Santon Downham is a village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

in the West Suffolk district of

Suffolk Suffolk ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It is bordered by Norfolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Essex to the south, and Cambridgeshire to the west. Ipswich is the largest settlement and the county ...

in eastern

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. In 2005 it had a population of 240.Estimates of Total Population of Areas in Suffolk
Suffolk County Council The village is located within Thetford Forest on a meander of the

River Little Ouse The River Little Ouse, also known as the Brandon River, is a river in the east of England, a tributary of the River Great Ouse. For much of its length it defines the boundary between Norfolk and Suffolk. It rises east of Thelnetham, close to ...

on the

Norfolk Norfolk ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in England, located in East Anglia and officially part of the East of England region. It borders Lincolnshire and The Wash to the north-west, the North Sea to the north and eas ...

-Suffolk border.

Thetford Thetford is a market town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Breckland District of Norfolk, England. It is on the A11 road (England), A11 road between Norwich and London, just east of Thetford Forest. The civil parish, coverin ...

is southeast and the nearest railway station is in Brandon west.

History

East of England Forestry Commission offices

The village was the administrative centre for the Eastern

Forestry Commission The Forestry Commission is a non-ministerial government department responsible for the management of publicly owned forests and the regulation of both public and private forestry in England. The Forestry Commission was previously also respons ...

for many years, following the planting of tens of thousands of trees in the

Breckland Breckland in Norfolk and Suffolk is a 39,433 hectare Special Protection Area (SPA) under the European Union Directive on the Conservation of Wild Birds. The SPA partly overlaps the 7,544 hectare Breckland Special Area of Conservation. As a la ...

to form the Thetford Forest. The District office and staff were housed in a 1960s office building close to the site of the now-demolished Downham Hall. The Hall garden formed the base for the nursery department of the district. The Forestry Commission repair depot was built close by in an award-winning building, next to which stood the Forestry Commission fire station. A

Bedford Bedford is a market town in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 Census, the population was 106,940. Bedford is the county town of Bedfordshire and seat of the Borough of Bedford local government district. Bedford was founded at a ford (crossin ...

Green Goddess The Green Goddess is the colloquial name for the RLHZ Self Propelled Pump manufactured by Bedford Vehicles, a fire apparatus, fire engine used originally by the Auxiliary Fire Service (AFS), and latterly held in reserve by the Home Office un ...

' fire tender and a water tanker were kept in the fire station due to the high fire risk in the area. In 1972 the bridge over the

appeared in programme 50 of the fifth series of BBC's sitcom ''

Dad's Army ''Dad's Army'' is a British television British sitcom, sitcom about the United Kingdom's Home Guard (United Kingdom), Home Guard during the World War II, Second World War. It was written by Jimmy Perry and David Croft (TV producer), David Crof ...

'', when Captain Mainwaring and his troops attempt to demolish it.

Climate

Santon Downham has an

oceanic climate An oceanic climate, also known as a marine climate or maritime climate, is the temperate climate sub-type in Köppen climate classification, Köppen classification represented as ''Cfb'', typical of west coasts in higher middle latitudes of co ...

(

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (1951–2014), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author ...

: ''Cfb''). On 18 July 2022 a high of 38.1°C was recorded in Santon Downham, making it the hottest place in England and the United Kingdom on that day.

Transport

The Santon Downham Tramway was a 6-kilometre (3.7 mi) long

narrow-gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge (distance between the rails) narrower than . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with tighter curv ...

railway, which was operated around 1918 to 1922.

References

External links

Village websiteVillage Hall websiteParish Council websiteExplore Santon Downham
at forestry.gov.uk * {{authority control Villages in Suffolk Forest Heath Civil parishes in Suffolk

History

Climate

Transport

See also

References

External links