From Rambles In And Around Warminster, first published in the Warminster Herald newspaper, 1882:
Hill Deverill
The little parish and church of Hill Deverill are situated within a few minutes walk of Longbridge Deverill. The parish is one of the smallest in the Diocese, its present population being about 120.
It is principally remarkable from its connection with the Ludlow family and for having been the residence, if not the birth place of the celebrated Sir Edmund Ludlow, whose name and seal appear upon the death warrant of King Charles the First. He took a very active part in the Civil War, and was constantly engaged in various parts of Wiltshire. In command of a small Parliamentary force he drove out a large body of Royalists from Salisbury. He quartered his men in the Close but was afterwards compelled by a superior force to retire from the city. At the restoration of Charles II he took refuge on the continent and lived during the greater part of the remainder of his life at Vevay, where he died and was buried about the year 1690, having attained the age of three score and ten. Soon after the accession of William and Mary and a few months before his death he returned to England, being advised by his friends that he would probably be appointed to some good position in Ireland. But as soon as his presence was known, Parliament petitioned the King to proclaim him, and the petition, which was presented by Sir Edward Seymour, member of another Wiltshire family, was granted. Ludlow escaped before the proclamation was issued and never afterwards quitted his Swiss retirement. From an old and confused inscription in Hill Deverill Church, it appears that Sir Edmond Ludlow’s mother was the daughter of Henry Coker, of Mawpowder. What relation this Henry Coker was to the Sir Henry Coker – “Coronell for King Charles the Mertre” – we are not able to say. It appears to have been the rule to name all the Ludlows Edmond, and all, or nearly all the Cokers Henry, and the result is of course perplexing. But probably Sir Edmond and Sir Henry, who were thus opposed in the Civil War, were cousins. The following is the inscription to which we have referred:
“Here lieth the bodyes of LUDLOW COKER eles son to Sr. Henry Coker son of Will. Coker, of Mawpowder, in the countie of Dorset, and LUDLOW COKER 2 son, Elizabeth 2 daughter, and Brigett, 5 daughter, begotten on ye body of Elizabeth daughter and sole Heyer to Edmond Ludlow, of Hill Deverill, Esq., son and heyer to Henry Ludlow, of Tadley, Esq.; the said Edmond begotten on the body of Lettice, daughter of Lord Delamar, and grandson to Sr. Edmond Ludlow, begotten on the body of Bridge, ye daughter and sole heyer of Henry Coker of Mawpowder, aforesaid, Esquire, there being Eliza, ye eldest buried a Coker in Smset.”
Sir Henry Coker’s monument is of wood, and has an effigy of the deceased, his head resting upon a book with an inscription Bibel, and his feet upon inscribed Status, referring perhaps to some work of which he was the author. The inscription is as follows:
“Heare lieth the body of Sr. HENRY COKER, Coronell of Horse and ffoot for King Charles ye Mertre, and Coll. for his sacred Matis, that now is; who dyed servant to his King and Country, aged 60, and Anno Domini 1661.”
There is also a remarkable and well-carved coat of arms, giving the bearings of no less than thirteen different families. Unfortunately the value of them is somewhat lessened by the fact that whatever the carver may have been, the painter was evidently not a learned herald, and apparently consulted his own taste and fancy a good deal more than any heraldic authority. The following are the bearings as given, the first ten being quarterly and the latter six being impaled quarterly:
1. Sable, on a bend gules, three leopards’ faces or. (These are the Coker arms except for the fact that the shield should be azure).
2. Sable, cross flory, twelve billets sable.
3. Ermine, bend sable.
4. Sable, on a bend gules, three foxes passant or.
5. Sable, on a chevron gules, between three bugle horns or, 5 crosses crosslet fitches, sable.
6. Sable, a chevron gules, between 3 laurel leaves.
7. Gules, fesse between 6 crosslets fitched, sable.
8. Sable, chevron or, between three cinque foils or.
9. Gules, bend or between 2 scallops.
10. As first.
11. Sable, chevron gules between three wolves’ heads erased sable. (Intended for the Ludlow arms, but wrong as to tincture).
12. Gules, tree eradicated or, debruised by a grey hound statant sable.
13. Sable, stag’s head, caboched armed or, between the attires, a cross pattee fitchee of the second, pierced through nostrils with an arrow pointing to sinister, or.
14. Sable, 2 bars argent between 9 martlets gules.
15. As first.
16. As No.11.
A rather elaborately sculptured marble monument is inscribed as follows:
“Underneath this lyeth ye body of RACHELL, ye wife of HENRY COKER, Esquire, who departed this life ye 15 of Feb., 1699.”
Underneath this monument is a brass inscribed as follows:
“Here lieth the body of HENRY COKER, Esq., Sonne and Heir apparent to Sr. Henery Coker and Dame Elizabeth, his wife who was sole heiress to Edmond Ludlow, Esq., and bury’d in the yeare of our Lord 1736, ye 31 of October, in the 80 year of his age.”
These monuments are all in the chancel of the church. Near them is an altar tomb, upon the panels of which are three coats of arms, the central coat being that of Ludlow.
On the other side of the chancel are tablets to the memory of ROBERT SMITH (d. 1793, aged 66), and WILLIAM MORSE (d. 1793, aged 62).
On the north wall of the church is an inscription to the memory of Mr. JOHN HALE CLIFFORD, of Hill Deverill, who died in 1876, aged 80, and who left £100 to the parish, the interest to be expended in coal and bread to be given to resident inhabitants only of Hill Deverill.
The Church was rebuilt and enlarged in 1841. It has a gallery at the west end, and there are in all 148 sittings.
The above notes were republished in the Warminster Wylye Valley And District Recorder, No.5, edited by Danny Howell. Bedeguar Books. December 2006.