All Saints, Elm

All Saints, Elm

Listed Building:

Fine parish church, early and late C13 with a C15 hammer beam roof. Only minor C19 restorations and additions. West tower, early C13 of coursed Barnack ashlar.

Seven table tombs, mid and late C18 to Blackborn and Jenkinson families. Limestone. One with shaped ends and inverted scroll brackets to corners. Bolection moulded and raised and fielded panels to sides and a shallow round-headed niche to one end with a weeper. Another is similar but rectangular and has the bolection moulded panels divided by a panel of fruit and foliage. The corners have similar ornament and at the end a panel with other emblems of mortality. A third tomb is probably late C18 or early C19, and neoclassical in style.(i) Headstone, early C18. William Tomson, 1696, and Ann, his wife. Probably Ketton. Winged cherub’s head above square panel with moulded edge and scrolled sides.

(ii) Headstone, Thomas Marshall, 1782. Limestone. Segmental head with two winged cherubs’ heads flanking an urn with a skull. Hour-glass, a serpent engulfing its tail and enclosing a crown are symbols
respectively of mortality, eternity and victory. Below is a circular
panel for the inscription with moulded edge, flanked by drops of fruit and foliage.

(iii) Headstone, late C18 to another member of Marshall family. Limestone. Engaged Corinthian columns with entablature and shaped pediment. In the tympanum is a coffin, partially shrouded in drapery. Below a circular panel for the inscription, now almost indecipherable, with a moulded edge and flowers to the spandrels.

(iv) Headstone, similar to (iii) and also to another member of Marshall family.

(v) Headstone, mid C18. Limestone. Two engaged Corinthian columns with entablature and shaped pediment having in the tympanum an angel holding a trumpet and a crown, both symbols of victory and the Ressurrection. Circular panel for inscription with leaf and foliate ornament.

(vi) Headstone, mid C18. Limestone. Winged cherub’s head above cartouche with border of C-scrolls.

(vii) Headstone, late C18. Limestone. Two Corinthian pilasters carved with drops of fruit and flowers, with segmental pediment with a glory of a winged cherub’s head in the tympanum. Below is circular panel with inscription with border of husk ornament and foliage, skull and flowers in spandrels.

(viii) Headstone, 1734. Limestone carved in bold relief. Segmental head with a glory of three winged cherubs’ heads with the centre cherub supporting, with its wings, a draped curtain bearing the inscription in low relief.

(ix) Headstone, Will. Goddard, 1758. Limestone. Engaged Corinthian columns with entablature and segmental pediment with angel trumpeter and three winged cherubs’ heads in a glory. Below in a circular panel for the inscription with foliate and flower ornament, a winged hour-glass and a skull.

(i) Chest tomb, late C18. Limestone. Moulded edge to top and base, with fluted panels to corners and oval tablets for inscriptions in sides with fan motif to spandrels. At one end, a glory above adult female figure of Hope with anchor, an urn partially draped. At other end a swagged and raised curtain above an adult female weeper.
(ii) Chest tomb, similar to (i).

Seven table tombs, mid and late C18 to Blackborn and Jenkinson families. Limestone. One with shaped ends and inverted scroll brackets to corners. Bolection moulded and raised and fielded panels to sides and a shallow round-headed niche to one end with a weeper. Another is similar but rectangular and has the bolection moulded panels divided by a panel of fruit and foliage. The corners have similar ornament and at the end a panel with other emblems of mortality. A third tomb is probably late C18 or early C19, and neoclassical in style.

(Source Historic England)

Mike Petty’s Fenland History noted in 2019:

The now peaceful village of Elm was the centre of uproar in 1881:
There was great parochial unrest when proposals were made to lay a tramline through the village, even a petition sent to Parliament. The tramway was laid from Wisbech to Upwell alongside the canal. Alas neither has survived, the tramway was a victim of Dr Beeching and the canal was filled in when the Anglian Water Authority re-routed the drainage in the fens. Many of the villagers remember the tramway and the canal, which was well used in the past, particularly on Saturday nights when revellers came home from Wisbech by barge, singing all the way! There are of course more houses now, a change from the last century when the scattered cottages all had their own small-holding or at least a large cottage garden. It is still an agricultural area with fruit, vegetables, flowers and grains being harvested throughout the year, but most of the newcomers go further afield to work. Social life centres round the church, church house, four public houses and the three village shops. In the 1920s there were five bakers in the village and the smell of new bread was wonderful! [Cambridgeshire Federation of Women’s Institutes. The Cambridgeshire village book. 1989]

Elm village, c 1920

1910 CDN 25.2.reported: Nearly 1,000 people assembled in a field adjacent to Elm churchyard where the incumbent refused to allow the parents of a young girl to place artificial wreaths. Since then a feeling of indignation has been growing throughout the area. Numerous speeches were made advocating the establishment of a free burial ground for the people of the district. A resolution was passed protesting against the compulsory removal of wreaths and the vicar’s statement that the district was shockingly immoral.