Faxton

Faxton is an abandoned village and chapelry in the county of Northamptonshire in England.

The last villager left in 1960 after the demolition of the parish church of St Denis. There is now just one house standing on this remote hilltop location, overlooking the rolling farmland. Nearby are the villages of Old, Lamport and Mawsley and the Northampton & Lamport Railway.

Archaeologists claim that the village dates back to approximately 1150 AD, although they did find a very small number of Roman artifacts. However, it is believed that the name Faxton comes from the Scandinavian Fakr and the Anglo-Saxon tun, meaning Fakr's Farm. This would indicate that Faxton grew from a Viking or Norse settler's farmstead and therefore would date from approximately the 9th century

The Domesday Book, naming Faxton as the Manor of Fextone, notes that the population was of approximately 60 to 80 people. The village is documented as having consisted of a church, a rectory, a hall, an aviary, almshouses and a number of ponds. Lady Danvers founded the parish's almshouses for four persons and, six years later, Jane Kemsey bequeathed £100 to it. By the 1950s, an aerial photograph shows approximately 25 dwellings.

It is noted that the reason Faxton no longer exists today was due to dwindling population but, prior to this, the village was a victim of the plague that decimated the tiny population. It is reputed that in an attempt to escape the Black Death in London, a family relocated to Faxton with their servants. However, one of the servants was carrying the fatal disease which quickly spread and almost wiped out the village. The Northamptonshire Record Office holds the christening, marriage and burial registers for the parish.

Read more about Faxton:  Sir Augustine Nichols (1559-1616)