Loddon is a small town and
civil parish
In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
in Norfolk, England, about south-east of
Norwich
Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. As the seat of the See of Norwich, with ...
. The town lies on the
River Chet
The River Chet is a small river in South Norfolk, England, a tributary of the River Yare. It rises in Poringland and flows eastwards through Alpington, Bergh Apton, Thurton and Loddon. At Loddon it passes under the A146 through Loddon Mill a ...
, a tributary of the
River Yare
The River Yare is a river in the English county of Norfolk. In its lower reaches it is one of the principal navigable waterways of The Broads and connects with the rest of the network.
The river rises south of Dereham to the west to the vil ...
within
The Broads
The Broads (known for marketing purposes as The Broads National Park) is a network of mostly navigable rivers and lakes in the English counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. Although the terms "Norfolk Broads" and "Suffolk Broads" are correctly use ...
. The name "Loddon" is thought to mean ''muddy river'' in
Celtic in reference to the Chet.
History
Origins
The earliest written mention of Loddon (Lodne) is in the will of
Ælfric Modercope
__NOTOC__
Ælfric Modercope ( ang, Ælfrīc Mōdercoppe; non, *Alfrīkr Mōðirkoppr), sometimes known as Alfric de Modercope in modern English and as Ælfric Wihtgarsson in the patronymic system, was an Anglo-Norse thegn from East Anglia.
Whi ...
written in 1042 or 1043. In the will Ælfric split his land holdings in Loddon,
Bergh Apton
Bergh Apton (Ber-Guh App-ton) is a village and civil parish in the South Norfolk district of Norfolk, England, 7 miles (11 km) south-east of Norwich just south of the A146 between Yelverton and Thurton. According to the 2001 census it ha ...
and Barton between the Bishops of
Bury
Bury may refer to:
*The burial of human remains
*-bury, a suffix in English placenames
Places England
* Bury, Cambridgeshire, a village
* Bury, Greater Manchester, a town, historically in Lancashire
** Bury (UK Parliament constituency) (1832–19 ...
,
Ely and
St Benet of Holme. Ælfric held of land in Loddon and was by far the biggest landowner. His manor house is believed to have been close by the church overlooking the river and the fields are known as Manor Yards.
The
Parish Council adopted Ælfric for Loddon's town sign in 1961 and the
bronze statue still stands on Farthing Green.
Modern times
Although Loddon and
Chedgrave
Chedgrave is a village and civil parish in English county of Norfolk. Chedgrave is separated from nearby Loddon by the River Chet.
History
Chedgrave's name is of Anglo-Saxon origin and likely derives from the Old English for Ceatta's pit or gr ...
have been
flooded many times through history, the worst or at least the best documented occasions were in August 1912 and September 1968.
At about midnight on 27 August 1912 a portion of the roadway was washed away and soon afterwards part of the bridge caved in. The footbridge across the river between the two industrial sites disappeared downstream. The mill was in great jeopardy and forty men worked hard to preserve as much of the road as possible. The piling and the banks of the Chet were washed away and some of the
wherries broke their
moorings.
On 12 September 1968 a great storm followed a very wet summer, so when the heavy rain came that night the ground was too waterlogged to let the rain drain away. According to the ''
Eastern Daily Press
The ''Eastern Daily Press'' (''EDP'') is a regional newspaper covering Norfolk, northern parts of Suffolk and eastern Cambridgeshire, and is published daily in Norwich, UK.
Founded in 1870 as a broadsheet called the ''Eastern Counties Daily P ...
'' it had been Norfolk's wettest ever September day. The torrential rain was accompanied by thunder and lightning and many roads were many inches deep in water.
Governance
The first tier of local government is Loddon Parish Council. The parish is within the areas of
South Norfolk
South Norfolk is a local government district in Norfolk, England. Its council is based in Long Stratton. The population of the Local Authority District was 124,012 as taken at the 2011 Census.
History
The district was formed on 1 April 19 ...
District Council and the
Broads Authority
The Broads Authority is the agency which has statutory responsibility for the Broads in England. Originally, the Nature Conservancy Council (now Natural England), pressed for a special authority to manage the Broads which had been neglected for ...
.
Landmarks
Loddon has many fine buildings; from the 15th-century parish church of Holy Trinity, through the 18th-century "Loddon House" (originally a
mental institution
Psychiatric hospitals, also known as mental health hospitals, behavioral health hospitals, are hospitals or wards specializing in the treatment of severe mental disorders, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, dissociative ...
), to "Farthing Green House", which is a good example of
Georgian architecture.
Holy Trinity Church
The town centre of Loddon, a designated conservation area, is dominated by the Holy Trinity Church dates from 1490 by
Sir James Hobart who lived at
Hales Hall
Hales Hall is a notable English country house in Loddon, Norfolk, largely dating from the 15th century.
It was once the seat of the Hobart family, including Sir James Hobart, who became attorney general to King Henry VII in 1485.
History
T ...
, and was
Attorney General to
King Henry VII
Henry VII (28 January 1457 – 21 April 1509) was King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizure of the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death in 1509. He was the first monarch of the House of Tudor.
Henry's mother, Margaret Beaufo ...
. The outside of the building is faced with flintwork and the interior contains a
hammerbeam
A hammerbeam roof is a decorative, open timber roof truss typical of English Gothic architecture and has been called "...the most spectacular endeavour of the English Medieval carpenter". They are traditionally timber framed, using short beams ...
roof, Jacobean
pulpit,
early Edwardian pews with carved
poppy-head ends, several table-top tombs, an ancient poor-box and a panel on the painted
rood
A rood or rood cross, sometimes known as a triumphal cross, is a cross or crucifix, especially the large crucifix set above the entrance to the chancel of a medieval church.
Alternatively, it is a large sculpture or painting of the crucifixion ...
screen which shows
William of Norwich
William of Norwich (2 February 1132 – 22 March 1144) was an English boy whose disappearance and killing was, at the time, attributed to the Jewish community of Norwich. It is the first known medieval accusation against Jews of ritual murder. ...
, a boy martyr who is reputed to have been
crucified
Crucifixion is a method of capital punishment in which the victim is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross or beam and left to hang until eventual death from exhaustion and asphyxiation. It was used as a punishment by the Persians, Carthagin ...
in the 12th century. There is also a
medieval
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...
baptismal font set high on three steps, however despite its shaft and bowl were originally carved and painted, they were defaced during periods of
iconoclasm
Iconoclasm (from Greek: grc, εἰκών, lit=figure, icon, translit=eikṓn, label=none + grc, κλάω, lit=to break, translit=kláō, label=none)From grc, εἰκών + κλάω, lit=image-breaking. ''Iconoclasm'' may also be conside ...
.
The church is said to have possibly replaced an earlier
Norman
Norman or Normans may refer to:
Ethnic and cultural identity
* The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries
** People or things connected with the Norm ...
church and an even older one built by
St Felix,
Bishop of East Anglia, about 630.
Watermill
There was a mill mentioned at Loddon in the
Domesday Book
Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manus ...
of 1086, and a watermill at
Chedgrave
Chedgrave is a village and civil parish in English county of Norfolk. Chedgrave is separated from nearby Loddon by the River Chet.
History
Chedgrave's name is of Anglo-Saxon origin and likely derives from the Old English for Ceatta's pit or gr ...
in the early 1330s, but there is no evidence for the sites of these mills. The present mill, Loddon watermill near the town centre which is no longer functioning, was built in the 18th century with the river diverted to run underneath it. Loddon watermill was sometimes known as Chedgrave mill and is one of the earliest recorded buildings in the town. It was built of
weatherboard
Clapboard (), also called bevel siding, lap siding, and weatherboard, with regional variation in the definition of these terms, is wooden siding of a building in the form of horizontal boards, often overlapping.
''Clapboard'' in modern Americ ...
with a
pantiled roof, and was situated quite close to the centre of the town. The mill pool was never very big, but was apparently a widened and deepened Y-shaped section of river up stream of the mill. This produced adequate power for the miller to meet the needs of the local farmers and villagers. The mill still retains 19th-century milling equipment.
When the mill was built it was found that the best position for it involved diverting the river Chet to the south of its natural course. This involved considerable effort and expense and in times of severe flood the river attempts to revert to its original channel.
Old Town Hall
![Former Town Hall, Loddon (geograph 5546771)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/09/Former_Town_Hall%2C_Loddon_%28geograph_5546771%29.jpg)
The
Old Town Hall
Old or OLD may refer to:
Places
* Old, Baranya, Hungary
* Old, Northamptonshire, England
*Old Street station, a railway and tube station in London (station code OLD)
*OLD, IATA code for Old Town Municipal Airport and Seaplane Base, Old Town, ...
was commissioned by a private company and the
petty session
Courts of petty session, established from around the 1730s, were local courts consisting of magistrates, held for each petty sessional division (usually based on the county divisions known as hundreds) in England, Wales, and Ireland. The sessio ...
hearings were held in there for the first time on 10 August 1870.
Education
Loddon is home to three state schools: Loddon Infant and Nursery, Loddon Junior and
Hobart High School
Hobart High School is a coeducational secondary school with academy status, situated in the village of Loddon, near Norwich in Norfolk, England. It typically has around 850 pupils.
The school previously had specialist science college status ...
, one of the few schools in the country to have a '
classroom of the future
A classroom or schoolroom is a learning space in which both children and adults learn. Classrooms are found in educational institutions of all kinds, ranging from preschools to universities, and may also be found in other places where education ...
'. This futuristic classroom lasted approximately 2 months before all the
tablets had to be replaced. There is also Loddon nursery school education. An independent school
Langley School, lies just to the North of Loddon at
Langley Park.
The first records about schooling in Loddon mention the school in what is now called he Priest's room in the Holy Trinity Church in 1781. The 19th century saw considerable changes, including a rise in the population and consequently in the number of children. It also saw a rise in the popularity of nonconformist religions and a certain amount of competition in the provision of education for the young.
As well as the established schools there were several private schools in the town at one time or another. The 1851/61/71 census figures show a private school on the east side of Bridge Street.
By 1856 it was decided to build a new school in Loddon for 180 pupils on the site of the old guildhall on Church Plain. Two-thirds of the cost was to come from the Town Estates, which was revenue derived from the renting of Town Farm and other town lands. The rest came from public subscription and an appeal was set up to raise money from the community. The eventual result was a
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...
faced
Gothic Revival building which is still used today as the Loddon Branch Library.
The school term started in 1858 (although the building does not appear to have been finished until 1859), when 99 children from 3–13 years old were entered. Many would not stay at school long, nor attend regularly as the need to supplement the family income when possible could not be ignored. Many children had a long walk to school, which could be impossible in bad weather. This building was used as a school until 1969.
Industry
Previous industries included egg packing and corn grinding. Loddon also had a gas and brick works.
Nowadays the north of the town has many boatyards situated on the River Chet. These provide yachtsmen and hire boat crews during the season and together with the boat-building and letting yards, make an important contribution to the economy of the town.
Loddon also has a small industrial area situated at the south of the town. Engineering and other industries sited on this
industrial estate
An industrial park (also known as industrial estate, trading estate) is an area zoned and planned for the purpose of industrial development. An industrial park can be thought of as a more "heavyweight" version of a business park or office park ...
provide employment for local people. However, Express Plastics, one of the major employers has recently moved to
Beccles
Beccles ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the English county of Suffolk.OS Explorer Map OL40: The Broads: (1:25 000) : . The town is shown on the milestone as from London via the A145 and A12 roads, north-east of London as the crow fl ...
. The site is to become a small housing estate.
A famous East Anglian company
Anglian Bus started in Loddon in 1986 before expansion resulted in moving to
Beccles
Beccles ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the English county of Suffolk.OS Explorer Map OL40: The Broads: (1:25 000) : . The town is shown on the milestone as from London via the A145 and A12 roads, north-east of London as the crow fl ...
.
The Loddon and District Business Association, which was formed in 2011, represents all businesses in the area both micro and multimillion-pound industry. They work together to enhance the community life and ensure that growth increases and the facilities needed in a community of this size are met.
Tourism
Today the
River Chet
The River Chet is a small river in South Norfolk, England, a tributary of the River Yare. It rises in Poringland and flows eastwards through Alpington, Bergh Apton, Thurton and Loddon. At Loddon it passes under the A146 through Loddon Mill a ...
is one of the focal points for boating tourism within the southern Broads area and is the only such centre within South Norfolk District.
Further downriver still can be found Hardley Flood, a good spot for bird watching.
Village of the Year
In 2005, Loddon was chosen to represent
Norfolk
Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...
in the National Calor Village of the Year Competition. In December 2005 representatives from Loddon, including local business woman Caroline Dwen and Lady Kate Hartland, went to London to the National Presentation Ceremony where the town had won the first prize for the East Region.
Transport
The
A146 bypasses Loddon heading north-east to
Norwich
Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. As the seat of the See of Norwich, with ...
and south-east to
Beccles
Beccles ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the English county of Suffolk.OS Explorer Map OL40: The Broads: (1:25 000) : . The town is shown on the milestone as from London via the A145 and A12 roads, north-east of London as the crow fl ...
and
Lowestoft. The route east to
Great Yarmouth lies along the B1136 and
A143. Both
First Norfolk & Suffolk
First Eastern Counties is a bus operator providing services in Norfolk and Suffolk in eastern England. It is a subsidiary of FirstGroup.
It has seven depots which are part of five operating areas spread out across East Anglia. The five operat ...
and
Konectbus
Konectbus is a bus operator based in Dereham in Norfolk, England. It is a subsidiary of the Go-Ahead Group and forms part of Go East Anglia.
History
Konectbus was formed in 1999 when the Saham Toney depot of Norfolk Green was purchased from wi ...
provide bus services to
Norwich
Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. As the seat of the See of Norwich, with ...
and Lowestoft via Beccles. Ambassador Travel runs services to
Thurlton
Thurlton is a small village in South Norfolk, located 14 miles (22 km) south-east of the city of Norwich, and 9 miles (15 km) west of the Suffolk coastal town of Lowestoft.
The villages name means 'Thorferth's farm/settlement'.
Thu ...
,
Seething, Norwich and Great Yarmouth.
The Broads
The Broads (known for marketing purposes as The Broads National Park) is a network of mostly navigable rivers and lakes in the English counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. Although the terms "Norfolk Broads" and "Suffolk Broads" are correctly use ...
system of waterways is connected to the
River Chet
The River Chet is a small river in South Norfolk, England, a tributary of the River Yare. It rises in Poringland and flows eastwards through Alpington, Bergh Apton, Thurton and Loddon. At Loddon it passes under the A146 through Loddon Mill a ...
and mooring is available to the east of the town.
Nearest places
*
Chedgrave
Chedgrave is a village and civil parish in English county of Norfolk. Chedgrave is separated from nearby Loddon by the River Chet.
History
Chedgrave's name is of Anglo-Saxon origin and likely derives from the Old English for Ceatta's pit or gr ...
– north
*
Hales
Hales is a small village in Norfolk, England. It covers an area of and had a population of 479 in 192 households as of the 2001 census, which had reduced to 469 at the 2011 census.
History
The villages name means 'Nooks of land'.
The manor ...
– south-east
*
Thurton
Thurton is a village in South Norfolk lying 8½ miles (13½ km) south-east of Norwich on the A146 Norwich to Lowestoft road between Framingham Pigot and Loddon. The A146 effectively divides the village in two; a 40 mph limit is in force. At ...
– north-west
*
Mundham – west
*
Thurlton
Thurlton is a small village in South Norfolk, located 14 miles (22 km) south-east of the city of Norwich, and 9 miles (15 km) west of the Suffolk coastal town of Lowestoft.
The villages name means 'Thorferth's farm/settlement'.
Thu ...
– east
*
Seething – west
Sport
A wide variety of sport is on offer in Loddon and the close surrounding area. The Hobart High School gym is used for many groups as is the Loddon and Chedgrave Jubilee Hall and other halls in the community.
There is a local football team called Loddon United. The team plays at The Playing Field, Jubilee Hall (locally referred to as 'The Jub'), Georges Lane, Loddon. There is also a youth football club, Loddon Grasshoppers, with teams for under 8s up to under 16s, including an under 13s girls team.
Loddon Ladies Hockey, Loddon Squash Club, White Dolphins Swimming for children, Loddon and Hales Cricket Club, Loddon Bowls Club, Loddon Community Gym, Short tennis, Short Mat Bowls, Badminton, Tumble Tots, Excelsior Keep Fit for over 50s, Tennis Club, Tennis Coaching, Junior Gymnastics, Junior Karate, Fencing, Volleyball, Pilates, Aerobics, Junior Trampoline, Medau Keep Fit, Indoor Bowls, Funky Feet Ballet, Yoga, Running Club, Darts and Walking with the Loddon and Chedgrave District Society.
Notable people
* Rodwell House in Loddon was for many years the residence of the
Buxton baronets
There have been two baronetcies created for persons with the surname Buxton, one in the Baronetage of Great Britain and one in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom. One creation is extinct while the other is extant.
The Buxton Baronetcy, of S ...
.
*
Adam Drury – Footballer for
Norwich City Football Club
Norwich City Football Club (also known as The Canaries or The Yellows) is an English professional football club based in Norwich, Norfolk. The club competes in the EFL Championship following their relegation from the Premier League in the 20 ...
used to reside in Loddon.
*
Davy Jones from the
Monkees
The Monkees were an American rock and pop band, formed in Los Angeles in 1966, whose lineup consisted of the American actor/musicians Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork alongside English actor/singer Davy Jones. The group was conc ...
lived there briefly as a boy.
References
External links
Parish website
{{authority control
Towns in Norfolk
Civil parishes in Norfolk
South Norfolk