Mr. Thomas Cramp, the founder of the Temperance cause in East Grinstead, was born at Lewes, where his father was a veterinary surgeon, on April 21st, 1810. He spent his boyhood at Bexhill and came to East Grinstead as an apprentice. He married Miss Jane Pretty, the daughter of a Wesleyan minister, on June 25th, 1841. He had begun his total abstinence practice exactly four years earlier - total abstinence from tea and coffee as well as alcoholic liquors, water being his only beverage. The Society he started met with most violent opposition. Its members were stoned in the public streets; Mr. Cramp was suspended from the Zion Church and removed from his post of Superintendent of the Sunday School; and his pastor preached a public sermon strongly condemning the newfangled craze and it was not until August 25th, 1845, some eight years later, that the use of the same chapel was first granted for a temperance meeting. But the cause grew and in due course East Grinstead boasted of one of the strongest temperance societies in the county. In 1887 Mr. Cramp's temperance jubilee was publicly celebrated, and on April 21st, 1890, a public meeting was held to congratulate him on attaining his 80th birthday. He lived to celebrate one more, passing away on August 18th, 1891. For over 35 years he was High Bailiff of the County Court; he founded the Penny Bank in East Grinstead; he was one of the founders and for 25 years Secretary of the first Gas Company; and he served most of the parochial offices.