Bromfield is a village 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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...
in
Cumbria
Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders the Scottish council areas of Dumfries and Galloway and Scottish Borders to the north, Northumberland and County Durham to the east, North Yorkshire to the south-east, Lancash ...
, in the north of England.
It is about five miles north-east of
Aspatria
Aspatria is a town and civil parish in Cumberland, Cumbria, England. The town rests on the north side of the Ellen Valley, overlooking a panoramic view of the countryside, with Skiddaw to the South and the Solway Firth to the North. Its dev ...
. According to the 2001 census the parish had a population of 530, decreasing to 510 at the 2011 census. It has two farms, a
church dedicated to St Mungo, and a pub.
Toponymy
According to one source the origins of the name of Bromfield (Brounefeld) comes from the old English brun + feld, meaning 'brown open land, or open land where broom grows'.
Governance
Bromfield is part of the
parliamentary constituency
An electoral (congressional, legislative, etc.) district, sometimes called a constituency, riding, or ward, is a geographical portion of a political unit, such as a country, state or province, city, or administrative region, created to provi ...
of
Penrith and Solway.
For
Local Government
Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of governance or public administration within a particular sovereign state.
Local governments typically constitute a subdivision of a higher-level political or administrative unit, such a ...
purposes it is in the
Cumberland
Cumberland ( ) is an area of North West England which was historically a county. The county was bordered by Northumberland to the north-east, County Durham to the east, Westmorland to the south-east, Lancashire to the south, and the Scottish ...
unitary authority area
A unitary authority is a type of local authority in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Unitary authorities are responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are usually performed ...
.
The manor
The old ecclesiastic parish of Bromfield, consisted of twelve villages or hamlets,
Allonby
Allonby is a village on the coast of Cumberland in Cumbria, England. The village is on the B5300 road north of Maryport and south of Silloth. The village of Mawbray is to the north, and to the east is the village of Westnewton, Carlisle ...
,
Westnewton,
Mealrigg,
Langrigg, Crookdake, Scales, Bromfield,
Blencogo, Wheyrigg,
Dundraw, Moor Row and Kelsick. But in accordance with the
Local Government Act 1894
The Local Government Act 1894 ( 56 & 57 Vict. c. 73) was an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales outside the County of London. The act followed the reforms carried out at county leve ...
, Allonby, Westnewton and Mealrigg became a joint independent parish, although the
vicar
A vicar (; Latin: '' vicarius'') is a representative, deputy or substitute; anyone acting "in the person of" or agent for a superior (compare "vicarious" in the sense of "at second hand"). Linguistically, ''vicar'' is cognate with the English p ...
of Bromfield retained the right to appoint the vicar; while Wheyrigg, Dundraw, Moor Row and Kelsick became part of the parish of
Waverton.
The locality is steeped in history, dating back to early times. The
manor of the village itself was granted by the first Lord of
Allerdale
Allerdale was a non-metropolitan district of Cumbria, England, with Borough status in England and Wales, borough status. Its council – Allerdale Borough Council – was based in Workington, and the borough had a population of 96,422 at the ...
to Melbeth, his physician whose posterity took the name of De Brumfield. The family ceased to be
Lords of the Manor
Lord of the manor is a title that, in Anglo-Saxon England and Norman England, referred to the landholder of a historical rural estate. The titles date to the English Feudalism, feudal (specifically English feudal barony, baronial) system. The ...
somewhere around 1300. In early
mediaeval
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and t ...
times the
patronage
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, art patronage refers to the support that princes, popes, and other wealthy and influential people ...
of the
church
Church may refer to:
Religion
* Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying
* Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination
* Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...
was reserved and granted to the
St Mary's Abbey, York
The Abbey of St Mary is a ruined Benedictine abbey in York, England and a scheduled monument.
History
Once one of the most prosperous abbeys in Northern England,Dean, G. 2008. ''Medieval York''. Stroud: History Press. p. 86 its remains li ...
. In 1434 the Abbey
leased these lands for a term of six years to William Osmotherley.
Holme Cultram Abbey also possessed land here. Prior to the
Dissolution of the Monasteries the
monks
A monk (; from , ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a man who is a member of a religious order and lives in a monastery. A monk usually lives his life in prayer and contemplation. The concept is ancient and can be seen in many reli ...
were not only
cultivating the land but also leasing it to
tenant farmers
A tenant farmer is a farmer or farmworker who resides and works on land owned by a landlord, while tenant farming is an agricultural production system in which landowners contribute their land and often a measure of operating capital and mana ...
. In 1543, following the suppression we find a William Hutton holding Bromfield for the
king
King is a royal title given to a male monarch. A king is an Absolute monarchy, absolute monarch if he holds unrestricted Government, governmental power or exercises full sovereignty over a nation. Conversely, he is a Constitutional monarchy, ...
. Later
Edward VI
Edward VI (12 October 1537 – 6 July 1553) was King of England and King of Ireland, Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death in 1553. He was crowned on 20 February 1547 at the age of nine. The only surviving son of Henry VIII by his thi ...
exchanged the manor with Henry Thompson for a hospital in
Dover
Dover ( ) is a town and major ferry port in Kent, southeast England. It faces France across the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel at from Cap Gris Nez in France. It lies southeast of Canterbury and east of Maidstone. ...
. Successive owners of the estate were the Porters of Weary Hall, and the families of Osmotherley and Barwise.
The railway
The
Maryport and Carlisle Railway
The Maryport & Carlisle Railway (M&CR) was an English railway company formed in 1836 which built and operated a small but eventually highly profitable railway to connect Maryport and Carlisle, Cumberland, Carlisle in Cumberland, England. There ...
intersects the southern portion of the parish. In 1859 a railway was laid through the village of Bromfield connecting the Maryport and Carlisle railway with the
North British line from
Silloth to Carlise. The subsequent
station
Station may refer to:
Agriculture
* Station (Australian agriculture), a large Australian landholding used for livestock production
* Station (New Zealand agriculture), a large New Zealand farm used for grazing by sheep and cattle
** Cattle statio ...
was opened on 8 August 1870 and was of great benefit to farmers who could move their livestock along the
Solway Junction Railway
The Solway Junction Railway was built by an independent railway company to shorten the route from ironstone mines in Cumberland to ironworks in Lanarkshire and Ayrshire.
It opened in 1869, and it involved a viaduct long crossing the Solway Fi ...
to the
auction
An auction is usually a process of Trade, buying and selling Good (economics), goods or Service (economics), services by offering them up for Bidding, bids, taking bids, and then selling the item to the highest bidder or buying the item from th ...
Market
Market is a term used to describe concepts such as:
*Market (economics), system in which parties engage in transactions according to supply and demand
*Market economy
*Marketplace, a physical marketplace or public market
*Marketing, the act of sat ...
in
Annan, on a line passing through
Bowness-on-Solway and across the now demolished viaduct over the
Solway Firth
The Solway Firth is an inlet on the west coast of Great Britain, forming part of the border between England and Scotland. The firth (a Scottish term for an inlet of the sea) divides Cumbria (including the Solway Plain) from Dumfries and Gallow ...
. Passenger services were finally withdrawn in 1921 and the line south of Annan over the Solway Viaduct was closed completely. The line remained open to through traffic until 14 February 1933; the track was lifted and sold as scrap in 1937.
The school
In 1612, Richard Osmotherley, a
merchant
A merchant is a person who trades in goods produced by other people, especially one who trades with foreign countries. Merchants have been known for as long as humans have engaged in trade and commerce. Merchants and merchant networks operated i ...
of London and native of the parish,
bequeathed £10 a year, to be paid by the
Merchant Taylors Company
The Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors is one of the 111 livery companies of the City of London.
The Company, originally known as the ''Guild and Fraternity of St John the Baptist in the City of London'', was founded prior to 1300, first in ...
out of his estates in
St. Botolph's parish, Aldergate, London, to the Clergymen and
Churchwardens
A churchwarden is a laity, lay official in a parish or congregation of the Anglicanism, Anglican Communion, Lutheranism, Lutheran Churches or Catholicism, Catholic Church, usually working as a part-time volunteer. In the Anglican tradition, holde ...
of Bromfield, in trust for the education of fifteen poor children belonging to Bromfield and Langrigg. According to the stipulation the occupants of
Langrigg Hall chose the children. It is said that the inhabitants built the school shortly after this. In 1741 the Rev. Dr Thomlinson gave a dwelling house, with outbuildings. In 1757 the Thomlinson gave £100 with which two fields were purchased, one in Bromfield the other in Blencogo. The family also built two rooms for the use of the
schoolmaster
A schoolmaster, or simply master, is a male school teacher. The usage first occurred in England in the Late Middle Ages and early modern period. At that time, most schools were one-room or two-room schools and had only one or two such teacher ...
, who was also
curate
A curate () is a person who is invested with the ''care'' or ''cure'' () of souls of a parish. In this sense, ''curate'' means a parish priest; but in English-speaking countries the term ''curate'' is commonly used to describe clergy who are as ...
of the parish. In 1770 a sum of £80 was collected by voluntary subscription, which generated £3 20p in annual interest. In 1805 a Mr. Thomlinson of
New Bern
New Bern, formerly Newbern, is a city in Craven County, North Carolina, United States, and its county seat. It had a population of 31,291 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is located at the confluence of the Neuse River, Neuse a ...
,
North Carolina
North Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, South Carolina to the south, Georgia (U.S. stat ...
gave £1,400 to be equally divided between the schools of Bromfield,
Wigton
Wigton is a market town in the Cumberland district of Cumbria, England. It lies just outside the Lake District. Wigton is at the centre of the Solway Plain, between the Caldbeck Fells and the Solway coast. It is served by Wigton railway st ...
,
Uldale and
Thursby
Thursby is a village in the Cumberland (district), Cumberland district of Cumbria, England. It is near to the city of Carlisle. Thursby was Historic counties of England, historically part of the county of Cumberland.
History
Thursby lies on ...
. During this time numerous masters taught the children to read, write and figure accounts, while several learned
Latin
Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
. The
Education Act of 1870 considerably modifies the constitution of the church and subsequent Acts brought it into line with other schools in the area.
The church
St Mungo's Church, is an active
Anglican parish church in the deanery of Solway, the archdeaconry of West Cumberland and the
diocese of Carlisle
In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop.
History
In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associate ...
.
The church has been designated by
English Heritage
English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, a battlefield, medieval castles, Roman forts, historic industrial sites, Lis ...
as a Grade I
listed building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...
.
The church dates from the 12th century with additions and alterations during the next two centuries.
Restorations were carried out in 1861–62, 1893–94 and 1926.
[
]
Notable people
* Jenny Cowern
Jenny Cowern (1943–2005) was a visual, multi-media artist, who took inspiration from the natural surroundings of her adopted county, Cumbria, to produce some of the most dramatic and lasting images of nature. An acute observer of the continual ...
, artist, lived at Langrigg, Aspatria
* Rae McGrath, Nobel Peace Prize co-Laureate (1997) and founder of the international charity Mines Advisory Group (MAG) lives in Langrigg
See also
* Listed buildings in Bromfield, Cumbria
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
Cumbria County History Trust: Bromfield
(nb: provisional research only - see Talk page)
Solway Junction Railway
{{authority control
Villages in Cumbria
Cumberland (unitary authority)
Civil parishes in Cumbria