Baston

For other uses, see Baston (disambiguation).

Signpost in Baston

Baston is a parish on the edge of The Fens and in the administrative district of South Kesteven, Lincolnshire, England. Like most fen-edge parishes, it was laid out more than a thousand years ago, in an elongated form, to afford the produce from a variety of habitats for the villagers. The village itself lies along the road between King Street, a road built in the second century, and Baston Fen which is on the margin of the much bigger, Deeping Fen. Until the nineteenth century, the heart of Deeping Fen was a common fen on which all the surrounding villages had rights of turbary, fowling and pasture.

Geology

The parish lies on a fan of gravel from the Devensian glacial period, which spreads from the upland mouth of the valley of the River Welland, to the east of Stamford, Lincolnshire. There are two main forms of business in the parish: arable farming and gravel extraction. The flooded gravel pits subsequently lend themselves to development for leisure pursuits such as angling, birdwatching and watersports. The gravel was washed down from the tundra environment to the west and deposited in the periglacial lake, known as Lake Fenland, below the icy waters of which the site of Baston then lay.^{[citation needed]}

Geography

Geographically, in the fen, the parish's northern boundary lies on the River Glen, beyond which is Thurlby. To the south is Langtoft and beyond King Street in the west is Greatford.

Signpost in Baston

History

Baston's story begins with King Street and the Car Dyke, a Roman boundary marker, canal or catchwater drain, according to one's opinion. Another significant Roman feature of Baston is the Roman road leading across the fen towards Spalding (Margary 261). Part of the modern fen road follows it.

At the end of the village, near King Street, was an Anglian cemetery which was in use up to about the year 500. This coincides approximately with the date of the beginning of King Arthur's exploits, as reported by the Historia Brittonum, when Arthur fought his first battle at the mouth of the River Glen and stopped the spread of Anglo-Saxon settlement for fifty years.^{[citation needed]} The Anglo-Saxon cemetery, of funerary urns, was found by Rev. Edward Trollope in 1851. He found around 10 burials in 1863 and traces of another 16 were found in 1963

Like most places in Europe, Baston suffered from bouts of the plague. Some Baston plague are shown in burial lists. A possible plague burial was uncovered during the building of a corn dryer.

Sport

In 2002, a group of local residents decided that the village needed an area where a range of sports could be conducted. The cost of a sports hall was thought to be prohibitive, so the project was focused on a multi-use sports and skateboarding area. Following a village-wide survey, which had a 37% return rate, a public meeting was held in June 2002. As a result of both the survey and public meeting, it was decided that there was a mandate from the village to progress the project. Consequently, B-Active was formed as a sub-committee of the BPFMC.^{[citation needed]}

As part of this the Baston Football Club was formed in 2006, and joined the Grantham & District Saturday Afternoon League.^{[citation needed]}

There is also Baston cricket club, who play in the south Lincs division 3 league.

New tennis courts have been built recently for all year round use.^{[citation needed]}

Local administration

• For the election of councillors to South Kesteven District Council the parish, as part of Truesdale ward, elects two councillors. The District Councillors current at 2011 are Kelham Cooke (Con)[1] and Rosemary H Woolley (Con).[2]
• Baston Parish Council

See also

• Baston can refer to a long rattan stick, used in Filipino martial arts.

Further reading

• Mayes, P. & Dean, M.J. An Anglo-Saxon Cemetery at Baston Lincolnshire The Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology. (1976) ISBN 0-904680-05-3
• Phillips, C.W. ed. The Fenland in Roman Times Royal Geographical Society (1970)

External links

• Baston historical summary (UK & Ireland Genealogy page
• Links to articles and documents concerning Baston's history