Preface
THE Reverend Evelyn Young was the son of the Reverend Frederic John Young, M.A. (Christ's College, Cambridge) by his wife Elizabeth Georgina Dodsley-Flamstead. He was born in 1866 at South Milford in the West Riding of Yorkshire and educated at Trent College (thrice Gold Medallist) and Christ's College, Cambridge, where he was Tancred Student and 11th Wrangler, proceeding M.A. in 1891. He was ordained a priest the same year and after holding other posts was curate of Fen Drayton, Cambridgeshire, from 1897 to 1916, rector of Toft-cum-Caldecote 1916-21, rector of Roughton, Norfolk, 1921-3, and became vicar of Colston Bassett in 1924. He was taken ill in his church there on Easter Eve, 1936 and died three days later, on 15th April, 1936. He left a widow (daughter of the Reverend Edward Norgate) and two daughters, one of whom, Mary Rachael, subsequently married, at Plumtree, 14th October, 1939, Thomas Kendall Knight Mallett, eldest son of Mr. Charles Mallett of Welsh Newton, Monmouth.
Through his mother, Evelyn Young was descended from Alvery Dodsley of Nottingham, surgeon (1670-1750), who was Sheriff of Nottingham in 1709; and from John Flamstead of Little Hallam, co. Derb. (from which family came John Flamstead, the first Astronomer Royal), and also from the Rev. William Rastall, rector of Winthorpe, Notts. 1778 to 1818, and cousin of William Dickinson Rastall, the historian of Newark and Southwell, and through him from the old Newark families of Rastall, Heron, Hobman and Crayle.
These connections gave Evelyn Young great interest in Nottinghamshire genealogy, and after coming to the county in 1924 he devoted on an average one day a week to calendaring the Wills in the Probate Registry at Nottingham, which he indexed down to the 19th century, besides making abstracts of many hundreds. He also transcribed in full the parish registers of Colston Bassett 1591-1925, Cropwell Bishop 1539-1812, Hickling 1646-1812, Owthorpe 1731-1837, Tythby 1559-1812 and also those of Elton from 1593, Granby 1567, Kinoulton 1606, Langar 1696 and Plumtree 1558.
Young also transcribed parish registers in Huntingdon, Norfolk and Suffolk; while during his long residence in Cambridgeshire he transcribed the marriages of some 150 parishes, almost the entire county, and was co-editor of Phillimore's Marriage Register series for Cambridgeshire.
Most of the above manuscripts, where not printed, have been deposited in the library of the Society of Genealogists in London.
During his twelve years' incumbency of Colston-Bassett, Evelyn Young compiled the history of the parish here printed. He left it fair-copied, ready for press, and had made several efforts during his last years to get it printed. It has been thought to be his most suitable memorial, as well as an acceptable addition to Nottinghamshire history, that the Thoroton Society should issue it. To the present editor, who had known Evelyn Young for twenty-six years, it has been a labour of love to see it through the press. Two more appendices have been added and the illustrations provided.
It may seem strange that Mr. Young gives so little detail, either architectural or archaeological, of the old church of St. Mary. But this is because both churches were dealt with in detail by the late Mr. J. T. Godfrey in his "Churches of the Hundred of Bingham" (1907), where twenty-two pages are devoted to Colston Bassett (4½ to the new church of St. John the Divine). In this work particulars are given of the architecture, bells, registers, and plate, and a list of the earlier vicars, so that Mr. Young expected those who desired further information to refer to that source.
It is a matter of great regret that the copy of the Elizabethan map of the parish, which had been so carefully analysed by the author and which forms the basis of his second chapter, was burnt in a deplorable fire at Colston-Bassett Hall about 1935. Unfortunately no photograph of it had been secured. To a little extent this loss has been remedied by the reproduction of the two later maps of 1727 and 1806.
The earlier pictures of the old church are from photographs kindly supplied by Canon R. F. Wilkinson. The portrait of the Rev. Joshua Brooke is from an unique photograph lent by the Rev. J. E. H. Wood of Knipton, and Mr. Salisbury's portrait of the late squire is supplied by Lady Le Marchant. Other illustrations are from views obtained by the present vicar, the Rev. John Booth, and photographs by Mrs. Wagstaffe and Miss Mary Blagg.
T.M.B.
Car-Colston, 24 August, 1941.