England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
North Ormsby St Helen

The Parish

The parish of North Ormsby lies in northeastern Lincolnshire about 5 miles northwest of the market town of Louth. There is not much to North Ormsby, just a hamlet with a scatter of farms and cottages lying about a mile west of the A16 road which connects Louth with the port of Grimsby. North Ormsby shows signs of having been cleared of its village to support the privacy of the Gilbertine priory established a little further up its valley. Much of North Ormsby is built along a dead-end lane that eventually runs out as a track leading past that Abbey site. The area would have been, and still is, largely dominated by arable farming on the edges of the Lincolnshire Wolds. North Ormsby is drained by a small stream which would have reached the North Sea at Grainthorpe Haven, now downstream much interfered with by manmade drainage and reclamation. North Ormsby is sited at around 60 metres above the sea but land rises to the Lincolnshire Wolds to its west with local heights reaching almost 130 metres, the landscape is gently rolling. North Ormsby parish was fairly typically sized for its area, it covered just over 1,600 acres and would have supported a population just over 100 parishioners. In Domesday times North Ormsby was a more substantial place, shared 3 ways between Drogo of La Beuvriere, Ivo Tallboys and the Bishop of Lincoln it could offer 7 ploughs as well as meadows and woodlands.

The Church

St Helen's church was deconsecrated in 1981 and is now a private house with no public access. The church sits on the lane rising up the southern side of the parish's valley and is set back from the right-angle bend that lane forms. The church is not a mediaeval one having been completely rebuilt in 1848 in an Early English Gothic style typical of the late 13th century. The church consisted of a simple nave & chancel with a bellcote on the western gable end. Adequate views and discrete photographs can be made from the nearby lane.