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St Cross Cottage

St Cross Cottage

St Cross 1960's

Thanks to Jill Whitear for providing much of the following information.


Construction 


Built in 1540, during the reign of King Henry VIII, it was originally two small cottages.  The evidence for this still exists today as there is a small, enclosed, winding staircase leading up to the one bedroom at each side of the cottage. The hall measures just 6’6” X 4’ and was a bedroom in which an elderly gentleman’s mother had given birth to six children. In those days there was only well water and no sanitation. Lighting was provided by paraffin and candles. The front of the cottage would have been flat, opening directly onto the street.


Occupants of St Cross Cottage 


Please see Bluebell Cottage  and The Mansbridge Family for the history of this family in Micheldever.


Alfred, brother of Arthur Mansbridge, and Jill Whitear's grandfather, lived in one of the St Cross cottages.


Alfred was born in Micheldever in 1863. He married Alice Mundy in 1885/6. She was born in 1864/5 at Stoke Charity. They had a son, Herbert, in 1887, also born in Micheldever. In the 1891 census, the family was living at St Cross cottage. Alfred was a bootmaker & photographer.. Thereafter the family lived at The Cottage, 58 Church Street.


In the 1939 Register, the right hand side of St Cross was occupied by Mr R W Gilbert and the left hand side by Mrs Goater.


Mabs Burgis moved into St Cross Cottage at some point after Barings Bank moved to Stratton Park from London in 1939 for the duration of the war. She worked for the bank. Her fiance died in World War II so she never married. She was a leading light in the church & ran the Sunday School from her cottage until the 1980s. She also organised Keep Fit classes and a class for the older girls in the village, a sort of female Youth Club. She died in a nursing home at Kings Worthy in 1994.

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