It was in 1136 that it the king exchanged it with his brother Henry de Blois, who was at the time the Bishop of Alresford. Afterwards it was known as Sottone bishop and later Sutton Episcopi.

Henry de Blois built his own palace and  traces of the flint and mortar walls were still visible until the beginning of the 19th century. It is said that the palace was destroyed during the Civil War.

The manor stayed in the hands of the Alresford bishops up until 1551 when Bishop Stephen Gardiner was deprived of his bishopric and the land became the property of the crown. The manor was restored to the bishop in 1558 by Queen Mary but then sold into hands in 1647 during the period of the Commonwealth. The land reverted to the bishops of Alresford after the restoration of the monarchy, and Sutton Common was enclosed in 1685 then divided among the copyhold and freehold tenants, a further 20 acres were later f reed from tithes and annexed to the vicarage and the remaining common lands were enclosed by an Act of Parliament in 1796.

There are two Norman entrances to the church and one is decorated with heads of part human and part bird like creatures, inside there crosses on the walls where the bishops anointed the stones on Consecration day

IMAGES OF BISHOPS SUTTON TODAY

The countryside surrounding Bishops Sutton
The Church of St Nicholas
The Ship		Cottages in the village
The main road to Alresford		The markings on the outside wall of the church, the bottom one is a triganometry point used by the Ordnance Survey in map making. On the darker brick at the top can be seen six or seven small holes, nobody knows what these are.
The markings on the doorway of the church
The pillars that support the tower, these are badly cracked and rough cut
The inside of the tower showing the timber supports		The Squint on the outside wall has been partially bricked up
The squint from inside the church. A squint was a window which was used normally by a hermit or leper  to view the altar as they were unwelcome in the churches of the time.		The church organ

Also inside the church below the chancel arch can be found a memorial tablet to William Cowper who worked as a surgeon in the capital in the reign of Queen Anne and it is reported that he killed himself by studying to hard

Another of the villages who became well known was Ethel Rhoda McNeile who was a graduate at Girton College and teh church Missionary Society,  who is said to have given up the last seat in the lifeboat of the ship Egypt which sank off of Ushant in 1922 and in the panic and confusion a mutiny of the ships stewards occurred but was brought under control just when the boats needed to be launched. Some of the passengers it is said had trouble putting their lifebelts on and the radio operator gave his own to a lady passenger, and he went down with the ship. The time came for the last lifeboat to be launched and a crewman called out "Three more" and Ethel McNeile was the third person in the line but then she saw a woman who was worried about her children who were already in the lifeboat and Ethel picked her up and passed her into the boat in her place.

Her brother says that  "My sister naturally gave her place, because it would have hurt her more that the children should be motherless than that her own life should be at an end. Had she not done what she did, all her life would have been haunted by that thought. She was always capable of rapid thinking and quick decision, and used both in that hour of peril in order not to miss her opportunity."

Getting back to more modern times, back in 1995 and in 2003 it was reported that a crop circle appeared in one of the fields here, which was described as 'scallop' semi-circles around a central ring and crescent.'

The parish itself contains around 3,740 acres of land and of this 9 acres are covered with water, it is of irregular shape the centre part in which the villages is located on fairly low ground and is by the head waters of the River Alre. The village lies south of the river whose source is about a mile eastwards. The main road from Alton to New Alresford cuts its way through the parish thus dividing it into roughly two equal halves. The church stands back away from the main road and is at the western end of the village and is approached from a north bound road from the main village street.

On the corner of this road can be found the Ship Inn with its sign depicting a steamer on one site and a sailing vessel on the other. Directly opposite is an ancient timber built house , and the road is lined with cottages with pretty little flower gardens. The Fox Inn is one of a group of little thatched cottages and past this can be found several new residences and the racing stables.

In the southern end of the parish to the north of Old Park Wood there is a rifle range.

The manor house is described at the time of Edward VI as
'Sutton is distaunte from Alleresford a myle, and the mannor-howse being a verie olde howse,* somtyme walled round abowte with stone, now decaied, well waterid with an olde ponde or moote adjoyning to it, and the ferme-howse being sett and within a stones cast of the said manner-howse, thowsing being but for a fermer, lying neer to Sutton churche. There is a xii score beneth the said manner-howse a corne-mill holden be copie, the ponde being the hed dam of the said mill, and a lyttell beneth that a faier great fermehowse belonging to the Lorde Chief Justice and holden by copie of the manner of Sutten. The parke of Sutton being a lyttell myle from Sutton Towne, and all the ground betwixt bi the heighwaie side parcell of Sutton ferme, having allso a greate sheape pasture enclosed lyeing round abowte thone haulf of the parke, all plaine, callid the Parke Downe, bi estymacion 400 acres, parcell of the ferme, and the parke being abowte two myles good pasture, and muche wood lately fellid ther, the lodge standing faier upon a hill towards the northe end of the parke. A greate wood lying from the sowthewest corner of the parke, full west, a two myles in length, and being a quarter of a myle or more over in moost places set with beache and thicke upon the Lord's common, and a faier plaine comon belonging to the said Lordeshipp, lying all alongest the northe side of the said longe wood.'

* The 'verie olde howse,' mentioned was possibly referring to the bishop of Winchester's palace,

HISTORY OF ST NICHOLAS' CHURCH