Swaffham (St. Peter and St. Paul)
A charter for a market and two annual fairs was granted by King John to one of the earls of Richmond, who were anciently lords of the manor, and who had a prison in the town; the market is on Saturday, and fairs are held on May 12th, for sheep, and July 21st and November 3rd, for sheep and cattle. The market-place, a fine area surrounded by handsome buildings, contains a beautiful cross, erected in 1783 by Lord Oxford, and consisting of a circular dome, supported on eight pillars, and crowned with a figure of Ceres. The county magistrates hold petty-sessions on the first and last Saturdays in the month; the general quarter-sessions take place here, by adjournment from Norwich, and manorial courts leet and baron occur in April or May. The powers of the county debt-court of Swaffham, established in 1847, extend over the registration-district of Swaffham. This is the most central town in the western division of the county, and the election of the members for the division is held here. A shire-hall has been recently erected; and there is a house of correction for the several adjoining hundreds, built in the reign of Elizabeth. The New Bridewell was erected in 1787, and is adapted for more than fifty prisoners; attached is a chapel, of which the chaplain, who is elected by the magistrates, has a stipend of £200 per annum. A treadmill was erected in 1822, and a residence for the governor in 1825. The parish comprises 7563a. 3r. 28p., of which 4524 are arable, 2853 pasture, meadow, and heath, 55 woodland, and 131 in roads, buildings, &c.
The living is a vicarage, with the rectory of Threxton annexed, valued in the king's books at £14. 5. 10.; patron, the Bishop of Norwich; appropriators, the Dean and Chapter of Westminster. The great tithes of the parish have been commuted for £1125, and the vicarial for £533. 10.; the appropriate glebe contains 110 acres, and the vicarial 53. The church, which is approached by a fine avenue of lime-trees, is a splendid cruciform structure in the later English style, with a stately embattled tower crowned by turrets, and surmounted by a well-proportioned spire. The nave is separated from the aisles by lofty ranges of slender clustered columns sustaining the roof, which is richly ornamented with figures of angels, carved in chesnut-wood; there are several neat monuments, and in the north transept is an altar-tomb, with the recumbent effigy of John Botewright, D.D. In a library attached to the church, and which was principally the gift of the Spelman family, is a curious missal. The north aisle is commonly reported to have been built by John Chapman, a tinker of the town, concerning whom a curious monkish legend prevails; and various devices in different parts of the church seem to be rebuses on the name of Chapman. Here was anciently a free chapel, dedicated to St. Mary; and about half a mile distant, in a hamlet once called Guthlac's Stow, now Goodluck's Close, stood another, dedicated to St. Guthlac. In the town are places of worship for Baptists and Wesleyans; also a free school founded in 1724, by Nicholas Hamond, Esq., who bequeathed £500 for erecting a school-house, and £500 for the instruction of 20 boys. Aspal's manor, comprising 100 acres, with a right of common of 300 acres, was granted to the town by Edward VI., for the repair of the church, high roads, &c., and for the relief of the poor: the income is £160 per annum. Adjoining the churchyard is a large green croft, bequeathed by Dr. Botewright, as a place of exercise for the inhabitants, and on which were formerly butts for the practice of archery. The union of Swaffham comprises 33 parishes or places, and contains a population of 13,084. At a place called Priors Thornes, about a mile distant, was a cell or hermitage, for pilgrims on their way to the shrine of Walsingham. John de Swaffham, a man of great learning, raised to the see of Bangor by Pope Gregory II., was a native of the town.
Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.