By Gillian Ashley-Smith
In 1806 the Verneys, the family name of the Lords Willoughby de Broke, became Lords of the Manor of ‘Great’ Kineton, and a few years later of ‘Little’ Kineton as well. Although they continued to live at Compton Verney, they owned much of the property in Kineton, which was rented out by a process of copyhold, allowing the tenancy of properties, small-holdings and farms to pass safely from generation to generation without fear of eviction. It was a popular system with the tenants, and the Verneys were well liked. An even closer link was established when the 17th baron died in 1862. Following his death, his widow, still only in her thirties, moved to Kineton House – the mansion house on the Norton Grange development in Little Kineton, allowing her eldest son to occupy the family seat at Compton Verney. So began an even closer association between Kineton and the Verneys.
No memorial in St Peter’s is more obvious or spectacular than the great East window over the altar, which commemorates Georgiana, 17th Lady Willoughby de Broke, the widowed lady who was the first Verney to live in Little Kineton. In 1892, three years after she died, her family (one of whom was Mabel Verney of whom I wrote recently) installed the stained glass. Her eldest son, Henry, the 18th Lord, went to what was probably the best glass making firm in the country, Powells of Whitefriars. The fame of this firm had spread when they had been used by William Morris, and they were associated with the production of fine glass in wonderful colours. The window was designed by J W Brown, and its delicacy still dominates the church, in the same way that the woman it commemorates dominated the well-being of Kineton in her life time.
Born into a Devon family that could trace its ancestry to the Governors of Calais and the battle of Agincourt, Georgiana Jane Taylor came to Kineton after her marriage in 1842. She was only eighteen when she married the 33 year-old Robert Barnard, vicar of Lighthorne. Ten years later she may have been surprised to find herself wife of the 17th Lord Willoughby de Broke, who succeeded unexpectedly to the title, and they were obliged to change their name to Verney as a condition of his inheritance! She had seven children, born between 1844 and 1855.
Once widowed, Georgiana spent the rest of her life (and a great deal of money) on the needs of the villagers of Kineton. She was generous with gifts for the poor, but the most prominent and permanent memorial to her efforts is the building on the Warwick Road, now known as Roxburgh House, which was erected in 1862, the year of her husband’s death, as the Kineton Middle Class School at a time when it was thought middle class education was deficient in the country. As well as serving as a school with accommodation for 30 boarders, the new building offered a permanent home for the reading room and library of the Kineton Literary Society and a venue for lectures and concerts. Having established the school, Georgiana moved her attention to the needs of the adult population. In 1866 she arranged for the building in the centre of the Market Square to be converted to a club room and assembly rooms for the entertainment (and education) of the Kineton people. Not much more than 10 years later, when the renewal of the licence of the New Inn was refused, Georgiana rose to the occasion by establishing a coffee tavern also in the Market Square. It was intended as a meeting place for workmen and labourers who were supposed to go there instead of frequenting public houses!
Until the illness that led to her death, Georgiana Jane was an ardent churchwoman, who was known for strict observance of Sunday, and who rarely missed church services. It is fitting that present-day churchgoers should be reminded so forcibly of her life when they contemplate the lovely window that recalls her memory.
© Gillian Ashley-Smith 2006