CHURCH.
There was a church in Ickenham by the
mid 13th century. (fn. 30) Little is recorded of its early
history or of the area it served until 1453 when the
Rector of Ickenham came into conflict with the
Bishop of Worcester, who had appropriated Hillingdon church, (fn. 31) about the tithes of 'Tickenham'. The
dispute was apparently decided in favour of Hillingdon and the area assigned for ever to that parish. In
fact those fields which can be identified remained in
Ickenham parish, (fn. 32) and in one of them, Tottingworth Field, the Rector of Ickenham had glebe land
in 1610. (fn. 33) At that date, as also in 1961, Ickenham
church served the whole area of the ancient parish.
The benefice seems always to have been a rectory.
Reynold Cabus held the advowson in the earlier 13th
century, (fn. 34) but in 1257 John Cabus, perhaps his son,
sold it to Lawrence del Brok. (fn. 35) His family presumably retained the advowson until 1334 when
William del Brok conveyed it to John Charlton. (fn. 36)
From this date until the 20th century the advowson
was usually held by lords of Ickenham manor. From
1452 until 1464 the widow of John Shorediche
exercised the right together with her two successive
husbands. (fn. 37) In 1531 the Bishop of London presented
for one turn only; in 1635 and 1660 the Crown
presented; and two women had a turn in 1686. (fn. 38)
After that the Shorediche family held the advowson
until 1743 when it was purchased by Thomas Clarke,
a London merchant, who in 1747 presented his son,
Thomas. (fn. 39) The Clarkes held the advowson throughout the 19th century, although in 1859 the Revd.
Henry St. John Beauchamp Pell was presented by
Oliver Claude Pell and William Ford. (fn. 40) In 1923
Thomas Bryan Clarke-Thornhill transferred the
advowson to Eton College, (fn. 41) which was still the
patron in 1961. (fn. 42)
In the Middle Ages Ickenham church had no
endowments, obits, or lights, but the abbey of
Chertsey maintained a chantry priest there. In 1547
this priest was described as a 'Frenchman'. (fn. 43) After
the Dissolution he was paid out of the Augmentations until the chantries were suppressed.
Ickenham church was valued at £2 10s. in the
mid 13th century. (fn. 44) In 1291 its value was assessed
at £2. (fn. 45) In 1535 the annual value of the rectory was
£13 and the tithes were worth 26s. (fn. 46) In 1610 the
rectory included a house with a garden and orchard,
barn, stable, three closes of meadow, and land in the
common fields. (fn. 47) In 1650 there were 25 a. of glebe in
five lands in the common fields and two leets of
meadow, the whole valued at £31 a year. (fn. 48) In 1751 the
Revd. Thomas Clarke in a survey of the glebe listed
14 allotments in the common fields, Chestlands, (fn. 49)
a close near Beeton Wood, the parsonage house, and
the land surrounding it. (fn. 50) In 1760 much of the glebe
was concentrated in a block along the south-west
side of Glebe Lane. (fn. 51) At inclosure twenty years later
the rector was allotted land in the loop of the Yeading
Brook in lieu of tithes. (fn. 52) In 1800 the rectorial glebe
covered 240 a., most of which was farmed out. (fn. 53)
In 1760 the parsonage house stood among the
fields on Glebe Lane. (fn. 54) It was described in 1800 as
an 'ancient wooden building' consisting of four
rooms. (fn. 55) From 1751 the rector, Thomas Clarke,
lived at Swakeleys House and the parsonage house
was leased to a tenant who farmed the glebe. By 1800
it had long been used as a farm-house, and it was
clear that the attached dwelling was an inducement
when a tenant was being sought to farm the glebe.
The rector therefore petitioned the bishop for permission to build a rectory nearer to the parish church
and the village centre. It was to stand near Back Lane
on land obtained in exchange with Thomas Truesdale Clarke. A faculty for the change was granted in
1800 (fn. 56) and the new rectory was built soon afterwards.
In 1927 the house was sold to the Ickenham High
School for Girls, (fn. 57) and the present rectory in Swakeleys Road was then built. (fn. 58) The old rectory was
demolished in 1965. (fn. 59)
The rector in 1547 was resident in the parish. (fn. 60)
On examination in 1586 the Rector of Ickenham was
found to be 'simple'. (fn. 61) By 1642 the rector was assisted
by a curate. (fn. 62) Three years later Andrew Clare was
deprived of the benefice for deserting his cure and
joining the Royalist army. (fn. 63) Nathaniel Nicholas, his
Puritan successor, was in turn ejected in 1660. (fn. 64)
Thomas Clarke, who was presented in 1747, (fn. 65)
bought the manor of Swakeleys in 1751. He continued as rector and owner of the manor until his
death in 1796. (fn. 66) One of the reasons advanced in
1800 for building a new rectory was that it would
encourage the clergy to reside. (fn. 67)
In Thomas Clarke's time services were held twice
on Sundays and there were four Communion
services a year. Children were catechized during
Lent, 'but with little success'. (fn. 68) At the end of the
18th century there were between 20 and 30 communicants. (fn. 69)
The church of ST. GILES stands near the pond
in the centre of the old village. It consists of nave,
chancel, north aisle, south porch, north-west chapel,
and modern vestries. (fn. 70) The walls are of flint rubble,
mostly roughcast, and of brickwork. The medieval
church consisted of a chancel (16 ft. by 12 ft.) and a
nave (32 ft. by 16½ ft.), both built in the later 14th
century; they retain a south doorway and several
restored windows of this date. A timber bell turret
was added at the west end of the nave in the 15th
century. In the late 16th century the church was
found to be too small and a large north aisle was
built by William Say, the old north wall being
pierced to form an arcade. The aisle is of brick and
consists of two bays, roofed under transverse gables.
In the north wall each bay has a square-headed
window with an oval window above it. The timberframed south porch is of about the same date, representing, with the aisle, the only surviving work of
this period in a Middlesex church. (fn. 71) The present
chapel of St. John was built at the west end of
the north aisle in the mid 17th century, probably
by the Harringtons of Swakeleys. (fn. 72) The walls are
of brick, plastered internally. It was designed as
a mortuary chapel, the west, north, and south walls
being lined with arcading to form arched recesses
to house the coffins; there is an original oval window in the north gable. In 1914 thirty coffins,
dating from 1647 to 1892, were removed from the
chapel and interred in the churchyard; the building
then became a vestry. In 1960, after new vestries
had been provided, it was renovated and dedicated
as the chapel of St. John. (fn. 73) The church was restored
in the 1870s, (fn. 74) the chancel arch and the north arcade
being refashioned in the 'Early English' style. After
the Second World War the church was again found
to be too small. An extension of two bays was therefore built at the west end of the nave; the new
windows were copied from those of the 14th century
already in the church, and old timbers were obtained
for an internal roof truss. To the north of this
extension a new vestry and a room for the choir were
built, the work being completed in 1958. (fn. 75) In 1962,
during external repairs, the cement was stripped
from the east wall of the chancel to expose the flint
rubble. In the same year the porch was restored and
glazed, the ancient south door being rehung in the
outer arch. In the course of the work a coped stone
coffin lid bearing a raised cross, thought to date from
the 14th century, was found beneath the floor. (fn. 76)
The church has a number of monuments, notably
of lords of the manor and their families. There are
several late-16th-century brasses commemorating
Edmund Shorediche and members of the Say
family. (fn. 77) A marble effigy of 1665 represents the
infant son of Sir Robert Clayton, whose own monument is at Bletchingley (Surr.). (fn. 78) There are two mural
tablets by Thomas Banks, one commemorating
Thomas Clarke, rector (d. 1796), and the other J. G.
Clarke (d. 1800). The carved wooden font dates
from the late 17th century and is believed to have
come from Swakeleys. (fn. 79) The oldest pieces of plate
are a silver flagon and a paten, dated 1682 and given
by Sir Robert Vyner. There is also a cup dated 1782
and a metal dish of the same period. (fn. 80) The registers,
which are complete, record baptisms, marriages, and
burials, and date from 1539.
The church hall, standing in Ickenham High
Road to the north of the churchyard, was built in
1932; it was partly financed by the sale of the former
church school. (fn. 81)