364
NOTES AND QUERIES.
[9 th S. II. Nov. 5, '98.
parishes of St. Mary Magdalen, St. Leonards,
and Hollington. The preamble to this Act
(31 & 32 Viet., cap. 146) gives important
information concerning these parishes.
I believe even the local guide-books of St. Leonards and Hastings, if they had been referred to, would have afforded MR. HAMIL- TON HALL some information which he does not appear to be possessed of. I allude more
Earticularly to that by Mr. Koss ;* but we all now there are guide-books and guide-books.
As the history of the parish of St. Leonards adjoining Hollington is both curious and interesting, and one to which it is not perhaps altogether easy to find a parallel, though there may be such, I will here give a slight sketch of the events and occurrences which led up to the promotion and adoption of the St. Leonards and St. Mary Magdalen Church Districts Act of 1868.
St. Leonards is the " parish " which inter- venes between Hollington and St. Mary Magdalen, beyond which latter lies the Cinque Port of Hastings, and towards the eastt lies Hastings. As I am writing on Hollington and St. Leonards I take no account of the parish of St. Mary Magdalen, although it is called in the Act a " decayed parish."
Among the original sources of information for the parochial history of St. Leonards arid Hollington are the following :
1. The records of the Corporation of Hastings.
2. The parish registers of Hollington.
3. The ecclesiastical registers, &c., cited by Mr. Durrant Cooper. All of these have been searched.
4. Maps of older date, such as that an impression of which is to be found in ' Cinque Ports,' by Montagu Burrows, p. 195, in the " Historical Towns Series." J
On referring to the parochial history of St. Leonards and Hollington, as drawn from these sources, we learn, in the first place, that the original parish church of St. Leonards disappeared long ago. Its disappearance took place at a period of remote antiquity. It is believed, as I said in my note at 8 th S. xii. 490, to have been washed away by the sea, together with other parts of the area of the parish. What now remains of the ancient parish of St. Leonards
- Mr. Ross was, if I am not mistaken, a member
of the Corporation of Hastings.
t In my note at 8 th S. :xii. 490 I was looking the other way.
J The map I have chiefly consulted for this article is that for the Cinque Port Liberty of Hastings.
is represented at the present time by the
town of St. Leonards-on-Sea, with a portion
of the adjacent land. In consequence of this
diminution of the area of the parish and the
disappearance of the parish church, there
arose in former times a disposition to deny
(I am afraid from interested motives) that
there was or had ever been such a parish.
The parish and its church, held by a rector or other incumbent, had certainly existed at some remote period, but as time went on its parochiality (so to speak) was denied, and it was called the pretended parish of St. Leonards, or the decayed parish of Si/. Leonards, or the reputed parish of St. Leonards (see the registers of Holling- ton and the Act of Parliament). The civil affairs of the decayed parish were managed by the Corporation of Hastings, to whose Cinque Port liberty or liberties it belonged ; but it lost its ecclesiastical position altogether, there being no parish church and no rector or other incumbent to exercise rights. Hence it was necessary, especially after Warrior Square had been built, and St. Leonards had become an important seaside resort, to re-establish the ecclesiastical posi- tion which was lost owing to the encroach- ments of the sea, and the Bill which I have mentioned was promoted and finally passed in the year 1868.
St. Leonards is called in the preamble to the Act " the reputed parish of St. Leonard," and the present St. Leonards-on-Sea is spoken of as the town and reputed parish of St. Leonards. When St. Leonards-on-Sea became, as I said above, an important seaside resort, church accommodation was required for a population which was largely resident in good houses, and several churches were built; but there being no parish church and no rector or other incumbent to exercise rights, a serious difficulty arose. The churches could have no districts assigned them ; and there could be no district parishes, as these could not be legally constituted, there being no mother church and no rector or other incumbent to exercise the right of giving or refusing con- sent to the division of the parish. These difficulties were removed by the passing of the Act.
The parish of Hollington adjoineu St. Leonards, and there was (as I have previously said) a free chapel of St. Leonards in Hollington ; but this is not to be con- founded with the rectory of St. Leonards. Probably it was established* as a free chapel
- See Dr. Cutts's ' Dictionary of the Church of
England,' s.v. 'Chapel.'
