Norfolk: Houghton St Giles

William White's History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Norfolk 1883

[Transcription copyright © Pat Newby]

HOUGHTON-IN-THE-DALE, or Houghton St. Giles, is a parish and small village, one mile S.S.W. of Walsingham, and 4 miles N.N.E. of Fakenham, in Walsingham union, Fakenham county court district, Norwich bankruptcy district, North Greenhoe hundred and petty sessional division, Massingham polling district of West Norfolk, Walsingham rural deanery, and Norwich archdeaconry. It had 165 inhabitants in 1881, living on 978 acres, and has a rateable value of £1768. Henry James Lee Warner, Esq., is lord of the manor and owner of the soil.

The CHURCH (St. Giles) was pulled down and rebuilt from the foundations on exactly the old lines in 1879. It comprises nave, south porch, chancel, and low square tower with three bells. There is a plain sedilia and piscina. The old open seats were carefully preserved, and new ones of the same character added. On the lower panels of the ancient screen are figures of six male and six female saints, richly painted and gilt, and in a wonderful state of preservation.

Henry James Lee Warner, Esq., is impropriator of the great tithes, and patron of the vicarage, which was valued in the King's Book at £8, and is now worth about £150 a year, having been augmented in 1755 and 1787 with £400 of Queen Anne's Bounty, invested in land at Fulmodeston. The Rev. G.R. Woodward, of Little Walsingham, is the incumbent, and has here 4A. 3R. 12P. of old glebe, and a good Elizabethan residence, built in 1862 at a cost of £900, and now occupied by the curate.

The children attend the United District Board School at East Barsham. (See East Barsham).

On the west side of the dale is a beautiful little chapel, now used as a barn, but still in tolerable preservation. It was probably built about 1380, and is an elegant specimen of the transition from the Decorated to the Perpendicular style. The rent of 3A. of land, allotted at the enclosure, is applied in repairing the highways, except the distribution of two loads of coal amongst the poor.

WALL LETTER BOX cleared at 5.35 p.m. week days, and on Sundays at 9 a.m., viâ Walsingham, which is the nearest Money Order Office.

         Butler  Mark Barratt  farmer
         Clarke  Charles       blacksmith
         Crafer  William       farmer
         Elwin   Rev. E.F.     curate-in-charge
         Gould   William       vict. Buck
         Hunt    William       parish clerk
 

See also the Houghton St Giles parish page.

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Copyright © Pat Newby.
October 2008