GENUKI: Norfolk: Oxborough, Norfolk

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

OXBOROUGH, or Oxburgh, an ancient village, on the banks of a rivulet, 3 miles N.E. of Stoke-Ferry, and 6½ miles S.W. of Swaffham, is in Swaffham union and county court district, Lynn bankruptcy district, South Greenhoe petty sessional division and hundred, Swaffham polling district of West Norfolk, South Cranwich rural deanery, and Norfolk archdeaconry. It had 228 inhabitants in 1881, living on 2518 acres of land, and has a rateable value of £2830.

The soil is all the property of Sir Henry Geo. Paston-Bedingfeld, Bart., who resides at Oxburgh Hall, which is encompassed by a moat, 52 feet broad and 10 feet deep, and is one of the most perfect ancient castellated mansions in the kingdom. It was erected in the latter part of the fifteenth century by Sir Edmund Bedingfield [sic], who was knighted at the coronation of Richard III., in 1483, and had in the previous year obtained a patent from Edward IV. to hold a market with court of piepoudre, every Friday, and to build a manor-house, with towers, battlements, machicolations, &c. It is built of brick, and was originally of a square form, environing a court 118 feet long and 92 feet broad, round which the apartments were ranged.

It resembles Queen's College, Cambridge, and the entrance is over a bridge (formerly a drawbridge), through an arched gateway, between two majestic octagonal towers which are 80 feet high. In the western tower is a winding staircase, beautifully turned, and lighted by quatrefoil œilet holes. The other tower is divided into four storeys, each forming an octagonal room with arched ceilings, stone window frames, and stone fireplaces.

The archway between the towers is supported by numerous groins, and over it is a large and handsome room, 33 feet long by 20 feet broad, called the 'King's Room,' having one window to the north, and two bay-windows to the south; the floor is paved with small fine bricks, and the walls are covered with very curious tapestry, which exhibits several figures of princes, ladies, and gentlemen of the time of Henry VII., who is supposed to have lodged in this apartment when he visited Oxburgh. The tapestry, and the bed which is in the same room, are heirlooms, and descend with the hall. The coverlet and curtains of the bed are well worthy of attention, being formed of green velvet and gold thread, and covered with a variety of devices, the joint production of Mary Queen of Scots and the Countess of Shrewsbury. They bear the names of the Countess and her husband, and the initials of the plotting Queen, who, however, was never at Oxburgh; but her cousin, Queen Elizabeth, once visited the hall, and lodged in the apartment over the King's room.

The great banqueting room, which stood on the south side of the quadrangle, was taken down in 1778. It was 56 feet long and 29 feet wide, and had an arched roof of timber and two oriel windows. Some of the other apartments, which have been modernised, are now spacious and elegant, and contain a few good paintings by Vandyck, Holbein, Salvator Rosa, and other old masters. The outer walls of the hall stand in the broad and deep moat, which is well supplied with water from the adjacent rivulet, which falls into the navigable Wissey, about 1½ mile below the hall.

Oxburgh was a place of note in the time of the Romans, and from some coins found in Blomefield's time, he considered that it was the Iceani of Antoninus, by some supposed to be at Ickborough. To the north-west of the village, on Warren Hill, are a very deep fosse and vallum, and several tumuli; and near the rivulet are numerous hollows, still denominated Danes' Graves. Stone celts are frequently found here.

At the Domesday survey the manor was held by Thorkill, the Danish Earl of East Anglia, and was called Oxenburgh. It was given by the Conqueror to Radulphus de Limesio, his nephew, and afterwards passed to the Weylands. In 1285, Nicholas de Weyland received from Edward I. a patent for a weekly market here on Tuesday, and a fair yearly on the vigil, day and morrow of the Blessed Virgin; but the former has long been obsolete, and the latter is now held on Easter Tuesday, for the sale of toys, &c.

Sir Edmund Bedingfeld, Knight, of Bedingfeld in Suffolk, obtained the manor by marrying the heiress of the Tudenham and De Weyland families, in the time of Henry V., and his descendants have retained it ever since, except during the time of the Commonwealth. Sir Edmund was a firm adherent to the House of York, and Edward IV. allowed him to bear his own cognizance, the fetterlock.

Sir Henry Bedingfeld was made governor of the Tower of London during the reign of Queen Mary, and had the charge of her sister Elizabeth. The Sir Henry Bedingfeld, who died in 1655, was confined nearly two years in the Tower, and his estates sequestered, for his adherence to Charles I.; but they were restored to his successor, who was created a baronet in 1660, immediately after the restoration of Charles II. The present baronet was born in 1830, and succeeded his father, the sixth baronet, in 1862. He served in the Austrian cuirassiers, and his son and heir was born in 1860.

The parish CHURCH (St. John the Evangelist) is a large edifice, supposed to have been founded in the reign of Edward I., and comprising nave, aisles, north and south porches, chancel, vestry, and square tower. The latter contains five bells and a clock, and its octagonal spire, which rises to the height of 156 feet, was rebuilt in 1877, at a cost of £500, after having been struck by lightning. The roof is of oak, panelled; and in the south aisle is a chapel, built in 1573, by the Bedingfelds, to whom here are several beautiful monuments. The terra-cotta screen, which separates this chapel from the aisle, is a fine specimen of renaissance work. The church contains a good organ, and a handsome brass eagle lectern.

The discharged rectory, valued in the King's Book at £8 6s. 8d., and now at £661, with the vicarage of Foulden annexed, is in the patronage of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and incumbency of the Rev. Alexander Thurtell, M.A., who has a pleasant residence about a mile from the church. The Rev. Charles Parkin, the continuator of Blomefield's History of Norfolk, was presented to this rectory in 1717, and died about 1768. The tithes were commuted in 1845.

Near the hall is a neat Catholic chapel, in the Early English style. This chapel is fitted with open poppy-headed benches, and containing a good organ and an elegant carved wooden reredos. It was built in 1835 by the late Sir H.R.P. Bedingfeld, in memory of whom a white marble effigy carved in Italy and resting on a block of alabaster has been placed in a mortuary chapel here.

In connection with it is a school, attended by 50 children.

In the rectory grounds are the ivy-mantled ruins of the old parish CHURCH; the only parts now remaining are the north and east walls; the latter contains a portion of an Early English window, and in the former is exhibited part of a Norman pillar, the rest being hidden by modern brickwork. Near the ruins many human skeletons have been found.

Thomas Hewar, in 1619, left his estate here in trust, to apply one-third of the rents towards repairing and beautifying the church, and two-thirds for the relief of poor parishioners. This estate now consists of a farm of nearly 98 acres, worth about £100 a year, which is applied to the support of a school attended by 60 children, which, with the master's house adjoining, was built in 1849, out of the funds of this charity. Mary Hammond, otherwise Craske, in 1679, bequeathed for the poor a tenement and three acres of land, to which eight acres were added at the enclosure, and the whole is now worth £18 a year. Sir H. Bedingfeld pays, for distribution among the poor, £2 per annum, called Walk Money, and they have about £3 every year from Yorker's Charity. (See page 202 [which is the entry for Cockley Cley].) The parishioners have the right of cutting fuel on about 12 acres of fen land, in the parish of Caldecott.

POST OFFICE at Mrs. Matilda Stacy's. Letters arrive at 7.30 a.m., and are despatched at 5.30 p.m., viâ Brandon and Stoke-Ferry which is the nearest Money Order Office.

         Bedingfeld Sir Henry George     Oxborough Hall, & 45 Cromwell
                      Paston, Bart.        Houses, S. Kensington, London
         Bennett    George               farmer
         Bodley     Rev. William         Catholic priest, and chaplain to
                      Hamilton, M.A.       Sir H.G.P. Bedingfeld, Bart.
         Cobbin     Miss Louisa          grocer & draper
         Colver     Thomas               endowed schoolmaster
         Dickinson  William              estate bailiff to Sir H.G.P.
                                           Bedingfeld, Bart.
         Goring     George               vict. Bedingfeld Arms, and farmer
         Green      William Gates        farmer
         Lancaster  John                 farm bailiff to Mr William Carter
         Mitchell   John Benjamin        farmer
         Stacy      Mrs Matilda          postmistress
         Thurtell   Rev. Alexander, M.A. rector
         Trundle    William              blacksmith
         Vine       Robert               coal dealer
         Woods      Miss Lucy            Rom. Cath. schlmstrs

The nearest RAILWAY STATION is Stoke-Ferry

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Norfolk: Oxborough

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