Steeple Claydon was described in 1806 in "Magna Britannia" as follows:
STEEPLE-CLAYDON, in the hundred and deanery of Buckingham, lies about a mile and a half from Middle-Claydon, and nearly six miles west of Winslow. The manor was given by King Henry I. to Robert D'Oyley, as part of the marriage portion of his wife Edith, who had been the king's mistress. About 100 years after this, it was in the family of Fitz-John, and passed by female heirs to the Cliffords, Burghs, and Mortimers. From Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, it descended to his grandson, King Edward IV. and thus became vested in the crown. In 1557 it was granted in fee to Sir Thomas Chaloner, a celebrated writer and soldier, who was knighted by the protector Somerset, in Musselborough field, and the manor-house became one of the seats of that family. This estate was forfeited by the attainder of Thomas Chaloner, one of the judges of King Charles I. but repurchased of the grantee by the family. Sir JohnVerney bought it of William Chaloner esq. in 1705: it is now the property of Lady Fermanagh. The manor-house has been pulled down, and its site is now occupied by a farm.
In the parish church is a memorial for Edward Chaloner esq. thirty years a lieutenant in the navy, who died in 1766. He was grandson of Thomas Chaloner the regicide, great grandson of the learned Sir Thomas Chaloner, (tutor to Henry, Prince of Wales,) and great great-grandson of Sir Thomas Chaloner, grantee of the manor as above-mentioned. Thomas Chaloner the regicide, in the year 1656, built a school-house at Claydon, which still remains, and endowed it with 12 l. per annum: the endowment has been lost, but Lady Fermanagh, who possesses the estates of the Chaloners, allows two shillings a-week to a school-mistress. The impropriate rectory, which was formerly parcel of the possessions of the priory of Oseney, belongs to Lady Fermanagh, who is patroness of the vicarage. The parish of Steeple-Claydon has been inclosed by an act of parliament, passed in 1795, when a corn-rent was assigned to the vicar, and allotments of land to Lady Fermanagh, as impropriatrix; and to George Hardinge and Charles Webb esq. for portions of tithes.
