Penn, Buckinghamshire
Historical Description
Penn, a village and a parish in Bucks. The village stands on an eminence, 2½ miles NE of Loudwater station on the Maidenhead and Oxford branch of the G.W.R., 4 SW of Amersham, and 4 NE of Wycombe; presents a picturesque appearance, and has a post, money order, and telegraph office under Amersham. The parish contains also the hamlets of Forty Green and Knocklock's or Knotty Green, and part of the ecclesiastical parish of Penn Street. Acreage, 3992; population of the civil parish, 1021; of the ecclesiastical, 413. There is a parish council consisting of nine members. The manor belongs to Earl Howe. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Oxford; gross value, £320 with residence. Patron, Earl Howe. The church is an ancient building of flint and brick in the Early English style, consisting of chancel, nave, S aisle, N and S porches, and a massive western tower. It contains monuments of the Penns and the Curzons. The tower commands a view over portions of twelve counties. There are Baptist and Wesleyan chapels, also a reading-room and institute.
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 | Penn Holy Trinity | |
Hundred | Burnham | |
Poor Law union | Amersham |
Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.
Church Records
The parish register dates from the year 1560.
Churches
Church of England
The Holy Trinity (parish church)
The church of the Holy Trinity is an ancient edifice of brick and flint with stone quoins, in the Early English style, consisting of chancel, nave of three bays, south aisle, north and south porches and a low but massive western tower in the Perpendicular style, containing a clock and 6 bells: the nave roof is Decorated: in tbe church are numerous monuments to the Penn and Curzon families, including one to Esther (Hanmer), first wife of Assheton, first Baron and Viscount Curzon, d. 21st July, 1764, and to Lady Dorothy (Grosvenor), his second wife, d. 24 Feb. 1774; and another monument, by Chantrey, to the Hon. Penn Assheton Curzon M.P. for Leominster and Leicester, d. 3 September, 1797: brasses with effigies to John Penn, 1596, and Ursula, his wife: William Penn, 1638, and Martha, his wife, 1635: John Penn, 1641, and Sarah, his wife: and others to Susan, wife of Sir Henry Drury, 1640, and to Elizabeth Rok, with effigy in a shroud: in the nave is a slab inscribed to Roger Penn, 1731, and one to William Penn, an infant: there is also a memorial to the Rev. Roger Mather, 11 years vicar; and below the church is the vault of the Penn family: there are 300 sittings. In the churchyard are several grand old yew trees.
Civil Registration
Penn was in Amersham Registration District from 1837 to 1974
Directories & Gazetteers
We have transcribed the entry for Penn from the following:
- Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Penn (Holy Trinity))
Land and Property
The Return of Owners of Land in 1873 for Buckinghamshire is available to browse.
Maps
Online maps of Penn 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:
Villages, Hamlets, &c
Penn StreetVisitations Heraldic
A full transcript of the Visitation of Buckinghamshire, 1634 is online