Wordwell (original) (raw)

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Village in Suffolk, England

Human settlement in England

Wordwell
Wordwell Church
Wordwell is located in SuffolkWordwellWordwellLocation within Suffolk
Population 20
Civil parish Wordwell
District West Suffolk
Shire county Suffolk
Region East
Country England
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town Bury St Edmunds
Postcode district IP28
UK Parliament West Suffolk
List of places UK England Suffolk 52°19′01″N 0°40′59″E / 52.317°N 0.683°E / 52.317; 0.683

Wordwell is a small village and civil parish in the West Suffolk district, in Suffolk, England, about five miles North of Bury St Edmunds. The village was hit by the Black Death in 1348 and never recovered in terms of population; in 2005 it was estimated to have only 20 residents.[1] During the 19th and early 20th centuries it was part of the Culford Estate. From 1974 to 2019 it was in St Edmundsbury district.

The village is mentioned as Wridewellan in the S1225 charter of 1040 AD where Thurketel grants the lands to Bury Abbey.

All Saints Church is largely Norman but with Victorian alterations. Wordwell is also one of very few Thankful Villages, that is to say one which lost no men during either World Wars but it is unclear whether any men left the village to serve in the first place.[2] The church has carvings on benches and in stone.

A mass grave, probably from the time of the Black Death, was found when electricity was provided to the church. Google Earth shows the outlines of buildings that once stood on the other side of the road.

  1. ^ Estimates of total population of areas of Suffolk Archived 2008-12-19 at the Wayback Machine Suffolk County Council
  2. ^ "HELLFIRE CORNER - The Thankful Villages". www.hellfirecorner.co.uk. Retrieved 21 April 2020.

Media related to Wordwell at Wikimedia Commons