Chiddingly

CHIDDINGLY is an extensive parish and village, 10 miles east from Lewes, 7 south-east from Uckfield, 5 north from Hailsham, 3½ from Berwick railway station, and 51 by road from London, in the Eastern division of the county, hundred of Shiplake, West Firle union, county court district and archdeaconry of Lewes, rape and rural deanery of Pevensey, and Chichester diocese. The church (name unknown) is near the centre of the parish: it is an ancient structure, in the Decorated style of the 13th century, having a square stone tower with four pinnacles, from which, rising to an altitude of 128 feet, is a very elegant spire: in the tower are 6 good bells: there are several monuments in the church, one of a stately character, erected to the memory of Sir John Jefferay, Knt., Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer, the then Lord of Chiddingly Place, who died in 1578; it is 18 feet in height and 12 in breadth, raised on a pedestal of Sussex marble. The register begins in the year 1625. The living is a vicarage, yearly value £158, in the gift of the Countess De La Warr (Baroness Buckhurst), and held by the Rev. James Henry Vidal, M.A., of St. John’s College, Cambridge: Owen John Fuller Meyrick, Esq., who is a large landowner, receives the great tithes. Here is a National school, supported by voluntary subscriptions. Chiddingly Place, the chapel of which is now used as a barn, is a very ancient mansion. [Kelly's Post Office Directory of Essex, Herts, Middlesex, Kent, Surrey and Sussex, 1867.]