Santon Downham Warren

Map of Location

Warren Features

Boundary Banks
Single, double, treble, quadruple

Trapping Banks
Dome-shaped bank 4m wide x 1m high but very ‘lumpy’. Runs towards north-south track and then meets another bank at a corner (ie they join) at TL82984 87015.

Lodges
Little Lodge Farm is possible site of warrener’s house. Little Lodge Farm is a collection of flint and brick buildings, with a barn and dwelling house of 19th century

Earliest documentary evidence
Map 1778 of Robert Wright’s estate showing Santon Downham rabbit warren ‘warren banks and lodge, doles, roads and tracks’.
[NRO MC 662/22 793X5]

Maps
Map 1778 of Robert Wright’s estate showing Santon Downham rabbit warren ‘warren banks and lodge, doles, roads and tracks’.
[NRO MC 662/22 793X5]

Maps 1805 and 1812
Estate Map 1865 has note ‘Parker’s Map of Litle Farm 1778 now called Little Lodge Farm’.
[NRO 4652 Bridgeman, WSROB HD2594]

Other documentary evidence
The manor of Santon Downham was held by St Edmundsbury Abbey before the Conquest, and by Frodo, Abbot Baldwin’s brother, in 1086. A John de Santon appears c.1170, and his granddaughter Alice married Robert de Vere, 5th Earl of Oxford (1240-96), which is the likeliest explanation for the manor passing to the de Vere family. The manor was subsequently subdivided, but a relevant feature of its history is the granting of Downham Ixworth manor to Ixworth priory in 1250-51. After the Dissolution it was granted to Richard Codington. The estate passed through many hands until it was sold to speculators in 1918. It was acquired by the Forestry Commission in 1924.

Abstract of Title to Estate 1664-1920
[WSROB
HA536/CD24]

Forestry Commission
It was acquired by the Forestry Commission in 1924

Poaching
Lord Cadogan committed William Plumb to Bury Goal 19 Nov 1793 – stole one rabbit from warren of Mr Robert Eagle – but not known as yet where this warren was.
[WSWROB
20/11/1793/2/5]

Lodges
Low Lodge Farm Downham [NRO MC114/2/1]

Boundary Banks
Section 1a At TL82323 86313 the bank 6m wide x 0.4m high curves in from the road at an angle.Covered with trees.

1b TL82734 86549 the bank 5m wide x 0.3m high crosses a linear bank 3m wide x 0.2m high at a right angle. This linear bank is c 40m long.

Section 2 At TL82848 86632 the linear bank (as in Section 1b above) 6m wide x 1m high turns to the north in a distinct curve. It continues to the right of the track but is much lower at 4m wide x 0.3m high. Bracken and trees on top both deciduous and pine. Bank 5m wide x 0.7m high truncated when reaches field (which may have been turf-stripped).

Section 3 Dome-shaped bank 4m wide x 1m high but very ‘lumpy’. Runs towards north-south track and then meets another bank at a corner (ie they join) at TL82984 87015.

Section 4 Another bank with old oaks on it runs parallel to bank nearest track (as in Section 3). This second and eastern bank 8m wide x 1m high covered with bracken. AT TL82890 86871 this bank flattens out in the plantation. There is another very faint bank 0.3m wide x 0.1m high and 10m to the west but for a short distance and in older trees.

Secton 5 From the loading bay, a bank 0.8m wide x0.8m high meets the bank from Section 1a
and runs parallel to it c 40 m away from it.