ULCEBY WITH FORDINGTON

Situated at the south-easterly extremity of the Lincolnshire Wolds, the parish of Ulceby with Fordington occupies some 2,200 acres and forms the north-westerly corner of the Willoughby group of parishes. The land lies mainly between 85 and 97 metres above sea level, straddling the ridge which rises from Gunby to the south-east and which runs in a north-westerly direction to The Open Gate Inn, from where it fans out in a broad plateau. This ridge carries the Bluestone Heath Road (A1028) and on either side the land falls quite steeply to about 45 metres in the two valleys running down to the adjoining parish of Skendleby. About a mile to the north-west of The Gate the A1028 meets the A16 at Ulceby Cross, from where a further road (A1104) runs north-easterly to Alford. It is a well-wooded landscape and although many of the fields have doubtless been consolidated into larger enclosures, in keeping with the needs of modern farming practice, they are in the main still bounded by hedges and so, unlike many parts of Lincolnshire, the typical patchwork quilt pattern of the English countryside is retained. There are far-reaching views to the coast of the North Sea in the East, across the fens and the Wash into Norfolk in the South whilst the gently rolling Wolds can be seen to the West and the North.

The principal agricultural uses of the land are mixed arable, dairy-farming and sheep rearing. There are now only three farming enterprises in the parish, Fred W Read & Sons Ltd. at Grange Farm Ulceby (arable and dairying), Mr David Thornalley at Fordington House Farm (arable and sheep rearing) and L & C Farming Co. Ltd. of Authorpe Grange (arable). Apart from farming, there are other small businesses in the form of The Open Gate Inn at Ulceby village and The Haywain Motel at Ulceby Cross, both well-known for their high standards of catering. Also at Ulceby Cross is a petrol filling station and an agricultural machinery dealer. In Ulceby village there is a joinery business, a removal contractor and a motor repair workshop. Overall it is a typical quiet rural community with a small, well-balanced population, the tranquillity being disturbed only by the sounds of agricultural machines, the low-flying aircraft of the R.A.F. and NATO air forces and, in summer, the noise of the cars, coaches and motor cycles of holidaymakers from Yorkshire and the Midlands en route to and from Skegness and Mablethorpe.

The present day church in Ulceby is a small brick-built structure with a single nave and chancel and was completely rebuilt in 1826 at the cost of £450, no doubt replacing an earlier structure which would have stood on the same site for many centuries before. It contains a limestone carved font which is reputed to have been rolled to Ulceby from the disused church at Fordington, during which operation the base was broken from the main body. The former Rectory House, now a private house known as The Peacocks, was built in 1852 at a cost of £2,000. It seems that the house acquired its present name from that of the incumbent of the church in 1856, the Rev. Wilkinson Affleck Peacock, B.A.

The information contained in the preceding paragraph is obtained from the Gazetteer and Directory of Lincolnshire published by William White of Sheffield, in 1856. At that time the population of the combined parish was 191 and it was noted that there were two licensed premises, one at Ulceby Cross and the other at the Gate, run by Joseph Brackenbury and Thomas Foreman respectively. There was a blacksmith, Joseph Brown and a wheelwright, Edward Rutter. Ulceby Grange was then farmed by Robert Riggall and there are three other farmers mentioned, Mary Burton, John Glover Willows and Mrs Mary Cartwright. The latter lady was at Fordington and it is interesting to note that the names of members of her family can still be seen, etched in the glass of the windows at Fordington House Farm.

Although Ulceby and Fordington are now united as one parish, this has not always been the case. Like its neighbour Dexthorpe (now a single farm forming part of the adjoining parish of Dalby), Fordington was badly affected by the Black Death plague of 1349 and its population was greatly reduced. Prior to the coming of the plague, Fordington (like Dexthorpe) had been an independent parish complete with its own church, the village having stood in the fields now lying immediately to the South of Fordington House Farm. Clearly the population never recovered from the devastation of the plague for the parish of Fordington was finally merged with that of Ulceby on the 22nd May 1450. According to ecclesiastical records the reason for the merger was "propter raritatem parochianorum pestilenciae causa" - which loosely translated from the Latin means "on account of the shortage of parishioners, due to the plague."

The beginning of the third millenium marks some 5000 years of continuous occupation of the parish. There is abundant evidence of man's presence since the neolithic period, notably the long barrow at Fordington forming part of a group of similar barrows known as the Giants Hills and which is considered to have been built somewhere between 3,500 and 2,700 BC. In the vicinity of Ulceby Cross there have been found pottery sherds and other artefacts indicating occupation from the neolithic period through the Iron Age and Roman period, whilst at Fordington there are traces of Bronze Age round barrows seen only as crop marks in aerial photographs, the mounds having been long since levelled by continuous farming activity. The outline of a Roman fort can still be discerned just to the south of Fordington House Farm and is best seen in the early morning sunlight, from the Dalby side of the valley.