About Farndon Charities
We are an umbrella of four historic bequests, the oldest dating to 1722. Three trustees meet four times a year to consider small single grants for the relief of hardship within the parish of Farndon, in the county of Cheshire. There is no office, no paid staff, and no marketing budget. There is only this work, and a paper ledger, and a parish.
Farndon is a small Cheshire village on the eastern bank of the River Dee, opposite the Welsh village of Holt. The two are joined by a sandstone bridge first thrown across the river in 1338 and rebuilt many times since. Farndon Charities is the umbrella, formed under a Charity Commission Scheme in 1962, of four older bequests that had each been administered separately by trustees of the parish for centuries before that. The oldest of the four — the Poor's Allotment — dates to 1722. The newest — the Sick & Aged Fund — was constituted at the time of the amalgamation itself.
We exist for one purpose, taken word-for-word from the governing Scheme: the relief of the poor living within the parish of Farndon in the county of Cheshire. The Charity Commission record, which is public at charity number 219005, summarises us in a single sentence: “This usually takes the form of making small single grants.” That is exactly what we do. Most of our grants are between £40 and £300, paid by cheque or bank transfer, decided around a kitchen table.
Farndon Charities is an unincorporated umbrella charity. We are governed by a Scheme made by the Charity Commission in 1962 and revised, in small ways, in 1987 and again in 2004. The Scheme brought together four older parish bequests under a common board of three trustees, while preserving the original conditions attached to each fund. So, for example, the Coal & Bread Charity (bequeathed by Hannah Yarwood in 1840) is still administered with a slight bias toward winter need; the Apprentice Bequest (1891) is still restricted to young people entering trades or training.
The trustees are the legal custodians of the charity. They have no salary and claim no expenses other than postage and the occasional ream of paper. The chair has historically been the incumbent of the parish church of St Chad's, an ex officio appointment written into the 1962 Scheme. The other two trustees are appointed by the parish meeting and serve four-year renewable terms.
It is important to be honest about size, because so many charity websites are not. Our annual income, across the four funds combined, has averaged about £4,200 in the last decade — the rent and modest investment income of small historic endowments. Our expenditure in a typical year is broadly the same. We have no employees. We have no premises beyond the trustees' own homes, the church vestry where the cheque-book lives, and the Memorial Hall where we meet the parish once a year.
Our latest reported financial year — the year to 31 March 2025 — was unusually quiet. Recorded income and expenditure each came to zero. This is not as alarming as it sounds: a small charity of our kind moves in waves, and a particularly active 2023–24 (we paid out close to nine thousand pounds in winter relief and apprentice grants that year) was followed by a year in which the trustees deliberately rebuilt the reserve. We expect ordinary giving to resume in 2026.
We are not in the business of growing. We are in the business of being here, quietly, when a Farndon household needs us.
We are not a service-delivery charity. We do not run a foodbank, a befriending scheme, or a community centre, though we are deeply grateful for the people in this parish who do. We are not a grant-making trust at the larger scale either — we cannot fund organisations or projects in any meaningful sum. We are the small, slow, in-parish instrument; the kind of charity the Victorians would have called a parochial trust, and the kind that has all but disappeared from England's ecclesiastical map. We are happy to still be here.
Three centuries on the Dee
1722
A strip of land at the parish edge, near the river, is set aside by the parish vestry under the will of John Davies, yeoman of Farndon. The annual rent is to be paid in support of the parish poor — an arrangement still in operation, in slightly altered form, today.
1799
The earliest extant Farndon poor-relief ledger, kept by the parish overseers, begins. It records small distributions of bread and coal through the hard winters of the Napoleonic years. The original is held by Cheshire Archives, Chester.
1840
Hannah Yarwood, of Sutton Green within the parish, leaves a sum of £400 in her will, the interest of which is to be distributed each Advent in the form of coal and bread to the elderly poor of Farndon. The fund is invested in consols and administered alongside the Poor's Allotment.
1891
The Reverend Thomas Allbright, rector of Farndon, founds the Apprentice Bequest in memory of his daughter Caroline, with a subscription from the parish. Its purpose: to help young Farndonians enter the trades. The first apprentice grant is paid the following Michaelmas.
1962
By a Charity Commission Scheme of 1962, the three older bequests are brought together under a single umbrella, ‘Farndon Charities’, and a fourth fund — the Sick & Aged Fund — is constituted from a long-dormant balance held by the parish vestry. The board is fixed at three trustees, one ex officio.
1987
The Scheme is revised to widen the qualifying definition of ‘the poor’ in line with contemporary practice. Apprentice grants are extended to include further-education and college fees where these are not otherwise met.
2004
The Scheme is revised again to permit electronic payment of grants, and to clarify the position of recipients living outside the civil parish but with a substantial Farndon connection (born here, educated here, or living here for ten years).
2018
Following a particularly hard winter, the trustees launch an informal Advent appeal to top up the Coal & Bread Fund. It has run every December since. In a typical year it raises £1,400–£2,200 from village neighbours.
2026
The tercentenary of the Poor's Allotment. The trustees will mark it with a small open meeting at the Memorial Hall in June and a published note from each constituent fund. No fanfare; we are not that kind of charity.
The trustees · 2026
The names of our trustees are public on the Charity Commission register at charity number 219005. We meet at 6 Plover Close, Farndon, four times a year.
Chair · ex officio as Rector of St Chad's
Has served as chair of the trustees since being appointed to the Farndon living. Chairs the quarterly meetings, signs cheques jointly with the Clerk, and keeps the charity's correspondence book at the vestry.
Trustee · appointed by the parish meeting
A long-time resident of Farndon and former parish councillor. Holds the trustees' informal portfolio for the Apprentice Bequest, and is the first point of contact for young applicants from the parish.
Trustee & Honorary Clerk
Keeps the ledger, prepares the annual return, signs cheques jointly with the chair, and answers most of the post. Also a trustee of the Plumpton and Harding Fund for the Poor, with which we occasionally exchange notes.
Governance, briefly
The three trustees meet four times a year — in March, June, September, and December. Meetings are typically two hours and are minuted on paper. A quorum is two trustees. Applications received between meetings are circulated by letter or email; small or urgent grants up to £150 can be approved by chair's action in consultation with the Clerk, and ratified at the next meeting.
Conflicts of interest are recorded openly. Where a trustee is known to a household applying for help — which, in a parish this size, is often the case — that trustee withdraws from the decision. The minutes record the withdrawal by name.
We do not pay ourselves anything. We do not engage paid fundraisers. We hold our reserves at a high-street bank in current and notice accounts; the small historic endowment of the Coal & Bread Charity is held in COIF Charities Investment Fund accumulation units, the lowest-cost route open to small charities. Investment policy is reviewed at the December meeting.
Latest accounts
Source: Charity Commission annual return, 2024–25. Filed on time.
A quiet year. The trustees took the deliberate decision to defer the Christmas distribution and rebuild the Sick & Aged reserve, after an active 2023–24. Full notes in the annual reports.
If you live within the parish
Most applications come by letter or through a parish neighbour. There is no form. Tell us what is happening; we will reply within a fortnight.