Bramerton

Bramerton
St. Peter's Church
Bramerton Location within Norfolk
Area	2.1 km2 (0.81 sq mi)
Population	323 (2021)
•  Density	154/km2 (400/sq mi)
OS grid reference	TG2905
Civil parish	Bramerton
District	South Norfolk
Shire county	Norfolk
Region	East
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	NORWICH
Postcode district	NR14
Dialling code	01508
Police	Norfolk
Fire	Norfolk
Ambulance	East of England
UK Parliament	South Norfolk
List of places UK England Norfolk 52°35′36″N1°23′29″E / 52.5933°N 1.3913°E / 52.5933; 1.3913

Bramerton is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk.

Bramerton is located 5.8 miles (9.3 km) north-west of Loddon and 4.3 miles (6.9 km) south-east of Norwich.

History

Bramerton's name is of Anglo-Saxon origin and derives from the Old English for a farmstead or village close to a bramble thicket. ^[1]

In the Domesday Book, Bramerton is recorded as a settlement of 25 households in the hundred of Henstead. In 1086, the village was part of the estates of King William I, Odo of Bayeux, Roger Bigod of Norfolk and Godric the Steward. ^[2]

Bramerton Hall, located on the corner of The Street and Surlingham Lane, was built in the 1830s and is also Grade II listed. ^[3]

There are numerous Grade II listed cottages in Bramerton. These include Orchard House (Seventeenth Century), ^[4] The Grange (Seventeenth Century), ^[5] Grove Farm Cottages (Seventeenth Century) ^[6] and the White House (Eighteenth Century). ^[7]

In the 1920s, a Lychgate for St. Peter's Church was created by John Shingles using oak wood from local trees. ^[8]

Geography

According to the 2021 census, Bramerton has a population of 323 people which shows a slight increase from the 301 people recorded in the 2011 census. ^[9]

The River Yare runs through the north of the parish.

St. Peter's Church

Bramerton's parish church is dedicated to Saint Peter and dates at its earliest from around the year 1300. ^[10] The church was significantly remodelled and restored in the 1860s when a memorial window depicting a Mary Adelaide Blake which was installed by Ward and Hughes. ^[11]

Amenities

Bramerton's post office closed in 1968 alongside the village shop in 1977 and the school in 1978. However, "The Water's Edge" public house is still in operation and was previously known as "Woods End".

At the north end of the village is a Dawn Christadelphian Hall, first opened in 1952 and extended in the 1960s and then again in the 1980s. A secondary hall for youth activities was added in the 2000s. ^[12]

Bramerton Health Care Clinic offers homoeopathy, herbal supplements and dietary advice.

Bramerton Pits

Fossil marine shell found by Bramerton Pits

The rock strata reaching the surface at Bramerton Pits, adjacent to the Common at Woods End, have resulted in the name of the village being given to an early Pleistocene glacial stage in the geological pre-history of the British Isles. The Bramertonian Stage is distinguished by the presence of shelly, sandy deposits indicative of a temperate climate. ^[13] Bramerton Pits has been noted as a Site of Special Scientific Interest on account of the geology and has been excavated on several occasions.^{[ citation needed ]}

Woods End

Billy Bluelight on the Wherryman's Way at Woods End PH with the River Yare in background

There has been an inn on the site since before 1700. In 1828 the area and the nearby river were painted by Joseph Stannard, prominent in the Norwich School; entitled Boats on the Yare near Bramerton, Norfolk, his painting is now in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge. ^[14] In Victorian times the inn possessed tea rooms and gardens popular with river-borne day-trippers from Norwich.

The Woods End is still a popular spot for the mooring of pleasure craft and is also one of the few places on the Norfolk Broads where water skiing is allowed. Outside the pub (now renamed the Water's Edge) is a statue of Billy Bluelight (William Cullum), who in the 1920s–30s used to challenge boat trippers to a race along the riverbank. He is famed for his claim... "My name is Billy Bluelight, my age is 45, I hope to get to Carrow Bridge before the boat arrive." He is said to have remained '45' for many years. ^[15]

The Woods End Inn

Sports and recreation

Bramerton and District Bowls club was founded in 1965, moving to its current location near the village hall in 1972. The village hall itself was erected by voluntary labour in 1988 after having been rescued from its previous existence as a Surlingham bungalow. The village hall is now the venue for a range of activities including a play group called Sunbeams, Brownies and yoga.

Adjacent to the Bowls club is a children's playground with swings, climbing frame and slide. At Grange Farm Barns in the centre of the village is a Caravan Club certified location.

Bramerton Village Hall

Transport

Bramerton is served by bus route 85 operated by Konectbus, providing nine services a day into Norwich via Kirby Bedon and to the neighbouring villages of Surlingham and Rockland St Mary. ^[16]

National Cycle Route 1 passes through Bramerton on its route from Norwich via Trowse and Whitlingham and out to Loddon via Surlingham.

The Wherryman's Way, a long distance footpath, passes close by at Woods End.

Governance

Bramerton is part of the electoral ward of Rockland for local elections and is part of the district of South Norfolk.

The village's national constituency is South Norfolk which has been represented by the Labour's Ben Goldsborough MP since 2024.

War memorial

Bramerton's War Memorial is a stone Celtic cross located in St Peter's Churchyard. ^[17] It bears the following names for the First World War:

Rank	Name	Unit	Date of Death	Other Commemoration / Burial
Lt. Col.	John D. M. Beckett	10th Battalion, Hampshire Regiment	9 February 1918	Mikra British Cemetery
LCpl.	Harry E. Doggett	8th Battalion, Border Regiment	14 July 1916	Thiepval Memorial
LCpl.	H. S. Hayes	9th Battalion, Norfolk Regiment	21 September 1916	Grove Town Cemetery, Méaulte
LCpl.	Frederic W. Perfitt	11th Battalion, Sherwood Foresters	5 October 1918	Prospect Hill Cemetery, Gouy-Saint-André
LS	John H. Osborne	HMS Hogue	22 September 1914	Chatham Naval Memorial
Pte.	John P. Debbage	1st Battalion, Essex Regiment	13 August 1915	Helles Memorial
Pte.	Percy W. Norman	10th Battalion, Essex Rgt.	1 July 1916	British Cemetery, La Neuville-lès-Bray
Pte.	Samuel J. Daynes	1/4th Battalion, Norfolk Regiment	19 April 1917	Jerusalem Memorial
Pte.	Arthur S. Frost	8th Battalion, Norfolk Rgt.	28 July 1916	St. Peter's Churchyard, Bramerton
Pte.	W. A. Daynes	Norfolk Rgt.	4 March 1919	St. Andrew's Churchyard, Trowse

References

1. "Key to English Place-names". kepn.nottingham.ac.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
2. "Bramerton | Domesday Book". opendomesday.org. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
3. Bramerton Hall, BritishListedBuildings.co.uk. Retrieved 7 November 2022.
4. "ORCHARD HOUSE, Bramerton - 1050450 | Historic England". historicengland.org.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
5. "THE GRANGE, Bramerton - 1050452 | Historic England". historicengland.org.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
6. "GROVE FARM COTTAGES, Bramerton - 1050453 | Historic England". historicengland.org.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
7. "THE WHITE HOUSE, Bramerton - 1050451 | Historic England". historicengland.org.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
8. "Norfolk Churches". www.norfolkchurches.co.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
9. "Bramerton (Parish, United Kingdom) - Population Statistics, Charts, Map and Location". www.citypopulation.de. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
10. "CHURCH OF ST PETER, Bramerton - 1050489 | Historic England". historicengland.org.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
11. "Norfolk Churches". www.norfolkchurches.co.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.
12. Bramerton Society. (1991). Bramerton Booklet.
13. The Crag at Bramerton, Near Norwich, Norfolk, adsabs.harvard.edu. Accessed 21 November 2022.
14. Joseph Stannard (1797–1830), artuk.org. Retrieved 21 November 2022.
15. "Discover the Heart of the Broads". Archived from the original on 15 July 2007. Retrieved 12 June 2007.
16. "85 Norwich to Surlingham". Konectbus. Retrieved 23 April 2024.
17. "Bramerton War Memorial, Bramerton - 1442053 | Historic England". historicengland.org.uk. Retrieved 15 November 2024.