The Green, Haddenham (RGL2025)

Haddenham Data

Mike Petty's Haddenham Scrapbook

Charles Bester gives a detailed description of the village in the Lorna Delanoy archive. Much of the archive includes descriptions and references to Haddenham.

Other publications with detailed descriptions of the village include:

Rural Reflections by Valerie Bloye, 2005. Interviews with numerous peope including: William Hitch, Pam Turner, Kevin Wolstenholmes, David Goddard, Joan Wood, Phyllis Markwell, Barbara Fairchild, Joan Hamence, Jake Allsop, David Pollard, Mary Peck, Moe Summerfield, Dennis Sampford, Eric Allsop,  Trevor Ward, Terry Foster, Moira Goddard, Maureen Kerslake, Cecil Burton, Ray Cross, Sid Burgess, Edna Burgess, Joyce Foreman, Robert Norman, Janet Markwell, David Fairchild, Harold Freeman, Richard Battersby, Alan Battersby, Betty Riley, Joyce Thulbon, Kath Peacock, David Hammond, Richard Papworth, Norman Gillett, Jean Gledenning, Lorna Delanoy, Janie Gothard, Stephen Alsop, Shirley Connolly, Caroline Furlong, Erika Wedgwood, Kim Mitchell, Bernie Dennis, Freda Crofts, Richard Johnson …

Sid’s life story from 5-3-29, the biography of Sid Burgess 2020

Haddenham’s Heritage, Valerie Bloye 2004. This is largely  about the people and places associated with the Methodist church in Haddenham. It includes numerous interviews with many different ministers and members of the congregation.

Loyal Sons and True WW! WW2 Haddenham’s War Memorials, Rosemary Ann Gorman. List of victims of WWI and WWII can be found on entry Haddenham War Memorial.

Life and Memories, Ray Cross, 2012. Ray describes how he went to school in Haddenham during WWII before his parents moved to Elton. He moved back to Haddenham with his mother after the death of his father in 1949. Ray worked on the Salmons farm fro six years. He married in 1954 and carried on living in Haddenham.

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1994 This is a recording of Lorna Delanoy giving a walking tour of Haddenham to members of the Burwell WI in July 1994. The original recording was an .wma file. This has been converted to .mp3 and cleaned by Chatgpt. The sound quality at the beginning is poor but it does improve!

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1798 the Methodist preacher Thomas Pinder visited and received a very rough reception at the hands of a mob led by the local clergy. he was sheltered by the aunt of the noted attorney, Mr Serjeant Matthews and was able to move on to Histon. (See History of Methodism in Cambridge by F Tice, 1966)

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The wagon belonged to Eliot Hugh Robinson of South Place, built by Fuller & Sons of St Ives for £18.

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https://archive.org/details/HaddenhamScrapbook18971990

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Postcard sent to Miss Burton, High Street, Haddenham in 1911:

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See chapter 8 of The Winter Fens, pub. 1993, by Edward Storey. There is reference to a booklet called ‘Recollections of a Country Woman, 1908-1980, by Mabel Demaine, who had spent most of her life in Haddenham.

See also chapter 12 about the 1947 floods at Haddenham.

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The Medieval Village at Days Drove
Letter to Lorna Delanoy dated c.1992–93

“The site of the old medieval village could always be seen at the bottom of Mill Field, particularly at the time of ploughing when bits and pieces of broken pots and building material would come to light.”

Commentary
This appears to preserve local knowledge about a deserted settlement site near Days Drove. It would be worth comparing with archaeological records and cropmark evidence.

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Discovery of a Bellarmine Jar
Letter to Lorna Delanoy dated c.1992–93

“It was spring-time, after deep ploughing on that site that my mother found a piece of earthenware jug which depicted the face of a bearded man… Nearly fifty years later I learnt that the curious feature of the bearded man was the portrait of supposedly Cardinal Bellarmine… they were known as ‘Bellarmine Jars’.”

Commentary
A fascinating story combining childhood memory, archaeology and European trade. The object links Haddenham directly to seventeenth-century Rhineland pottery imports.

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Wells, Pumps and Water Supply
Letter to Lorna Delanoy dated 27 September 2000

“The most simple type of pump which was in common usage from the early middle ages, and again back to Roman times, was the ‘Common Pump’.”

Commentary
Part of a lengthy discussion of wells, springs and water supplies around Haddenham. This material could be extremely useful for local environmental history.

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The Loss of Living Memory
Letter to Lorna Delanoy dated 27 September 2000

“Living memory will soon have gone, as much has gone already… Thus we lose that ancient character of a village which made it the place we were brought up in,—and not so very different from how it always was the centuries before us.”

Commentary
This is perhaps the key statement in the entire collection. The writer sees himself as recording memories before they disappear and recognises the importance of preserving ordinary village experience.

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Charles Bester
Letter to Lorna Delanoy dated 20 August 1991

“It was something else, and maybe of greater importance to me, to be able to see and talk with you again, in the presence of that great man, Charles Bester!”

Commentary
This suggests that Charles Bester was regarded as one of Haddenham’s principal memory-keepers and local historians. The remark gives insight into who was considered important within the village’s historical community in the early 1990s.

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