Welsh Journals

A Rector of Newtown. BY J. B. WILLANS, Recently I visited Twyning church, 2 miles north of Tewkesbury, and found on the north wall of the tower a tablet to a former rector of Newtown. The inscription runs: — Near this spot lies the mortal remains of the Rev. George Foxton, M.A., Rector of Newtown in the County of Montgomery, and forty two years Vicar of this Parish. He departed this life at Cheltenham, on the 8th day of July in the year 1844 in the 83rd year of his age in humble hope of immortality through the merits of his Redeemer. The same spot is also sacred to the memory of Sarah Foxton (Daughter of the above George Foxton and Sarah his wife) who was taken to her rest on the 31st day of July in the year of our Lord, 1812, and in the 15th year of her age." Above was a tablet to Sarah, wife of Rev. George Foxton, M.A., Vicar. She died, August 24, 1807, in her 34th year. In Archdeacon Thomas' History of the Diocese of St. Asaph, Vol. I., p. 547, Rev. George Foxton, M.A., Christ Church, Oxford, and Vicar of Great Coxwell, Berkshire, exchanged that living with that of Newtown with Rev. 1. F. Cleaver. He was also Vicar of Queeniborough in Leicestershire and of Twyning in Gloucestershire. At the latter he resided. On a window pane in a bedroom at Newtown Rectory I have been shown the autograph of Rev. George Foxton written with a diamond. In the Newtown registers he is recorded to have sometimes officiated, and in 1831 a Frederic J. Foxton is mentioned as curate, presumably his son.