Wickhambrook

All Saints, Wickhambrook

After cycling down the Cambridgeshire border from Dalham, I turned inland, so to speak, at Cowlinge, and the woods and winding river rapidly fell away behind me. The lanes narrowed, hemmed in by low hedges. The houses were scattered, and few; mainly Spanish haciendas, or 1960s yellow brick bungalows. It wasn't wholly attractive. Occasionally, there'd be something a bit more interesting, like a Victorian farmworkers cottage; but even these would be done up for professionals, a 4x4 sitting on the mock paved drive outside.

The lanes ran straight, doglegging for no apparent reason every half a mile or so. There didn't seem to be any passing places; God knows what happens when the 4x4s meet. The fields were generally fallow. It was like a temporary landscape.

The grand north aisle overwhelms the nave with its pretty little clerestory. The wide chancel roof looks intriguing beyond. The tower has buttresses you could walk up. Hmmm...

Suddenly, the tiny lane spat me out into a major road junction. A grand filling station across the way doubled as a supermarket, and a group of young mums were having a chat by the play area. I had arrived in Wickhambrook.

Again, there was not much here that was particularly attractive, except possibly some of the young mums. The houses were all functional, their gardens ridges of scarlet runner beans and boilings of pampas grass. Lorries thundered along the main road. I sighed, and consulted my map for the church.

The archway between the Saxon church and its 12th century replacement.

It was only at this point that I realised quite how big Wickhambrook is. It is easily the largest place in the Bury/Haverhill/Newmarket triangle. It sprawls, although not in an easy way; more in the manner of a bony man trying to get comfortable on a pebble beach.

There are bits of it that aren't even joined on, and from the map I could see that it was actually several settlements that had grown together.

Would finding the church be to find the real Wickhambrook? Away from the main road, I went down a lane, and came out in a street of pretty cottages. Now, this was more like it.

I'm sorry to moan, but I was in rural west Suffolk, after all. If I want busy roads and Spanish haciendas, I'll go east of Ipswich, to Kesgrave or Martlesham.

Beside the church was a set of 17th century almshouses, and then there was All Saints, in its pleasantly walled churchyard.

It is a large, lovely church, of great age and dignity.

The first impression is of the great swathe of 14th century aisle, with a pretty clerestory peeping above it. But there is significant evidence of Saxon work at the east end of the aisle, and so this must have been the site of the original church, the later chancel being built beside it, and the great nave and south aisle extending westwards. If you go round to the south side, you'll find a Saxon image protected by glass set in the wall.

Looking west. Brass rubbings flank the great tower arch, with its gorgeous Decorated window beyond. Where the organ is, the pulpit stood for two centuries.

Looking east. Another gorgeous window, although this one does look a bit odd from the outside. Note the extent to which the chancel roof has been raised.

There are gorgeous Decorated windows set at the east and west ends. In a county more noted for Perpendicular, these are some of the best.

I stepped inside, to a light, open interior, accentuated by the width of the chancel. Arthur Mee remembers the forgotten 19th century romance Golden Days by Edna Lyall, which is set in Wickhambrook. The hero visits this church, which he finds "plain enough and bare enough to please a puritan".

There is certainly a sense of space, and the size may account for its bareness - although Lyall might have known the church before its considerable 1860s reordering.

In those days, the pulpit stood at the west end, and the seats faced west rather than east. This was not unusual in puritan hotbeds, and it attempted to break the link between the eastwards view and Catholic sacramentalism. The same was also at Bramford and Little Bealings. Certainly, puritan staunchness seems to have dispensed with Catholic romanticism in this parish.

Peter Northeast records that a new Vicar, arriving here fresh from the ferment of Tractarian Oxford in the mid-19th century, could not find a single person in the parish who knew the dedication of the church.

Thomas Higham died in 1630. The helm above is a replica.

The view eastwards is a remarkable one, with the beautiful low window, and a low arch connecting north aisle chapel and chancel. The rood loft apparatus describes a winding path, and there is a fine railed memorial to Thomas Higham.

The church also contains several brasses, of which the parish have thoughtfully placed rubbings at the west end. One contains a request for us to pray for his soul.

The font has been cut about a bit, or was it built in that strange shape?

And so, onwards, ever onwards, to the heights of Rede and Hawkedon, leaving civilisation behind, young mums and all.

All Saints, Wickhambrook, is just off the main road through the village, the B1063 Newmarket to Clare road, just north of where it crosses the A143 Bury to Haverhill road. I found it locked with a keyholder nearby.

Please also visit Maggie King's archive of photographs of All Saints at the turn of the century.