List of Barton Rectors and Curates

Advowson

The advowson of Barton is mentioned in Victoria County History, Vol. II, 1908. It states that it Barton church is not mentioned in Domesday, and the first reference to it occurs in 1178, when Pope Alexander III confirmed the manor with the church to the abbey of Ramsey. Probably, therefore, the advowson had been in the gift of the abbey for some time before that date. The right of presentation continued vested in the abbey until the Dissolution, when it was transferred to the crown. In 1291 the value of the church was £12, which by 1535 had increased to £26 9s. 6d. From the reign of Henry VIII to the present day the right of presentation to the church and rectory has belonged to the crown, which has always presented with one exception, in 1660, when the bishop of Ely collated.

List of Rectors and Curates

• 1232 – Geoffrey de la Mare
• 1265 – Stephen de Walsoken
• William de Brumpton
• 1291 – Henry de Lascy
• Simon de Bristoll
• 1336 – Philip de Le
• 1349 – Richard de Thoern
• 1359 – John De Wellewyk
• Gregory de Southleigh
• 1374 – Richard Bee
• 1396 – John Clerk
• 1397 – Robert Archer
• 1399 – Thomas Bysshopp
• 1399 – Robert Bowland
• 1400 – Thomas Kembell
• 1403 – Richard Brown
• 1414 – Thomas Walton
• 1438 – Maurice Wynter
• 1443 – Richard Hore - 31 May 1443
• 1448 – John Alberton - 24 Jul 1448
• 1449 – John Gele - 29 Jun 1449
• 1456 – Edmund Shireff M.A
• 1458 – Dean John Colynson
• 1459 – William Danyell
• 1464 – Thomas Toly
• 1465 – John Waltham
• 1466 – Thomas Prewet - 26 Jul 1466
• 1475 – William Derby
• 1491 – Thomas Ingilby of Rathluren
• William Eleys
• 1503 – William Knyght
• 1516 – Sir William Pisce
• William Pys
• 1534 – William Parres or Parishe
• 1540 – William Smyth M.A
• 1569 – Thomas Norley
• 1570 – Samuel Fowlke/Fulke M.A
• 1622 – Gabriel Moore - 20 Sep 1622 M.A
• 1626 – John Gardner - 1626 [curate]
• 1646 – Robert Viney
• 1660 – William Sclater
• 1660 – John Norton
• 1662 – Thomas Crawley
• 1677 – Arthur Humphreys M.A
• 1718 – Edward Willes M.A
• 1730 – Joseph Newcome M.A
• 1757 – William Smith M.A
• 1782 – John Hawkins M.A
• 1820 – Timothy Fysh Foord Bowes M.A
• 1865 – Arthur Blomfield B.A
• 1884 – John Fitzalan Cornwall M.A.
• 1898 – John Henry Spokes M.A
• 1928 – Thomas N. Dixon M.A - 1928
• 1932 – Frank Wolde - 1932
• 1947 – Geoffrey Morris Oakeshott
• 1951 – Albert Henry Willson Cleaver
• 1962 – Edwin Arnold Wild
• 1970 – Ian Henry Gaunt Graham-Orlebar
• 1992 – Peter Harold Whittaker

Ecclesiastical Census 

On Sunday 30th March 1851 a census of all churches, chapels and preaching-houses of every denomination was undertaken in England and Wales. The local results were published by Bedfordshire Historical Records Society in 1975 as Volume 54, edited by D. W. Bushby. The return for Barton church noted the following pieces of information:

• The church had 452 sittings (255 free, 197 other).
• The general congregation had been 112 in the afternoon, 203 in the evening.
• Sunday scholars had been 126 in the morning and 127 in the evening