Buckden - a Huntingdonshire Village

33 Huntingdonshire Local History Society and, through the fund established in her name, a benefactress of many local history societies – including Buckden’s. Glebe Lane is a short residential street running between Manor Gardens and Lucks Lane, which it joins opposite the cemetery lych-gate. Gloria Patri, the Bugden. This scurrilous late 18thC or early 19thC rhyme is thought to be aimed at the Bishop of Lincoln of the day: ‘To the Father and Son/All praise must be given/Their spirit is even,/ And their lying is one. The father lies well/The son is as clever/They have lied, they do lie/And will lie for ever.’ If anyone knows what lies behind this attack, the Local History Society would be pleased to hear from them! golf course. Unlike the Buckden by-pass (q.v.), Buckden golf course is not a myth – although its exact location has passed out of memory. It is known to have been somewhere on the eastern edge of the village. It flourished at the beginning of the 20thC. That it was open only between August and April suggests it may have been on rented farmland which was returned to livestock grazing during the spring and summer. No mere pitch- and-putt course, it was the home of the Buckden golf team and was extended in 1902. The last known reference to it is during the First World War (in 1916): it may well have fallen victim to the drive to grow more food. Good, Dr Frederick Thomas MRCSEng LSA (c. 1855-1894) was for six years senior partner in the Buckden practice of Good & Hillyer – although he never actually lived in the village. See Chapter 14. goosing shed [MapRef 22]. Also known as the goose barn, this was part of the blacksmiths’ premises just north of the Vine inn. The Great North Road was one of the main routes along which flocks of geese were once walked on their way to London’s great Christmas goose fairs. Buckden was one of the staging-posts on this long journey, giving the drovers an opportunity to prepare the geese for the rigours of the miles still to come. They did this by herding them through the goosing shed, whose floor was a mixture of sand and heated tar that left the soles of the birds’ feet with a protective coating. Grafham Water is England’s third largest inland water. Although no part of the 1,500 acre site falls within Buckden’s parish boundary, some older residents are in no doubt that the reservoir has had an effect on the village. They believe that Buckden’s exceptionally dry climate is caused by the temperature difference between the huge expanse of water and the surrounding land. This causes rain clouds approaching from the west to divide, so that they pass to the south (and more often) north of the village. Great Buckden Hay Robbery. A frisson of disapproval or of amusement, depending on which side of the social divide you stood, ran through the district in 1885. James Matthews, a carter employed by the Rowley family of Priory Park, St Neots, was directed to carry several loads of hay from the Rowley farm to Buckden station for onward transport and sale. It subsequently became apparent that less hay arrived at the customers’ end than started out from St Neots. It was first thought the ‘shrinkage’ took place during the railway journeys. Then the police received a tip-off from a boy who had occasionally accompanied the carter and had been uneasy at what he saw. As a result, they searched two Buckden pubs, the Windmill at the south end of the village, and the Crown at the north. They discovered quite large amounts of hay concealed on both premises. It turned out that on arriving at the station, the carter would ‘find’ a broken truss of hay and keep it back as fit only to ‘feed the horses’. In fact, the horses saw little of it, as on the way back he would stop off at one or other of the pubs and exchange the hay for beer. (No money seems to have changed hands.) After the carter had been found guilty by the St Neots magistrates, the two licensees were also charged. With a notable lack of chivalry, both put the blame on their wives. Great North Road. One has only to look at a map of Britain to see why this road was so important in opening up and maintaining trade and communications between London, the north of England and Scotland: a direct route for goods, livestock, passengers, royal messengers, postal services and armies. At times its importance—and the prosperity of Buckden—has diminished, as with the com- ing of the railways in the 19thC, and the 1959 opening of the M1 motorway and its later extension to Yorkshire. Several other entries in this book attest to the continu- ing presence—for better or worse—of the Great North Road (or A1 as the relevant stretch now is) in Buckden’s life. A good place at which to start is Chapter 18 which describes why its adoption as a turnpike road was regarded as a priority in the early 18thC and led to the sidelining of the more easterly Old North Road from Shoreditch to Alconbury via Royston. Green family. The Greens of Coneygarths (and other houses in the village) were one of Buckden’s leading gentry families throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They were related to John Green, Bishop of Lincoln, and connected by marriage to Edward Maltby, Vicar of Buckden and later Bishop of Durham. The best- known member of the family was Captain John George This memorial in painted cast iron is located in the roof of the lych-gate to the cemetery.