Diss Family History Group

WINFARTHING is a parish and pleasant village, 5 miles north-west from Diss station on the Ipswich and Norwich section of the Great Eastern railway, in the Southern division of the county, Diss hundred, petty sessional division and county court district, Depwade union, rural deanery of Redenhall, archdeaconry of Norfolk and diocese of Norwich. The church of St. Mary the Virgin is an ancient building of flint, in the Perpendicular style, consisting of chancel, nave, south aisle and an embattled western tower containing 6 bells: in 1912 the tower and eastern gable of the nave were restored and the existing 5 bells recast to make 6: the interior is plain, with an oak roof: in 1889 a new organ was erected: there is an oak chest of the 16th century and an oak pulpit, provided in 1900: the church was partially restored in 1873 by the Rev. Ellice Keppel, rector I871-83, and in 1906 the south aisle rebuilt, some of the foundations underpinned and most of the interior refloored; the ancient steps to the rood loft were also opened out: there are 280 sittings: the rectory was rebuilt in 1888. The register dates from the year 1614. The living is a rectory, net yearly value £280, including 30 acres of glebe, with residence, in the gift of the Earl of Albemarle K. C. V. O., C. B., M. V. 0. and held since 1911 by the Rev. Arthur Edward Church M. A. of Cambridge University. There are Wesleyan and Primitive Methodist chapels. The fuel allotment of 40 acres produces £35 yearly. The Church and town estate is all copyhold and brings in about £50 yearly, and by a sealed order of the Charity Commissioners, dated 1898, half the money is to go to the rector and churchwarden for the use of the church and half of the remainder to be devoted to the general benefit of the parishioners, and is generally distributed in coals at Christmas. There is an old tradition here respecting a sword called “the Good Sword of Winfarthing,” said to have belonged to a thief who had taken sanctuary, and afterwards to have been preserved by the monks, who found it to possess such virtues that they placed it in a shrine, to which many superstitious folk from far and near came and offered gifts. The Lodge Farm is a portion of a deer park of 1,000 acres, inclosed by Philip Earl of Arundel and Surrey in 1604, and contains two oak trees of great size, one of which is said to measure 70 feet round the base and 40 feet round the centre of the trunk, but it is now (1912) in a very decayed state. The manor, anciently held by the Crown, was given by Henry VIII to Sir William Montchesny. The Countess of Albemarle is lady of the manor. Mrs. Charlotte Phipson, Alfred Cole and Tacon Hart esqrs. and the trustees of the late James Mann esq. are the chief landowners, and there are several smaller freeholders. The soil is mixed; subsoil, clay. The chief crops are wheat, barley, clover, beans and peas. The area is 2,670 acres; rateable value, £2,809; the population in 911 was 397.

Parish Clerk, William Reeve

Post & Telegraph Office. - William Reeve, sub-postmaster. Letters arrive from Diss at 7.10 a.m. & 2 p.m.; dispatched at 10.50 a.m. & 6 p.m.; sundays 7.20 a.m.; dispatched 9.15 a.m. There is a dispatch every night per mail cart on payment of ½d. extra postage at 10 p.m. The nearest money order office is at Banham, 3½ miles distant.

Pillar Letter Box, Hart's Corner, cleared at 8.00 a.m. & 5.35 p.m. week days only, & one opposite Wesleyan chapel cleared at 9.15 a.m. & 5.45 p.m. week days only.

Public Elementary School (mixed), erected in 1854 on glebe land, by funds raised by the late Rev. J. Bourne, for 90 children; average attendance, 81; John Edward Shipp, master.

Carrier to Diss. - John Munford, tues. & fri.

PRIVATE RESIDENTS.
Betts Mrs. Park farm
Church Rev Arthur Edward M.A. (rector), Rectory
COMMERCIAL.
Banham George, bricklayer
Barker Henry, farmer
Betts Frederick, Fighting Cocks P.H.
Betts George, cattle dealer, Park farm
Brewster John H. grocer
Capes Frederick, farmer
Cole Alfred & Sons, farmers, The Lodge & Park farms
Coleman George, farmer
Danby Francis, farmer
Filby Edmind Elijah, landowner, farmer, insurance & manure agent, White house
Fuller Edward, farmer
Gardiner William, blacksmith
Gardner Ann (Miss), shopkeeper
Garrard Allan, farmer
Garrard George A. shopkeeper
Hart Tacon, landowner, farmer, seed, coal & manure merchant
Holmes David, farmer
Holmes William, bricklayer
Howlett William, farmer
Minns George, farmer
Morley Edward, farmer
Morley James, farmer
Morley John, farmer
Mullinger Terah, farmer
Munford Arthur, farmer & assistant overseer & clerk to Parish Council
Newstead John, farmer
Phipson Richard Makilwaine, farmer, Heath farm
Pigney William, farmer
Reeve William, thatcher & parish clerk, Post office
Rodwell George, farmer
Rudrum Walter, carpenter
Salter Robert, book maker
Salter William, farmer
Sharman Charles Samuel, farmer, The Firs farm
Spurfdens Batson, farmer
Stevenson Isaac, farmer
Trudgill Walter, farmer & landowner
Vincent Thomas, Old Oak P.H.
Witton Joseph, jun. farmer