More... history

Mid-16th to Mid-18th Century

The Manorial System served both as the foundation of land ownership and management and of maintaining the peace and good order of each local community. It had its origins in  Early Medieval times (what was formerly known as the Anglo-Saxon period) and was further shaped and developed following the Norman Conquest – which is now taken as being the start of the Late Medieval era.

The one thing missing from F.A. Crisp’s printed versions of the Lowestoft Parish Registers (1902) is any reference to the baptisms or burials of any infants born out of wedlock. Yet, such entries are there from the very first year of the first surviving register book: 1561. The best guess as to why this is so is probably to be found in attitudes of the time regarding illegitimacy being widely seen as a social disgrace, together with the more practical matter of who was to be responsible for the raising of the child – if it survived.

Coastal erosion (South beach, Lowestoft) 1906-2023 approx 200m!   Measuring from the current cliff-top edge to the east of All Saints Church (as was) to the low-water mark on a OS 25-inch map, revised in 1903 and published in 1905.   The lines in red are the old roads and buildings. 

See also Dave Burt FB

by Susan Steward and Harry Grainger

When Elizabeth I acceded to the English throne in November 1558, she had a number of problems facing her – not the least of which was the matter of what the country’s official brand of the Christian Faith was to be and what form it was to take.

Among the many interesting features to emerge from close study of the 507 wills and 100 probate inventories which have survived for the period indicated in the title are the rates of literacy able to be determined in the various occupational groups which formed the town’s socio-economic structure. Even today, there would probably be argument (or at least discussion) among specialists in the field as to what literacy means. The same holds true for historians.

Annot’s Free Grammar School

The single most important event in the process of public education in Lowestoft during the early modern period came in June 1570, when Thomas Annot (merchant) founded a free grammar school. A summary of the original deed of gift is to be found in the Rev. John Arrow’s Memorandum Book (he was Lowestoft’s parish priest, 1760-89) – Norfolk Record Office - PD 589/92, pp. 13-14. And it is also present in Edmund Gillingwater’s An Historical Account of the Ancient Town of Lowestoft (1790), p. 299.

The largest administrative task by far to demand both the attention and the time of the parochial authorities in Lowestoft during the Early Modern period was relief of the poor – a weighty responsibility placed upon English parishes by the formative Poor Law Act of 1601. And the fortunate survival of Overseers of the Poor account books for the period 1656-1712 (Suffolk Archives, Ipswich - 01/13/1/1&2) reveals much about the implementation of this legislation.

The Novel David Copperfield is well known for its central figure’s connection with Blundeston, Great Yarmouth and the Peggotty family – but, scarcely known at all for David’s brief acquaintance with the town of Lowestoft, as revealed in Chapter 2 of the novel.

A good deal has been written about the scores over the years - not all of it accurate. What follows here is an account of these footways, working from north to south, and looking at them in both a topographical and historical context. The main sources used for the study are a Manor Roll of 1618 (which gives a complete account of landholding in the parish, together with location and tenancy stated) and a series of Manor Court minute books dating from 1582-85 and 1616-1756.

George Glover (1812–1890) was a British architect who made significant contributions to the architectural landscape of Lowestoft. Born in York, he was the brother-in-law of Joseph Aloysius Hansom, the inventor of the Hansom cab. Glover’s early career included working for Norwich architect John Brown. 

ACHIEVEMENTS: Ensured that vital wartime communications remained operational. Dorothy Ann Daphne Dallimer, born on December 1, 1889, in Lowestoft, was awarded the British Empire Medal (BEM) during World War II. As an Assistant Supervisor, Class II, at the Lowestoft Post Office, she displayed remarkable bravery and unwavering dedication by ensuring efficient telephone services despite the perilous air raids of 1941. Her courageous actions ensured that vital communications remained operational during these critical times.   

Centuries of Ongoing Change

Denmark Road, Flensburgh Street and Tonning Street: three closely connected roads near the shopping-centre and railway station of the Suffolk coastal town of Lowestoft (the UK’s most easterly community). What possible connection can there be between this trio, the most southerly located of the Scandinavian countries and two towns in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein?

A fitting tribute to Henry Browne, Clifford Brewster, and the other Lowestoft men who lost their lives serving with tank units in both world wars.

The first almshouses in Lowestoft were provided by John Manyngham, the parish vicar from 1457-78. The exact year of institution is not known, but they were located on the north side of Fair Lane (now Dove Street) near its junction with West Lane (now Jubilee Way). And they seem to have remained in operation, in some form – undoubtedly with alterations made – into the final quarter of the 19th century, when White’s Directory of Suffolk (1874), p.

For centuries, the use of alms boxes in parish churches throughout the whole of England was a means of collecting sums of money for charitable purposes – particularly the relief of poverty where it was known or seen to exist. During the 16th century, as a result of general cost inflation (aggravated by Henry VIII’s mindless extravagance and debasement of the coinage, to say nothing of the social and economic problems caused by the Dissolution of the Monasteries), the alleviation of financial distress in the lower levels of society became more and more of a challenge.

.. but definitely nerdy lol

It would be great when providing an online primary source if you could link directly to the relevant phrase/sentence within a long external page. Well it seems you CAN!

Syntax

[URL]#:~:text=[RELEVANT%20PHRASE]

So instead of 

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/25852/25852-h/25852-h.htm  > then telling people to scroll down 300 paragraphs and you will find relevant section. You can do this…

(Parish Register Entries)

The register entries below are presented in as close a way as possible to the original handwritten ones

Nos. 5 -25 High Street

Nos. 26-33 are part of an overall sequence of town properties (1-271, in all) showing their transfer, as recorded in the manor court minute books.

They relate specifically to what once occupied the land later taken up by Nos. 5-25 High Street.

Extracted in this form from The Town of Lowestoft c. 1720-25: People and Property in a Pre-Industrial Coastal Community (Lowestoft Heritage Workshop Centre, 2019).

(North of Mariners Street)

• Moving from North to South.
• Occupying former agricultural land and of freehold tenure.
• All properties fronting the High Street.

East end of the North Field  

1. John Burgis - house, garden & adjoining arable enclosure (seven-eighths of an acre).

2. Agnes Eastgate - two houses & adjoining garden (half-acre).

Church Way interposing (now St. Margaret’s Road)

3. Thomas Bury - house, curtilage & garden (one acre).

1867 A completely new Lowestoft Low Light, made of wrought iron. It was designed to be moveable.

So-called “Ship Money” had its roots in Late Medieval times, when coastal towns and counties in England were periodically called upon to supply vessels to the Crown for use in naval warfare during times of conflict – mainly with the French. After having suspended Parliament in 1629, following a series of disputes, and not reconvening it again until 1640, Charles I had to find ways of creating revenue other than the rents yielded by the Royal Estate.

The Town of Lowestoft c. 1720

This map was created by Ivan Bunn (former archival assistant at the North Suffolk Record Office, Lowestoft) and the writer, working in collaboration and using manorial documentation as the primary source. See end of text for numbered locations, which are also referred to in the narrative.  

In 1662, an Act of Settlement for the Better Relief of the Poor was passed by Parliament – a measure soon to become known as the Act of Settlement and Removal, as it aimed at restricting the movement of people from the parishes where they were living in a state of poverty into ones (nearby or further removed) where they believed that they would be better off.

It is hard to make sense of the lost buildings at the top of High Street when all that is left is a long stretch of grass. So we started with an 1893 map that had TWO buildings that are STILL here today Arnold House (4) and The Flint House (now called The Royal Falcon (26)). 

Hearth Tax, as a means of raising money for The Crown, was introduced into England following the Restoration of the Monarchy under Charles II in 1660. It functioned on the principle of being a wealth tax, in that the number of fire-places in a house was taken as indicating the affluence of the occupant. The greater the number of rooms heated, the richer that householder was assumed to be – either as owner or renter.

This is an exhibition of a printed monthly community newspaper, which was produced for more than eleven years in various back rooms, first issued in 1973. Some front covers are on display, but more importantly, you can browse original copies. Soon there will be a book, reflecting on its history and its relevance for today.

novel published, Silver Harvest, which is based on Lowestoft's history 1826-1956. The launch is at Waterstone's, Lowestoft, on Thursday, 5th September, 6.30 for 7.00

Authorisation for this Elizabethan taxation was granted by Parliament on 18 December 1566 and the official date of collection was 24 February 1568. Lowestoft’s stated contribution of £34 19s 8d was 47% of the Lothingland total of £74 8s 6d and its 112 tax-payers constituted 42% of the half-hundred’s contributors (267 in number). These figures confirm the town’s dominant position in its local area, just as those of the 1524-5 collection did over forty years earlier. The 1568 Subsidy was structured differently from its predecessor in the way that the assessment was made.

The Lay Subsidy of 1524-5 (1) see also (2)

This national taxation measure was approved by Parliament in 1523, to raise money for war to be waged with France and Scotland (who else!), and with a hoped for total of £800,000 as its aim. As with previous countrywide levies, it was based on the value of lands held and rented out (where this was the major source of income), on movable goods (where these served the same purpose) and on wages for men of labouring or servant status.

Comparisons of Lowestoft with other Suffolk communities

Suffolk’s Top 25 Townships (1524-5 Lay Subsidy) (2)  see also (1)

Order by wealth

The national tax levied in 1327 to raise revenue for the Crown came at a troubled time for the country, for this was the year in which Edward II was deposed by his wife, Isabella, and her lover, Roger Mortimer, Earl of March – ostensibly, in favour of the future Edward III, who was a fourteen-year-old minor. It was also a time of conflict with Scotland, with an army from north of the border making an incursion into England and engaging with English forces near Stanhope, in County Durham.

A paper written in advance of the creation of the High Street HAZ in 2019 

When Henry III died in November 1272, his son and successor Edward (thirty-three years old) was in Sicily, on the way home from fighting in the Seventh – and last – Crusade. A hardened warrior of many years experience, it wasn’t until the year 1274 that he finally reached England to take up his throne, with the coronation being held in Westminster Abbey on 19 August. He went on to subjugate Wales, invade Scotland (becoming known as “the Hammer of the Scots”) and generally impose his presence on all around him – his impressive height of 6’ 2” gaining him the nickname of “Longshanks”.

The High Street area of the modern town is a fine, surviving example of late medieval urban planning, resulting from relocation of the community (between c. 1300-1350) from its original site less than a mile west-south-west of the present one, somewhere in the large municipal cemetery between Normanston Drive and Rotterdam Road. The reasons for the move resulted from a combination of factors.

Produced to assist with the building’s regeneration and future uses

1. The Lowestoft community relocated itself (onto what is now the High Street area of a much expanded town) from what was probably its original location about a mile to the south-west, in an area now occupied by a large municipal cemetery between Normanston Drive and Rotterdam Road.

• A large, filled-in trench is visible on the North Denes, a little to the east of the net-drying spars. Its presence is indicated by a slight depression in the ground and by the vegetation growing along its length. The latter is much lusher and of a different type from what is to be found on The Denes generally, showing that the trench’s infill is of a different type from the soil around it.
• The dimensions of this feature were originally eighty to ninety paces in length, on a north-south alignment, and c.

The Historic England schedule of Listed buildings for Lowestoft (inc. Kirkley, Pakefield. Oulton Broad, Oulton Village & Gunton)

All Grade II unless otherwise indicated

1. Ormiston Denes Academy (original building), Yarmouth Road.

2. Hillingdon, 24 Gunton Cliff.

3. Park Mansions, 3 & 4 North Parade. 

4. Wedgewood Court, 1 & 2 North Parade.

5. Ravine Bridge.

6. Belle Vue Park.

7. Patrol Service memorial (Belle Vue Park).

Plans are afoot to try and sensitively recreate this 100 year old wall advert. It will reflect and celebrate the restoration and revitalisation going on currently throughout Lowestoft but particularly on the historic High Street. 

 The property owner is supportive of the project so work is now underway to raise the £8,000 the project will require. 

 Any info about 'Football Tea' gratefully received, especially if it's historical evidence.

Lowestoft Rental (1545) – Suffolk Archives, Ipswich 194/A10/71

(Formerly North Suffolk Record Office, Lowestoft) 

A Lowestoft rental renewed there on the first day of June, in the thirty-seventh year of the reign of our Lord King Henry VIII, by the grace of God King of England, France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith in the said land(s) and Supreme Head of the Church of England and Ireland – relating to the annual rents of the town of Lowestoft, Shadingfield, Ellough and Willingham. [Translated from Latin]

Two elderly Lowestoft women, Rose Cullender and Amy Denny, were tried for witchcraft at Bury St Edmunds Assizes, having been accused by their neighbours. Found guilty, they were sentenced to death by judge Sir Matthew Hale and hanged at Bury St. Edmunds on March 17th.

The Black Death arrived in Lowestoft devastating the population.The national accepted average for deaths in England is somewhere around 60%. Info on Lowestoft is very limited. 

Many readers will know know something of London’s so-called “Great Plague”, which began in May 1665 and stretched into January 1666, and in which an estimated 100,000 people may have died out of a population of 350,000-400,000. A total of 68,596 burials  is accounted for in parish records, but so intense was the rate of death from July to September that many people’s burials went unrecorded.

CREDIT: Ivan Bunn and David Butcher

Origins

This article is in its original form, with minor alterations. It was published (with editorial adjustments and changes) in English Ceramic Circle Transactions, vol. 21 (2010), forming pp. 49-74 of that journal.

Special thanks to PlantGrow for generously supporting this transformation