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FORDHAM:
Geographical and Historical information from the year 1835.

[Transcribed information from A Topographical Dictionary of England - Samuel Lewis - 1835] (unless otherwise stated)

"FORDHAM, a parish in the hundred of STAPLOE, county of CAMBRIDGE, 5 miles (N.) from Newmarket, containing 1042 inhabitants. The living is a discharged vicarage, in the archdeaconry of Sudbury, and diocese of Norwich, rated in the king's books at £13: 6. 8., and in the patronage of the Master and Fellows of Jesus College, Cambridge. The church is dedicated to St. Mary. The Independents have a place of worship here. There are six almshouses for poor widows,.erected by Thomas Hinson, in 1626. A small Gilbertine priory was founded in the reign of Henry III., by Sir Robert de Fordham, as a cell to the great monastery of the same order at Sempringham in Lincolnshire, scarcely a vestige of which remains. James I., when coursing-in this parish, took refreshment at a place still called "the King's Path," and killed a hare near the spot; this circumstance being commemorated upon a beam still preserved in the church, by a carved representation 01 two greyhounds pursuing a hare. ."