England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Little Saxham St Nicholas

The Parish

The parish of Little Saxham lies in western Suffolk about 4 miles west of the cathedral city of Bury St Edmunds. Little Saxham is a small place a crossroads settlement of a few cottages and farms which sits, in lanes, about a mile and a half south of the busy A14 road which connects the port of Felixstowe through the Midlands. Like most of Suffolk Little saxham, then and now, would have earned its living from arable farming, the parish does, however, show quite significant amounts of woodland which would have been extensively coppiced for fencing materials etc. Little Saxham is drained northwards by a small tributary of the Lark which it joins near to Icklingham, thence across the Fens to join the Great Ouse and the North Sea through The Wash. Little saxham is sited at around 60 metres above the sea and sits in a shallow valley, local heights rise gently to around 100 metres within a couple of miles. This area is dominated by many small parishes and Little Saxham parish was typical of one of these, it covered just under 1,400 acres and would have supported a little over 200 parishioners. In Domesday times Little Saxham was recorded combined with Great Saxham, it is difficult to determine which of the 3 landholders held which portion but collectively King William, Bury St Edmunds Abbey & Count Gilbert's son Richard held 15 ploughs, meadows & woodland and a half share in a mill.

The Church

St Nicholas' church sits in the western side of the main, slightly staggered, crossroads of Little Saxham. The presence of the round tower immediately alerts to an early church and Pevsner notes that this is not only Norman but rates it as "the most spectacular Norman round tower in Suffolk". The topmost portion is indeed a work of great style with the regular arches particularly elegant. Also remaining from the Romanesque period are both southern and northern doorways, the latter albeit has been reused during an intervening restoration. From the traditional church-building periods of the Decorated, the northern aisle, and Perpendicular, the nave and much of the chancel, comes much of the remaining fabric of the building. For once Pevsner does mention a Victorian restoration so any work must have been light or sympathetic. The churchyard is surrounded by mature trees with a small entrance off the lane which leads to Chevington, once through that border the churchyard is relatively open and has few obstructions to photography.