James Crofts (1773-1844), a village farmer who farmed at Mount Pleasant, had included in his will (dated 30 June 1830) a sum of £500 which was given to the minister and the parish officers of Church Lawford to apply yearly the sum of £10 (part of the interest from the money), in educating 5 boys and 5 girls, children of the most deserving poor of the parish, and to distribute the remainder of the interest on New Year’s day in blankets, sheets, and coals amongst the most deserving and industrious poor of the parish – as can be seen in the charity minutes below.
The money given for education was used from 1845 onwards, and the £10 was given to an appropriate teacher to educate the 5 boys and 5 girls – in the example below William Sibley is being given the monies in 1848/9. When the Village School was opened in 1849 the charity was used to support the schooling of 10 nominated children, but in 1890 the Education Act ensured free education was provided for all children, so the monies were then used for prizes given to the children with the best attendance at the school – noting it was limited to children from Church Lawford only, as seen in the extract from the Parish Newsletter of 1898.
Distribution of the Charity Money continued into the latter half of the twentieth century – the village newsletter of 1966 records that the monies of all three ecclesiastical charities (Marriotts, Crofts and Edmonds) were distributed that year.