Stoke-Poges (St. Giles)

STOKE-POGES (St. Giles), a parish, in the union of Eton, hundred of Stoke, county of Buckingham, 2 miles (N.) from Slough; containing, with the chapelry of Ditton, and part of the village of Slough, 1528 inhabitants. The splendid mansion and park of Stoke were purchased of Mr. Granville Penn, by the Rt. Hon. Henry Labouchere, president of the Board of Trade, in 1848, for £62,000. A fair is held on Whit-Tuesday. The living is a discharged vicarage, valued in the king's books at £7. 17., and in the patronage of Lord Godolphin (the impropriator), with a net income of £319: the great tithes have been commuted for £150, and the vicarial for £68. There is a place of worship for Wesleyans; and a national school is supported by bequests producing an income of £30. An hospital for four men and two women was founded in 1557, by Lord Hastings, of Sloughborough, who endowed it with a rent-charge of about £53, for a chantry priest and four bedesmen. It was originally in Stoke Park, and its noble founder, becoming one of its inmates, ended his days within its walls, and was buried in the chapel attached; the ancient building was pulled down in 1765, and the hospital refounded on its present site. The revenue, since augmented, is £142; the inmates are three brethren and two sisters, with a master. The churchyard is the scene of Gray's Elegy, and contains the remains of the poet; in the field adjoining, a large sarcophagus was erected to his memory in 1799, by the late Mr. Penn, of Stoke Park.