who is sufficient for this thing
Wisely to harpe on every string
Rightly divide the word of truth
To babes & men to age & youth.
One of a thousand where’s he found
So learned, pious, wise & sound
Earth hath but few there is in heaven
One who answers I CAN DEAL EVEN.
It remains to be mentioned that in 1683 the upper part of the 13th century tower was destroyed by fire. It continued in a ruinous condition until 1752, when the present upper stages were built, as set forth on a tablet in the wall._ “I am risen from ye Ruins of near 70 years. T. Hollis, J. Carford, Churchwardens.”
Transcribed from “County Churches by J Charles Cox, LL.D., F.S.A. Pub. 1911.
