Rolling landscape under endless skies
The wide open spaces of the rolling Lincolnshire Wolds offer undiscovered gems to explore in a peaceful rural idyll
WHITE CLOUDS SCUD across a canopy of blue sky. Rolling fields of wheat and pasture are bisected by tall hedgerows. Swallows and swifts dip and swoop; small silhouettes against the green landscape. After an expanse of flat fens, the land unexpectedly bucks and folds into small wooded valleys, bottomed by meandering rivers and an intricate network of roads and small lanes; ancient byways which have been navigated by travellers for centuries. This is the Lincolnshire Wolds, a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and one of the least populated areas in England. Even on a warm day, as holidaymakers seek the long, golden beaches of the nearby coastline, the roads are remarkably empty. Only the occasional tractor, puttering along, causes a rare queue.
The Wolds lie in the north-eastern corner of the county. Originally formed 150 million years ago, they were created by glaciers, which sculpted the rounded hills and wide, ice-scoured valleys. Cretaceous chalk was laid down under a warm, sub-tropical sea some 90 million years ago. Since Roman times, people have been reclaiming, draining and working the land. This has created the current topography of large fields divided by hedgerows and tracks, with grassy verges as wide as 65ft (20m). Wild flowers bloom here, as grassland on chalky soil creates a special habitat, with some small areas supporting rare orchids. In June, the verges are frothy with cow parsley. A closer look reveals ox-eye daisies, quaking grass, purple-flowered betony, meadow vetchling, greater knapweed and the tall, sculptural stems of hogweed. All thrive, attracting bees and clouds of white butterflies.
The small town of Alford is set on a gravel ridge, where an ancient track crossed a stream connecting coastal Lindsey Marsh and the arable farmland of the chalk Wolds. The town’s name is
believed to have come from the old English ‘alder ford’, meaning ‘the ford where alders are found’, or possibly ‘Eau Ford’; the ford across the ‘eau’, or stream.
Market town
In 1086, according to the Domesday Book, Alford was a tiny settlement, with seven households. After the Norman Conquest, William of Well became Lord of the Manor. In 1283, he obtained a charter for a market on a Tuesday, and this helped to forge the town’s prosperity through the middle ages. The market still takes place; the small streets bustling with visitors shopping for vegetables, meat and eggs, much as they would have done centuries before. Cheery planters of brightly coloured geraniums and petunias enhance the marketplace, whitewashed buildings reflect the bright sunshine, and there are wooden benches where passers-by sit and watch the activity.
Alford’s compact town centre comprises elegant historic buildings, and it is now a conservation area. St Wilfrid’s Church was built in the 14th century, replacing an earlier wooden version, thought to date to the 12th century. The tower was reconstructed between 1525 and 1535, and again in the 1860s, when it was raised and decorated with pinnacles. The tower houses six ringing bells and an ancient sanctus bell. Some of St Wilfrid’s treasures include a Jacobean pulpit, a 14th century screen and fragments of 14th century stained glass in the north chancel window and north aisle, which glow like jewels as the sun shines through.
Display of wealth
By 1530, houses clustered around the church and marketplace. Many were thatched with straw and reeds, and made of wattle and daub, known locally as ‘mud and stud’. A major landmark in the town is Alford Manor House, a Grade II listed building, believed to be England’s largest thatched manor house. Built in 1611 to a traditional H-shaped plan, its ownership can be reliably traced back to Sir Robert Christopher in the late 17th century.
Evidence suggests it was built by Thomas Tothby, who was part of an influential local family in medieval times.
Sir Robert was an ambitious lawyer, who cared deeply about his social standing. During the English Civil War, he fought on the side of Charles I and was made a Knight Bachelor in 1661. It was around this time that the original timber-framed building was encased in brick, indicating high status and wealth. After his death in 1668, Sir Robert left large sums of money to the town, including Alford Grammar School, which had been founded in 1576. He also paid for an imposing alabaster tomb, featuring effigies of himself and his wife, Elizabeth, in St Wilfrid’s chancel.
Alford Manor House stayed in Sir Robert’s family for generations, passing through marriage to the Manners dynasty. In the 1820s, land agent John Higgins moved in and became a prominent figure in the community. In 1958, the Manor House was purchased by his granddaughter Dorothy Higgins, who sold it to the Alford Civic Trust in 1967. The house became a folk museum and is now open to the public, with exhibitions including a display that explores Alford’s milling history. House tours enable visitors to see the old kitchen, with its tiny stone oven, originally used for drying spices and tobacco; a music room, with intricately patterned blue and white Delft fireplace tiles, dating to 1700; the creaky attic; and an outside washhouse, where servants laboured over the household laundry.
The house is a popular spot for home-made afternoon teas, with tables and chairs set outside on the front lawn. Produce from the garden is sold in the café and shop, including apple juice from the 21 Lincolnshire-bred heritage fruit trees which grow here. Alford Manor House is run by a team of 90 volunteers, including Sandie Spenceley, who has lived in Alford for 40 years. She has been a member of the team here for 11 years.
Saved from collapse
The house was closed from 2002-2006, following a survey showing it to be in a perilous state. The floor joists had separated from the walls and beams, water had penetrated and rotted crucial supports, and the weakened roof could not support the 25 tons of thatch. “It was in danger of total collapse,” says Sandie. Grants were obtained to fund the repairs, and the house now plays a central part in community life. The walled gardens are thriving after their restoration in 2010, and the Museum of Rural Life, situated in the adjacent Higgins Barn, is packed with interesting artefacts. These include a
“There are, indeed, few merrier spectacles than that of many windmills bickering together in a fresh breeze”
Robert Louis Stevenson
hand-operated machine for making pear drops, from Hildred’s confectioner’s; the contents of F W Heely’s chemist shop; a working threshing machine; and a 400-year-old set of stocks, originally located in the marketplace, where a replica now stands. “We sometimes have visiting ghost hunters, who say they can feel presences, but I’ve been on my own in the dark here, and I think it is a very happy place that is full of life,” says Sandie.
The Corn Exchange, built in 1856, is also run by volunteers and used for cultural events, such as concerts, antiques markets, dances and community groups. Another lively venue is the Craft Market Centre, which occupies a shop in West Street, near the marketplace. Heather and Michel Ducos are the presidents of Alford Craft Market, and they also own Alford Pottery in Commercial Road. “There’s a real resurgence of interest in people wanting to learn to make things with their hands,” explains Michel. “At the shop, there are courses for sewing, knitting, quilting, jewellery making and pottery. Many different crafts are sold there; the makers take it in turns to man the shop.”
Heather and Michel moved to Alford in 1973, setting up a business in their cottage before expanding to their current premises. They make stoneware dinner services, throw pots on a wheel, and Michel also works in porcelain and earthenware, creating sculptures and unusual rope pots. “After 47 years, we are slowing down, but still take on commissions and create pieces for exhibitions,” he says.
Harnessing the wind
A striking structure on the eastern outskirts of the town is Alford Windmill, although it is currently without its famous
five sails, which have been removed for restoration. This 98ft (30m) tall, Grade I listed mill has six floors and a tapering brick tower. It was built in 1837 by local millwright Sam Oxley. Every Lincolnshire town and village had at least one windmill, and in 1932, Alford had three. The millwrights built, repaired and maintained them. They had to be multi-skilled, requiring carpentry for the woodwork, blacksmithing for metalwork and engineering for mechanisation. Victorian millwrights climbed out onto the sails and hung from the tower on ropes to make repairs. In 1850, Alford millwright John Oxley died after falling from Barrow Mill. Alford windmill is now owned by Lincolnshire County Council and is currently closed to the public.
Leaving Alford and travelling in a north-westerly direction, the road swoops through fields, hills and steep valleys to charming villages, such as Burwell, with its round, red-brick, 17th century Buttercross Hall. Small churches in grassy churchyards, some grazed by sheep, are a common sight. There is one at Ulceby Grange, and another at South Thoresby.
Capital of the Wolds
Elegant, historic Louth, with its attractive mixture of Georgian and Victorian architecture and a medieval street pattern in the centre, is known as the Capital of the Wolds. It is the largest market town in
the area, with a population of approximately 15,000. It nestles in the foot of the wooded valley of the River Lud. Anglo Saxon invaders settled here, at the point where the ancient pre-Roman Barton Street track forded the river in the late 5th or 6th century. The name Louth is thought to come from the old English word ‘lud’, meaning ‘loud’, referring to the sound of the river. Under Danish invasion, the settlement was a hub for surrounding agriculture, and a weekly market was established by the Norman Conquest. In medieval times, raw wool was traded with the weavers of the Flemish lowlands, and the town flourished. Queen Street was named Fullers’ Street during this period. A fuller had the unenviable task of trampling wool in barrels of stale urine or water; a process which produced a softer cloth.
The town’s wealth was reflected in the rebuilding of St James’ Parish Church. This culminated in the completion, in 1515, of the tallest parish church spire in the country, at 295ft (87m) tall. Louth’s prosperity continued in the 1770s with the building of an 11-mile canal joining the Humber Estuary. Trade through this waterway flourished. As part of the wool industry, a carpet factory was established in 1791 by Adam Eve. Flat-weave, reversible carpets were made on Jacquard looms and exported to Europe and America. Wharves, warehouses and
yards sprang up, and in the first half of the 19th century, the population increased by 147 per cent. An 1856 directory for Louth shows the town had blacksmiths, auctioneers, cattle and horse dealers, corn merchants, millers, maltsters, wheelwrights, curriers and leather manufacturers. In 1848, the railways came, and more routes were added over the next 30 years: many fine buildings in the centre date back to this boom time.
Louth Museum, at 4 Broadbank, provides a snapshot of the major historical milestones. Despite its compact size, the independent museum has approximately 14,000 items. Honorary Archivist Ruth Gatenby has been working there since 2008. It is operated by a charity, the Louth Naturalists’, Antiquarian and Literary Society. “This is a community effort, and we’re all volunteers,” explains Ruth, who lives in nearby Manby.
Painting the town
One of the most intriguing exhibits is a replica of William Brown’s Louth Panorama. In 1844, the local house painter, journalist and, according to Ruth, “an all-round busybody, who knew everyone”, climbed to the top of St James’ spire on scaffolding. Over three years, he made sketches, then produced a giant pair of oil paintings, each measuring 9ft by 6ft (2.7 x 1.8m), depicting a summer day in the town. Buildings, people, gardens and carriages are reproduced in detail. A recruiting sergeant stands outside the Wheatsheaf pub; boys throw stones and gentlefolk stroll in their gardens. “The original paintings are on display in The Sessions House during limited hours, but this replica, which is approximately two thirds of the original size, allows many more people to study it,” says Ruth. “We have volunteers who can identify their own houses on there.”
The museum displays the largest collection of Victorian woodcarver Thomas Wallis’ work. Wallis, who lived in the town, took eight months to carve his Trophy of Spring, a masterpiece of entwined flowers, nesting birds and leaves. There is also a gibbet cage, used to display the body of John Keal of Legbourne, hanged at Lincoln Castle in 1731 for the murders of his wife and baby son.
The mezzanine in the museum is dedicated to the flood of Saturday 29 May 1920. While that fateful day had started out fine in Louth, early afternoon saw torrential rain. A wall of water burst through the dam, causing the river and canal to flood, and a wave 14ft (4.2m) high surged through the streets of the town, demolishing houses and bridges in its path. Twenty-three people died as a result of the flood and many were left homeless. “At the time, there was
an election, and the flood was well publicised,” says Ruth. “There was great nationwide support.”
Thriving centre
The waterway closed in 1924, due to the opening of the East Lincolnshire Railway Line in 1848. Passenger trains stopped running in 1970, when the stations closed, followed by goods trains 10 years later. But this has not affected Louth’s centre, which has many small shops and a market on a Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.
It is estimated that 75 per cent of the shops here are independent businesses. Paul Adams and his partner, Steve Parris, run The Cheese Shop in Eastgate. Some of the cheeses are stacked in truckles, while others are sliced into wedges. “For our Lincolnshire Poacher cheese, I visit a farm at nearby Ulceby Grange, choose a batch with farmer Tim Jones, then reserve a set number of truckles,” explains Paul, who has been running the business for 13 years. Popular local varieties include creamy Cote Hill Blue, made with the milk of Friesian cows; a mature cheddar, called ‘Just Jane’, from Skegness; and Lincolnshire Sunset Blue. Butter is also made locally for the shop; hand-patted and flavoured with Welsh Halen Môn sea salt. “This is a rich area for cheeses, but in my opinion, you cannot beat the Lincolnshire Poacher with its forward flavour,” says Paul. Once weighed, each portion of cheese is carefully wrapped in paper with a hand-written label. It is then placed in a brown paper bag alongside a small mouse made from white chocolate.
Among the other businesses in the streets and quaint cobbled passages are traditional poulterer A Dales & Sons, which sells seasonal game, and bakeries offering Lincolnshire plum bread, made from dried fruit, eggs, sugar and flour. The Eve & Ranshaw department store was founded in 1781 and is still going strong, with attractive window displays featuring swathes of fabric, cookware and clothing. Independent eateries include Babbits Bakery and Coffee Shop, with its bright pink painted front, serving cheese scones with thick slices of Lincolnshire ham and chutney. The tiny Ye Olde Whyte Swanne Inn, in Eastgate, is the oldest pub in town, dating to 1612; its beer garden filled with baskets of cascading flowers.
Naomi Leckenby runs a small
“On either side of the river lie Long fields of barley and of rye, That clothe the wold and meet the sky; And thro’ the field the road runs by”
Alfred Lord Tennyson, ‘The Lady of Shallott’
gallery, called Little Bits of Louth, in New Street, where she sells her photographs of the town. “I’ve lived here since 1999, and I love the friendliness and the people,” she explains. “All the shopkeepers in my road socialise, and I’ve received huge support since I started my business a year ago.” Inspired daily by the Georgian and Victorian architecture around her, Naomi urges visitors to the town to ‘look up’.
On Louth’s west side, past the grammar school, there is a chalk-sided steep, leafy valley, which was created some 40,000 years ago at the end of the last ice age. This is Hubbard’s Hills, a popular area for dog walkers and families enjoying balmy summer afternoons by the Lud with their picnics and fishing nets. The area was landscaped as an Edwardian pleasure garden in the early 1900s and bequeathed to the town by a Swiss man named Auguste Alphonse Pahud, who had worked as a teacher at the school and married wealthy farmer’s daughter Annie Grant. He never recovered from her death in 1889, and when he took his own life in 1902, left instructions that the land should be purchased for the town. A neoclassical temple was built and dedicated to Annie.
Picturesque village
West of Louth, on the way to the village of Tealby, the road cuts through the heart of the Wolds’ Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. There are wide expanses of unbroken, undulating countryside; fields of ripening wheat splashed with scarlet poppies; and dense copses. Kestrels wheel, hover and plunge, and a skylark flies upwards, bubbling with song. The only
interruptions in the views are farmhouses; often shielded by brick and stone walls. Many date to the Victorian era, when mechanisation and crop rotation led to increased cultivation of land. Some fields show areas of obvious lumps and bumps; likely to be the remains of deserted villages which disappeared between the 13th and 15th centuries for various reasons, including the Black Death, changing agriculture and famine. The Wolds has approximately 100 of these deserted or shrunken medieval villages; one of the highest concentrations in the country.
It is noticeable that many village names end in the letters ‘by’, such as Utterby and Fotherby. This dates to the Danish invasion, and it means ‘farmstead’ or ‘village.’ The Viking army settled in the picturesque village of Tealby in the 9th century, though the earliest settlement has been traced back to the 5th century. Now, the village, often described as the prettiest in Lincolnshire, is a mix of tiny cottages and larger houses; many built from locally mined orange ironstone. Thirty-one are listed buildings.
All Saints Church stands high above the village on a green slope, with views over to Lincoln Cathedral 20 miles away. Starlings chatter to their young in the rural churchyard. Dating to the 12th century, the church is constructed from the same orange stone as the houses. It stands close to the route of the Viking Way: a 147-mile-long path between the Humber Bridge in North Lincolnshire and Oakham, Rutland.
The church contains memorials to George and Mary Tennyson, who were the grandparents of the poet Alfred Lord Tennyson. The family were influential in the village, and George and Mary’s second son, Charles Tennyson D’Eyncourt, built a 60-room stately home nearby, called Bayons Manor; destroyed in 1964 after falling into disrepair. He also built the village primary school in 1856; its hammer-beamed roof modelled on Westminster Hall. The school is still in use, with its distinctive white bell tower piercing the sky above the roof tops.
Perfectly kept cottage gardens have roses scrambling over picket fences and
growing through iron railings, with fragrant sweet peas, lavender and herbs. The River Rase flows through the village, and Beck Hill Ford, at the bottom of steep Beck Hill, provides a crossing point and a refreshing paddling place in crystal waters. The river has been a major influence for 800 years, with water power providing an essential resource for industry. Up to 15 watermills operated in the village from the early 17th century to the 1830s, and were used for grinding corn, tanning leather, processing wool and making paper.
The community-run Tealby Village Shop sells local produce, such as honey and Lincoln Russet beef. Cakes, lunches and cream teas are available at the quaint Tea Rooms, and the thatched Kings Head pub, one of the oldest in the country, is a tranquil place to enjoy a cool drink outside on the lawn.
Willingham Woods is three miles away; home to deer, foxes, squirrels and bats. There are waymarked trails for easy exploration, and the area provides a shady and peaceful spot in which to while away the hours. With the hum of bees buzzing over a profusion of wild flowers in the long grass, a summer day spent exploring the peaceful Lincolnshire Wolds remains a timeless pleasure.