Upton’s Beginnings
Earliest Archaeological Records
Evidence of habitation since the Stone Ages has been found in the immediate area around Upton. Worked flints and an axe have been discovered in eight locations, while a Bronze Age spearhead and part of a Belgic vessel, together with signs of enclosures, a ring ditch and mounds show continuing human habitation. There have been extensive finds from Roman times, like the potsherds and coins which show a possible connection with the large Roman settlement at Duston.
At Upton there are foundations of an unusually large Saxon building west of St Michael’s church, with a hearth, domestic debris and loom weights. These are on display in Northampton Museum. The supposition is that the building was a weaving shed. Recent excavations in the former walled garden before the construction of the new sports field revealed walls, ditches and some Saxon pottery, with the suggestion that the site might have been a kiln or a bakery. The remains of the deserted village to the south-east of Upton Hall [home of Quinton House School] may date back to Saxon times as the village is recorded in Domesday Book in 1086 and possibly the Hall itself has Saxon origins, but this can only be speculation.
Upton and the Domesday Survey
UPTON. 2 hides. Land for 10 ploughs. In lordship 1.
10 villagers and 10 smallholders have 5 ploughs.
A mill at 12s 8d; meadow, 6 acres.
William the Conqueror’s national survey is complete for this part of England and so Upton (Optone) is recorded. We are by no means sure what the King intended to do with the information gathered, as he died his very nasty death before the full returns were complete, but the entry is not very satisfactory for our purposes in discovering more about the lives of the inhabitants.
As you can see from the Domesday entry [above], the survey seems only to have been concerned with property values and the work force, so most historians conclude that the results were to be used for taxation, or for numbers of men available for military service. We can tell that Upton was fairly wealthy with a mill and five ploughs, compared with other local villages. Not recorded is the name of the Saxon owner or anything about the buildings. The whole area became part of the King’s own land in 1066 and only passed out of royal hands in 1189. There is a copy of the local volume of the Domesday Book with the Northampton entries in the Quinton House School library
Medieval Upton
Upton Manor in the Middle Ages
Archaeology provides information on: the remains of ridge and furrow cultivation, resulting from centuries of ploughing field strips in the same direction to create drainage mounds; the remains of the deserted village which was certainly occupied in the Middle Ages; and the traces of the fish ponds often created by villagers or their lords to provide not only water reserves, but also fresh fish. (At that time the Catholic Church forbade the eating of meat on Fridays, as well as on many other days in Lent and Advent, so fish was a valuable addition to the monotonous diet. Ducks and waterfowl were also obviously fish as they swam on water!) After 1066 we begin to get some written evidence to add to the archaeology.
The written evidence, limited though it is, confirms the impression of a prosperous village unit under its lord. 1 have used the research done so meticulously in the early 19th century by George Baker, who studied the various Charters and Court records in the original Clerk’s Latin (the Domesday Survey was written in a form of shorthand known as “Clerk’s Latin”).
The manor in the Middle Ages was the whole of the land and house held by a feudal tenant and, as stated earlier, William kept most of Northamptonshire for himself and his family. The resistance of the Saxon hero, Hereward the Wake who was the former Saxon nobleman of Northamptonshire, meant that there was a need for a strong hand in this area and William entrusted it to his niece, Judith, who married the Saxon Earl of Northampton, Waltheof. He was executed on 1076 for treason, showing that William the Conqueror did not have an “easy ride” in overcoming the Saxons. The lands passed to her daughter, Maud, who married Simon de Senlis, one of William’s chief followers. Northampton itself benefited largely from the Senlis family, but there is no record of them at Upton.
However the manor passed out of royal hands in 1189, a year when Richard the Lion Heart was raising money for the Third Crusade. Many towns, including Northampton, date their first charters from 1189 and the suspicion is that the King was selling privileges and land to pay for his foreign responsibilities.
Robert Fitzsewin was granted the manor “for services” although what they were is not recorded, but land grants were often made to repay royal debts. It passed through the female line to the Chauncey family but the land seems to have been sub-divided between tenants. The Abbot of St James obtained the mill and some meadowland in the reign of Henry III. A mill was a valuable possession as all farmers had to pay to have their corn ground and this may be the origin of the local belief that the Hall had monastic connections.
Legal Case Relating to the Weedon Road
There were various Law Court appearances noted. There are few other records, but all legal records were kept and are still available so that one might get the impression that Englishmen were very fond of going to law and were often in trouble with the authorities. Historians, however, have to study those records that still exist.
Perhaps the most interesting case occurred in 1329 in the reign of Edward 111. The then lord, Nicholas de Chauneas, or Chaunceux, was summoned to explain what right he had to exact tolls on the fish and salt passing through the manor, presumably along that part of the King’s Highway that was later to become the A45. He was also asked whether he kept “ pillory and tumbril” to punish offenders within his jurisdiction, which would have implied the expense of catching, trying and punishing criminals. It seems he was only fining criminals instead of using the traditional punishments.
It appears that Nicholas was charging 1d for each cart load of fish, which we hope were salted or smoked, with a farthing for each horse load and a farthing for a bushel of salt. He must have been a shrewd early businessman as salt was essential at a time when fresh meat was unknown from September till June for all but the very rich. Fish was a valuable contribution to the diet and was carried long distances to market.
The Weedon Road was a main highway to and from Northampton, an important provincial town with its Royal castle, and Nicholas might have been making a very good profit. The verdict seemed to be going against him until the ancient system of getting a jury of twelve local men to swear to the truth was used. They declared that his activities were of “ancient lineage” and said the family had improved the roads and so had a right to the tolls. Roads at the time were often impassable, so this would be a valuable local service. Nicholas was fined half a mark, but he kept his lands. What happened about the tolls is unknown, but probably he would not have been able to collect them afterwards. By a strange coincidence, this Nicholas’ daughter married a Richard Knightley who died in 1346, seventy years before the Knightleys from Staffordshire bought the property. Perhaps one could guess that it was this marriage that brought the manor to their attention.
Village Life in the Middle Ages
There is no evidence about the life of the villagers in the Middle Ages. From the remains already mentioned it seems to have been quite prosperous, with a mill worth forty shillings. In an inventory of 1477 twenty four houses are recorded which is almost the equivalent of the Domesday entry and corresponds with the mounds of the “lost” village ( see the reconstruction below). By that time the Knightleys had already started their aggressive depopulation for sheep enclosures at their bigger manor at Fawsley. This struggle is well documented as the tenants resisted through the Courts, but what happened at Upton is obscure. Perhaps the family extended their policy to Upton, but parish records are not available till 1594 because St Michael’s church was originally a Chapel of Ease of St Peter’s in Northampton and would be treated as part of that parish. Certainly the village declined. By 1700 there were only eleven houses and at the first census of 1801 there were only four.
The village may have died a natural death - of disease such as the Black Death of 1348-9 or its successors, or the workers might have been attracted into Northampton. The existence of a large town nearby may have allowed the workers to leave without protest. We can only guess at the reasons for the disappearance of the houses, and it may even have been as late as the Samwell creation of the Park in the 18th century.
Extract taken from A Brief History of Upton, Northampton (second edition 1995) by Kathleen A. Healey BA, Cert. Ed., printed and produced for Quinton House School. Reproduced by kind permission of Quinton House School.