Thorpe in the Glebe

Churchyard

The church site is part of Scheduled Monument number 29917, being part of the Thorpe in the Glebe medieval settlement.

The schedule entry description of 1998 states that “abutting the main village street is a large raised enclosure which stands about 1.5m above the street level. In the centre of this enclosure is a clearly defined rectangular platform which stands about 0.5m higher still. This is the site of the parish church and churchyard which was still in use in 1730, but is shown in a sketch to have been in ruins by 1790. Human bone has been recovered from the southern banks of the churchyard enclosure.”

Oral tradition states that there were gravestones in this area as late as the early twentieth century. However, this is not borne out by the statement of a witness at a meeting for the Tithe Commission in 1848. John Harrison, who was 74 years old and lived at Wysall like his father before him, gave evidence under oath that he and his father had both occupied land at Thorpe. He said, “There was never in my memory any sign of any person being buried in the ground which is now considered the site of the old church”.

Today the churchyard is a small grassed enclosure to the north west of the farmhouse at Church Site Farm and open to the Chapel Close to the north. It is approached by a footpath running south west from the Wymeswold Road across the Ladies and Chapel Closes.