FLAMSTEAD, a parish in the hundred of DACORUM,
county of HERTFORD, 2 miles (N. W.) from Redbourn,
containing 1392 inhabitants. The living is a perpetual
curacy, in the archdeaconry of Huntingdon, and diocese
of Lincoln, endowed with £800 parliamentary grant,
and in the patronage of the Master and Fellows of
University College, Oxford, to whom the rectory, rated
in the king's books at £41. 6. 8., was devised by Robert
Gunsley, in 1618, on condition that, besides paying a
stipend to the curate, they should maintain four scholars
at a grammar school, affording them a stipulated allowance
yearly after their removal to college, the selection
to be made equally from the grammar schools of Roches?
ter and Maidstone, of scholars born in the county pi
Kent. The church is dedicated to St. Leonard. The village,
not far from which is the Roman Watling-street,
stands upon the summit of a high ridge of land which
rises abruptly from the south-western side of the valley
through which the river Ver runs, and was in ancient
times called Verlam-stedt, in allusion to its situation
near that river. There is a small sum for the education
of children. An almshouse for two widowers and two
widows was founded in 1669, by Thomas Saunders, Esq.,
who endowed them with a rent-charge of £5. A priory,
dedicated to St. Giles, is stated by Leland to have
been founded at Woodchurch, in this neighbourhood,
by Roger de Tony, for a prioress and nuns, the demesnes
of which, at the dissolution of religious houses,
lapsed to the crown, and were granted by Henry VIII.
to Sir Richard Page, Knt., to whose mansion Edward VI.,
in his infancy, being in an infirm state of health, was
sent for the benefit of a salubrious air.