at St. Anne's Church in Fence

Home Page

A distinctive "trace" of the Pendle Forest line of Grimshaws is a large gravesite monument at St. Anne's Church in Fence, a community located east of Pendle Hill (about 11 miles northeast of Blackburn.) 

Webpage Credits

Gravesite Monument

Grimshaw Griffin on Monument

St. Anne's Church

Inscriptions on Grimshaw Monument

Identification of Interred Grimshaws on Pendle Forest Descendant Chart

Where is Fence Located?

Reference

Thanks go to Gerald Brewin and his son, Derek, for accompanying the author on his initial visit to St. Anne's church and the Grimshaw monument in May 2000. Also to Leo Wrigley of Haslingden for serving as "tour guide" on that field trip.

A large monument marking the gravesite of 17 Pendle Forest Grimshaw descendants is in the cemetery at St. Anne's church (see Figure 1 below). 

Figure 1. The Grimshaw monument in St. Anne's Church cemetery is shown below with the author for scale. Note the monumental inscriptions, starting with "SACRED" which can be seen quite clearly. The "Grimshaw griffin" can also be seen above the inscriptions and the wreath (see Figure 2 below.) 

The Grimshaw Griffin -- that is, the rendition for the Pendle Forest Grimshaw line -- is included on the monument above the inscriptions on one side (see Figure 2 below). The griffin is depicted in bas relief above the inscriptions on the side facing the church. The ducally crowned rendition of the griffin is also shown on the Pendle Forest descendant chart, as presented in Whitaker¹. 

Figure 2. Closeup view of the Grimshaw Griffin on the monument. Note that the griffin is the same as on the Pendle Forest Grimshaw descendant chart (i.e., ducally crowned.)

St. Anne's Church in Fence is almost completely surrounded by the church cemetery (see Figure 3 below). 

Figure 3. West side of St. Anne's Church. The Grimshaw monument is directly around the other side of the church (to the right) in this view.

Monumental. A close-up of the griffin is also presented at the bottom of this webpage below the first photo.

The monumental inscriptions on the monument are given below.  Inscriptions are included on all four sides of the monument. Side One has the griffin above it, and Sides Two to Four continue clockwise around the monument. A total of 17 individuals are included in the inscriptions; they are numbered  below in braces { }. The individuals have been identified (by the numbers in braces) in the Pendle Forest Grimshaw descendant chart; see the next section of this webpage.

All of the interred persons are descendants (and their spouses) of Nicholas and Elizabeth (Harrison) Grimshaw, starting with their children Nicholas (b. 1779), John (b. 1784) and John's wife, Alice (Dugdale) Grimshaw.

(Side One, with Griffin above)

SACRED

TO THE MEMORY OF

NICHOLAS GRIMSHAW {1}

OF HEIGHT, HIGHAM BOOTH

WHO DIED AUGUST TWENTY-FIFTY

EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND FORTY,

IN THE SIXTY SECOND YEAR OF HIS AGE

ALSO

OF JOHN GRIMSHAW, OF {2}

BANK HOUSE, HIGHAM BOOTH,

WHO DIED JUNE SEVENTEENTH,

EIGHTEEN HUNDRED FIFTY SIX,

IN THE SEVENTY SECOND YEAR

OF HIS AGE

ALSO OF ALICE, RELICT OF THE {3}

ABOVE NAMED JOHN GRIMSHAW,

WHO DIED SEPTEMBER NINETEENTH,

EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-ONE,

IN THE SEVENTY-FIFTH YEAR OF HER AGE

ALSO

JAMES NORMAN GRIMSHAW {4}

BORN NOVEMBER 19^TH 1906, DIED JANUARY 8^TH 1992

AND

DOROTHY MARY GRIMSHAW {5}

BORN SEPTEMBER 9^TH 1906. DIED JANUARY 16^TH 1945

(Side 2)

ALSO

TO THE MEMORY OF

JAMES GRIMSHAW, {6}

OF REEDLY GROVE

BORN JULY 20^TH 1843

DIED DECEMBER 29^TH 1911

ALSO

TO THE MEMORY OF

ALICE GRIMSHAW, {7}

WIFE OF THE ABOVE,

BORN SEPTEMBER 11^TH 1847,

DIED NOVEMBER 4^TH 1923

ALSO

TO THE MEMORY OF

JOHN GRIMSHAW, {8}

BORN NOVEMBER 24^TH 1899

DIED JANUARY 29^TH 1964

ALSO

BERNARD KEIRBY GRIMSHAW {9}

SON OF JAMES NICHOLAS GRIMSHAW,

BORN JUNE 6^TH 1909, DIED JANUARY 5^TH 1967

(Side 3)

ALSO

TO THE MEMORY OF

ANN HARTLEY, {10}

BORN SEPTEMBER 28^TH 1834,

DIED JANUARY 12^TH 1882

ALSO NICHOLAS GRIMSHAW {11}

BORN NOVEMBER 22^ND 1838,

DIED MAY 25^TH 1906

ALSO

ELIZABETH GRIMSHAW, {12}

BORN MAY 7^TH 1845

DIED FEBRUARY 10^TH 1922

ALSO JAMES

NICHOLAS GRIMSHAW, BORN SEPTEMBER 25^TH 1875 {13}

DIED OCTOBER 1^ST 1964

ALSO GERTRUDE GRIMSHAW {14}

WIFE OF THE ABOVE,

BORN MARCH 5^TH 1876

DIED AUGUST 31^ST 1967

(Side 4)

ALSO

TO THE MEMORY OF

THOMAS GRIMSHAW {15}

SON OF THE AFORE NAMED

JOHN AND ALICE GRIMSHAW,

WHO DIED JUNE TENTH,

EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-ONE

AGED THIRTY-NINE YEARS.

ALSO EDA, THE YOUNGEST {16}

DAUGHTER OF JOHN AND

MARY JANE GRIMSHAW,

WHO DIED FEBRUARY TWENTY-

EIGHTH, NINETEEN HUNDRED,

AGED TWENTY-FOUR YEARS,

AND OF NICHOLAS, ONLY {17}

SON OF SAID JOHN AND

MARY JANE GRIMSHAW,

BORN JANUARY 24^TH 1866

DIED MARCH 19^TH 1910

The full descendant chart for the Pendle Forest Grimshaw line from Whitaker¹ is shown on a companion webpage. A portion of the chart  (the lower right corner) is replicated from the full chart in Figure 4 below. Thirteen of the 17 individuals in the monumental inscriptions have been identified on the abbreviated chart and are indicated with circled numbers. These numbers correspond to the numbers in braces in the monumental inscriptions listed above. 

Figure 4. A portion of the Pendle Forest Grimshaw descendant chart from Whitaker. The individuals in the inscriptions on the Grimshaw monument are indicated by circled numbers. These numbers correspond to the numbers in braces in the inscriptions above.

As noted, all of the interred persons are descendants (and their spouses) of Nicholas and Elizabeth (Harrison) Grimshaw. Two of the individuals, James (#13, b. 1875) and his wife, Gertrude (#14, b. 1876) are tentative but highly probable. The four individuals on the inscriptions that are not on the descendant chart (#4, #5, #8, #9) were born after the 1872 copyright date of Whitaker.

Fence is in the Forest of Pendle, about 3 km southeast of Pendle Hill, as shown in Figure 5. The location of St. Anne's church is indicated by the church symbol just below the pink circle in the second map.

Figure 5. Small-scale and large-scale map showing location of Fence near Pendle Hill.