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Wigsthorpe
Wigsthorpe maps
Historic maps of Wigsthorpe and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Wigsthorpe maps
Wigsthorpe photos
We have no photos of Wigsthorpe, although we do have photos of these nearby places:
Oundle| Thrapston| Old Weston| Islip| Lowick| Denford| Raunds| Spaldwick
Wigsthorpe area books
Displaying 1 of 10 books about Wigsthorpe and the local area. View all books for this area
You can read extracts and browse photos from these books.
Memories of Wigsthorpe
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Cambridgeshire memories
Thrapston And Stoke Doyle Memories
My grandad was George Pears, the local dentist from Laburnum House Bridge Street (now part of the Bridge Hotel). My dad was Bill Pears who lived there with his dad George, his mum Evelyn (nee Abbott) and his brother Bob and sister Jean. My sister Susan was born there in 1947, brother Mick was born in Brigstock Nursing Home in 1952, sister Kerry was born in Thrapston in 1955 and sister Jill was born in 1956 at Church Lane Stoke Doyle where we moved in approx 1954 after also living at 30 Highfield Rd Thrapston. Sue and I went to Thrapston Top School and then to Stoke Doyle primary school which closed approx 1954 and then to Oundle jnr school which is now an estate agent's saleroom behind the vet's. Sue & I have just returned from our 1st visit to Thrapston in over 25 years and in lots of ways it's still very much the same but we also remember places like the Swan ( where the fire station... Read more
Oundle Junior School > Corby Grammar School
Around this time I passed the 11 plus and attended Corby Grammar School. In the same class from Oundle, I fondly remember Sheelagh Rowbottom and Susan Essam. Other names I remember from Corby School itself are Maureen Bosworth, Mick Page and Philip Blowfield.
The Black Swan (Pub)
Old Weston & the Black Swan.
My first memory of Old Weston was back in 1955 and actually when the picture of the Black Swan was taken. I was stationed at RAF Molesworth from March 1955 to March 1957. This was one of the first pubs I went to after arriving in England that year. I have since visited Old Weston in 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005 and have visited Old Weston on every trip. The pub is now called The Swan. Lots of good memories from back then and always enjoyed visiting the area.
The Swan
I became landlady of The White Swan as it was then, with my husband Gordon, who has since died. It had previously been run as an up market restaurant, but had not been successful. We concentrated on the village life, bringing the community together. Introduced bar skittles, darts, and instead of the restaurant, kept to plain English home-made cooking. We always had a themed New Year party, and people would be queueing outside on a Saturday night. The hardest three years work of my life, and while there were many happy memories, there were more unhappy ones. I was so glad to leave it. I have visited only once since, in the mid 90s. I may be tempted to do so again, but I doubt it. I am glad the new owners are making a success of it, but they are more than welcome to it.
Hales Family
My dad was born in the village in 1927 in a cottage in Sheep Street. The Hales family have lived in the village for a number of generations until the 1960s. The churchyard is a testament to this as there are a number of gravestones with the family name on. I remember visiting the village as a child and walking from the main road where the bus dropped us up the hill to the village sometimes using a footpath across fields. My dad's family had moved to a cottage on The Avenue behind the war memorial, and as a child I can't remember venturing far from this. The other side of the cottage was used by a men's temperance group that didn't frequent the pub! We make regular visits to the village and each time my dad shares another memory of his childhood, maybe about his schooldays at the village school or visits to the pub with his grandad. He was brought up by his grandparents as his... Read more
Sawtry 1901 And 1968
Somehow fate seems to draw me to places where some of my ancestors have been living, yet I was born in London. In 1968 I bought a house in Sawtry, off St. Judith's Lane, and where I lived until returning to Sweden in 1974. Now, thanks to the Internet I have discovered that my grandmother Jane's older sister Charlotte Braybrook, née Fairey, had a daughter Gertrude Annie, who, in 1894, married one, Joe Chamberlain. And yes, he was born in 1870 - in Sawtry St. Judith, and in 1901 Joe and Gertrude were living there. Unfortunately there is no further information available as yet regarding them, although I gather there is still someone of the name Chamberlain resident in Sawtry.
Despite having lived many years in Sweden, there have been links to various places in England, and places I have either visited or lived where others of my family have resided, and at the time I have known absolutely nothing of their existence or connections.
Fate moves in mysterious ways.... Read more
Spaldwick Windmill & The Belton Family
The Belton family has a long association with Spaldwick as millers, witnessed by a hill being in the family name, (O.S. map 153), just north of the village.
My mother's sister Violet Bass, from nearby Kimbolton, was married to John Belton.
John, my uncle, inherited the windmill as well as a further windmill at Alconbury and a *water driven mill at Houghton, now owned by the National Trust. The Belton family had a very healthy corn milling business in this area of Huntingdonshire, (sad that it had to be gobbled up by Cambs.). I have documents associated with the business as well as John's 'verge' pocket watch, which formerly belonged to a "Charles" Belton, (father?). I have also, letters written to John's mother when he was in France in WW1 and a number of French embroidered postcards which were popular with soldiers.
Why 1955? Well it was around this time that I visited the mill as a teenager and was saddened to see it in its dilapidated state. The... Read more
