Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Tag: Norwich

  • Norwich – St. George’s Church, Tombland (John Coppin)

    Norwich – St. George’s Church, Tombland (John Coppin)

    This stone tablet (clicking on the photo makes it larger) is located on the external wall of St. George’s Church in Tombland and it commemorates the life of John Coppin, who was born in 1630.

    John was the long-serving (probably from 1660 until 1711) rector of Winfarthing church, located near Diss, and he died on 23 November 1711 at the age of 81. It seems, slightly surprisingly, that John Coppin wasn’t a rare name at the time, so I can’t quite ascertain where he was born or died, nor what his relationship was with this church in Norwich.

    A short distance away from this church is Red Well, which is where in 1701 Francis Burges set up the Norwich Post, which is considered to be the first provincial newspaper in England. Unfortunately, very few copies of this newspaper remain, the earlier survivor being from 1707. I wonder whether John’s death would have been mentioned in the newspaper, although I think the aim of provincial newspapers was often a little more political than the more mundane reporting of local obituaries.

    Sometimes graves are moved onto the structure of the church at a later date, but it appears this was placed here following John’s death. A book of the city’s history written by Francis Blomefield at the beginning of the nineteenth century notes that the stone was in its current location in 1806. Much of the stone tablet is blank suggesting at some stage it was thought more might be added. Inside the church is (or was) a memorial to Dorothy Mettyer, the daughter of John, who died in 1722. It seems possible that perhaps it was initially planned to add her details to that of her father.

  • Norwich – St. George’s Church, Tombland (William Martin Seppings)

    Norwich – St. George’s Church, Tombland (William Martin Seppings)

    Tucked away at the back of the churchyard of St. George’s Church in Tombland, Norwich is the gravestone of William Martin Seppings. William was born in 1785 and lived in South Acre, a village located nearby to Castle Acle and he married Anne Squire (born in 1791) in 1811.

    The electoral register of 1835 notes that he held a freehold estate at Tombland which gave him the right to vote. He was also one of the first chairs of the East of England Bank following its establishment in 1836, a bank which got into financial difficulty in 1864 and was reformed as the Provincial Banking Corporation, later becoming part of Barclays Bank. In his various roles on the council, William served alongside Samuel Bignold, the general secretary of Norwich Union and son of its founder.

    At the 1841 census, William was living at Tombland (although no more precise address is given) with his wife Anne, along with Beatrice Ellis (aged 40), Elizabeth Jessup (aged 35) and Sarah Smith (aged 20). The ages at the 1841 census aren’t always perfect, and William was listed as being aged 50. I can’t find any evidence that the couple had any children.

    William died at his house at Tombland on 19 March 1846, at the age of 61. The death was reported by the local press, who noted that William had been one of the first batch of magistrates appointed by Sir Robert Peel’s administration after the Whigs had lost power. Perhaps more telling is the comment that “although he possessed no inconsiderable portion of eccentricity, he was an independent and honourable man and generally respected”.

    Anne lived much longer, she died in 1883 at the age of 92, having lived at a property at Castle Meadow with two servants for over three decades. Elizabeth Jessup remained as a servant until the late 1860s, having served the family for over thirty years.

    There’s not enough information that I can readily find to tell the whole story of William Martin Seppings, although we know he did well financially and was well respected. We also know that he was quite eccentric, thanks to his obituary, and that he was afforded a decent headstone which has lasted well. What he would think about being in the corner of the graveyard next to some bricks and compost I’m not sure. But the church remains in use, he’s near to Tombland where he lived and worked for much of his life, and so perhaps he’d be quite content knowing that not that much has changed here.

  • Norwich History by Parish : St. George Tombland

    Norwich History by Parish : St. George Tombland

    And a new little project that Jonathan and I are undertaking because this lockdown is clearly here for at least a few more weeks. It’s a bit niche (our project I mean, not the lockdown), I’ll accept that, but there we go. Effectively, it’s walking around Norwich, ancient parish by ancient parish and seeing what is there now compared to a map from the 1880s (the map above is from 1789, but the one from the 1880s is more detailed, which is why we used that). There’s a PDF of these boundaries to provide some extra background to this whole project.

    St. George Tombland is the fifth parish we’ve done this for and, again, there’s substantially more history than I can mention in this post, a reminder of just how much heritage remains in Norwich.

    The parish of St. George Tombland isn’t large geographically, but there are over thirty listed buildings in what is a relatively small area.

    A map of the area from the late nineteenth century.

    We started in Tombland itself, slightly challenging as there’s an extensive renovation of the area taking place at the moment. This area was the heart of Anglo-Saxon Norwich and was where their market was located. Its name origin is from the Viking word ‘tom’ meaning an empty space rather than a tomb as in grave. Tombland was also at the effective centre of the four Anglo-Saxon settlements of Coslany, Conesford, Norwic and Westwic. When the Normans took over the city they moved the centre of their settlement to be at Norwich Castle, although Tombland remained as a market area.

    There were until very recently underground public toilets here, although they’ve long since been closed, and the council’s plan is to open the area up with its renovation project. Tombland had, unfortunately, all become a little run down and wasn’t a pleasant place to sit. Visible in the background are the phone boxes, which are listed, and an old water fountain.

    The buildings on one side of Tombland have been built against the wall of the Cathedral Close.

    The parish boundary is to the right of this doorway, which leads to St. Mary the Less Church.

    For many years this has been Prezzo, although it was announced this week that the restaurant is now permanently closed in Norwich, meaning both the chain’s outlets in the city have gone. The building itself was a former residential property and it’ll be interesting to see what its future is.

    Looking towards the eastern side of Tombland.

    Today a Japanese restaurant, this is 6 Tombland which was built as a residential property in the eighteenth century.

    Turning the corner into Princes Street, of which the section further down is in the parish of St. Peter Hungate. The white-fronted building on the right is 26 Princes Street, a residential property built either in the late sixteenth or early seventeenth century. The building behind it, facing the churchyard of St. George, is 1 Tombland Alley and that was built in the seventeenth century, also as a residential property. Access to that property is now only possible by going through 26 Princes Street. George Plunkett took a colour photo of these buildings in 1936 and not much has really changed.

    The entrance to Plumbers Arms Alley, which I’ve written about before…..

    The parish boundary with St. Peter Hungate and there is a link on that page to a photo George Plunkett has showing that there were three of these markers here until not that long ago.

    Looking back down Princes Street towards Tombland, with nearly all the properties on the left hand side being listed.

    That bulging window (I admit that’s probably not the technical term) is delightful. It’s located at 18 Princes Street and the window dates from the eighteenth century.

    The small area of churchyard in front of the church of St. George, from which the parish takes its name. Not many gravestones remain here, but the soil is piled up a little, with no doubt many hundreds of burials having taken place in this small area until the practice was stopped in the middle of the nineteenth century.

    Inset into the church is this memorial to Mary Barber, who died in 1689. I find these are really useful ways of connecting with the past, people who lived and worked in Norwich over three centuries ago. Times were turbulent in the seventeenth century with civil war and the the battle over religion being major issues for the people of the country, there must have been great uncertainty. And life, as with Mary who died aged 32, was often short.

    Looking towards the south side of the church of St. George. It’s Grade I listed and there has likely been a church on this site since the late Anglo-Saxon period. The current structure dates from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, with the tower dating from 1445 and then having major repairs in 1645. There’s a monument of note inside from 1617 which commemorates the life of Thomas Anguish (more on whom further down this post).

    Unfortunately, the church is closed at the moment, but public entrance is usually allowed. This is the northern side of the church, where a path cuts across which is known as Tombland Alley. There were iron railings on the church side, but these were removed during the Second World War to be used as part of the war effort. The north porch of the building has been closed off and is now in use as a small chapel.

    The rear of Augustine Steward’s House which dates from the mid-sixteenth century. This is a substantial building, and quite a survivor, with three floors and a basement, stretching back some way from its frontage onto Tombland. The property takes its name from the man who commissioned it, Augustine Steward, who was the Sheriff of Norwich in 1526 and Mayor of Norwich in 1534, 1546 and 1556. It’s thought that the building was completed in 1549, although it was in a state of some disrepair towards the end of the nineteenth century and needed substantial renovation. The roof was also badly damaged during a fire which took place in 1944. There’s a George Plunkett photo of these properties which he took in 1935.

    Augustine Steward’s house is to the left and straight ahead is Tombland and Norwich Cathedral. There’s something quite delightful about the wonkiness of these buildings and how repairs have had to work around these little idiosyncrasies.

    This was once the house of Christopher Jay, the Mayor of Norwich, and he wanted something quite grand at the entrance to his residence. So, he installed statues of Hercules and Samson, likely in around the late 1640s. They have become something of a Norwich icon, but the two wooden statues there now are modern replacements. The originals were removed in the 1990s and were left to dry out by Norfolk Museums Service so that they could be restored and put on display. It was discovered that the statue of Samson was covered in sixty layers of paint and was original, dating to 1647, although Hercules was a Victorian replacement. The building which they’ve guarded has been used for multiple usages, including perhaps most famously a nightclub for some decades. There was some controversy, and perhaps quite rightly, when these statues were painted red when a restaurant took over the premises a few years ago.

    Next door is the Louis Marchesi pub, which has been a licensed premises since around 1770, when it was known as the Waggon & Horses. There was previously a fourteenth century building here and the crypts of that were retained when the newer structure was added on top and the Tudor effect is fake and dates to the early twentieth century. The pub was renamed the Louis Marchesi in 1976 and changed again to the quite drab name of Take Five in 2004, but since 2017 the Louis Marchesi name is back.

    Louis Marchesi (1898-1968) was a local man and he founded the Round Table movement, a charitable organisation for young men. Wikipedia notes that Marchesi was also the man who came up with the “There are things we must do, there are things we can do and there are things we should do”, although I haven’t checked that little bit of information….

    Today this is known as Waggon and Horses Lane, after the pub (before it was renamed to the Louis Marchesi), but it was previously referred to Elm Hill Lane and it connected to Elm Hill Street at its other end. This was all a bit confusing, so Elm Hill Street became known simply as Elm Hill, and this street was renamed.

    The Black Horse pub, the section on the left which until recently was the Black Horse bookshop and is now an Indian restaurant.

    This was Jonathan’s favourite discovery of the day and I must admit, I’ve never noticed it here. It’s the “Black Horse Skittle Saloon”, the former skittle alley of the Black Horse pub. There’s plenty more information about the Black Horse at the Norfolk Pubs web-site.

    The main part of the building is now an opticians, but the black horse remains.

    The parish boundary cuts across Wensum Street and includes the rear of the Maid’s Head hotel.

    The frontage of the Maid’s Head hotel, which claims to be the oldest hotel in the UK. I think that’s perhaps a little arguable (more on that on the Guardian’s web-site), but there’s certainly a long heritage to this building and a long history of hospitality. The hotel notes on its web-site:

    “The first Norman Bishop of Norwich, Herbert de Losinga had his original palace here, so we base our claim on the site’s continuous use for hospitality since the middle of the 1090s.”

    They also have some old images of the hotel, both internally and externally. The mock Tudor frontage on this section dates from the 1890s and George Plunkett has a photo of this side of the hotel which he took in 1934.

    This door is a modern recreation and it’s to note that Thomas Anguish (1538-1617), the Mayor of Norwich in 1611, lived here. Anguish left money in his will for a children’s hospital and this was founded in 1618, the year after his death.

    This is the rear of the Maid’s Head and the old map notes that there was a Bishop’s Palace in this area, which fits in with the information provided by the hotel itself. I feel that I need to learn more about this, as I didn’t know that such a building ever existed on this site.

    The Erpingham Gate isn’t in the parish, but the boundary reaches the wall.

    The statue of Edith Cavell, which was moved here a few years ago from the traffic island that was located a short distance away. It’s easier to see the statue in its current location, as there’s less chance of being run over, but George Plunkett has a photo from 1932 which shows its former position in front of the Maid’s Head.

    Edith Cavell (1865-1915) was the first of four children of the vicar of Swardeston and she worked in this area and in Brussels in a role looking after children. She then trained as a nurse and worked in London and Manchester, before moving permanently to Brussels, which would have been quite an adventure for the time. She decided to stay in Brussels to help British and French soldiers, which included hiding over 200 of them from the Germans. Someone betrayed her to the Germans and she was sentenced to death by a military court, being shot at dawn on 12 October 1915. She was buried at Norwich Cathedral on 15 May 1919 following a memorial service which took place in Westminster Abbey.

    Cavell’s death was used as propaganda by the British and the allies, to show the horrors of the Germans in shooting a nurse. There was significant international condemnation for the Germans and numerous attempts were made by countries to get the execution suspended. This wasn’t one of those decisions which was undertaken by an impulsive German soldier, this was a real dilemma for the German authorities who gave consideration to what they were doing. They didn’t want Cavell inspiring a wave of young women to offer resistance to the Germans, so they went ahead with the execution as a warning of what would happen to others who sought to repeat her rebellious efforts.

    This stretch of wall behind Edith Cavell’s monument had buildings that joined onto it in the past and although they’ve now been swept away, some of the marks are still visible.

    Most of the Edith Cavell branding has been removed from the pub, having been replaced by Prime Restaurant signage. The Norfolk Pubs web-site mentions that it was opened in the mid-nineteenth century when it was known as the Tombland Stores until 1879, then the Army & Navy Stores until 1981 before taking its current name (bar a short spell as Coles).

    The bottle and jug entrance to the pub, for those customers who wanted to take beer away with them, with what is likely Victorian etching which has survived the decades.

    And that’s another parish done, surprising me that there were a considerable number of historic bits and pieces that I hadn’t noticed before, not least some of the graves around the church of St. George and also the skittle alley at the rear of the Black Horse.

  • LDWA 100 – Training Walk 12

    LDWA 100 – Training Walk 12

    This was our twelfth walk in preparation for the 2021 LDWA 100.

    WALK NUMBER: 12 (The Wroxham Wander)

    DISTANCE COVERED: 18.5 miles

    NUMBER OF NATHAN’S FRIENDS WE “ACCIDENTALLY” BUMP INTO: 0 (but see below)

    SUFFICIENT BEER CONSUMED: No (all the pubs are shut)

    PUBS VISITED: 0 (not through choice)

    WEATHER CONDITIONS: Dry and surprisingly warm

    ATTACKED BY ANIMALS: No

    NUMBER OF SNAKES SEEN: 0

    The LDWA 100 in May is creeping up rather fast and so it was time for us to go on another little meander in the quiet Norfolk countryside. Above is what is currently Zaks American restaurant and they’ve been in these premises since 1979. Apologies for yet another mention of George Plunkett, but he has a photo of what this former tea pavilion looked like in 1931.

    Nathan guided us through Mousehold Heath through trial and error (mostly error), but I must confess that I still manage to get lost in this area so I wasn’t much help. Here’s a pile of big twigs constructed to build a shelter.

    A beehive sign, suitable given that the building behind was until relatively recently the Beehive pub. It’s now a Co-op, but the old web-site for the pub is being maintained as a community project, which is a marvellous idea. I’m not entirely taken by this habit of supermarkets taking over former pubs, once an asset like that is lost it’s going to nearly certainly be a permanent loss.

    This is the end of the pavement on the Norwich to Wroxham Road, beyond that pedestrians are expected to walk down the round. It’s not ideal…… We decided that we wouldn’t walk back this way, instead going via Rackheath, which proved to be a sensible decision. One day there will be proper access for walkers and cyclists on roads such as this, but I fear that we have a little bit of a wait for that.

    I’m very pro-rail and often grumble about new roads, but the council have done a good job here with the Northern Distributor Road (alternatively known as the Taverham-Postwick Road) in terms of footpaths and cycle access. The council were content not to make pedestrians to walk along the road here, so that made matters rather more pleasant.

    Moist roads….. Komoot wasn’t entirely helpful in the stretch beyond this, as its routings tried to send us down private paths that weren’t on the definitive map. That meant some backtracking was necessary and although Komoot are reliant on external data, it’s a situation that means significant caveats would have to be made before anyone uses Komoot in rural Norfolk. Nathan muttered about Komoot quite a lot today but I considered it to be user error. I didn’t say that though, I didn’t want to cast a dark cloud on proceedings.

    On the right is the railway line that runs from Norwich to Sheringham, and this point is just before entering Wroxham. There’s an amazing amount of earthworks that took place for this line to be constructed in what some people believe is a flat county. But, as Norfolk residents know, there are mountains and hills all over this area.

    Looking over the bridge towards to Norwich, although we managed to miss the trains today so there are no photos of the new Greater Anglia fleet.

    Here we are. A word of caution (I made have added jeopardy there, as it’s not really a problem to get this muddled up), the villages of Hoveton & Wroxham have effectively merged together, and the railway station is known as that, Hoveton & Wroxham (although that wasn’t the case before 1966, when it was just Wroxham). Roys of Wroxham is actually in Hoveton, along with most of the shops and food outlets.

    This was the Castle Hotel, the only pub in Wroxham, but it closed in November 1996 and is now a residential property. There isn’t much more of a choice in Hoveton, with the really average Greene King King’s Head pub being the most obvious one.

    They appear to have built Wroxham library on a floodplain (or where the river floods, I’m not sure of the geological term I’m supposed to use) but at least the stilts look sufficiently high to avoid damp books.

    The footbridge over the River Bure, that’s Hoveton in the background.

    This reminds me of days spent on Broads cruisers, although I found the driving the boat quite a hassle. I preferred the sitting down watching the scenery whilst eating sausage rolls.

    The old stone bridge and there has been some structure here since the early medieval period such is the importance of this crossing. This is a challenging bridge to get under, and I think Heidi guided operations when we did this in a Broads cruiser, but accidents here aren’t rare. For anyone who fancies having a look at proceedings, here’s a YouTube video, although there have been much worse incidents here. It’s recommended to use the pilot service to get through here, to avoid any scraping issues.

    And here’s another little video of what boating is like at Wroxham, involving an angry man from Broads Tours. I quite like this video.

    We opted for chips at Greys in Hoveton and they were priced towards the higher end of the scale, but met my expectations in terms of the taste and temperature. More on this in another post though. At this point we had a quick meander around Wroxham, but it was rather packed with tourists and so we decided not to linger. We did though have time for a mini game of GeoGuessr and more on that in another post. Nathan saw someone he thought he knew, but it was all a bit vague (he claimed he hadn’t met him in person and only on Zoom, but I like to think there’s some gossip behind the whole situation), so I’m not counting that one in the tally at the top of the page.

    This is St. Mary’s Church in Wroxham, unfortunately closed otherwise I could have seen the doorway which is apparently of considerable note. It’s a building rather marred by what I consider to be ugly additions, but its location near to the river gives it a peaceful feel. More on this Grade I listed (primarily for the doorway) church in another post, but it’s mainly fifteenth century although there are parts of the previous twelfth century church still in situ.

    Trafford Mausoleum which is located in the churchyard of St. Mary’s Church and was constructed for the Trafford family who lived in Wroxham Hall, which has now been demolished. It was constructed in around 1830 and was designed by Anthony Salvin, also known for his work on restoring castles.

    An interesting old property on Church Lane, which was once the heart of the medieval village but now feels a little more remote. It’s a really nice area of Wroxham, and there’s also a pleasant area by the river known as Caen Meadow. Nathan decided I was faffing about too much here taking photos, but I ignored those complaints because I couldn’t be bothered to walk any quicker.

    Aaaaah, a lamb, how very lovely.

    The walk was quite dry today, but there were areas of water to navigate.

    The Taverham-Postwick Road as I’m now calling it, with lots of trees planted on the side of the bank. This was like a wind tunnel though walking alongside it, which wasn’t entirely ideal.

    I’m not sure that I’ve been to Thorpe End Village, but it was nice to see the local LDWA treasurer here. As the name suggests there’s a village feel to this little settlement, which has rather now merged into the outskirts of Norwich.

    And walking back into Norwich, this is the same path that Nathan took us down on a previous GeoGuessr evening walk. It was less muddy on this occasion and, fortunately, I had more suitable shoes on which made matters easier.

    All told, this was another walk that went quickly and we didn’t encounter any medical issues on the expedition, which bodes rather well for the 100. The weather was quite balmy at lunchtime and we did debate getting an ice cream in Wroxham as a dessert for the chips, but the area was a bit busy and we thought it best to try and avoid people given the current health situation. So, another rather lovely day.

  • Norwich – Black Lives Matter Graffiti

    Norwich – Black Lives Matter Graffiti

    I don’t intend to veer into politics on this blog, but this graffiti has appeared under the flyover on Magdalen Street and it seems nicely done. Something which tells a story and adds some interest to the area near Anglia Square is perhaps really quite welcome.

    As an aside, this is a ugly area, it’s a shame that nothing in the past could have been built under the flyover to tidy this whole site up. This rather beautiful building is what used to stand here…..

  • Norwich History by Parish : St. Peter Hungate

    Norwich History by Parish : St. Peter Hungate

    And a new little project that Jonathan and I are undertaking because this lockdown is clearly here for at least a few more weeks. It’s a bit niche (our project I mean, not the lockdown), I’ll accept that, but there we go. Effectively, it’s walking around Norwich, ancient parish by ancient parish and seeing what is there now compared to a map from the 1880s (the map above is from 1789, but the one from the 1880s is more detailed, which is why we used that). There’s a PDF of these boundaries to provide some extra background to this whole project.

    St. Peter Hungate is the fourth parish we’ve done this for and although it’s relatively small in size, it has got some considerable heritage packed into it. There’s substantially more history than I can mention in this post, a reminder of just how much heritage remains in Norwich.

    The parish boundaries map.

    And a map of the area from the 1880s.

    The parish boundary goes right through the middle of this building, better today known as the Halls and it’s where Norwich Beer Festival is held. It’s actually though two buildings, St. Andrew’s Hall on the left and the building off to the right is Blackfriars’ Hall. We ignored the former today, as it’s in a different parish, just looking at Blackfriars’ Hall which is named after the Dominican Order which took over here in 1307. There’s imagery of inside of Blackfriars’ Hall on their official web-site.

    The area next to Blackfriars’ Hall, which isn’t accessible to the public, but the parish boundary runs through the middle of it, along the line of the concrete wall.

    This keyboard mould was pushed into the concrete in around 2000 by Molly Sole, a local art student, and there was a wave of public interest about it in 2020.

    Formerly one residential property, this house has now been divided into two and in the nineteenth century a corner shop was opened. It’s been used for numerous purposes since then, including as a cafe.

    At the top of Elm Hill, a pair of eighteenth century residential houses, with a plaque noting that the Friars de Sacco settled in a property on this site which was given to them by William de Gissing in around 1250.

    The rear of Blackfriars’ Hall, this is the most complete friary complex remaining in the country. Volunteering at Norwich Beer Festival has numerous exciting benefits, including free beer and food (and meeting people and all that stuff), but also being able to explore this wonderful building.

    The entrance to Monastery Yard.

    This area is now a car park (I think the city council have a plan for Norwich to become the European City of Car Parks), but there were residential properties which were on the left-hand side here. On the right-hand side is a monastery chapel which was built by Father Ignatius (more on him later), but which was forced to close in 1876.

    The rear wall of Monastery Street and there used to be residential properties which backed onto it.

    It’s now possible to walk by the River Wensum, but there were once buildings all along here which went down to the riverside. The situation here was that in the medieval period there were some grand properties owned by wealthy merchants on Elm Hill and they would have gone down to the river. Over time, these rear areas were filled with often poor quality residential properties and industrial buildings accessed by courts and yards, most of which were pulled down during slum clearances.

    This was once Crown Court Yard and its entrance remains, but the buildings have gone and it’s just a car park now. This really isn’t a great use for a site such as this in a prime part of the city.

    This is the remains of Towler’s Court which connects from the river to Elm Hill, with the buildings here being demolished as part of the 1920s slum clearances.

    And these are the parish boundary markers on Elm Hill, with the boundary of St. Simon and St. Jude on the left from 1842, and St. Peter Hungate on the right from 1814 and 1834. The parish boundaries are rarely logical, twisting and turning through buildings, so these iron markers really were essential.

    And the same parish boundary markers on the other side of the road, a real legacy of this system of dividing up the city.

    37 Elm Hill, with an entrance to Norris Court Gardens.

    Elm Hill is one of the more historic streets in Norwich and there are numerous Tudor buildings and undercrofts along here. So, what did the city council want to do in the 1920s? They proposed demolishing the properties along here so that they could build a swimming pool. Fortunately, local opposition and the intervention of the Norwich Society saw off these misguided plans and fortunately this marvellous area survived.

    Some on the council were entirely blindsided by the local opposition, with Mr Manning saying in a council meeting in 1926:

    “The city would be purer and better if the site was cleared. It is one of the festering sores in the city and the council would be well advised if they cleared the whole of the street away and made a public restplace”.

    Just weeks later, the city said that it was reversing its decision and the City Engineer was drawing up plans to restore the frontage of the buildings along Elm Hill, working with William Weir, the architect to the Society for the Preservation of Ancient Buildings.

    As an aside, there was a meeting in early 1926 held by the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society and the chairman said that he was hopeful that there were some members of the Labour Party present. The chair said that he was aware that it wasn’t everyone in the Labour Party who wanted old buildings pulled down as “some members in the Labour Party were now very cultured and fond of anything artistic and antique”.

    I mentioned Crown Court Yard earlier in this post, and this is the sign visible from Elm Hill.

    And the entrance to Crown Court Yard from Elm Hill, not that there’s much of a yard to go through to.

    Looking back down Elm Hill.

    There’s a parish pump and an elm tree, although both are modern replacements.

    An old doorway with a plaque commemorating the life of Father Ignatius (1837-1908) who was an Anglican Benedictine monk who wanted to bring back the monastery system. He purchased this house on Elm Hill, definitely suitably located given he could see Blackfriars’ Hall from his window, which must have been a constant inspiration. George Plunkett has a photo from 1935 of this doorway.

    Briton’s Arms is currently closed and is for sale, after being run by sisters Sue Skipper and Gilly Mixer for 45 years. The building likely dates to the middle of the fourteenth century and was a beguinage, or a house for religious women. It was the only house in the street to survive the fire in 1507 and for the next couple of centuries it was used by barbour surgeons and individuals involved in the wool trade. Timothy Gridley, a woolcomber, was perhaps the first landlord here when he was listed as a licensee in 1760. The pub was initially known as the Kings Arms, being changed to the Briton’s Arms in the early part of the nineteenth century. It remained in use as a pub until 1945, when it became a restaurant and cafe.

    Looking back down Elm Hill.

    A drawing, from around the same spot as the above photo, drawn in the 1920s as part of the plan to restore the street.

    The porchway of St. Peter Hungate, the first church in the country to be repurposed when it was declared redundant in 1936. It housed a museum of church art, an inspired and forward-thinking idea, but sadly it closed in 1995. Now under the management of the Norwich Historic Churches Trust, the church is now home to Hungate Medieval Art, a charity which promotes the city’s medieval history.

    Inside the porch, which can’t be accessed and I took this photo through the gate…. I will at some point hopefully find my photos of when I visited this church during the Flintspiration weekend in 2017. There are some photos of how the church looked on the web-site of Hungate Medieval Art.

    There may have been a church on this since the Anglo-Saxon period, although most of the current building dates to the fifteenth century. Much of the cost of this was paid for by John Paston and Margaret Paston, best known perhaps for the Paston Letters. The chancel and tower had been built in 1431 under the supervision of Thomas Ingham, although the chancel had to be rebuilt in 1604 when it fell down, which wasn’t entirely ideal. The church tower was shortened at the beginning of the twentieth century and the belfry was also knocked down, a period when the building was in generally a poor state of repair.

    The chancel end of the church with the graveyard behind, which is currently inaccessible to the general public.

    This building is on Prince’s Street and it used to be a shop, visible in this 1936 photo from George Plunkett. We went to stand by the entrance to where the shop was, but there’s no trace of it left at all, although the grate is in the same place.

    Two more parish markers, St. George Tombland 1777 and St. Peter Hungate from 1834. George Plunkett has a photo of these from 1934, and unfortunately one has gone missing, as his photo showed a St. George Tombland 1828 marker as well.

    Located on a new building on the other side of Princes Street is this parish boundary marker from 1834, a real survivor since this had to be taken off an older building and placed onto its replacement.

    And that was the end of our little tour, which was quite a moist expedition given the amount of rain. There are 16 listed buildings in this one parish and the streetlines haven’t really changed in this parish for over 500 years, so it’s an area of the city that is worth meandering to.

  • Norwich History by Parish : St. Edmund

    Norwich History by Parish : St. Edmund

    And a new little project that Jonathan and I are undertaking because this lockdown is clearly here for at least a few more weeks. It’s a bit niche (our project I mean, not the lockdown), I’ll accept that, but there we go. Effectively, it’s walking around Norwich, ancient parish by ancient parish and seeing what is there now compared to a map from the 1880s (the map above is from 1789, but the one from the 1880s is more detailed, which is why we used that). There’s a PDF of these boundaries to provide some extra background to this whole project.

    St. Edmund is the third parish we’ve done this for and it’s been the most challenging in terms of trying to compare it to the past, since there’s nearly nothing left with the exception of the medieval church itself.

    On the above map from the 1880s, the street of Fish Gate is at the base (now known as Fishergate), Peacock Street is at the left hand side (now known as Blackfriars) and Cowgate Street is on the right hand side (now known as Whitefriars). All of the buildings inside of that have gone, demolished as part of slum clearances, property redevelopment and road building. This entire site is now taken over by Smurfit Kappa, or the building perhaps still better known by most as the Norwich Corrugated Board, or NCB building.

    The premises of Smurfit Kappa, who produce various types of packaging. Once on this site there were schools, shops and residential buildings, including the courtyards known as Staff of Life yard and Fleece Yard.

    This is the side of the factory and this rather resolved a query we’d had the previous week. The factory wasn’t built in the 1980s as I had thought, it had been refronted in the 1980s and this older part of the building shows the original element of the structure.

    Rather helpfully, a staff member from the company came out at this point, as I don’t think they get many tourists taking photos of their building. It’s lovely, but I suspect more people take photos of Norwich Cathedral and Norwich Castle. What the helpful staff member did provide us with were photos of what the building used to look like, and there’s a walkway here over the road that I didn’t know about.

    This is another photo provided, showing the factory after it had been refronted, with the walkway now removed. The factory building which that walkway led to has now been demolished and has recently been replaced by residential properties. It was also nice for the two long-standing staff members to help us in this quest, they’d worked there for a considerable period of time and added lots of context to how the area had developed. I also very much appreciated their sending me the photos of the site, the one above shows just how much this area has changed, along with the roundabout to the top of the photo which was built for the inner ringroad.

    This is what was formerly known as Peacock Street, which I’ve written about before. These properties are standing on the site of the former Tiger Inn, demolished for road widening in 1936. George Plunkett’s photo of the building shows just what impressive buildings the council has pulled down in its quest to satisfy car drivers.

    Over the road is Hansard Lane, which I’ve written about before.

    This is the the church of St Edmund, from which the parish takes its name. The church has a small footprint with nearly no graveyard, although it perhaps had one in the medieval period. The church became redundant in the late nineteenth century, one of the early casualties of the sheer volume of churches that Norwich had. There has been a church here since the Anglo-Saxon period, but the current structure is from the fifteenth century onwards. The Anglo-Saxon origins are pretty certain, as the church is dedicated to Edmund the Martyr, the Saxon King of the East Angles. Inside the building, there’s a single nave and chancel, with the porch visible in the left of the above photo dating from the nineteenth century.

    Although the building is Grade I listed, it wasn’t far from being demolished in the early 1970s, following a Church of England which seemed to have forgotten that it was the protector of historic churches. Fortunately, the community took an interest into what the church was planning with its disposal of buildings, and it was saved. It’s currently used as a Christian house of worship once again, although has been used for storage and also as the Norwich Pregnancy Crisis centre.

    A shed at the rear of the church which is of no historic interest, I just liked the icicles…. I’m so easily pleased.

    The church was once surrounded on three sides by a factory building which is visible from the overhead photo earlier on. Today these are riverside residential properties and it’s impossible to walk along the river here as it’s gated off.

    It’s possible to reach the river as there’s a car park behind the GP’s surgery.

    The view of the River Wensum.

    Back on the other side of Fishergate, this is the area behind what was Thompson’s Yard, all now council housing which seems to date from around the 1970s. It’s all sadly devoid of history.

    I quite like little stumps of former buildings, a reminder of what was once here. George Plunkett is of help here (yet again), the rest of the building is in one of his photos from 1936. The now demolished building was once the Rampant Horse pub, which had been a licensed premises since the early nineteenth century and was closed in 1912, another pub lost in the wave of forced pub closures.

    The building still standing next to this stump of wall was also a pub, the Duke of Marlborough, at 29 Fishergate and George Plunkett excels himself again by providing a photo of the landlord and customers in the pub in March 1939. This pub had started to serve customers from 1708 and traded until its closure in 1952.

    It’s hard to establish where the parish boundaries were, but I’ve decided that some of Thoroughfare Yard was probably in the parish of St Edmund. The Church of England don’t supply boundaries of this particular parish, which is likely as the church isn’t in their use any more, and the definitive map doesn’t have them on, so they must have shifted at some stage.

    It’s George Plunkett who once again helps me here, as he has a photo from 1936 which has the parish plates visible, and one of them marks the parish boundary of St Edmund.

    Thoroughfare Yard goes through to Magdalen Street, but I feel I need to investigate it further on a future expedition to ascertain whether those parish plates are still visible (likely not, as the buildings have gone), or where these parish boundaries were. For the moment, here’s another photo from 1936 that George Plunkett took of how the yard once looked.

    So, this wasn’t the most historic of areas that we’ve covered so far, but there were elements that remain from the past. Thanks again to the staff of Smurfit Kappa for their assistance, much appreciated! And, after this walk we went to get chips, just in case anyone wondered.

  • GeoGuessr (Norwich Version) – Walk 4

    GeoGuessr (Norwich Version) – Walk 4

    I already have a better explanation (well, longer explanation anyway) for this plan. In essence, whilst lockdown is on, I need to find ways of walking nearby to Norwich in quiet areas for my LDWA 100 training. So, I’m using GeoGuessr to pick out five random locations within a certain area which I’ve defined and then walking to them, to see what kind of story I can uncover.

    This walk was with Liam and the five locations that we got are above.

    We didn’t follow the Komoot route exactly and it came in at just under 18 miles, a rather useful training walk for the LDWA 100 and managing to avoid people for the vast majority of the day. We were fortunate in that our three locations outside of the city centre were all located in the same sort of area, as it would have made for a much more challenging expedition if just one had been off towards the east of Norwich.

    We started the walk going through Old Library Wood in Norwich.

    Our first location, which was 83 to 87 King Street, which has been much tidied up since George Plunkett took a photo here in 1985.

    By a lucky coincidence we managed to walk past a Greggs en route to our second location.

    A sausage roll and a latte, rather lovely.

    And the second location, showing the Guildhall and Tesco Metro. The Guildhall dates from 1413 and has been an important municipal building over the centuries and was used as the meeting place for Norwich City Council until 1938 and Norwich Courts until 1977.

    Some colourful graffiti in the underpass which stands roughly where the Bull and Butcher pub was once located before the inner ring road ploughed through the area. I hadn’t realised how much graffiti there is here, at least it’s quite artistic and not just random swear words scrawled onto a wall.

    I had a quick pop into Earlham Cemetery for this photo….

    I hadn’t noticed this before, a milestone from when this route was once a toll road leading from St. Benedict’s Street in Norwich to the metropolis of Dereham. The route was 16 miles long and the road was a turnpike between 1770 and 1872, when the tolls were removed. I assumed that this was a modern replacement, but it’s actually from the fourth and final set of milestones which were added by the Turnpike Trust in 1868. The metal plate is recent, as is the white paint which has been added over the stone. Each to their own, but having seen a photo of what it was like before the restoration, I preferred it as it was as I like history being raw and authentic (and yes, I know it’s just a stone and talking about it being raw is perhaps excessive….).

    A few weeks ago, Nathan and I walked here trying to trace the source of the River Wensum and when we were walking in this area off Hellesdon Road we saw some parakeets. Liam and I tried to spot some, but unfortunately failed….

    And another milestone. Ignoring the modern metal plate and the patchy white paint, the beauty of the original stone can still be imagined.

    And our third location in Bowthorpe, which didn’t really require walking far from the Dereham Road.

    We then walked from Bowthorpe to Costessey, this photo shows the Wensum Valley in the background. There’s what I consider to be an appalling attack on the countryside here proposed by Norfolk County Council, but fortunately the Stop the Wensum Link are working hard to end this environmentally disastrous project.

    This next stretch wasn’t entirely ideal, rather mountainous.

    A decorative datestone on this building on West End in Costessey.

    Slightly annoyingly, this photo doesn’t show how steep I thought the hill was here.

    Walking through the woods….

    We then came out into Queen’s Hill, a relatively new housing development located between Costessey and Taverham. The estate, according to the EDP, has 1,784 homes and 5,000 residents and despite people living there for ten years, they’re only now building their first shop, a Co-op which will open in late 2021. It felt a safe area to be, all quite middle-class and content, but I was surprised to see just how tightly the developers have packed the houses in.

    Public transport to Queen’s Hills isn’t ideal, there’s no train or light rail (the council didn’t seem bothered about this when they gave permission for thousands of homes to be built), and the bus stops have an absence of any information. I mentioned the Wensum Link above, the county council seem almost bemused as to why there is so much traffic in areas like this, it’s almost a mystery given that there’s limited public transport…. Anyway, I won’t grumble….

    A rather sweet little shed, which I think was a book swap location, with the house behind it having an artistic display in their windows.

    These four photos are from where cars have splashed water up against the hedge, creating a rather impressive little ice display. I was quite transfixed by the whole thing, although I’m easily pleased to be honest….

    [The River Tud, which is a future expedition for Nathan and me…..]

    Writing later on, this wasn’t the Tud (which is an off-shoot of the Wensum), this is the River Wensum…..

    Unfortunately, the bridge at the entrance to Taverham isn’t listed, so I can’t find out much about it. There’s an access point for firemen to attach hoses to the river though jutting out.

    And another view from the bridge, all rather scenic.

    Entering Taverham we thought we’d better get some lunch, and the chip shop here was well reviewed and it seemed only appropriate to pop in. I took this photo after eating chips, which might be noticeable from the smears on my phone’s camera……

    Friendly service, no facility to accept cards (my perennial complaint) and the prices marginally above average. All fine, nothing exceptional, but perfectly good value for money so nothing to complain about with the food. Liam had to wait for more chips to be prepared for his order, and I think the staff member seemed confused when I said to leave them unwrapped (most people don’t want to walk along an icy road in the cold eating chips perhaps) and I then realised he forgot to add the salt and vinegar.

    The Post Office looks like it does lovely fish and chips…..

    And our fifth and final location in Taverham.

    After some surprisingly slippery roads in Taverham, we decided to get back to Norwich by walking down the Marriott’s Way, the former railway line. Not very original perhaps, but it’s an easy walk back into the city.

    A bridge over the River Wensum, I’m not sure what that unsuitable surface on the bridge is.

    There’s still a lot of flooding in the fields nearby to Marriott’s Way.

    A variety of faces on some trees.

    All rather peaceful….

    This is Dragon Bridge on Marriott’s Way,  and there’s a story about a little train incident that happened here which is best told at Marriott’s Way web-site.

    And the end of the walk, with Gas Hill (Mountain) being closed off to traffic, a common occurrence in the mountain tops of Norfolk.

    So, the end result was that neither of us fell over on the ice, which was a major achievement in itself. The temperature was moderately warm, which was helpful, and it was useful to get some walking distance in for the LDWA 100. There were some areas of the city that I hadn’t seen before, mainly around Queen’s Hill and Taverham, so it was useful to see something new.

    As for the whole concept of these five random locations….. I still really like it, as the element of the random forces some exploration in areas that I might not think about ever visiting and it is quite handy at ensuring I can visit new chip shops in the Norwich area….

  • GeoGuessr (Norwich Version) – Walk 3

    GeoGuessr (Norwich Version) – Walk 3

    I already have a better explanation (well, longer explanation anyway) for this plan. In essence, whilst lockdown is on, I need to find ways of walking nearby to Norwich in quiet areas for my LDWA 100 training. So, I’m using GeoGuessr to pick out five random locations within a certain area which I’ve defined and then walking to them, to see what kind of story I can uncover.

    The five locations, which were conveniently all relatively central, meaning that walk wasn’t too long. Which was handy as I have an inability to walk on anything vaguely icy without sliding over and there was no shortage of ice in the city centre.

    As can be seen, the five locations didn’t make for a long walk, so trying to make this sound like an adventure is going to be quite challenging….. It’s more of a plod around Norwich, but I shall do my best….

    Two wooden sculptures in Old Library Wood, an area of the city much improved now that a community project has been set up to improve the park. It’s been really successful and it’s a much more pleasant area to walk through now than it was.

    And, after about three minutes of walking, here’s the first location, which is outside Norwich railway station. Just for those interested, Norwich railway station still doesn’t have a Greggs, whilst Ipswich does. I don’t get much involved with rivalry between cities/towns, but, as Viz would say, sort it out Norwich…..

    Norwich Railway Station was formerly known as Norwich Thorpe Station, when the city was fortunate to have three railway stations, the others being Norwich Victoria (opened in 1849) and Norwich City (opened in 1882). Norwich Thorpe opened in 1844, but the current building dates from 1886, both of which are visible in the above map from 1884. The top building of the two is the one that was being constructed when the map was produced, the one below it is the original and this has now been demolished.

    And our second location wasn’t much of a walk, located next to Norwich City Football Stadium at Carrow Road. Note the icy pavement and the road which was entirely free from ice. I take the radical view that if the council can’t clear the pavements, then pedestrians should just walk on the road instead. However, car drivers don’t much like this approach if I’m being honest.

    Crossing the River Wensum on the Julian Bridge, named after St. Julian’s Church and Lady Julian.

    The still closed Queen of Iceni pub and I’ll be glad when this, and other licensed premises, can re-open…..

    Who says Norwich isn’t hilly? Down the steps is the war memorial commemorating those who workers from Bullards Brewery, Morgans Brewery, Steward & Patteson and Youngs, Crawshaw & Youngs who lost their lives fighting for their country. There’s more about this at https://www.warmemorialsonline.org.uk/memorial/197721/.

    Our third location isn’t accessible at the moment as there’s work underway at Norwich Castle, so the area in front of the building has been closed off. They’re spending £13.5 million on the castle’s renovation and this will restore it to something more like its twelfth century appearance.

    As as aside, being slightly controversial (again, although perhaps grumbly is another word more appropriate here), I fear that this will lead to further price increases, which had already hit near enough £10, with surcharges made for visiting certain parts of the building. Although those who are so inclined to visit museums seem broadly pleased when they visit, I’ve heard too many people over the years refuse to go or to take their children on the grounds that it’s too expensive. Anyway, enough grumbling for now.

    Crossing the city centre we walked by Norwich City Hall, completed in 1938 and unfortunately destroying tens of interesting buildings which were on the site.

    St. Giles on the Hill Church and I mention its full name as a reminder of just how many hills there are in this city.

    The Roman Catholic Cathedral, built from the 1880s on the site of the former Norwich City Gaol. I won’t linger on the details of this building for long, it has appeared on a few of my walks recently…..

    Fortunately, the locations on our route meant that we went past the chip shop on Stafford Street, handily called The Chip Shop. As another slightly grumbly comment, although I’m pleased to note that the number of chip shops refusing to take cards is falling (albeit slowly), this one remains steadfast in their opposition to customer convenience and only takes cash.

    The arrival of my chips……

    The portion of chips here looks very small, but that was a combination of how they were wrapped and how closely I was holding them. The portion size was though generous and the battered sausage was a rather lovely complement to them. They came to £3 each, which is a bit above the average for Norwich, although hardly excessive given the quality.

    Our fourth location was Northumberland Street, a road which hasn’t changed a great deal over the last century in terms of the buildings. I don’t know the background for this street’s name, so I’m going to make up the best reason that I can. One of the biggest influences on building in the city in the nineteenth century was the Unthank family, which many Norwich residents will recognise due to Unthank Road. This family was from Northumberland, and their ancestral of Unthank Hall is still there. There might not be any link at all, but this is the best reason that I can think of, so that’s what I’m going with until gives me a better explanation.

    Our fifth location. This was handily in the area of St. Martin’s, meaning I ‘treated’ Nathan to a mini history walk around the area of the Tabernacle.

    This wasn’t a particularly long walk, slowed down only by my carefully walking in areas of ice (Nathan made some reference to Bambi which I ignored), which makes it hard to make a fascinating story of this little adventure. But, to be fair, there were chips involved in proceedings and that made it all worthwhile. Given the ice situation though, it was perhaps fortunate that this wasn’t an overly long expedition.

  • Norwich – Rosary Cemetery (Alfred Edward Hubbard)

    Norwich – Rosary Cemetery (Alfred Edward Hubbard)

    Alfred Edward Hubbard was born on 22 June 1889 and was baptised on 16 July 1889 at St. Peter Parmentergate in Norwich. He was the son of George Hubbard, who worked as a telegraph clerk, and Bertha Hubbard. The family lived on Synagogue Street, a street off Mountergate sadly now lost, although George Plunkett has a photo of how it looked.

    Alfred was one of a large family, at the 1891 census he had older brothers Frank, Charles and Harry, along with older sisters Alice and Bertha. Tragedy hit the family in the 1890s with the death of George Hubbard, meaning that Bertha was left alone to support her family. A later census noted that she had six children and they were all still alive, which wasn’t all that common, often children died young.

    At the 1901 census, Bertha ran a lodging house at 88 Chapelfield Road, living with her children Frank (working as a carpenter), Alice, Bertha (a pupil teacher), Henry (a clerk) and Alfred. By the time of the 1911 census, the family had moved to 73 St George’s Street, including Bertha and her children Frank (working as a carpenter), Alice, Bertha Constance (a teacher employed by Norwich City Council), Harry (a brewer’s clerk) and Alfred (now working as a teacher employed by Norfolk County Council).

    In early 1915, Alfred married May Mann and they lived on Yarmouth Road in Caister-on-Sea. He joined the Norfolk Regiment, service number 15653.

    Unfortunately, Hubbard’s war records are amongst those which were destroyed in an air raid during the Second World War, but he was in the 7th Battalion, which was formed of volunteers, also known as Kitchener’s Army. Alfred was injured in Hulluch, in northern France, in October 1915. The regimental records written in the field survive, although Hubbard isn’t specifically mentioned, but the above image is from that battalion in the Hulluch area from earlier in October 1915, showing the scale of the losses.

    Copyright Imperial War Museum (45786).

    This image is posted on Wikipedia, showing the state of the area between Loos and Hulluch in 1917. The British trenches are on the left, the German trenches on the right, with a now heavily damaged road going through them.

    Alfred died on 19 December 1919, at the age of 30, likely because of the injuries occurred during the First World War. The inscription on his gravestone reads “having fought a good fight in life and war, rest on”. There aren’t that many burials of the war dead at the Rosary Cemetery in Norwich, they’re mostly at Earlham Cemetery, so this stood out amongst the nearby graves. The uniformity of war graves ensures their visibility in a graveyard, and is a reminder that in death everyone was equal regardless of rank.

    It’s hard to imagine what Alfred’s brothers and sisters must have thought when standing at his graveside in late December 1919, it’s a far cry from the time of the 1911 census when they were all embarking on their new careers. And Alfred’s new career as a teacher was cut short, fighting a battle in a country to which he might never have otherwise visited.