A Visit to St Firmin's, Thurlby

On the penultimate Saturday of November, before the temperature finally dipped to that closer to winter, I visited St Firmin’s church in Thurlby. Many churches in the fenland area are, understandably, eighteenth or nineteenth century, so it was a treat to find a substantial church with origins in the 10^th century and lots of evidence of expansion over the years. 

The church clings to the lowest part of the village, the rest of it sitting on the higher ground up the hill to the west. The church and a few houses are cut off from the rest by what is now the busy A15, but was historically King Street, a Roman road leading to Lincoln.

What delighted me most about the church was its liminal location on the very point where the snooker-table-flat fens rise up to higher ground. I had checked maps and a satellite image of the church before I arrived, and knew that Car Dyke, the local Roman canal was next to the church, but I was very pleased to see it played a part in the boundary of the church grounds.

Car Dyke is said to follow the Iron Age shoreline (there is an old book featuring a wonderful map that I last saw in a Stamford bookshop that illustrates this point perfectly, but I cannot find it – the search will continue) and there has been much discussion, therefore, about whether the dyke was built as a canal or as a drainage dyke. Frankly, it is impossible to build such a feature and for it not to act as a drainage feature and likewise to create a feature and not expect people to use it for transport. There are some signs that the dyke has been used for transport and it links up well with roads and paths that still exist in the landscape. I look forward to Rex Sly’s upcoming book on Car Dyke to read what he has made of it.

You would expect the church to be on the western ‘dry’ side of Car Dyke, but it is on the ‘wet’ eastern side instead. There are several things to remember here: firstly, Car Dyke is largely straight and the boundary between fen edge and high ground is not; the church was built hundreds of years after Car Dyke and the shoreline was not close at that point; it is possible that people were living or ploughing all the other available land and it made sense to use land that was available. We cannot rule out the fact that earlier religious features were there first (as is presumed at Maxey church) and this was a continuation of that. It’s worth pointing out that St John’s Church Peterborough/Medeshamstede was originally built on the boggy fen edge with less success and it had to be moved at the start of the 15^th century because it was often inaccessible in the winter.

                                                            

The church is lovely and there is an adjoining car park, which makes visiting easy, so I recommend you do. I didn’t get the chance to go in to the church, but I was more than satisfied with the features outside. The porch features two large coffin lids which are complemented by others used in the wall by the entrance gate to the graveyard. I am certainly no expert on architectural features, but there are a number of interesting faces and features on the walls to observe; you might want to take binoculars or a decent camera to see them. If you’re very observant, you’ll spot the faded datestone in the wall at the north-eastern end of the church by the curious feature that looks like a bowed stand for a statue. If anyone knows what it is, then do let me know!

                                                    

The graveyard is really well kept and there are some unusual and noteworthy gravestones. See if you can spot the panther family as you start to walk around, or some of the common local names such as Lenton.

                                        

The southern side of the church has a feast of different windows as if a foreman has gathered every window shape they could find in a workshop and forced them all into the part of the church they were asked to build. There is little logic to them from the outside, so I am hoping that a visit inside the church will explain the existence of such oddly placed windows.

Walking to the edge of the churchyard really gives you a sense of the churches place in the landscape, and how it was been extended into the flatter land as it has become necessary. You can also get a greater sense of how the land rises up at Car Dyke and then continues up the hill.

Should you still be curious about Car Dyke, you can follow the path that runs along it either north to Bourne or south to Kate’s Bridge. There appear to be some interesting mounds to the south, so I intend to return to see what they are. On this day I headed north and followed the footpath over the culverted dyke – it’s always nice when modern features respect the old boundary lines. The path is short and takes a quick turn over the released dyke, over which is a tiny bridge with what appear to be old footings. After crossing a (very high) style you find yourself in a field and you can follow the path across it to continue to walk along Car Dyke all the way to Bourne, should you wish. On that route you’ll pass the old manor house and The Grange, which has clear examples of ridge and furrow in the fields close to the A15.

                                                  

                                                Old coffin lids used in the graveyard wall

St Firmin's is a little oasis and a delightful site to visit if you want to blend Roman history with medieval and more recent history. It’s also delightful to stand at the edge of the graveyard, knowing it was once the Iron Age coast and that as you look northeast there is nothing but flat land (and Spalding) between you and The Wash.

All images belong to the author.

The Deeping Fen Waterspout

In my last blog I briefly mentioned the great bog that was Deeping Fen, so it felt important to explain a little more about it and highlight an unusual event.

Deeping Fen was, as Stukeley had observed, largely a bog and at times a lake. Even in more recent times, the central part of the area was commonly referred to as a lake and was mostly unusable land.

The Deeping fen area stretches from the rivers Glen to the north and Welland to the south, an area of vast flatness with no observable feature that was not manmade. Several towns and villages exist on the periphery of the fen with strong Anglo-Saxon roots, and Roman Car Dyke flirts with the western edge of the fen. There are also some excellent archaeological features from prehistory, so the land was never ‘just a swamp’.

Drainage began centuries ago, and the enormous hand-cut drains still dominate the landscape today. They remain vital in protecting the low-lying land from summer deluges and winter’s constant rains. Almost as vital as the deeply dug river channels of the Welland and Glen whose wide and enormously high banks have happily contained a vast quantity of water without incident for many years. However, in took centuries to drain the fen until it was suitably habitable.

It was thanks to this frequent dampness that Deeping Fen was the site of an unusual weather feature in 1752. The journal Fenland Notes and Queries carried an account from Reverend Benjamin Ray, the Perpetual Curate of Cowbit and Surfleet, who had seen a waterspout over Deeping Fen. Rev. Ray is described in Literary Anecdotes related to the Spalding Gentlemen’s Society as being ‘A most ingenious and worthy man, possessed of good learning, but ignorant of the world; indolent and thoughtless, and very often absent.’ Hardly a glowing report and perhaps not the most reliable reporter of a rare meteorological sighting. The report was as follows:

May 5^th 1752, a phenomenon appeared about 7 in the evening, in Deeping-Fen, which, from its effects, seemed to be a water-spout, broken from the clouds. A watery substance, as it seemed, was seen moving on the earth and water, in Deeping-Fen. It passed along with such violence and rapidity, that it carried every thing before it: such as grass, straw, and stubble; and in going over the country bank, it raised the dust to a great height; and when it arrived in the wash, in the midst of the water, and just over against where Mr R. lived, it stood still for some minutes. This watery substance spouted out water from its own surface to a considerable height, and with a terrible noise.

The waterspout continued to Cowbit and then headed towards Weston Hills and Moulton Chapel, destroying a field of turnips, and damaging two gates on its progress. Others were also seen on the same day, but none of them would have benefitted from the specific landscape credentials of Deeping Fen.

The journal Fenland Notes and Queries can be viewed online, as can Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century. Follow the links below.

https://archive.org/details/fenlandnotesque01sweegoog/page/n272/mode/2up

https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Literary_Anecdotes_Of_The_Eighteenth_Cen/-UxjAAAAcAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&printsec=frontcover

Image of a sheep on the high bank of the River Welland by the author
 

An Earthquake in Stamford in 1750

Much of the information I gain comes from the fantastic British Newspaper collection. Little notes can lead to large stories when cross-referenced with other collections, archive material, census information, books etc. Sometimes, it's just nice to find accounts of small events and share them for the fun of it.

Back on the 3rd October 1750 an earthquake was recorded in Stamford. This was obviously long before we have the sophisticated material that exists today and any earthquake can feel quite alarming, so how did they explain its strength?

Thankfully, there were people who had experienced two earlier earthquakes in London that were able to compare it with the Stamford earthquake. It was described as 'stronger than the first [London earthquake], but neither so violent, nor continued so long as the latter.' If this were a competition, I have a feeling that the Stamford earthquake would have managed a respectable 2nd place rosette. A reminder, if one were needed, that provincial towns should not compete with great cities like London on such matters!

Whilst researching, I came across a book that made me wonder if the town's well-known historian William Stukeley had witnessed the earthquake, for I discovered he had published a book called 'A Philosophy of Earthquakes, Natural and Religious'. The book, I discovered, pre-dated the earthquake, and Stukeley was living in London then, but additional information in the third edition printed in 1750 was just what I was looking for.

Stukeley still had many local friends and they corresponded with him on local earthquakes. The Stamford earthquake was claimed to have occurred on 30th September at '36 minutes after 12 o'clock at noon' and the description by Mr Alderman Taylor is vivid:

They were suddenly surprised with an uncommon noise in the air, like the rolling of large carriages in the streets, for about 20 seconds. At the same instant they felt a great shake, or snap, as he calls it; insomuch that it sensibly shook a punchbowl, which was in his parlour, and made it ring. He says it was perceiv'd of most of the people of Stamford, who generally ran out of their houses.

The description continues, stating that the earthquake was felt far and wide including Oakham and Peterborough. However this detail is part of a much larger book in which Stukeley attempts to use philosophy (science) and a little religion to try to understand what earthquakes are and how they're formed. One note regarding the centre of another earthquake being situated in Deeping Fen which was 'under water in the winter time; underneath 'tis a perfect bog' ruled out a theory that earthquakes came from subterranean fires.

I recommend taking a look at the book, which is free to access thanks to the Gutenberg Project, and diving into that great philosophical mind. He makes some interesting observations which need to be read in context to be really appreciated.

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/63322/63322-h/63322-h.htm

B. Country News, The Ipswich Journal, 13 October 1750, p.1.