Hide

Norfolk Hundreds

hide
Hide

White's History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Norfolk 1845

NORTH GREENHOE HUNDRED

Is of an irregular oblong figure, extending nine miles in length along the sea-coast, and averaging seven miles in breadth from north to south, -- being bounded on the east by Holt Hundred; on the south by Gallow; and on the west by Brothercross.

The soil is generally light, but well cultivated, and the face of the country is beautifully diversified, and seen to great advantage from Great Snoring church, where the prospect to the north is highly picturesque, and is terminated by the ocean. A substratum of fine marl is found in almost every part of it, and the whole district abounds in all sorts of game.

It is watered by the river which flows through a fertile vale from Snoring to the ocean, near Stiffkey. Its name is supposed to be a corruption of Green-hill, - the Hundred court being anciently held on such an eminence. The royalties of the whole Hundred, with the lordship of Wighton, were possessed by the Crown in the reigns of Edward the Confessor, and William the Conqueror, but were subsequently granted in fee to various families, though a court of the Queen's Duchy of Lancaster is still held at Wighton.

Petty Sessions are held at Little Walsingham, on the first Monday of every month; and at Wells on the nearest middle Monday of every month. The magistrates' clerk is Mr. Thos. Garwood, of Wells. Little Walsingham has also Quarter Sessions.

The whole Hundred, except Cockthorpe and Field-Dalling, is in the Deanery of Walsingham, and comprises sixteen parishes, of which the following is an enumeration, shewing their population in 1841, the annual value of their land and buildings, as assessed to the County Rate in 1843, and their territorial extent, in assessable acres:--

PARISHES. Pop. Annl.
Value
£.
Acres.
Barney 276 1,668 1,174
Binham 502 3,282 2,241
Cockthorpe 42 684 500
Egmere 54 1,370 1,140
Field-Dalling 403 2,262 1,582
Hindringham 721 5,616 3,314
Holkham 731 3,622 3,652
Houghton-in-Dale }
Quarles (extra Par.) }
242
22
1,294
684
946
* Snoring (Great) 556 2,540 1,585
Stiffkey 487 2,676 2,235
Thursford 347 1,604 1,222
Walsingham (Great) 426 3,002 2,367
Walsingham (Little) 1,155 2,532 952
Warham All Saints, }
and St. Mary }
337
75
2,400 3,185
* Wells-next-the-Sea 3,504 7,708 1,505
Wighton 559 3,604 2,883



TOTAL 10,439 46,548 30,483

[There is more information about individual parishes]

All are in Briningham Police Division.

* Great Snoring included 81 persons in the Union Workhouse; Little Walsingham, 50 in the House of Correction; and Wells, 49 in Vessels. From Hindringham, 63 persons had emigrated to Canada since 1831.

The Annual Value of the Hundred, as assessed to the Property Tax, was £37,102 in 1815; and £45,413 in 1842.

WALSINGHAM UNION comprises all the 16 parishes in North Greenhoe Hundred; 24 parishes in Gallow Hundred, (see page 647; [this is in Gallow Hundred description]) and 10 parishes in Holt Hundred, which see. These 50 parishes extend over an area of 121 square miles, or 72,493 acres; and had in 1841, 20,960 inhabitants, of whom 10,121 were males, and 10,839 females.

Their average annual expenditure from 1832 to 1835, was £21,497; but since the formation of the Union, it has been reduced to about half that sum. The UNION WORKHOUSE is at Great Snoring, and was finished in 1838, at the cost of £5,903. It has room for 300 inmates; but had only 81 in July 1841, and 169 in January, 1845.

Mr. John Overton, of Fakenham, is Union Clerk and Supt. Registrar; and Mr. Robt. Platten is master of the Workhouse. The relieving officers are - Mr. Henry Scales, of Fakenham; and Mr. Thos. Webb, of Wells. The Rev. R. Leeder is chaplain. Seven surgeons are employed by the Union, and among them the three following are Registrars of Births and Deaths, viz:- Mr. G. Damant, for Fakenham District; Mr. C. Adcock, for Walsingham District; and Mr. J. Young, for Wells District.


Notes

Some placenames in the transcription (of pages 668 to 669) above are given below together with their standard spelling :-
Houghton-in-Dale/Houghton St Giles, Snoring (Great)/Great Snoring, Walsingham (Great)/Great Walsingham, Walsingham (Little)/Little Walsingham, (Warham) St. Mary/Warham St. Mary

Quarles has "extra Par." after it which means Extra Parochial.


For more information see :-

These pages are for personal use only. They may not be copied, and the links within them may not be harvested for use on your own web pages. Please see the Copyright Notice.

Copyright © Mike Bristow.
April 2006