|
|
|
|
|
BODNEY parish has only one house and a few cottages, on the east side of a rivulet, 7 miles S. of Swaffham. It is in Swaffham union and county court district, Lynn bankruptcy district, South Greenhoe petty sessional division, South Greenhoe hundred, Watton polling district of West Norfolk, Cranwich rural deanery, and Norfolk archdeaconry. It had 103 inhabitants in 1881, living on 2605 acres, and has a rateable value of £1212 7s.3d. It all belongs to William Amherst Tyssen Amherst, Esq., M.P., who is lord of the manor.
The large farmhouse is occupied by Mr. Walter Wortley Flatt. It stands near the site of the old hall, which was taken down many years ago, and was at one time the tranquil retreat of the nuns of Montargis, among whom Eloise Adelaide de Bourbon, daughter of the Prince of Condé, took the veil here on July 9, 1805.
The CHURCH is a small ancient fabric of flint and pebbles, and was thoroughly restored in 1879 by the lord of the manor. The seats in the nave were brought from Tottenhill Church. The living is a discharged rectory, valued in the King's Book at £6 7s.8d., and consolidated with Great Cressingham, in the gift of the Lord Chancellor, and held by the Rev. Henry Stewart Fagan, M.A.
The school is held in a cottage near the church.
POST via Hilborough, 1½ miles distant; no delivery to Bodney. Letters for the hall should be addressed Bodney Hall, Hilborough R.S.O. Mundford is the nearest Money Order Office, four miles.
Flatt Walter Wortley farmer, Bodney hall Sayer George parish clerk & sexton
Copyright © Pat Newby.
April 1999