Thomas Seckford and Woodbridge
On a walk around Woodbridge, it doesn't take long to realise that there is a name that crops up time and again - Thomas Seckford. It is remarkable that the life of one man, living in the turbulent Tudor era, should have had such an enduring impact on the town of Woodbridge and the surrounding area of Suffolk: an impact that is as powerful today as it has been down the centuries.
Thomas Seckford was born in 1515 at Seckford Hall, the family seat outside Woodbridge which is now a luxury hotel. His country house was the Abbey, now the junior school for Woodbridge School.
He built for the town the Shire Hall to serve as the local court, which it continued to do until the late 20th century and now houses the Council Chamber and the Foundation’s archives.
For a time he owned the iconic Tide Mill, one of only two working tide mills remaining in the United Kingdom. Seckford was a prominent lawyer who served Queen Elizabeth I in a number of important judicial roles. He amassed a considerable fortune and when he died in 1587 he left his estate in Clerkenwell, then comprising pasture land just to the north of the City of London, to endow an almshouse for thirteen poor men of Woodbridge. I believe they were actually started before he died.
Although Seckford had made generous provision in his will for his brothers and their offspring – he himself had no children – much of the first one hundred years was occupied by challenges to the endowment made by various members of the Seckford family, but one consequence of these legal wrangles was that the Master of the Rolls and the Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas were appointed to be the governors of the charity, with administration being delegated to the churchwardens of St Mary’s parish church in Woodbridge. As income from the estate grew, surplus funds were used to teach, clothe and care for poor children and the pensions paid to residents of the almshouse were increased and as London expanded and finally engulfed Clerkenwell, so the rental value of the endowment increased significantly, facilitating the construction in the mid 19th century of a magnificent new almshouse, the Seckford Hospital, not far from the centre of town, which today remains the centre of the Foundation’s care activities.
In 1662 Dorothy Seckford, the widow of Seckford’s nephew Henry, last of the Seckford family, joined with a number of other eminent locals to found a free school which was housed in a property in Seckford Street, just off the town’s Market Hill, donated by Robert Marryott, after whom one of the current school’s buildings, now housing the Foundation’s administrative headquarters, is named. The school was to teach ten “sons of the meaner sort” of Woodbridge residents, along with others who were to be charged £1 a year. They were to be taught Latin and Greek to prepare them for university; or, if not capable of mastering these subjects, arithmetic and writing as preparation “for trades or to go to sea”. Over the first two centuries of its existence the school had its ups and downs, including a headmaster disappearing in order to escape from his creditors, and despite educating an increasing number of boys, a number of whom went on to build eminent careers, its fortunes had dramatically declined by the mid nineteenth century and its premises had fallen into disrepair; in contrast to the increasing fortunes of the almshouse charity.
In 1861 it was therefore agreed that the Almshouse charity should merge with the Free School charity. As a result of the merger, the Seckford Foundation was created, facilitating the move of the School to a spacious new site on the edge of the town which still houses Woodbridge School as well as the administrative offices of the Foundation. As well as providing funds for more bursaries, the merger freed up the original school building in Seckford Street for use as a dispensary and a lending library and reading room, both funded by the Foundation.
The original school building in Seckford Street which, in 1861, was converted for use as a dispensary and a lending library and reading room - both funded by the Foundation.
The Foundation has not stood still since then: the past 150 years have seen continuous development of the activities of the Foundation and its facilities, and since the turn of the century alone the Foundation has entirely remodelled the Almshouses, providing exceptional accommodation for its residents; constructed a 350 seat theatre, the Seckford Theatre, for the benefit of the School and the local community; has substantially upgraded the teaching facilities of Woodbridge School, to include a new classroom block, sixth form centre and technology centre; opened three new Free Schools, in Beccles, Ixworth and Saxmundham, providing educational choice in those areas; launched Seckford Springboard to help young people under 25 to access education, employment and training; and led on an initiative called ‘Flourish’ to help tackle the issue of rural poverty within Suffolk.
It seems incredible that one man from the Tudor era could have such an impact even today! The man himself was buried in St Mary`s Church, so a visit was on the itinerary.
St Mary's Seven Sacrament font is one of thirteen survivals in Suffolk. It now stands at the west end of the south aisle, under the exquisite 1937 font cover by Walter Forsyth.
The panels show the sacraments of the Catholic Church, and are a reminder that our Medieval churches were not built for congregational Anglican worship. The panels are a bit battered, but are all recognisable. The one on my image above is the Crucifixion scene, this panel, anathema to the protestants of the 1540s, has been paid particular attention by them
The panels are, in clockwise order from the north, Ordination, Matrimony (the two sacraments of service), Baptism, Confirmation (the two sacraments of commission), Reconciliation, Mass, Last Rites (along with Reconciliation, one of the two sacraments of healing) and, in the final eighth panel, the Crucifixion.
The survival of so much Catholic imagery in this church, when we know that the 17th century puritans were particularly active in this area, may seem surprising. But, ironically enough, it is a result of the destruction of a century earlier. During the early Reformation of the 1540s, Woodbridge was wholeheartedly Anglican, and the wrecking crew went to work with a vengeance. The destruction here probably took place in the Autumn of 1547, during the first months of Edward VI's reign, when there was a free-for-all in places like Suffolk. The easiest way to deal with the font was to knock off the more prominent relief, and plaster the whole thing over. When Dowsing and his Biblical fundamentalists arrived at this church almost a century later on the 27th January 1644, they found very little to do.
The tomb of Thomas Seckford, the great benefactor of Woodbridge
The Deban Millennium Frieze. Designed by Michael Coulter and created by the Deban Decorative and Fine Arts Society, this 20 foot long and 3 foot wide frieze gives a brief history of Woodbridge over the past 2000 years. Rather clever, I thought.
I hold and am held
This rather eye-catching 2016 sculpture by Rick Kirby is in the churchyard of Woodbridge Quay Church. Funded by a church member, this work is made of small pieces of welded sheet steel in the shape of a pair of supportive hands, which reflect the church's statement of faith and hope in God.
The Sisters
Installed in November 2020, ‘The Sisters’ sculpture, commissioned by Woodbridge Boatyard and made by Andrew Baldwin, celebrates Molly and Ethel Everson who, along with their brothers Cyril and Bert, managed the yard inherited from their father until 1969.
Cyril and Bert built boats and handled the river work, so ‘living’ memorials to them can be seen in the many Everson boats that still sail these waters. The sisters managed the chandlery, sail store and office, where the rowing club now stands. This sculpture celebrates their contribution. These two tough, resilient women now watch over the Deben once again and their story is remembered.
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