South Cove, Suffolk

Coordinates: 52°22′08″N 1°40′12″E / 52.369°N 1.670°E / 52.369; 1.670
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

South Cove
Shire county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townBeccles
Postcode districtNR34
Dialling code01502
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Suffolk
52°22′08″N 1°40′12″E / 52.369°N 1.670°E / 52.369; 1.670

South Cove is a

East Suffolk district. Neighbouring parishes include Covehithe, Frostenden and Reydon as well as Wrentham.[3] The village lies to the east of the main A12 road, on the B1127 road between Wrentham and Southwold,[4] and is around 1+1⁄2 miles (2.4 km) from the North Sea coast.[5]

The parish is sparsely populated.[4] At the 1981 United Kingdom census it had a population of 35 in 11 inhabited houses;[a][1] in 2005 the population was estimated to be around 20.[2][6] The parish council operates as a joint council with Frostenden and Uggeshall.[7]

History

Archaeological remains in the parish include flint tools from the

Anglo-Saxon period or of a dock recorded in the Domesday Book as being at Frostenden.[13][14][15] Claude Morley discussed the possible origins of the site in 1923.[16]

South Cove is mentioned in the Domesday Book, at which point it was known simply as Cove,

Count Alan of Brittany and Robert Malet holding land in the village.[1][20]

By the 13th century the parish church was owned by

Benedictine priory established during the 11th century.[21] The manor, which was combined with Covehithe to form the manor of South Cove and North Hales, was held by a variety of owners until it was bought by the Blois family in the late 17th century.[c][18][22][23] A second manor, named Polfrey or Blueflory-Cove, was owned by the Gooch baronets of Benacre Hall by the start of the 19th century.[18][23] The family owned most of the land in South Cove and in neighbouring Covehithe by the middle of the century and remain the major landowners in the area.[1][18] An Act of Parliament to enclose land in the parish was passed in 1797.[1][24]

The population of the parish peaked during the mid-19th century at around 200. It declined rapidly after the 1930s.[1] The land has always been primarily used for agriculture, although clay dug in the parish was used for brick making at Cove Bottom from the 1870s until 2005.[1][19][25][26] During World War II the parish formed part of the immediate invasion defences and a number of anti-tank ditches and other invasion defences were built.[27][28] From 1944 a heavy anti-aircraft battery operated in the east of the parish.[29]

Geography

Agrciculrutal land in the parish
Potter's Bridge on the B1127 on the southern edge of the parish

The majority of the land in the parish is used for agriculture, primarily arable crops.[1] The underlying geology of Norwich Crag Formations is overlain with glacial clays, sands and gravels. The majority of the parish is classified as forming part of the North Suffolk Sandlings landscape with quick draining sandy soils. The Sotterley and Benacre farmland plateau, with clay soil, extends into the north-east of the parish area. This produces a gently rolling landscape suited to arable crops.[30][31]

The southern and eastern boundaries of the parish feature areas of low-lying wetlands with marshland and reed beds classified as estuarine marsh.

Suffolk Coast and Heaths, an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.[33]

The B1127 roads crosses the marshland at Potter's Bridge, linking the parish to Reydon and Southwold to the south. The area has been subject to flooding, leading to extended road closures.

early medieval period, with a port recorded at neighbouring Frostenden at the Domesday survey.[36] The coast at Covehithe to the east and the former parish of Easton Bavents to the south-east,[d] are subject to rapid coastal erosion.[31]

Religion

Interior of the church of St Lawrence

The Church of England parish church of St Lawrence is in the centre of the parish alongside the B1127. It possibly dates from the late Saxon period[5][38][39] and may have been included as one of the two churches listed at Frostenden at the Domesday survey.[40] It is certainly Norman at the latest, with a 12th-century nave with original doorways and a chancel that dates from the 14th-century. It has a thatched roof and a tall, flint-built tower which dates from the 15th-century. Windows in the nave date from as early as 1300 and a piscina in the chancel has been dated to the 13th-century.[5][17][40][41]

Part of the rood screen survives, and a 15th-century painting of St Michael was rediscovered in 1929 and restored by

Grade I listed in 1953.[41] Today the parish is part of the Sole Bay benefice, a group of eight churches administered from St Edmund's Church, Southwold.[5][38] The weathered 15th-century font in the church may have been moved from Dunwich after the loss of one the town's churches to coastal erosion and flooding.[42][43]

The churchyard features a war memorial with five names from

93d Bombardment Group, crashed near the church with the loss of all nine crew members. A hand-written memorial inside the church lists their names alongside the names of the men on the war memorial.[45][46]

The church was used as a filming location for the 2001 film

biopic of Iris Murdoch.[17][47]

Culture and community

The Five Bells public house on the northern border of the parish

The population of the parish is concentrated in a small cluster of buildings around the church and another at Cove Bottom, close to the site of the former brickworks.

public house on the northern edge of the parish is technically within the parish area but generally considered to be within Wrentham.[6] It has operated since at least 1835.[48] Another pub, The Chequer, is known to have been put up for sale in 1801, although this may have been an earlier name for the Five Bells.[49]

Other than the church and pub, the parish has no services,[4] although it shares a village hall with Frostenden.[50] A Sunday School is known to have operated during the 1830s.[1]

Notes

  1. ^ The 1981 census was the last time the population of South Cove as a parish was recorded.
  2. ^ The addition of South to the parish name was to distinguish it from both Covehithe and North Cove, a parish to the north on the border with Norfolk.[17] The parish was still being recorded as Cove (South) by William White in 1844 and John Marius Wilson in the 1870s.[18][19]
  3. ^ The seat of the Blois family was at Cockfield Hall at Yoxford.
  4. ^ Easton Bavents was merged with Reydon in 1987.[37]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k South Cove, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-25.
  2. ^ a b Estimates of Total Population of Areas in Suffolk, Suffolk County Council, 2007-05-01. Retrieved 2021-02-23. (Archived, 2008-12-19.)
  3. East Suffolk District Council
    . Retrieved 2023-03-25.
  4. ^ a b c Frostenden, Uggeshall & South Cove, Healthy Suffolk. Retrieved 2023-03-25.
  5. ^ a b c d St Lawrence, South Cove, Suffolk, The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture. Retrieved 2023-03-23.
  6. ^ a b South Cove, Suffolk Pubs, Campaign for Real Ale in Suffolk. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  7. ^ Frostenden Uggeshall & South Cove Parish Council, Suffolk infoLink. Retrieved 2023-03-25.
  8. ^ Monument record SCV 003 - Chipped flint axe dark grey found in ploughsoil about 1971, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  9. ^ Monument record SCV 005 - A very fine polished Neo axe head of dark grey flint found beneath the foundations of Half Way house situated there when demolished, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  10. ^ Monument record SCV 004 - Scatter of flints. (Neo), Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  11. ^ Monument record SCV 021 - Possible Bronze Age round barrow, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  12. ^ Monument record SCV 025 - Cropmarks of possible Bronze Age round barrow, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  13. ^ Monument record SCV 001 - Mound with surrounding ditch, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  14. ^ Monument Number 392236, Historic England Research Records, Heritage Gateway, Historic England. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  15. ^ South Cove: The Mound, Gatehouse. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  16. ^ Morley C (1923) The Sea Port of Frostenden. Part I – its place in history, Proceedings of the Suffolk Insititue of Archaeology, vol. XVIII, part 2, pp. 167–179. (Available online. Retrieved 2023-03-28.)
  17. ^ a b c Knott S (2018) St Lawrence, South Cove, Churches of East Anglia: Suffolk. Retrieved 2023-03-25.
  18. ^ a b c d White W (1844) History, Gazetteer, and Directory, of Suffolk, p. 362. Sheffield: R Leader. (Available online at Google Books. Retrieved 2023-03-26.)
  19. ^ a b South Cove, Suffolk, Vision of Britain. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  20. ^ (South) Cove, Open Domesday. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  21. ^ Page W ed (1975) Houses of Benedictine monks: Priory of Rumburgh, A History of the County of Suffolk: Volume 2, pp. 77-79. (Available online at British History Online. Retrieved 2023-03-26.)
  22. ^ Page A (1844) South Cove Parish, Topographical and genealogical, The County of Suffolk. (Available online. Retrieved 2023-03-26.)
  23. ^ a b Copinger WA (1908) The Manors of Suffolk : notes on their history and devolution, vol. 2, p. 44. Manchester: Taylor, Garnett, Evans. (Available online. Retrieved 2023-03-26.)
  24. ^ Tate WE (1952) A Handlist of Suffolk Enclosure Acts and Wards, Proceedings of the Suffolk Insititue of Archaeology, vol. XXV, part 3, pp.224–263. (Available online. Retrieved 2023-03-28.)
  25. ^ Monument record SCV 007 - Cove Bottom Brickworks, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  26. ^ Reeder MG (November 1987) South Cove Brickworks Suffolk, British Brick Making Information, no. 43 , p. 9. (Available online. Retrieved 2023-03-26.)
  27. ^ Monument record SCV 016 - World War II strongpoint overlooking Pottersbridge Marshes, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  28. ^ Monument record SCV 032 - World War Two anti tank ditch, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  29. ^ Monument record SCV 013 - World War II 'Diver' Heavy Anti Aircraft battery T19, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  30. ^
    Waveney District Council, April 2008. (Available online
    . Retrieved 2023-03-28.)
  31. ^
    Suffolk Coast and Heaths. (Available online
    . Retrieved 2023-03-28.)
  32. ^ Benacre, Suffolk's National Nature Reserves, Natural England, October 2008. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  33. Suffolk Coast and Heaths
    . Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  34. ^ Suffolk MP urges court action against landowner over flooded road, BBC News, 9 December 2021. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  35. ^ Powell M (2021) Hundreds sign petition to fix closed Suffolk road as MP visits site, East Anglian Daily Times, 3 December 2021. Retrieved 2023-03-23.
  36. ^ Monument record FOS 046 - Record of a Medieval port and former salthouse in the Domesday Survey of 1086, Suffolk Heritage Explorer, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  37. ^ The Waveney (Parishes) Order 1987, Local Government Boundary Commission for England. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  38. ^ a b St Lawrence's, South Cove, Sole Bay Churches. Retrieved 2020-08-09.
  39. ^ Goode W (1994) The Round Tower Churches of South East England. Round Tower Churches Society.
  40. ^ a b Monument record SCV 006 - Church of St Lawrence, Suffolk Heritage Gateway, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  41. ^ a b Church of St Lawrence, National Heritage List for England, Historic England. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  42. ^ a b c History of the Church, St Lawrence, South Cove.
  43. ^ St Lawrence Church, South Cove.
  44. ^ South Cove War Memorial, National Heritage List for England, Historic England. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  45. ^ 42-51241, American Air Museum in Britain]. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  46. ^ South Cove parishioners and B24 USAAF crew, War Memorials Online. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  47. ^ Sapsted D (2001) Vicar stars with Dench in film of writer's life, The Daily Telegraph, 3 May 2001. Retrieved 2023-03-28.
  48. ^ Wrentham Five Bells, Suffolk Pubs, Campaign for Real Ale in Suffolk. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  49. ^ South Cove Chequer, Suffolk Pubs, Campaign for Real Ale in Suffolk. Retrieved 2023-03-26.
  50. ^ Frostenden and South Cove Village Hall, Suffolk InfoLink, Suffolk County Council. Retrieved 2023-03-28.

External links

Media related to South Cove at Wikimedia Commons

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