This site is dedicated to all those who so willingly help with my research, and to those ancestors of ours who lived at some stage in the villages of East Rudham, West Rudham or Pockthorpe in the county of Norfolk.
The site is divided into a number of different areas, allowing you to search on a specific property, a family name, or a time period. It also has an area for asking others about specific queries or answering these if you can.
Its an ongoing work in progress site as every day more and more information comes to light and keeping up with it is hard work, but please bear with me.
If you have any queries regarding the site, the village, the families or the history, please don't hesitate to email me.
Regards
Paul
The site and the work that goes into gathering the data is taking up more and more time, to a point its difficult to sustain freely. If you'd like to make a donation towards the effort spent working on this data, however small, we'd appreciate it. Thanks.
I keep getting asked why. Why on earth is a bloke in Blackpool UK interested in a little village in Norfolk.
Here's the reasons.....look out for the hidden one!
My Great Grandmother lived to the ripe old age of 95, was totally with it to the end, smoked 5 Senior Service every night before bed, and was certainly the centre of my maternal family.
After she passed away we discovered a vast amount of documentation regarding her family. Much of it centered on her husband who came from Grantham, but all the really old stuff came from Rudham. In these boxes we discovered photographs, old land transactions, deeds and various index's of the village, plus a massive Family Bible. And so, I started to trace my own family tree, back in 1977.
It wasn't long before pulling out these old documents, I realised I needed to know who my Great, Great Grandfather sold land to, and why. Who was Richard Black, who was the butcher standing in the doorway, etc. and so I opened up my tree to anyone who had lived in the village. The obvious way to their data, was through living descendants who had an interest in Genealogy, and so I opened up a site on the internet, in a very basic form seeking these people out. The database grew from 1,000 entries on my personal tree, to 32,000 Rudham ancestors and descendants and there it remained for a good number of years, before a change in occupation and time restraints allowed me to continue.
Now, I run a hotel with my partner Toni. During the winter months, and often during the week I find enough time to dedicate myself to the project, and so decided to launch a new site, with my basic web skills, to try to find even more answers. I visited Rudham, not for the first time, but this time armed with handouts, visiting every home, and seeking out those who had lived in the village all, or nearly all, their lives. I talked to people who remembered my great grandparents, had more photographs, documents and memories. I saw where my family used to live, I imagined the walks they used to make, to see other family members, to shop, to visit the local markets, and even just to go to Church.
I also saw a village with a tremendous amount of history. Much I knew about, but little things like the markings on the bricks, made over 100 years ago now meant something to me, I recognised names from etchings. The most incredible experience was had on the top of the church tower. Up there it seemed as if the entire village had at one time left their mark in the lead roof, and for 10 minutes I stood there and wondered if I should add my name to the list. It just wasn't right to do so.
But I also saw that something was about to be lost forever. The people from this village walked to find a wife. They married others from within a 20 mile circumference. They worked in the local fields, mills and villages. Some might travel to Norwich, Kings Lynn, maybe even as far as London, but they came back within a few days to their homes. Now, the fabric of the village is changing. People from London are buying the houses, they work miles away and commute daily. By the time they get home all they want to do is watch a bit of TV and go to bed. The names on the photographs of football teams, bowls clubs and cricketters change every year now, and the threads of old village names are dying out. One church is now empty, my Great Grandmothers grave is totally lost in 5 foot of brambles, and the other one seems to survive on special occasions. The shops have nearly all gone now. Those that remain are part time remnants of what they used to be. 10 pubs is now 3, maybe 2, maybe 1 soon.
Small one up, one down houses are being knocked around by people looking for more space to live in. Some without any regard for the history, others trying to base it on the history, but all of them changing what was there for something else they personally wish to create. Historic buildings were vanishing infront of me and I was only there for a week! Every single house I visited had either been "modernised" or was about to be due to age of occupant, or the condition of the building. Rudham was fundamentally loosing everything I could imagine it ever had. Close families, a community, a sense of belonging to somewhere very special. I fell in love with the village, not with what its becoming, but with what I could see it had been once.
