Mendham, Suffolk

The Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Redenhall (St. Mary's Church) is a Grade I listed parish church in the Church of England in Redenhall, Norfolk. It is the mother church of the large ecclesiastical parish of Redenhall-cum-Harleston and Wortwell, with the smaller church of St John the Baptist in Harleston originally being a chapel of ease to Redenhall.

The village of Withersdale Street is located within the rural parish of Mendham, on the Norfolk/Suffolk border, in the Waveney Valley. The village is predominantly a ribbon development, along the B1123, from Harleston to Halesworth. To the west of the village lies Mendham Priory, an early 19th century neo-classical mansion, with a Doric style porch, whilst to the east, the Red House, a later Georgian red brick building also mentioned by Pevsner, faces towards the new village hall and overlooks the playing field. The original Mendham Priory was founded in the middle of the 12th Century and fell into decay. There is still a mound of flint relating to the medieval Cluniac Priory of St Mary on the marshes beside the River Waveney, to the north of the present Mendham Priory. However, much of the building material of the original Priory was removed and used in the surrounding parishes. This was located at a different site to the present house called Mendham Priory. Much of this material however can be found in the walled garden and in the Lodge of the present building. The estate was purchased in 1824 by Alexander Adair and by the mid-1870s Mendham Priory was home to the Dimmock family and formed the centre of a working estate. The Dimmock family remained at Mendham Priory well into the 20th Century. Mendham Priory also survived a nearby bomb blast during the Second World War which is said to have lifted the entire roof of the conservatory without breaking a single pane of glass. Each village had its own brickworks - Withersdale is no exception. Kiln House has its own kiln in the back garden and there is a clay pit at the top of Pegg's Hill, overlooking the village from the south. Other bricks have been used in local houses from nearby villages. St Cross South Elmham had its own brickworks, with the mark of a cross within the face of the brick, only revealed now when a wall is knocked down and the structure of the brick revealed. Grange Lodge was the old police station, whilst the Old Post House originally had petrol pumps outside. Withersdale Cross was once the village pub, the Golden Cross, the sign for which can still be seen in the roof tiles. This also housed Withersdale Ceramics, founded by John and Fiona Cutting in the early 1970s, examples of whose tiles in clock faces and pot stands still appear in local auctions or houses within the village. The designs were screen printed on to the tiles and then hand painted, often by people from the village. In November 2009, the new village hall was opened by Rebecca Knight from OperaBabes, having been built on land to the east of the village. It was the culmination of funding from, amongst others, Suffolk County Council, Mid Suffolk District Council, Suffolk Environmental Trust, Adnams, the Clothworkers' Foundation, Garfield Weston, the Rank Foundation and the Suffolk Foundation and including much effort from the local community. In 2012, a Multi-Use Games Area or MUGA was added to the north side of the village hall. It has flood lights so that it can be used in the evenings. Two new storage buildings were added to the village hall site in 2015, together subsequently with two boules boulodromes or pitches.

Wortwell is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk and adjoining the county of Suffolk. It is located on both the River Waveney (which forms the county boundary) and the A143 road, some 20 km east of Diss and 30 km west of Lowestoft. The city of Norwich lies approximately 30 km to the north.[1][2]The village name originates from roughly 1704 when naturally occurring 'Wort' was found to spring from a well fed by a water source near to the local river Waveney. When the local brewer was satisfied with the beer brewed from the 'Wortwell' he would ring a bell to let the local residents know it was ready for drinking, which also gave the local drinking establishment its name, established as a pub in 1836. The civil parish has an area of 4.6 km2 (1.8 sq mi) and in the 2001 census had a population of 574 in 243 households, the population decreasing to 561 at the 2011 census. For the purposes of local government, the parish falls within the district of South Norfolk.[3]The village of Wortwell is one of the few in Norfolk not to be listed in the Domesday Book of 1086. Until the end of the 19th century Wortwell was a hamlet within the parish of Mendham-in-Norfolk, (the modern village of Mendham is south of the River Waveney in Suffolk) becoming a parish in the 1885 boundary alterations.Ezekiel Blomfield (1778–1818), a Congregational minister, author and compiler of religious works and works on natural history, was buried on 21 July 1818 in the grounds of the Meeting House at Wortwell.Wortwell has a well established football club, and its two football teams currently play in the Anglian Combination Football League, the first team playing in division 2 and the reserves playing in division 6. Home games are played at the rec at Wortwell community centre village hall.

Mendham Priory was a priory in Suffolk, England.

Wortwell was a station in the small hamlet of Wortwell, Norfolk. It was opened in 1855, as part of the Waveney Valley Line between Tivetshall and Beccles, and closed in 1878.

Redenhall was a station in the small hamlet of Redenhall, Norfolk. It was opened in 1861 as part of the Waveney Valley Line between Tivetshall and Beccles and closed in 1866. It was close to the settlement of Harleston.

Homersfield Bridge is a road bridge across the River Waveney between Norfolk and Suffolk, and stands partly in the civil parishes of Alburgh and Wortwell, Norfolk and partly in Homersfield, Suffolk. It is one of the oldest surviving concrete bridges in Britain and is a grade II* listed structure.The bridge was designed by architect Henry Eyton and constructed in 1869 by Messrs W & T Phillips of London for Sir Shafto Adair, Bt of the Flixton Estate. It has a single 50 foot (15 metres) span consisting of a wrought iron frame encased in concrete and a cast iron balustrades decorated with Adair monograms. The pioneering composite construction of the bridge makes it an early example of a reinforced concrete structure. In the 1990s the bridge was restored by Norfolk Historic Building Trust and Suffolk Preservation Society after it had been compulsorily purchased by Norfolk County Council. Road traffic was diverted over a new bridge in 1970, and the old route over Homersfield Bridge is now a foot and cycle path. A plaque on the bridge describes it as "The oldest concrete bridge in Great Britain".

Homersfield, also known as St Mary, South Elmham, is a village and civil parish in the north of the English county of Suffolk. It is in the East Suffolk district, 4 miles (6.4 km) south-west of the market town of Bungay and 3 miles (4.8 km) north-east of Harleston. The official name of the civil parish is St Mary, South Elmham otherwise Homersfield. It is one of the parishes around Bungay known as The Saints.The parish had a population of 158 at the 2011 United Kingdom census. The northern boundary of the parish is the River Waveney which marks the county border with Norfolk. It borders the Suffolk parishes of Flixton, St Cross South Elmham and Mendham and the Norfolk parishes of Denton, Alburgh and Wortwell.

Homersfield was a railway station which served the village of Homersfield in Suffolk, England, although the station was located in Alburgh, across the county boundary in Norfolk. The station was part of the Waveney Valley Line.

Gawdyhall Big Wood, Harleston is a 29.8-hectare (74-acre) biological Site of Special Scientific Interest north of Harleston in Norfolk.This ancient wood on poorly drained chalky boulder clay has coppiced hornbeam, ash and hazel with oak standards. The ground flora is especially diverse around the hornbeams and on wet rides.The site is private land with no public access.

Alburgh is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. It lies about four miles (6 km) north-east of Harleston and 16 miles (26 km) south of Norwich.

Harleston was a railway station in Harleston, Norfolk, on the Waveney Valley Line. It was an early post-war closure; passenger services on this line were withdrawn in 1953 with goods trains lasting until the complete closure of the line in 1966.