Roy's blog: CAMBRIDGESHIRE

CAMBRIDGE is of course the home of the famous university founded in the 13th century and situated on the River Cam. Student recreation lies very much on 'The Backs' where lovely gardens and lawns slope down to the river

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre on the corner of Round Church Street and Bridge Street is a Grade 1 listed building indeed known as The Round Church.
It was built around 1130 and its shape was inspired by the rotunda of the church of the same name in Jerusalem. Now redundant, the church is managed by Christian Heritage and is open to the public.

One of the claimants to being the oldest inn in England, The Ferry Boat Inn stands, thatch- roofed and proud, on the banks of the Great Ouse at HOLYWELL near St Ives. Be prepared for a shock when you enter the bar for there is a gravestone set into the floor!

The story goes that more than 1,000 years ago, local girl Juliet Tewsley was spurned by one Thomas Roul, with whom she was smitten. The girl is said to have hanged herself near to the inn and, as a suicide was denied burial in consecrated ground, so she sleeps under the gravestone inside the inn. It is not clear why the grave should be inside, but it is claimed that on the anniversary of her death, 17^th March, she walks in search of her lost love. A good time to capture the spirit of over a thousand years!

A 14^th century bridge over the River Ouse links the towns of HUNTINGDON and GOLDMANCHESTER, but only just! Apparently it was a case of ‘ guess and hope for the best’ when it was built because work on building this bridge started on both sides of the river at the same time and without a common plan. Luckily the builders managed to make a sort of connection but, if you look closely, you will see a severe kink towards the centre of the bridge.

STILTON is a village now by-passed by the modern A1 road. The village gave its name to the famous Stilton Cheese.

Wikipedia tells us :

Stilton is an English cheese, produced in two varieties: Blue known for its characteristic strong smell and taste, and the lesser-known White. Both Blue Stilton and White Stilton have been granted the status of a protected designation of origin by the European Commission, two of only ten British cheeses currently produced to have such protection.^[1] The PDO status requires that only cheese produced in the three counties of Derbyshire, Leicestershire, and Nottinghamshire and made according to a strict code may be called "Stilton".

According to the Stilton Cheesemaker's Association, the first Englishman to market Blue Stilton cheese was Cooper Thornhill, owner of the Bell Inn on the Great North Road, in the village of Stilton, Huntingdonshire.^[2] Traditional legend has it that in 1730, Thornhill discovered a distinctive blue cheese while visiting a small farm near Melton Mowbray in rural Leicestershire – possibly in Wymondham.^[3] He fell in love with the cheese and made a business arrangement that granted the Bell Inn exclusive marketing rights to Blue Stilton. Soon thereafter, wagon loads of cheese were being delivered to the inn. Since the main stagecoach routes from London to Northern England passed through the village of Stilton he was able to promote the sale of this cheese and the fame of Stilton rapidly spread.

However, the first known written reference to Stilton cheese actually predates this and was in William Stukeley's Itinerarium Curiosum, Letter V, dated October 1722. Daniel Defoe in his 1724 work A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain notes, "We pass'd Stilton, a town famous for cheese, which is call'd our English Parmesan, and is brought to table with the mites, or maggots round it, so thick, that they bring a spoon with them for you to eat the mites with, as you do the cheese."^[4]

Frances Pawlett (or Paulet), a "skilled cheese maker" of Wymondham, has traditionally been credited as the person who set modern Stilton cheese's shape and style characteristics in the 1720s,^[5]^[6] but others have also been named.^[7] The recipe for a Stilton cheese was published by Richard Bradley, first Professor of Botany at Cambridge University in his 1726 book A General Treatise of Husbandry and Gardening. Bradley records a letter from a correspondent, John Warner, which states the cheese is made in Stilton and that the Bell Inn produced "the best cheese in town".^[8]

WANSFORD is an old village on the River Nene situated at the junction of the A1 and the A47 to the west of Peterborough. It is a very pretty village with stone built houses and a very fine stone arched bridge over the river.

The Haycock Hotel is a lovely old coaching hostelry and its colourful signboard tells a very interesting story…. Passers-by on the bridge one morning were most surprised to see a local rustic floating on the water underneath on a hay-cock. Apparently he had been sleeping on the hay during which time it had been swept away by a sudden flood. “Where am I?” he shouted, not knowing how long he had been asleep or how far he had travelled on the hay-cock. When told that he was at Wansford the rustic said, “What, Wansford in England?” The village has been known as ‘Wansford in England’ ever since.

PARSON DROVE is a small fenland village to the West of Wisbech.

There is a fine brick built building with a clock tower on the village green known as The Cage. Built in 1829 it was originally a lock-up to house minor offenders and drunks. In 1897 the clock tower and clock was added to commemorate Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee. The clock turret is of wood with steeply pitched hipped roof and the clock face has the letters
SIXTY YEARS and V.R. in place of numerals.

In later years it was used to house the fire engine and as a Police post.

Fully restored it is now a Grade 11 listed building.

Situated very close to Stamford in Lincolnshire, Burghley House is a grand 16th century country house which was built for Sir William Cecil, Lord High Treasurer to Queen Elizabeth 1.

This Grade 1 listed building is now in the care of a charitable trust

established by the family.