England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Kings Lynn St Nicholas

The Parish

The parish of St Nicholas, King's Lynn occupies the northern portion of the market town & port, technically St Nicholas was a chapel of ease rather than a parish in ecclesiastical terms. King's Lynn sits in western Norfolk at the mouth of the River Great Ouse roughly 44 miles west of the city of Norwich and some 97 miles north of London. King's Lynn sits on the route of the A47 road which crosses the county from west to east connecting King's Lynn with both Norwich and also with its eastern port of Great Yarmouth. King's Lynn acquired its royal prefix as a result of Henry VIII's monastic changes, acquiring royal control of what before had been known as Lynn Epicopi. Medieval King's Lynn occupied a small area of the eastern bank of the Great Ouse, protected to the east by a town wall complete with 9 bastions. In 1146 new lands were exploited to the north a the Purfleet, which once formed the northern boudary, these lands being appropriated as St Nicholas. King's Lynn has two distinctive roles within its county, besides functioning as the principal market town for western Norfolk, offering the usual market and specialist trades unable to be supported in villages, King's Lynn is a major port, and was once of national importance for that role. The trade with near Europe, dominated by importation of timber from Scandinavia and wine & brandy from France and Iberia, was augmented by export of the region's rich agricultural produce as well as the product of the area's rich weaving tradition. King's Lynn was also a centre for fishing, at one time it also had a whaling fleet, and the local area of The Wash abounded with shrimp & other shell-fisheries too. King's Lynn's importance as a port faded in time, largely due to the difficulties of maintaining a channel with constantly shifting sands around The Wash requiring extensive dredging, today King's Lynn remains a small port and an important market with light industry supporting many too. The town has expanded greatly in modern times becoming contiguous with the villages of North Wootton and Gaywood into an area encompassing ove 4 miles from north to south. Major developments have come to King's Lynn, a railway connection to London being an early improvement, the former Midland & Great Northern line cross-county to Norwich, has disappeared and west of the town it now forms the route of the A17, Washway. As King's Lynn sits at the confluence of not only the Great Ouse but also the Nar it is drained the short distance to the North Sea through The Wash. Virtually all of the town lies lower than the 10 metres contour, much at sea-level, itself, inland the land rises only gently to local heights of still lower than 20 metres within a couple of miles. St Nicholas chapel's area of influence covered the north of the town and  was a mere few blocks of densely packed streets within which a substantial population of more than 2,000 would have resided. In Domesday times King's Lynn was already a substantial settlement, shared by no fewer than 5 landholders it could offer just 5 ploughs but had an impressive 10 salt-houses, a mark of its importance as a port even in those early days

The Church

St Nicholas' church sits in northern "old" King's Lynn on the eastern side of St Ann's Street and opposite St Nicholas' Street. St Nicholas is immense its dimension staggering, a full 203 feet in length with 11 bays across the undivided nave and chancel. With the exception of the southwestern tower that whole edifice was built as a single act in the early 15th century in the Perpendicular style. The exception to that construction phase is the earlier southwestern tower which, strangely, sits lower than the main body of the church. Given a date of c1225 by Pevsner it is in the Early English Gothic style, the tower has, however, had a few changes, evidence that it was increased in height is assigned a date of c1275 whilst the original spire collapsed in 1741 and was only rebuilt in 1869. The main feature of the church, however, is the impressive main body, a complete and largely unaltered set of bays topped with a clerestory that stretches on into the distance when viewed from the roadside.Victorian alterations were few beyond adding today's spire and the splendour of the Perpendicular remains unabashed as a result. St Nicholas has an urban setting with only sparse parking immediately around it, a town car park is recommended. That urban setting also impedes the ability to draw away sufficiently to encompass a true landscape format image, there is simply insufficient ground in which to do so.