There are TWO crosses (maybe even three?) at Westborough – the Village Cross, recorded as Westborough (1) and a churchyard cross, recorded as Westborough (2).

Westborough Village Cross on the village green – The original socket stone has gone, replaced by a modern stone c.1960
Parish/DistrictWestborough and Dry Doddington/South Kesteven
Locationlocated on the village green where Long Lane and Town Street meet
CategoryVillage cross
National Grid RefSK 85103 44650
DesignationScheduled / Listed II
Stone TypeLimestone
RefsAP Survey 9 Dec 1993; Davies, D S, 1913, Lincs Notes and Queries, Vol XII No.5, p.149 
VisitsAP: 9 Dec 1993 | DS/HH: 10 Mar 2006

Westborough has a substantial cross base with four large steps, set on its village green. There is no market charter recorded for Westborough but this cross has the aura of a market cross.

Intriguingly, Nattes drew Westborough’s churchyard cross, but did not draw the village cross . . . or did he? Nattes includes a drawing labelled Weston Cross which does not look like either of the crosses known in Weston, but does does look very much like Westborough’s village cross – is this an error in labelling?

The 1888 O.S. map records a benchmark on the cross, although none can be seen today. Davies (1913) comments that the structure may have been ‘restored’ to commemorate the coronation of George V (1911) but, if so, this was a probably a repair rather than a restoration – no record of this work can be traced.

The medieval socket stone is gone – Davies (1913) saw it, and recorded it as being 0.76m square by 0.28m high. It was said to be ‘broken up’ in 1960 and was replaced by a machine-cut stone block, 0.645m square and 0.2m high. This stone has a small square hole in its upper face (as if for the insertion of a pole or shaft) which is now filled in.

There is an interesting square block of limestone lying by the roadside at the northern end of the village green (at SK 8514 4484), which looks temptingly like an inverted socket stone. This is probably not an original part of the surviving village cross . . . but it may be part (socket stone?) of a second cross once located at the other end of Westborough village green.

The surviving cross base comprises four steps and the modern capstone. – The steps are all roughly square in plan and constructed of limestone blocks. The lowest step is about 3.1m square, the second 2.4m square, the third 1.7m square and the fourth 1.15m square. All four steps are medieval in date with modern consolidation and repair. On the top step rests the modern slab, 0.64m square and 0.2m high. The full height of the cross base is approximately 1.65m.

This drawing by J C Natters (c.1800) labelled ‘Weston Cross’ looks very much like the Westborough village cross (and nothing like either of the Weston crosses). Has he mis-labelled it?
(c) Lincolnshire Archives
Westborough village cross has all the looks of a market cross, although the re is no market charter recorded. The structure has been much repaired.

Westborough’s village cross features on the village sign (left), and remains an important element of the village’s community spaces (photo from village website, below)

This interesting limestone block at the northern end of the village green may have been part of a second village cross?
Westborough (1)

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