England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Basing St Mary

The Parish

The parish of Basing lies in northeastern Hampshire not too far from its border with neighbouring Berkshire. Basing is located about two miles east of its larger neighbour Basingstoke, on modern maps the original village of Basing is now referred to as Old Basing. Basing sits just north of the A30 road which connects Basingstoke through to London, more modern communications also pass through the parish, the Basingstoke canal, London to Southampton railway and the M3 motorway also carve their way through Basing parish. Basing would have been a large village grouped around the Norman motte and bailey castle. Basing has participated in quite a few historical military events, it was the scene of the Danish defeat of King Ethedred in 871, entertained Queen Elizabeth in 1560 and the castle was besieged, stormed and ultimately destroyed by Cromwell's forces in 1645. The villagers, undoubtedly, just got on with the main economic activities of arable farming supplemented by pastoral grazing of cattle on the floodplain of the River Loddon on the eastern banks of which Basing sits. The Loddon drains the parish northeastwards, reaching the Thames to the east of Reading it heads, through the capital, to the North Sea via the Thames Estuary. Basing is sited at around 80 metres above the sea, as it sits in a valley land rises around it in gentle countryside to local heights of about 110 metres. Basing parish was one of the larger in its area, it covered about 5,300 acres and supported a substantial population of over 1,100 parishioners. In Domesday times the builder of the castle Hugh de Port held Basing, it was relatively prosperous offering 14 ploughs, meadows & woodland and no fewer than 3 mills.

The Church

St Mary's church sits at the heart of Old Basing sandwiched between The Street and Church Lane in an oval shaped area of grounds. In common with the castle St Mary has its origins in the Norman period but little remains of that period except the configuration of the building itself with a central crossing tower. Pevsner points to both northern and southern arches as proof of that Romanesque origin. The bulk of the church was, however, almost completely rebuilt during the great church-building era of the Perpendicular period. An inscribed date of 1519 is probably reflective of the period in which the work was completed. Still later in 1874 the Victorian restoration occurred, described by Pevsner as "drastic" it clearly altered much of the building to Pevsner's dismay. St Mary's site can be approached either from The Street or from Church Lane as a series of pathway crisscross the churchyard, views and photographic angles are, however, much impeded by the abundant foliage within the grounds.