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DONINGTON, though now a large, village-type community, was once a market town and the centre of the local hemp and flax trade with — up to the 19th century — three hemp fairs a year, in May, September and October. The May and October fairs survived as horse fairs until the 1940’s; amusement fairs still visit the Market Place at these times. It is probably because of this town’s status that Donington possesses this large church.
THE CHURCH, dedicated to St. Mary and the Holy Rood, is a history in stone of remote ways of life and of architecture. It is one of that splendid constellation of parish churches located in the Marshland and Fenland parishes of south Lincolnshire and western Norfolk where wealthy peasants with a church-building interest were to be found in considerable numbers in the 13th century. Many of these churches have spires, a decorative characteristic of a broad belt of country running diagonally across England from Lincoln to the north coast of Somerset, and Donington is no exception. Its splendid tower and spire, surmounted by a fine ball and weather-cock, rises to about one hundred and forty feet. The building is mainly late Decorated and Perpendicular in style (1300-1400), but traces of earlier Norman (1100) and Early English (1200) masonry are to be found in its walls. Its dimensions, in round figures, are:
THE LIVING was in the gift of the Knights Templar from 1228 to 1331, when it was appropriated by the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, who continued as Patrons until 1540. When the Order was dissolved by Henry VIII in 1541, the presentation of the Living passed into the patronage of private gentlemen and so continued, except for the period 1593 to 1671, when it was a Crown gift until 1887, when it was acquired by Simeon’s Trustees, who exercise this right until today. Simeon (1759-1836) was a Cambridge divine who was Vicar of Holy Trinity, Cambridge and a founder of the Church Missionary Society. Worship at Donington follows the Evangelical tradition, of which he was an exponent.
