[Handout from P&G Wells Bookshop]

Today we journey from Winchester to Jane Austen’s home ground – where she lived for the first 25 years of her life: Steventon.

The house she and her siblings were born and raised in no longer stands, but thanks to her niece Anna Lefroy (or possibly her nephew-in-law Ben Lefroy), we have these drawings of the house:

and this rear view:

All that is left today is this fenced-in location of the house pump: so our imaginations have to run wild…

It is the Church we come to see here [a St. Nicholas of course]: you can also see we are done with the cold of Kent, and welcome the warm and cloudless sky of lovely Hampshire – [I am reminded for a moment of Margaret Hale in Gaskell’s North and South and the loss of her beloved Hampshire and her favorite “Helstone” roses, as she makes her way in northern cold and dark Manchester…]

Members of the Jane Austen Society warmly greeted us on this lovely day, offering delicious fare and Austen-related merchandise to buy. Then a quiet visit inside the church to see where Jane would have worshipped, her father rector here from 1761 (and of Deane from 1763) until his retirement in 1801 and death in 1805.

Michael Kenning, rector here from 1992-2012, introduced us to the Church and its Jane history – I have had the pleasure of meeting Canon Kenning in 2003 for the JASNA AGM trip to Winchester – he is little changed, and still an avid Austen “fan” – the vice-chairman of the Jane Austen Society Trustees. He shared this baptism note in the church records:

And some of the documents that Jane had written in, in one or more of her imaginative fits marrying herself off to various people, as well as her serving as a witness to a marriage (Kenning noted that she wasn’t actually old enough to serve as a witness, so what does that do the married couple?!]:

–

Kenning also showed us the massive and heavy key to the church – the door having a lock that was unmanageable, the key hidden in a nearby tree [did EVERYONE know this?!]

–

The church interior is lovely, with these William Morris-like decorative designs, but not there during Austen’s time.

The Austen neighbors the Digweed family are very present with large memorials and many graves in the churchyard:

–

James Austen has a few memorials and is buried in the churchyard – it states that Mary Lloyd Austen is buried here, but no mention of Ann, his first wife, though records show she is buried here as well…

**************

A sad memorial to encounter is the one for William Knight, Jane’s nephew [Edward’s son] – he was rector here from 1823-73. This memorial shows the death of his three young daughters within days of each other from scarlet fever – and the graves in the yard:

The iron pieces at the edge of the grave indicate there would have been an iron-fence enclosure around the grave – many such metals were removed for use during wartime in the 1940s.

I have already written a bit about the parsonage that Austen grew up in – and while today there is nothing but the pump to give us a sense of time and place, when William became the rector, Edward Austen demolished the Steventon Rectory, his own boyhood home, and built a new one for William on higher ground – sometime in around 1826 [it is all quite confusing as these two blog posts about Steventon indicate]:

The Saga of the Steventon Parsonage;

and a follow-up post.

 – this rectory still stands…

…..and was recently on the market – here a grand example of just how wrong some real estate listings [and history in general] can be: this Steventon House [as it is called] was not built on the same location where Jane Austen lived and wrote…

.https://www.houseandgarden.co.uk/article/jane-austen-steventon-house-for-sale

But see the great pictures of the house interior and gardens…! It sold, the going price £8,500,000 – not sure how much it actually went for…

*************

A few more images to leave you with – a magical place here:

************

UPDATE: Tony Grant reminded me of the archaeological dig at Steventon – here from the BBC in 2011:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-hampshire-16002088#.

And here from Jane Odiwe in 2015:

https://janeausten.co.uk/blogs/jane-austen-life/jane-austens-china-and-the-steventon-archaeological-dig?

**********

We then headed back to Winchester for some time on our own to explore the city – the afternoon finding us at the Hampshire Cultural Trust, which I shall write more about in a Day 6, Part 2 post…so much there to talk about! [think the “pelisse”… and do not faint…]

So stay tuned…

c2025JaneAustenInVermont

[Joy and I “dressed” for the occasion…]