Frank Hartley wrote about the Church of England Temperance Society in the village newsletter of March 2018.
Our Victorian forbears were very much alive to the problems caused by drunkenness amongst the working population. A number of Temperance Societies sprung up in the mid to late Victorian years. The Church of England Temperance Society (CETS) was set up in 1862 and was active in most towns and villages, including Church Lawford. The village branch of CETS held monthly meetings at some of which there were musical recitals. At the well-attended meeting held in the schoolroom on 9th March 1891 attendees would have heard inter alia, a “pianoforte solo’ by the indefatigable Miss Alice Worth Townsend of King’s Newnham, a reading by the Rector (Rev Manners Wood) of “Mexican Plug”, from an account about an unruly horse by Mark Twain and a “vocal duet” of the old song, “Gypsy Countess” by Miss Smith and Miss Whiteman. The last named performer I believe to be Isabella Whiteman, daughter of the local blacksmith, Charles Whiteman.