Celebrating Hampshire Historians

Knapp, Rev George E C

September 1899 – 29 September 1971

From 1944–1964 George Knapp was Vicar of East Worldham where his ashes are buried and he is commemorated in a memorial window. Coincidentally, it was the benefice held by the last surviving chantry priest of Selborne Priory during the mid-16th century.

Between 1911 and 1914 George was an engineering apprentice on the Great Western Railway at Swindon. The First World War saw him in the Wiltshire Royal Engineers, a Lieutenant in 1915 and a Captain in 1917 (Mentioned in Despatches).  Later, he travelled widely, to Russia in 1919 where he received the Order of St Anne, to America in 1920-21, and Burma 1921-32. In 1926 he married Joan Kirkby. He trained for the priesthood at Westcott House in 1932-34 and was ordained in 1935.  He had joined the scouts in 1909, moving up to Scoutmaster in 1918 and becoming a Burma District Commissioner.  He achieved the Silver Wolf Long Service Medal in 1955.

That year he took the lead from Rev W S Scott in the work on the site of Selborne Priory, begun in 1953.  A Selborne Priory Excavation Committee was formed, attracting key younger people such as Deirdre Le Faye the Austenian scholar who published a definitive history of Selborne in 1975. George retired in 1969, passing the baton to David Baker who published the full project in 2014.

Sources

• Cole, Peter (son-in-law) pers comm

• Le Faye D, 1975. Selborne Priory, 1233-1486, Proc Hants Field Club & Archae Soc, 30, 47-71.

Portrait

Contribution to county’s history

George’s final twenty years were much occupied with exploring the Priory site whose natural history and antiquities had memorably fascinated Rev Gilbert White in the late 18th century. His way into that major project was study of the medieval floor tiles of the Alton region with their prominent Selborne examples.

Relevant published works

• Knapp G E C, 1954. The medieval paving tiles of the Alton area of NE Hampshire, Proc Hants Field Club & Archae Soc, 18, 289-314.

Critical Comments

Other Comments

George himself was remembered as a kindly person, known affectionately as ‘Uncle George’, who may have sometimes found it difficult to control an enthusiastic volunteer labour force.  Nonetheless, he brought an engineer’s precision to what were still essentially antiquarian excavation methods. After early confusion about the relationship of church and cloisters, he settled down with a loyal team whose site daybooks (now archived at Chilcomb House) proved invaluable for writing the final report.

Contributor

David Baker April, 2022

Key Words

Selborne Priory, medieval floor tiles

Any queries or further suggestions for this part of the list should be addressed to celebrating@hantsfieldclub.org.uk.

Back to Historians I-L from Innes, Kathleen to Luce, Sir Richard