Denham, Buckinghamshire
Historical Description
Denham, a village and a parish in Bucks, on the river Colne and the Grand Junction Canal, at the boundary with Middlesex, 2 miles NNW of Uxbridge station on the G.W.R., with a post, money order, and telegraph office under Uxbridge. Acreage, 3940; population, 1242. Denham Place, a large brick mansion on the site of an ancient manor-house of the Peckhams, has a fine old chapel with ancient gilded seats, and was built in 1667 by Sir Roger Hill. Denham Court, a modernized old moated mansion, belonged to Sir W. Bowyer, the friend of Dryden,gave concealment, under Lady Bowyer's care, to Charles II., and was the place where Dryden wrote part of his translation of Virgil. A lime avenue of exactly half a mile leads to it. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Oxford; net yearly value, £562 with residence. The church is of the 14th century, is a beautiful structure of stone in the Perpendicular style, and contains monuments of the Peckhams and Sir Roger Hill, and some fine brasses, one being to Abbess Jordan of Sion Monastery. There are only three in England to pre-Reformation abbesses. The bells of this church once belonged to Lavenden Abbey, and were brought to Denham at the dissolution of the monastery. There is a Wesleyan chapel.
Administration
The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.
Ancient County | Buckinghamshire | |
Ecclesiastical parish | Denham St. Mary | |
Hundred | Burnham | |
Poor Law union | Eton |
Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.
Church Records
The parish register dates from the year 1564.
Churches
Church of England
St. Mary (parish church)
The parish church of St. Mary, standing in a churchyard planted with and surrounded by fine trees, is a Perpendicular building of flint, consisting of chancel, clerestoried nave of three bays, aisles and an embattled western tower containing a clock and 8 bells: the east window and two lancet windows are stained: the font is ancient: there are several monuments of the Peckhams, including one with recumbent figures, dated 1564, to Sir Edmund Peckham, cofferer in the King's house, knighted 18 Oct. 1537, and Anne his wife; there is another to Sir Robert Peckham, knighted 1553, privy councillor to Queen Mary, who died in 1569, being then on his travels, and was buried in the church of St. Gregory at Rome, his heart being deposited at Denham, pursuant to his own request; there is also a monument to Sir Roger Hill kt. 1729, several tablets to the Bowyer family, baronets, of Denham Court, a brass to Agnes Jordan, last Abbess of Sion, in the parish of Isleworth, Middlesex, who was buried here in 1545, another of the 15th century to Walter Durdent, his two wives and 21 children, and a palimpsest brass, long supposed to have been lost: the earlier figure on the reverse side is that of a friar, in gown and hood, with his hands folded within his sleeves and a knotted cord hanging from his girdle, but his feet have been cut off; below is an inscription in Latin to John Pyke, a native of Langport, between the letters M.J.P.S. perhaps for Johannes Pyke Magister Scholae; the date is c. I440; the figure on the obverse side is that of a lady in a long-sleeved robe and pedimental head-dress, and below an inscription to Amphillis, daughter of Sir Edward Peckham kt. d. 13 March, 1445; under this is a quartered shield of arms; there is also & brass effigy of a priest, 1612, and a slab incised with a figure of a man in a gown, to Philip Edelen, 1656: the south wall exhibits remains of a painting: the Early English font has an octagonal basin, supported on a central shaft surrounded by eight smaller ones: there are 250 sittings.
Civil Registration
For general information about Civil Registration (births, marriages and deaths) see the Civil Registration page.
Denham was in Eton Registration District from 1837 to 1974
Directories & Gazetteers
We have transcribed the entry for Denham from the following:
- Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Denham (St. Mary))
Land and Property
The Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Buckinghamshire is available to browse.
Maps
Online maps of Denham are available from a number of sites:
- Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- Google Streetview.
- National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
- OpenStreetMap.
- old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
- Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
- A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)
Newspapers and Periodicals
The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following Buckinghamshire papers online:
Visitations Heraldic
A full transcript of the Visitation of Buckinghamshire, 1634 is online