KING EDGAR granted to St Augustine the four plough lands called Plumstede. Four plough lands seems a very small area; as each averaged about 120 acres, so it probably represented all the arable land in the parish, and not including marsh and woodland.

While this is the first

recorded history, evidence of Roman occupation has been found in the shape of a lead coffin from the first half of the fourth century, dug up in Wickham Lane in 1887.

The derivation of the name Plumstead is uncertain. It could be from the plums or the plumes! The arable land was rich in orchards and the marshes populated by geese, swans and herons from which plumes were collected to make quills.

You might not be inclined to think of Plumstead in terms of boating and fishing, but 13th century records describe the parish as a well-ordered and self-centred agricultural and fishing village.

In 1313 the Lord Abbot of

St Augustine's was prosecuted 'for that he did take a certain whale in the river Thames of his lands in Plumstead of the value of 40 shillings and did retain the said whale for his own profit.'

In the same year the Abbot of Lesnes was summoned and convicted for using nets of too fine mesh for lawful fishing, and back in Norman times one tenant had to provide a boat to ply between Plumstead and London. No wonder then that the parish church was dedicated to

St Nicholas, the patron saint of sailors and fisherman.

The church can be traced back to a 12th century stone and rubble building. It was

enlarged during the 13th century - a chisel was found when work was being carried out in 1958, and is now in the Science Museum.

With the dissolution of the monasteries in the 16th

century, Henry VIII granted the parish of Plumstead to his agent Sir Edward Boughton of Burwash (Burrage) Court. The name Burwash derives from Lord Bartholemew de Burghesh of Plumstead, a Norman nobleman.

In 1702 London merchant Nathaniel Maxey bought the house and 300-acre

estate, then nkown as Burwash, Burrough Ashe or Borrage, subsequently Burrage. In the early 18th

century James Pattison

married Mary Maxey.

The church seems to have been neglected towards the late 16th and early 17th

centuries, because a gravestone in the floor close to the font, states: 'Here lyeth the body of Mr John Gossage who by his care and greate

industry caused this church to be repaired after above twenty years lying waste and ruinous. He dyed April 24th 1672 aged 50.' It was churchwarden Gossage who built the tower which dates from 1664. Restoration under Gossage, a prosperous farmer, came speedily St Nicholas.

The 18th century however, brought another period of

depression for the fortunes of the church. Vestry books show that while a rate of 6d in the pound had been

authorised in 1735 for the

'repairing of the parish church and the repairing and beautifying of the altar piece thereof', it was found that the work could not be carried out because of damage and decay.

The register contains some curious burial

entries: '1688 John Robards and George Robards both died in one hole of a granado shell and was buried the 24 day of June... 1736, July 25. William Butler a dwarf buried two foot and a half in length aged 40 years.'

In 1907 the church was badly damaged by an explosion in the Woolwich Arsenal,

initially from a magazine,

followed by another caused by flying debris penetrating a gas holder. In a small bottle found embedded in cement in the north wall was a scrap of paper bearing the inscription three times: 'George Bodle, June 1820', indicating his churchwardenship.

Mr Bodle, a prosperous farmer who has lived in Montague House (in the High Street next to Best's the chemist), had executed

repairs to the wall and had left his witness. Thirteen years later Bodle was murdered by arsenic poisoning by his grandson.

The long and fascinating history of St Nicholas Church within the parish of Plumstead is recorded in a booklet written by Stanley Henwood, St Nicholas Plumstead - A Short History Of Church And Parish,

available for £1. Call Mrs E Crawley on 0181 856 1347.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.