Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for SUDBURY

SUDBURY, a town, three parishes, an extra-parochial tract, a sub-district, and a district, in Suffolk. The town stands on the river Stour, and on the Cambridge and Colchester railway, 21 miles W by S of Ipswich; was known to the Saxons as Suthberie or Sudberi; had a mint at Domesday; acquired afterwards a college, an Augustinian friary, a Dominican friary, a Benedictine cell, and a house of the Knights Hospitallers; was one of the first towns selected by Edward III. for the settlement of Flemings, in order to the introduction of woollen manufacture; numbers among its natives Gainsborough the painter, and Enfield author of the "Speaker;'' gives the title of Baron to the Duke of Grafton; is a seat of quarter-sessions and county courts, and a polling place; publishes two weekly newspapers; carries on manufactures of silk and velvet; consists of several irregular streets; presents a neat and clean appearance; and has a head post-office,‡ a r. station with telegraph, two banking offices, two chief inns, a town hall, a corn exchange, a temperance hall, three fine ancient churches, six dissenting chapels, a literary institution, an endowed grammar-school with £90 a year, two other endowed schools with £24 and £20, an alms-house hospital with £19, other charities £170, a workhouse, a corn market on Thursdays, and a general market on Saturdays. It was made a borough by Queen Elizabeth; is governed, under the new act, by a mayor, 4 aldermen, and 12 councillors; sent two members to parliament till 1848; and was then disfranchised. The borough limits include the three parishes and the extra-parochial tract of S., and the Essex parish of Ballingdon-cum-Brundon. Pop. of the borough in 1851, 6,043; in 1861, 6,879. Houses, 1,484.

The parishes are All Saints, St. Gregory, and St. Peter, and the extra-parochial tract is St. Bartholomew. Acres, 1,093. Real property, £17,795; of which £300 are in gasworks. Pop., 1,350, 2,781, 1,880, and 7. Houses, 323, 559, 410, and 2. The living of All Saints is a vicarage united with Ballingdon, and the livings of St. Gregory and St. Peter are a conjoint p. curacy, in the diocese of Ely. Value of A. S.-with-B., £140;* of St. G. with-St-P., £300.* Patrons of the former, Simeon's Trustees; of the latter, the Bishop of Ely.—The sub-district includes also 7 other parishes, and comprises 8,067 acres. Pop., 8,918. Houses, 1,936.—The district comprehends also Bulmer, Bures, Melford, and Hartest districts-districts; and comprises 78,302 acres. Poor rates in 1863, £21,834. Pop. in 1851, 30,834; in 1861, 31,415. Houses, 6,926. Marriages in 1863, 241; births, 1,038,-of which 83 were illegitimate; deaths, 887,-of which 328 were at ages under 5 years, and 26 at ages above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 2,219; births, 10,144; deaths, 6,280. The places of worship, in 1851, were 44 of the Church of England, with 13,962 sittings; 9 of Independents, with 2,825 s.; 4 of Baptists, with 1,280 s.; 1 of Quakers, with 350 s.; 1 of Unitarians, with 120 s.; 3 of Wesleyans, with 244 s.; 3 of Primitive Methodists, with 74 s.; and 2 of Roman Catholics, with 114 s. The schools were 32 public day-schools, with 2,725 scholars; 55 private day-schools, with 1,167 s.; 45 Sunday schools, with 3,900 s.; and 6 evening schools for adults, with 101 s.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a town, three parishes, an extra-parochial tract, a sub-district, and a district"   (ADL Feature Type: "cities")
Administrative units: Sudbury CP       Sudbury SubD       Sudbury RegD/PLU       Suffolk AncC
Place names: SUDBERI     |     SUDBURY     |     SUTHBERIE
Place: Sudbury

Go to the linked place page for a location map, and for access to other historical writing about the place. Pages for linked administrative units may contain historical statistics and information on boundaries.