England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Manston St Nicholas

The Parish

The parish of Manston lies in northern Dorset roughly 6 miles southwest of the market town of Shaftesbury. Manston sits on and south of the B3091 road which links Shaftesbury with Sturminster Newton. The B3091 performs a sharp right-angles bend on arriving in Manston from Shaftesbury, most properties lie along the resulting westwards headed B3091 or along the narrow lane leading to the church. Manston lies on the northern banks of the Dorset Stour river, its water-meadows gave it rich pastures and pastoral farming dominated the local economy such that early gazetteers estimated less than 100 acres was arable. Manston is drained southeastwards by the Stour, it passes through the nearby chalk ridge ti Blandford Forum then onwards to reach the English Channel through Christchurch Harbour. Manston is sited on the valley sides climbing from 40 metres by the church to 65 metres in the main part of the village; across the Stour by some 3 miles looms the chalk escarpment which climbs to 184 metres on Hambledon Hill above Iwerne Courtney. Manston parish was fairly typically sized for its area covering a little over 1,300 acres it would have supported a population of around 150 parishioners. In Domesday times Manston was a holding of one Waleran, a hunter, with assets of just 4 ploughs accompanied by some meadow & woodland it would be a poor holding but for also having 2 mills presumably powered by the Stour.

The Church

St Nicholas' church sits to the south of the village almost on the banks of the Stour and accessed by a narrow roughly surfaced track from the lane that leads to Child Okeford. The church has early origins, the chancel shows the lancets typical of the Early English Gothic period and indicating a build in the late 13th century, a date consistent with that of its piscina showing a trefoiled head. Also showing lancet styled windows is the northern aisle although Pevsner attributes these to the short Transitional period from 1300 to 1310. The Transitional period merged into the early 14th century style of the Decorated and this too has some presence in the church, the three-bay arcade having a Decorated style motif to its arches. Much else is of the Perpendicular style that followed in the late 14th century an flourished into the 15th, the battlemented western tower is a mid-15th century addition in that style. Thereafter the church was only the subject of what could be called tinkering, the nave windows are of the 17th century, the western bay of the aisle was demolished in 1780 and two Victorian restorations occurred, the first of 1870 adding a vestry whilst the second of the mid 1880s was a more thorough piece of work finishing by removing the plaster from the church. As the lane to the church is rough there is the choice to park at its entrance or outside the gates where a substantial copse of trees causes a few issues with views of that western tower, otherwise all aspects are relatively free of photographic obstructions.