Bishop Tanner, in the Notitia Monastica, says of Bordeney Abbey,
“Here was a public monastery before the year 697, to which
Ethelred King of Mercia was a great benefactor, if not the
original founder; who upon the resignation of his crown
retired hither, and became first a monk, and afterwards
abbat of this house till his death. It is said to have had
three hundred monks, but was destroyed by the Danes A.D.
870.”
The branch or stock of the Trevelyans settled at Basil is now extinct.
A Sir John Trevelyan, Knight, of that place, is said to have greatly
reduced his fortunes by various law-suits. An anecdote is anciently
related of him in the neighbourhood, that having failed in making an
appearance to some civil suit, a process issued to the sheriff for
attaching his person, who went to Basil accompanied by several
horsemen, and riding into the court-yard made proclamation of his
authority, and called on the defendant to surrender; but he, on the
contrary, threatened the sheriff if he did not depart, with letting
loose his spearmen upon him, and then overturned some hives of bees,
which effectually routed the whole troop.
Basil now belongs to the family of Mr. Robert Fanshawe, an Out
Commissioner of the Navy Board resident at Plymouth, who made the
purchase from Mr. Tremayne of Sydenham.
This parish contains 3242 statute acres.
Annual value of the Real Property, as £. _s._ _d._
returned to Parliament in 1815 1998 0 0
Poor Rate in 1831 112 0 0
Population, { in 1801, | in 1811, | in 1821, | in 1831,
{ 134 | 165 | 175 | 171;
giving an increase of 27½ per cent. in 30 years.
Present Vicar, the Rev. J. P. Carpenter, instituted 1823.