The altar tomb of Sir Thomas
Bonham has his effigy in a pilgrim's robe which is said to commemorate
that knight's seven years' sojourn in Palestine. An incredible
tradition, current among the country people, says that Lady Bonham
gave birth to seven children at one time, and that the sieve, in which
they were all brought to the church to be christened, hung in the old
nave for many years. The fine tomb in the chancel is that of Sir
Richard Grobham (1629). His helmet and banner are suspended upon the
opposite wall; an old chest in the south aisle is said to have been
saved from a Spanish ship by this knight.
The main road continues up the valley to Stapleford, where is a fine
cruciform church with Norman arches on the south of the nave and with
a door of this period on the same side. The fine sedilia and piscina
in the fourteenth-century chancel should be noticed, and also the
well-proportioned porch that has within it a coffin slab bearing an
incised cross. Here the valley of the Winterbourne comes down from the
heart of the Plain at Orcheston through Winterbourne Stoke and Berwick
St.
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