Chiddingly Church 

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This enormous edifice is without doubt the show piece of the interior of the church and it is worth describing it in detail. The monument is to Sir John Jefferay, died 23rd May 1573, who was Chief Baron of Exchequer under Elizabeth I and at various times member of Parliament for Arundel and East Grinstead. His effigy in legal robes reclines on its elbow above the recumbent form of his second wife, Dame Alice. Below them kneels a grand-daughter, Elizabeth, later to marry Robert Bertie. In the two niches stand Sir John's only daughter Elizabeth and her husband Sir Edward Montague, both with a look of ineffable hauteur. Lady Elizabeth's fantastic ruff and farthingale is in marked contrast to the simplicity of her mother's costume. The monument is in alabaster, which was perhaps mined at Mountfield near Battle where there is still a quarry in use. The monument has been attributed to William Cure II, one of a famous family of sculptors who came from Amsterdam in 1541 and worked in England for three generations. Latterly it is felt that it was probably the work of more than one sculptor as there are considerable variations in the quality of the carvings. This is one of the most impressive and important pieces of monumental sculpture in Sussex, as there are only two known examples in England of erect figures in monuments of this period (16th Century). The other is at Spilsby, Lincolnshire, and this fact is recorded in Prof. Brian Kemp's authoritative work "English Church Monuments" (1980). The families portrayed in each memorial are related. An interesting local tradition concerns the stone drums on which Sir Edward and Lady Elizabeth stand. These are supposed to represent the cheeses that were placed before them as stepping-stones as they walked from Chiddingly Place to church, as they were too proud to put their feet to the ground. There is also a persistent tradition of a secret tunnel from Chiddingly Place to the church which is supposed to emerge either in front of the monument or at the base of the tower, but this is so far unproven. It is known, however, that part of a tunnel was found at Chiddingly Place which emerges in one of the original rooms of the present Place Farm.

The monument has sadly been disfigured and although tradition attributes this to the Puritans of the 17th Century there is no foundation in fact.

It is thought by many that the monument probably suffered from the common mistake which identified this Sir John Jefferay with Sir George Jeffrey, the inhuman judge of James II reign ('The Bloody Assizes').

This impression is unfortunately still prevalent. From what we gather of his private and public life Sir John Jefferay was a most just and estimable man, so that it is doubly unfortunate that he has been confused with a man so much his opposite.

The Montagues have lost arms and fingers, and three carved shields with a wealth of heraldry lie at the base of the monument awaiting restoration to their proper place above the inscription. The shields were in position until the summer of 1944, when a V1 flying bomb exploded in the fields between the church and Muddles Green. The blast of the explosion caused some minor structural damage to the exterior of the church, and loosened the shields to such an extent that it was deemed safer to take them down. It is recorded that 50 high explosive and 1350 incendiary bombs were dropped on Chiddingly in the course of World War II.

In 1830 there was a wave of agricultural unrest known as the 'Captain Swing Riots', which swept across Sussex from East to West in a matter of weeks. They took the form of machine-breaking, rick-burning, riotous assemblies and a great deal of damage was done to the property of parson and squire. Riots took place at Hellingly and Ringmer, the latter in the churchyard. The interior of Horsham Parish Church was badly damaged and it is not impossible that there was such an incident at Chiddingly, in the course of which damage was done to the monuments. The riots, which went on for two years in the South of England and East Anglia, provoked savage sentences from the courts. Over four hundred people were transported and nineteen hanged.

As there are several memorials to other members of the Jefferay family in the church, it may help to add a note on their relationships.

John Jefferay I, who lived in Chiddingly from c. 1480 until his death in 1512, is commemorated with Amis, his wife in the black-letter memorial brass on the floor of the centre aisle. His home, Chiddingly Place, now Place Farm, was enlarged by his grandson into an E-shaped Elizabethan manor house of which only a part remains.

John had three sons; the eldest Richard I who inherited Chiddingly Place from his father, the second Thomas I who lived at Ripe, the third William I who lived at Pekes House in this parish.

Richard's son and heir was John II, the Sir John of the monument, whose only child and heiress was Elizabeth. Sir John's younger brother, Richard II, is commemorated in the mural tablet on the left of the chancel arch. The other members of the family whose monuments are still in the church are descended from the Pekes branch. William II and Awdray Harvey, and his wife with their two sons and seven daughters, kneel in the recently restored charming monument by the South door. This monument was originally behind the pulpit. The inscription records that all the children survived their parents, a rare occurrence in the 17th Century with its high infant mortality. The eldest son, Thomas II, went to America in 1631 and his name appears in the New England register as living in Weymouth, Connecticut. William's grave-slab is just below the chancel step and the Jefferay coat of arms can be distinguished on it. The remaining Jefferay memorial which is on the north wall of the chancel is that of Margerie, wife of Thomas II, who died in her early twenties. It bears the macabre device of a skull in an urn, with the stark words 'Margarita fui' - I was Margerie.

The memorials of the other Jefferays of the older generation have vanished but there are two matrices of memorial brasses. The smaller of the two is below the sanctuary step at the north side and suggests that it may have depicted two figures kneeling and facing each other, which is characteristic of 16th Century brasses. The other and larger matrix is concealed by the sanctuary carpet. There are two figures with labels issuing from their mouths - an inscription below and the matrices of two shields at the upper corners. In his notes on the restoration of the chancel (1864), Mr. Vidal suggested that this might be the missing tomb of William Jefferay I,

For fuller details of the old Sussex family of Jefferay the reader is referred to M A Lower's "Parochial History of Chiddingly".

The other memorials and ledger stones in the chancel are of members of the French and Bromfield families. The Frenchs had been ironmasters at Stream in the north east of the parish since 1540 where their furnace sites and hammer ponds can still be seen. They were connected by marriage to the Bromfields, a cadet branch of an old Welsh family, who had settled at Udimore near Rye.

On the south wall of the chancel is a hatchment of the arms of Bromfield impaling French. This device concerns Thomas Bromfield (d. 1710) and his wife Ann, eldest daughter of Stephen French. As Ann was an heiress in her own right her arms are borne in the escutcheon of pretence.

There are other ledger stones in the centre aisle. One is to the magnificently named Thomas Thunder of Thunder's Hill. Two mark the graves of former incumbents both of whom wrote their own epitaphs. The one nearest the tower is of Thomas Eades. He was one of the four hundred Anglican clergy who, after the expulsion of James II in 1688, refused to take the oath of allegiance to his successors William III and Mary and were deprived of their living in consequence. They are known as the "Non-jurers" and they remained as a separate church producing both saints and scholars until they died out in the 18th Century. Thomas lived on his own property at Whitesmith to a ripe old age, quarrelling with his neighbours. As his epitaph is now almost illegible it is worth recording:

"The body of Mr. Thamas Eade lies here. A faithful shepherd that did not pow’rs fear; But kept old Truth, and would not let her go, Nor turn out of the way for friend or foe. He was suspended in the Dutchman's days, Because he would not walk in their strange ways. Daemona non armis sed morte subegit Jesus, As Xt by death his rampant foes trod down, So must all those who doe expect a crown".

"He died 1717, aged about 80 years".

Next to him lies Thomas Baker, Vicar of Chiddingly and Alciston, who wrote poetry much regarded locally at the time, although the florid piety of his epitaph is hardly to the taste of today.

Over the north and south doors are tablets bearing the arms of Richardson. Thomas Shepherd Richardson, locally known as "Squire Richardson", bought Hilder's farm at the end of the last Century and transformed it into a small country estate. He and his family were great benefactors to the church and village.

John Herring, whose grave we have noticed in the porch, is reputed to have introduced the potato to this part of Sussex.

An earlier Vicar, Giles Watkin, has his memorial stone in the external West wall on the North side. His Christian name is given in its Latin form, "Aegidius".