Category: Potter Heigham

Walter Robert Linkhorn is buried in the churchyard of St. Nicholas’s Church in Potter Heigham. He was born on 29 March 1887, the son of farm labourer William and Sarah Ann Linkhorn, and the official records say he was baptised on the same day (very efficient if true, but probably not). At the 1891 census, Walter was living in Potter Heigham with his parents, along with his older brothers James, Edward, Charles and Francis, as well as with his older sisters Sarah and Priscilla.

By the 1901 census, the Linkhorn family had moved to Hickling Road in Catfield and along with his parents, he was living with James, Sarah, Charles and Francis as well with his nephew Norice (that name doesn’t sound right, but I can’t see what else it says) and niece Victoria. All of the males of the Linkhorn family were by this time working as farm labourers, although I can’t imagine what other jobs there would be in the Potter Heigham area.

Walter joined the Royal Naval Reserve with service number 5073/DA and served on HMS Attentive III. I don’t have much knowledge in this area (well, none really), but I think HMS Attentive III was shore-based, so something of an administrative unit. Walter died of illness on 14 March 1919, having reached the rank of deck-hand, with his next of kin being his father, William Linkhorn, who by this stage lived at Howe Hill in Ludham. As an aside, some of his medals were sold recently in an auction, which seems a slightly sad end to the story.

This caught my eye at St. Nicholas’s Church in Potter Heigham as I like the idea that the tree and fence have been here for decades, getting ever closer.

I still struggle to think of Potter Heigham without linking it to Latham’s and their memorable radio ads, but this church is a little way from there and in a relatively peaceful countryside spot. It dates from the twelfth century, although the nave was substantially remodelled in the early sixteenth century. The round tower has some heritage, probably twelfth century but perhaps as early as the eleventh century, with some Norman elements visible in the main structure of the tower and church.

The chancel is from the thirteenth century and remains thatched, making a curious difference to the leaded nave. And, this is recent, the nave was changed from thatch to lead in the last decade and although I’m sure it was necessary for some technical reason, I can’t say it looks aesthetically particularly pleasing.

The sizeable porch, which has gates from the Queen’s coronation in 1953.

The church’s round tower had an octagonal top added in the fourteenth century, a relatively common regional addition that has been better executed here than in some local churches.

The sizeable and peaceful churchyard, which seems a little bereft of older graves and I do wonder where they’ve gone. It hasn’t always looked in such good repair, when some antiquarians visited it in 1870, they noted “the churchyard looked as if the inhabitants were using it as a place for the cultivation of the rankest weeds”. They also added that the church needed “judicious restoration”, which was a typical Victorian strategy that often caused more damage than good to the buildings.

Getting inside the church isn’t yet possible, although it apparently holds some treasures in the form of medieval wall paintings and a hammer-beam roof of note.