Downham Market, Norfolk test

DOWNHAM (or Downham Market) is a market and union town, parish, and the head of a county court district, with a station on the Lynn and Ely section of the Great Eastern railway and a branch line to Stoke Ferry, 88 miles from London, 59¼ west from Norwich, 15¾ north from Ely and 11 south from Lynn, in the south Western division of the county, Clackclose hundred and petty sessional division, rural deanery of Fincham(eastern division), archdeaconry of Lynn and diocese of Norwich.

By Order of the County Council, Downham was in 1896, divided into two parishes, the rural part called Downham West, and the urban, Downham Market. The town is seated on the eastern acclivity of the vale of the navigable river Ouse, over which the neighbouring county is a fine uninterrupted view; the river is here crossed by an iron lattice girder bridge with two piers erected at a total cost of £3,500, from designs by Mr. David Oldfield C.E. and opened 9 Feb 1879.

Downham Market is governed, under the provisions of the"Local Government Act, 1894" (56 & 57 Vict. C. 73),in place of the board of Improvement Commissioners, constituted under 5 & 6 Wm. IV. c. 52, amended by 39 & 40 Vict. 20, by an Urban District Council. The main streets and roads are well paved, and the town is lighted with oil lamps: the Downham Gas and Coke Company Limited, formed in 1840, have extensive works near the railway station.

The church of St. Edmund is an ancient pile, originally Norman, but rebuilt in the Early English Period,and since extensively altered; it now consists of chancel, nave, aisles, south porch and a low embattled western tower of carrstone, with buttresses and quoins of freestone, surmounted by a slender spire, which with the tower, was restored in 1896, at a cost of £340: in the tower are 8 bells, rehung in 1896: in 1884 a stone reredos was erected and the chancel floor relaid, and in 1886 a stone statuette of St. Edmund the Martyr was set in aniche over the entrance to the south porch and a brass lectern placed in the church, both at the cost of the late Mr. Henry Oakes : the stained east window was placed in 1873 by J. Wortley esq. of Skeyton, in memory of his wife's family, and there are several other memorial windows, and four stained windows, erected during the period 1896-9.

During the building of the new organ chamber in 1873 an original Norman window was discovered, built up in the wall behind the chancel arch, on the north side: the figures of the saints and angels in the roof; which had been left in a mutilated state by Cromwell's soldiers, were restored in accordance with the original designs in 1899: in 1886 the arms of the ancient family of Bardolph and those of Ramsey Abbey, formerly on the church were carved in stone and replaced the arms of the sees of Canterbury and Norwich and those of Thomas Leigh Hare esq. J.P., D.L the present lord of the manor, being added:the curious old font has been repaired and re-set: the church was repaired in 1855 at a cost of £700 and affords 700 sittings. 200 being free.

The register dates from the year 1551 The living is a discharged rectory, net yearly value £230, together with 29 acres of glebe, with residence, in the gift of the trustees of the late Rev. Edward Robert Franks B.A. rector (1850-82), and held since 1894 by the Rev. William Beaufoy Stillman M.A. of Worcester College, Oxford, chaplain of Downham union, and surrogate. There are Wesleyan, Baptist, Strict Baptist and Primitive Methodist Chapels. Mount Tabor Free Methodist chapel, Bridge street, erected in 1859, will seat about 260 persons. The Wesleyan chapel, in Lynn road, was thoroughly repaired and two vestries built in 1864, and in 1876 a new organ loft was added: it has 450 sittings; the school-room was rebuilt in 1895: Zionchapel, in Parson's lane, was rebuilt in 1874, and seats 170 persons. A Cemetery of 2 acres, with two mortuary chapels, was formed in 1856, at a cost of about £1,600, and in 1884 was enlarged by the addition of 2½ acres, at a cost of £500: it is under the control of a joint committee appointed by the Urban District Council and the Parish Council for Downham West.

The Town Hall, erected in 1887-8, at a cost of £1,730, occupies a site facing the Market Place and Bridge Street, and is a structure of white and moulded brick, relieved by brown carr-stone panels in the Renaissance style, from designs by Mr.J. J. Johnson A.R.I.B.A, architect, of London: it comprises a large hall, 74 by 33 feet, with a platform 12 feet wide, a corn exchange, reading, committee and retiring rooms, library, lavatories and offices: the hall will seat 500 persons, and has two ordinary entrances and special exit doors. The Literary Institute and Stanley Library now occupying rooms in the Town hall, was established in 1865, on the foundation of the Mechanics' Institute, dissolved in December, 1865, and provides in the reading-room most of the daily and weekly London papers, weekly local papers and the principal periodicals; the extensive and carefully selected library was formed from a nucleus of £50, given by the late Earl of Derby K.G. when member for King's Lynn(1848-69), and supplemented by subscriptions: the members number between 80 & 90: the subscription is merely nominal.

The Conservative Club, opened 8 Aug. 1890, occupies premises in Bridge street, formerly tenanted by the Literary Institute: it is well supplied with most of the daily and weekly papers, and has about 200 members. Three large fairs for horses and cattle are held yearly, Winnold's Fayre on or about March 1 stand the three following days, and other fairs on the first Friday in May and the 2nd Friday in November; and Statute fairs for the hiring of servants are held on the Saturday fortnight before and the Saturday after Old Michaelmas Day, but they are now nothing more than pleasure fairs.

The Downham Market Market Company Limited was formed in 1856. The market is held every Friday in the Market square, where stands a clock tower, presented to the town by James Scott esq. in 1878: it is in the Gothic style, from the designs of Mr. William Cunliffe, of London, and the main and lower portions being octagonal, with a rectangular clock chamber above, presenting four illuminated dials, lighted automatically: the roof of the tower is relieved by tracery and surmounted by a vane. The County Police Station, in Church road, has detention cells and a charge room; the deputy chief constable’s residence adjoins police station. There are three large brickyards here, where a superior class of white bricks and pantiles are made; an extensive roller flour mill owned by Messrs. F. and A. Bird; large malt-houses, belonging to T. H. Wenn and Co.; and a brewery. The American nurseries of Messrs. Bird and Vallance, near the railway station, cover 29 acres, well stocked with fruit forest and ornamental trees and American plants, ferns: the inhabitants, by permission of the proprietors, are allowed to use the nurseries as a promenade during the summer months.

In the town are two good hotels, the Crown Hotel, in the market place, and the Castle Hotel, High street, both old established and well-appointed houses. There are charities of about £86 yearly value, for distribution in fuel, clothing and provisions: this amount includes a sum of £66, being the proportion assigned to this parish from the Hundred Acres charity, the income derived from which is equally divided between the parishes of Wimbotsham, Stow and Downham; there is also a sum of about £20 from the Batchcroft charity, and consisting of the rent of land; and there are other estates, the produce of which is applied in keeping the church in repair and maintaining the bridge over the river Ouse. Thomas Leigh Hare esq. M.P. of Stow Hall, and Edward Roger Murray Pratt esq. of Ryston Hall, who are the lords of the several manors, J. Wortley esq. Thomas Lancelot Reed esq. of Crow Hall, Denver, and Messrs. Robert Haylett, Sen., Edward Hyde, JohnWortley, of Frettenham, Harry Wayman, William Pope, and the trustees of the late Joseph Kemp are the chief landowners. The area of Downham Market parish is 951 acres; rateable value, £10,809; the population in 1891 was 2,537, including 89 officers and inmates in the workhouse. The area of Downham West parish is 1,840 acres of land, 6 of water, 38 of tidal water and 17 offshore; rateable value, £2,382; the population in 1891 was 469.