Great Bealings is a small village in
Suffolk, England. It has about 302 people living in it in around 113 households. Its nearest towns are
Ipswich ( away) and
Woodbridge (). Nearby villages include
Little Bealings
Little Bealings is a village in Suffolk, England. It has a population of approximately 470 people living in around 185 households. The population had fallen to 420 at the 2011 Census. Its nearest towns are Ipswich ( away) and Woodbridge ( awa ...
,
Playford,
Culpho,
Hasketon
Hasketon is a village and civil parish in the East Suffolk District of Suffolk, England.
Its church, St. Andrews, is one of 38 existing round-tower churches in Suffolk. St. Andrews stands more or less at the centre of its scattered parish, and ...
and
Grundisburgh. The village does not have an obvious centre, and the population is split between two areas — one around Lower Street to the East of the village, and the other at Boot Street/Grundisburgh Road to the West of the village. St Mary's, the village church, is about in the middle of these two centres of population.
The village shares a playing field with Little Bealings, which is located behind the joint Village Hall, and includes a grassed plateau, a fenced and hard surfaced multi-sports court, children's play equipment, and a
boules
''Boules'' () is a collective name for a wide range of games similar to bowls and bocce (In French: jeu or jeux, in Croatian: boćanje and in Italian: gioco or giochi) in which the objective is to throw or roll heavy balls (called in France, ...
piste. It is named after
John Ganzoni, Lord Belstead, who lived in the village for many years, and whose Charitable Trust Fund supported the project.
The River Lark passes through the middle of the village, and is crossed by the main road with a
humpback bridge
A humpback bridge (or hump bridge) is a name for a type of bridge, specifically an arch bridge, where the span is higher than the ramps on either side, forming a hump-like arrangement. Examples include Chinese and Japanese moon bridge
A moon ...
.
[Great Bealings History](_blank)
/ref>
History
In the Domesday Book there is mention of the Saxon Hall, owned by Halden, with Anund the priest in attendance. This was on the meadow by the church and was owned by several families such as the de Peche, Clench, and Majors, who knocked it down in 1775 to use the material to aid the construction of Bealings House.
The village has always had a strong agricultural
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people ...
base with several small farm
A farm (also called an agricultural holding) is an area of land that is devoted primarily to agricultural processes with the primary objective of producing food and other crops; it is the basic facility in food production. The name is used f ...
s. In White's gazetteer of Suffolk in 1855, the listed tradesmen are: brickmaker, two boot makers, builder, wheelwright
A wheelwright is a craftsman who builds or repairs wooden wheels. The word is the combination of "wheel" and the word "wright", (which comes from the Old English word "''wryhta''", meaning a worker or shaper of wood) as in shipwright and ark ...
, blacksmith, gardener, shopkeeper, and miller as well as several farmers and gentlemen.
Historical writings
In 1870–72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described the village as:
: ''BEALINGS (Great), a parish in Woodbridge district, Suffolk; on a branch of the Deben river, and on the East Suffolk railway, near Bealings station, 2¼. miles W by S of Woodbridge. Post Town, Little Bealings, under Woodbridge. Acres, 1,029. Real property, £2,091. Pop., 338. Houses, 88. The property is divided among a few; and much of it belongs to-Lord Henniker. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Norwich
The Diocese of Norwich is an ecclesiastical jurisdiction or diocese of the Church of England that forms part of the Province of Canterbury in England.
History
It traces its roots in an unbroken line to the diocese of the Bishop of the East ...
. Value, £250.* Patron, Lord Henniker. The church is good.''
In 1887, John Bartholomew
John Bartholomew (25 December 1831 – 29 March 1893) was a Scottish cartographer.
Life
Bartholomew was born in Edinburgh, Scotland. His father, John Bartholomew Sr., started a cartographical establishment in Edinburgh, and he was educated ...
also wrote an entry on Great Bealings in the Gazetteer of the British Isles with a much shorter description:
: ''Bealings, Great, par., E. Suffolk, 2½ miles W. of Woodbridge, 1036 ac., pop. 287.''
Notable residents
*The Seckford family had been landowners in the time of Edward I
Edward I (17/18 June 1239 – 7 July 1307), also known as Edward Longshanks and the Hammer of the Scots, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 1272 to 1307. Concurrently, he ruled the duchies of Aquitaine and Gascony as a vassal ...
, with local benefactor Thomas Seckford
Thomas Seckford Esquire (1515 – 1587) was a senior lawyer, a "man of business" at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, a landowner of the armigerous Suffolk gentry, Member of Parliament,M.K. Dale, 'Seckford (Sakford), Thomas (1515/16-87), of Gray' ...
rebuilding Seckford Hall
Seckford Hall is a Tudor period house in Seckford Hall Road, Great Bealings, near Woodbridge, Suffolk. The hall is now a hotel.
The hall was constructed in the 1530s as the family home of Thomas Seckford. It is built of local brick in two store ...
as the country residence in 1530. He was a close advisor to Elizabeth I. His parents are buried in Great Bealings Church.
*Admiral Pelham Aldrich, who was Admiral-superintendent, Portsmouth
The Admiral-superintendent, Portsmouth was the Royal Navy officer in command of the Naval Dockyard. Portsmouth from 1832 to 1971; prior to this date a resident Commissioner of the Navy Board had had oversight of the yard, since 1649. In May 1971 co ...
, and attended several surveying expeditions around the world, was a resident and is buried in the churchyard and became the namesake of Mount Aldrich
Mount Aldrich () is a massive, somewhat flat-topped mountain standing at the east side of Ragotzkie Glacier in Britannia Range. Discovered by the ''Discovery'' expedition (1901–04) and named for Admiral Pelham Aldrich
Admiral Pelham Aldrich, ...
.
*Major Edward Moor. He served with the East India Company, being wounded three times, rising to the rank of brevet-captain. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society and an author on Indian mythology. He wrote the mystery, ''Bealings Bells'', published in 1841, about an apparently haunted system of bell-pulls. In the 1820s, with the help of his son the Reverend Edward James Moor, he built a low pyramid southeast of Bealings House, about ten feet (three metres) high, of mixed found materials (including mill-wheels) but incorporating at the apex the triple-headed figure of Shiva and in a niche the seated figure of Brahma
Brahma ( sa, ब्रह्मा, Brahmā) is a Hindu god, referred to as "the Creator" within the Trimurti, the trinity of supreme divinity that includes Vishnu, and Shiva.Jan Gonda (1969)The Hindu Trinity Anthropos, Bd 63/64, H 1/2, pp. 21 ...
. These were found by Moor on Malabar Point, Bombay
Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second- ...
, and appear to be 11th century. His son-in-law William Page Wood, 1st Baron Hatherley PC, a lawyer and statesman who served as a Liberal Lord Chancellor from 1868 to 1872 in William Ewart Gladstone
William Ewart Gladstone ( ; 29 December 1809 – 19 May 1898) was a British statesman and Liberal politician. In a career lasting over 60 years, he served for 12 years as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, spread over four non-conse ...
's first ministry, is buried in the churchyard.
*General Sir Richard Thomas Farren GCB, a British Army
The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gur ...
officer who became General Officer Commanding Eastern District lived in Bealings House form before 1891 and was buried in the churchyard on 4 January 1910 aged 92 years. There is a memorial to him within the church.
* Winifred Beech, the author and wife of Sir John Fortescue, was born in Great Bealings rectory, the daughter of Rector Howard Beech, in 1888.
* John Ganzoni, 2nd Baron Belstead, Baron Ganzoni PC, a Conservative politician and peer who served as Leader of the House of Lords
The leader of the House of Lords is a member of the Cabinet of the United Kingdom who is responsible for arranging government business in the House of Lords. The post is also the leader of the majority party in the House of Lords who acts as ...
under Margaret Thatcher from 1988 to 1990, is buried in the churchyard.
* Cynthia Cooke (1919-2016), military nurse and nursing administrator who served as Matron-in-Chief of the Queen Alexandra's Royal Naval Nursing Service, the nursing branch of the Her Majesty's Naval Service
His Majesty's Naval Service is the United Kingdom's naval warfare and maritime service. It consists of the Royal Navy, Royal Marines, Royal Fleet Auxiliary, Royal Naval Reserve, Royal Marines Reserve and Naval Careers Service. The term Naval Se ...
. She was appointed a Commander of the Order of St John in 1974, and a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1975 Birthday Honours
The Queen's Birthday Honours 1975 were appointments in many of the Commonwealth realms of Queen Elizabeth II to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of those countries. They were published on 6 June 1975 for ...
.
Rectors of the Parish
Plaques in the church list the following Rectors:
:
Images of Great Bealings
Image:GreatBealingsChurch.JPG, St Mary's church from over the Lark
Image:GreatBealingsChurchClose.JPG, And from its churchyard
Image:BealingsOldVicarage.JPG, The old vicarage - Lord Belstead's home until his death
Image:BealingsBridge.JPG, The hump-backed bridge
Image:BealingsLarkFromBridge.JPG, The River Lark from the bridge
Image:BealingsWarMemorial.JPG, The war memorial
Related pages
*Little Bealings
Little Bealings is a village in Suffolk, England. It has a population of approximately 470 people living in around 185 households. The population had fallen to 420 at the 2011 Census. Its nearest towns are Ipswich ( away) and Woodbridge ( awa ...
*Bealings railway station
Bealings railway station was a station in Little Bealings, Suffolk on the line between Ipswich and Lowestoft. It was down the line from Ipswich. While the station was shut on 17 September 1956, the line remains open, and both the station build ...
*Seckford Hall
Seckford Hall is a Tudor period house in Seckford Hall Road, Great Bealings, near Woodbridge, Suffolk. The hall is now a hotel.
The hall was constructed in the 1530s as the family home of Thomas Seckford. It is built of local brick in two store ...
External links
The Great Bealings web site
The Weather from Great Bealings
References
{{Authority control
Villages in Suffolk
Civil parishes in Suffolk