‘MEETING PLACES’ A homage to my parents By Denis Bellamy 1 My ancestors viewed from the places where they lived To:- my mother: who wondered why her father called his house in Grimsby "Aldeburgh"; & my father: who thought his father came from 'Market Deeping'. With grateful thanks to the living Bellamys and Kemps in Lincolnshire, Norfolk, and Suffolk who have brought some of the facts to life. Thanks also to the helpful staff of the County Record Offices of Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire and Norfolk. 2 CONTENTS PREFACE PART 1 Chapter 1 'LOST TO THE TIE': A CELEBRATION OF GRANDPARENTS 1 The Fatal Delay 2 The Aldeburgh Kemps 2 1 The Lie of the Land 2.2 The South End Family 2.3 The Town 2.4 The Sandlings 2.5 The Marshes 2.6 Slaughden 2.7 An Aldeburgh Childhood 2.8 Other Aldeburgh Kemps 3 Parson Drove 3.1 The Deepings 3.2 The Beginning of the Migration 3.3 The Broader Picture 3.4 Township Life 3.5 The 'sad' View of Pepys 3.6 People of the Droves 3.7 Expansion 3.8 Departures 4 Epilogue Chapter 2 KINSHIP AND PLACE 1 Sticking to Places 1.1 Suffolk Kemps: the Narrow View 1.2 Suffolk Kemps: the Broader View 1.3 Suffolk Kemps: the Very Long View 2 Whys Hows and Fulfilment 2.1 An Aptitude for History 2.2 Ancestor Hunting: the 'ology' 2.3 Something About 'Nature' 2.4 Something About 'Nurture' 2.5 A Sense of Place 3 Chapter 3 KEMP PLACES 1: PARHAM, FRESSINGFIELD AND FRAMLINGHAM 1 From Theberton to Grimsby 2 The Parham Connection 3 Kemps of Fressingfield: A Loose End 3.1 The Story of 'Boy Cracknell' 3.2 Other Entries of the Parish Books 4.Framlingham Kemps in the 17th Cent. 4.1 As Property-holders 4.2 Beginnings of the Line to Theberton 4.3 Kemps in Place 4.4 Lines of Descent from Nicholas Kemp 4.5 Payers of the 1674 Hearth Tax 4.6 Nicholas Ist's Grandsons 4.7 Connections with Saxstead 5 Kemps Who Became Attached to Parham 5.1 The Whightman Connection 5.2 Benoni Kemp of Parham Hall 6 The Carpenter-/Joiners of East-Suffolk 7 A procession of Kemps Chapter 4 KEMP PLACES 2: ROUTES TO FRAMLINGHAM 1 The problem 2 Looking to the South 2 1 Families of Dallinghoo 2.2 Families of Woodbridge 2 3 Families of Pettistree 3 Looking to the North 3.1 First name evidence 3.2 To Chediston and back Chapter 5 KEMP PLACES 3: AN HISTORICAL PANORAMA 1 Social Landscapes 1.1 Defining a social landscape 1.2 Social clustering in the 14th century 1.3 Social clustering in the 17th century 1.4 Development of the Kemp Social Landscape 4 2 Fortunes of the Post-Conquest Kemps 2 1 Early eastern clusters 2 2 Bulcamp 2.3 Campsey Ash 2 4 Kembroke Hall 2.5 Speculative connections 2 6 Norman of Peasenhall: founder of the Kemp Clan 2 7 Sorting out the 'Geoffreys' 2.8 Kemps of Norwich 3 Lords and Baronets 3.1 Geoffrey Kemp: Warden of Ipswich 3.2 The Kemps of Gissing 3.3 Kemps of the Lower Blyth Valley 3.4 After the ‘Conquest’ 3.5 Summarising a long-view 3.6 Gissing: an ending Chapter 6 THE KEMPS LEAVE SUFFOLK 1 Kinship network of the Suffolk Kemps 2 Munnings Kinfolk: Meetings on the Marsh 2 1 Sudbourne 2.2 The ‘Marsh House’ community 2.3 Origins of the Munnings family 3 The Pivitts 4 The Kindreds 5 The Kemps move to Aldeburgh 6 The Move to Yarmouth 7The Move to Grimsby 8 Those left behind 8.1 Those in Yarmouth 8 2 Those in Westleton 8.3 Those in Aldeburgh 8.4 Those who branched out before Westleton 9 The Aldringham Kemps 10 Summary Report: descendants of William Kemp of Framlingham 5 Chapter 7 A TOUCH OF NORFOLK: THE READS AND THEIR KIN 1 Read Country 1.1 Runham 1.2 Broadland 2 Kinship 2 1 The Read/Hunn network 2.2 Looking back from Grimsby 3 Norfolk Reads: Origins and Movements 4 The Runham Reads 5 My Grandparents in Runham 6 Deeper Roots 7 Western Origins 7.1 The Beighton connection 7.2 The Kerrisons 8 Summary Report: Descendants of John Read of Runham PART 2 Chapter 8 THE BELLAMYS OF GODMANCHESTER 1 Samuel 2 His Children 3 His Property 4 Ann Squires: His Wife Chapter 9 SPREADING THE NET FOR BELLAMYS 1 Trouble with Samuels 2 Huntingdenshire Bellamys: the Statistical Picture 3 Huntingdenshire Bellamys: Time Sequence of Village Records 4 Bellamys at Village Level 4.1 Farcet and Stanground 4.2 Sawtry 4.3 Winnick 4.4 Little Gidding 4.5 Great Gidding 4.6 Steeple Gidding 4.7 Brampton 5 Bellamys: the Gobal Picture 6 CHAPTER 10 BELLAMYS AND KEMPS IN GRIMSBY 1 Grimsby 2 The Bellamy Kinship Network 2.1 The Grimsby magnet 2.2 Links through common first names 2.3 Links through memories 3 The Search for ‘Henry the Builder’ 4 Some Random Memories of Grimsby Life 4.1 Places and people 4.2 A disordered miscellany 5 Summary Report: Descendants of William Bellamy of Laneham CHAPTER 11 ORIGINS OF BELLAMYS 1 Distribution 1.1 Lincolnshire 1.2 The Trent families 1.3 The Witham families 2 The Kettlethorpe Bellamys 2.1 Origins 2.1 The Laneham diaspora 2.3 Dunham: the French connection 3.4 Social positions CHAPTER 12 MEETING THROUGH FISH: A PROVISIONAL CONCLUSION 1 The First Generation 2 Preparation of Grimsby for Its Immigrants 2.1 The trawl 2.2 The fish 2.3 Rivalry with Hull 2.4 Grimsby’s opportunity 3 The Second Generation APPENDICES SUPPLEMENTS 1 REACHING OUT THROUGH RUNHAM 2 PASSING THROUGH PARHAM 7 8 PREFACE I am writing this a few hours after my mother died, aged 91 and a bit. My keening has resonances that range from the discomforting to the acutely painful, as the whole charged mother-son relationship surfaces. Although we never spoke about it, I imagine that my being somewhere, living a separate crowded adult life, yet still and always embedded in her, gave a meaning to her existence. I know that this is the case for me, in reverse. In her being there was something of the hearth and the firelight, around which we gathered in the evening, deciphering the bright caverns and dark volcanoes, in the glowing, sputtering coals. Above all there was a steadfast level of care, concern and support, which continued till the end. Alone with my thoughts, I am very much aware of life being like the dash of a bewildered bird, fluttering through a crowded hall on a dark night; emerging into warmth and light, only to return to an unimaginable blackness. Really, our only legacies are reminiscences of this uncertain passage, told or written, of a blurred flight, faster than we can imagine at the beginning. It seems appropriate that my mothers death should cause me to write a preface for this uneven flow of people and places, which she started by wondering why her father called their home, behind the Grimsby fish dock, 'Aldeburgh'. She met and married Arthur Bellamy in Grimsby, where they were both children of recent emigrants from, as my father used to put it, 'the country'. They met in Grimsby because their fathers were attracted to this corner of Lincolnshire by the promise of a better life. Ted Kemp and Fred Bellamy settled in newly built terraces, hastily put up to house families growing with the expanding fishing industry. They are mute as to whether their expectations were fulfilled- I have my doubts. The only substance remaining of their family networks, are the 'two up and two down' Victorian 'starter homes', packed tightly into criss-cross streets, 'over the marsh', to the west of the old town centre, and New Clee to the east. My father died before the seed of the family tree, which has germinated in the following chapters, was set. Questions I would like to ask him now, will probably remain forever unanswered. His specific contribution to my research comes from a conversation we once had together on a bike ride through the fens- a reminiscence that his father came from the wetlands of Market Deeping. His contribution to my geographical outlook came, I am sure, from his encouragement and support of my tendency to roam. I also believe he kindled a latent spirit of historical enquiry by giving me his own rusty keys to a countryside, which started just a few yards down our road. At first by walking, then by bike, we would traverse the local parishes, he making me aware how important it is to be able to tell an oak from an ash, me delaying the journey by collecting far too many different coloured snails from the hedgerow, to keep as jam-jar pets. I don't think it’s too far fetched to think of my interests in the past beginning with our walks across the pastures of Weelsby, Clee and Scartho, lured by ancient houses and churches. Old Clee was our local focus for things historical. Everyone knew Saxons built its tower! It seems as though as soon as I could read, we would recite a list of former erstwhile villagers, picking out each one from names on their tombstones, which overlooked the narrow lane. When my 9 sister was born my mother also took me regularly to this place; the local baby clinic was held in the parish hall.