Capturing Cambridge
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Wood Ditton, tombstone 1929 (photo W M Palmer) (Cambridgeshire Collection)

St Mary, Woodditton

History of St Mary

Listed Building

Parish church. Earliest surviving structure early C13, two and half bays of north arcade, extended later in C13 or early C14. Chancel and south nave arcade rebuilt in mid C14. Tower and south porch C15; clerestorey late C15.

This is the burial place of William Simonds:

Notable Epitaphs in Cambridgeshire II: from Leaflets of Local Lore by Urbs Camboritum (Cambs Collection)

William Simonds’s epitaph:

Here lies my corpse who as the man

That lovd a so in a dripping pan:

But now believe me I am dead,

Now here the pan stands at my head.

Still for sop to the last I cry’d

But could not  eat and so I died.

My neighbours they perhaps may laugh

Now they do read my epitaph.

In the old burial ground to the west of the tower “The Dripping Pan Headstone” displayed its locally famous inscription ….. (R H Vincent, A Tanner Will Do)

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Licence

This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Dear Visitor,

Thank you for exploring historical Cambridgeshire! We hope you enjoy your visit and, if you do,  would consider making a donation today.

Capturing Cambridge makes accessible thousands of photos and memories of Cambridge and its surrounding villages and towns. It is run by the Museum of Cambridge which, though 90 years old, is one of the most poorly publicly funded local history museums in the UK. It receives no core funding from local or central government nor from the University of Cambridge.

As a result, we are facing a crisis; we have no financial cushion – unlike many other museums in Cambridge – and are facing the need to drastically cut back our operations which could affect our ability to continue to run and develop this groundbreaking local history website.

If Capturing Cambridge matters to you, then the survival of the Museum of the Cambridge should matter as well. If you won’t support the preservation of your heritage, no-one else will! Your support is critical.

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Thank you,
Roger Lilley, Chair of Trustees
Museum of Cambridge