Ince Grange (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Ince Manor; Ins; Jus

In the civil parish of Ince.
In the historic county of Cheshire.
Modern Authority of Cheshire.
1974 county of Cheshire.
Medieval County of Cheshire.

OS Map Grid Reference: SJ44957655
Latitude 53.28222° Longitude -2.82642°

Ince Grange has been described as a probable Fortified Manor House.

There are major building remains.

This site is a scheduled monument protected by law.
This is a Grade 1 listed building protected by law*.

Description

Ince Manor was a grange of the Benedictine Monastery of St Werburgh, Chester and was one of the chief properties soon after the Conquest. In 1399 license to crenellate the manor house was granted. The hall and a domestic range, now known as the Manor and Monastery Cottages, are still substantially complete. The hall is of early C15 date with windows of late C15/early C16. The domestic range probably belongs to the late C13/C14. The two buildings occupy two sides of a rectangular space still defined by walls and hedges. Lengths of foundation walls, now incorporated in garden boundaries, are clear evidence of a further building occupying a third (the south) side. Remnants of a filled-in moat or ditch are visible behind Monastery Cottages, and north of Ince Manor at the bend in the lane, a rock-cut ditch can be seen in the front gardens of a pair of recently built houses. There are also the remains, probably of small fishponds, in the field immediately north of the Manor. Park Cottages, south of the group, incorporate Medieval stonework and may be a former barn. (PastScape–ref. Davey and Williams, 1975)

A Royal licence to crenellate was granted in 1399 March 18 (Click on the date for details of this licence.).
A Royal licence to crenellate was confirmed in 1410 Feb 5.

Sources of information, references and further reading

National Heritage List for England Scheduled Monument Number 1009635, Legacy Scheduled Monument Number 13516
National Heritage List for England Listed Building number(s) 1138810
Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 69558.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 19/4/0.

Books
- Emery, Anthony, 2000, Greater Medieval Houses of England and Wales Vol. 2 East Anglia, Central England and Wales (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) p. 477
  Lewis, J., 1994, Ince Manor, Ellesmere Port, Cheshire
  de Figueiredo, P. and Treuherz, J., 1988, Cheshire Country Houses (Chichester: Phillimore) p. 245-6
  Thompson, Patience, 1983, Ince Manor: medieval monastic buildings on the Mersey Marshes (Cheshire monographs 5)
  Platt, C., 1969, The Monastic Grange in Medieval England p. 210
  Burne, R.V.H., 1962, The Monks of Chester. The History of St Werburgh's Abbey
  Slater, F.G., 1919, A Cheshire Parish: being a short history of Ince
  Turner, T.H. and Parker, J.H., 1859, Some account of Domestic Architecture in England (Oxford) Vol. 3 Part 2 p. 219, 420 online copy
  Ormerod, G., 1819, History of the County Palatine and city of Chester (London) Vol. 2 p. 12-13 (tenurial history) online copy
Periodical Articles
- 1984, Moated Sites Research Group report Vol. 11 p. 32
  Davey, P.J. and Williams, S.R., 1975, Cheshire Archaeological Bulletin p. 25-28
Primary (Medieval documents or transcriptions of such documents - This section is far from complete and the secondary sources should be consulted for full references.)
- Maxwell Lyte, H.C. (ed), 1909, Calendar of Patent Rolls Richard II (1396-99) Vol. 6 p. 522 online copy
  Maxwell Lyte, H.C. (ed), 1909, Calendar of Patent Rolls Henry IV (1408-13) Vol. 4 p. 160 online copy
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- English Heritage, 2011, Heritage at Risk Register 2011 North West (London: English Heritage) p. 24 online copy

Most of the sites or buildings recorded in this web site are NOT open to the public and permission to visit a site must always be sought from the landowner or tenant.
It is an offence to disturb a Scheduled Monument without consent. It is a destruction of everyone's heritage to remove archaeological evidence from ANY site without proper recording and reporting.
Don't use metal detectors on historic sites without authorisation.

The information on this web page may be derived from information compiled by and/or copyright of Historic England, County Historic Environment Records and other individuals and organisations. It may also contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence. All the sources given should be consulted to identify the original copyright holder and permission obtained from them before use of the information on this site for commercial purposes.
The author and compiler of Gatehouse does not receive any income from the site and funds it himself. The information within this site is provided freely for educational purposes only.

The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

Please help to make this as useful a resource as possible by contacting Gatehouse if you see errors, can add information or have suggestions for improvements in functality and design.
Help is acknowledged.

*The listed building may not be the actual medieval building, but a building on the site of, or incorporating fragments of, the described site.

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