Hingham, Norfolk
Hingham is a market town and parish in mid-Norfolk, 13 miles (21 km) west from Norwich.
The town's name derives from the homestead or village of 'Hega's people'. The town, originally spelled 'Hengham', is an ancient settlement, as its Saxon name denotes. It was the property of King Athelstan in 925 and of William the Conqueror in 1066 and 1086.
In 1414 the town was exempted from an English toll and in 1610, the town was granted a royal charter by James I.
By the 1600's, the town was still agricultural. A map, produced in 1610/11 showed that Hingham was, at the time, situated in countryside with diverse terrain, profuse windmills, well-watered soil and a large degree of inland water traffic.
Many Puritans refused to conform to the wishes of King Charles I and his Archbishop, William Laud, so they fled to the Plymouth Bay or Massachusetts Bay colonies, in what has been labelled the 'Great Migration'. In 1633, migration from England to the Americas began with a number of participants on a ship named the Bonaventure. Robert Peck, the Rector of St. Andrew's Church in Hingham, and his associate Peter Hobart, emigrated to the new colony of Massachusetts with half of his congregation, most likely all of the 133 people on the ship Diligent, which departed in June 1638 from Ipswich, Suffolk. Peck had been censured by religious authorities for his Puritan practices, and his daughter had married the son of another well known Puritan minister named John Rogers. The passengers on the Diligent, working class people such as shoemakers and millers, a number of ministers, and gentry, were mostly Puritans. Once there, the passengers founded New Hingham, to remind them of 'Old' Hingham in England.
Grand architecture surrounds the historic market place and town greens of Hingham. A fire in 1688 destroyed many of the town's buildings, leading the better-off local families to build the handsome Georgian homes for which the town is now known. It was claimed that the Hingham gentry were "so fashionable in their dress that the town is called by the neighbours Little London".
The town sign depict the emigration of Hingham people to America, two of those were Samuel Lincoln, an ancestor of President Abraham Lincoln, and Edward Gilman, an ancestor of Nicholas Gilman, the New Hampshire delegate to the Continental Congress and a signatory of the U.S. Constitution
Hingham, Norfolk
Hingham is a market town and parish in mid-Norfolk, 13 miles (21 km) west from Norwich.
The town's name derives from the homestead or village of 'Hega's people'. The town, originally spelled 'Hengham', is an ancient settlement, as its Saxon name denotes. It was the property of King Athelstan in 925 and of William the Conqueror in 1066 and 1086.
In 1414 the town was exempted from an English toll and in 1610, the town was granted a royal charter by James I.
By the 1600's, the town was still agricultural. A map, produced in 1610/11 showed that Hingham was, at the time, situated in countryside with diverse terrain, profuse windmills, well-watered soil and a large degree of inland water traffic.
Many Puritans refused to conform to the wishes of King Charles I and his Archbishop, William Laud, so they fled to the Plymouth Bay or Massachusetts Bay colonies, in what has been labelled the 'Great Migration'. In 1633, migration from England to the Americas began with a number of participants on a ship named the Bonaventure. Robert Peck, the Rector of St. Andrew's Church in Hingham, and his associate Peter Hobart, emigrated to the new colony of Massachusetts with half of his congregation, most likely all of the 133 people on the ship Diligent, which departed in June 1638 from Ipswich, Suffolk. Peck had been censured by religious authorities for his Puritan practices, and his daughter had married the son of another well known Puritan minister named John Rogers. The passengers on the Diligent, working class people such as shoemakers and millers, a number of ministers, and gentry, were mostly Puritans. Once there, the passengers founded New Hingham, to remind them of 'Old' Hingham in England.
Grand architecture surrounds the historic market place and town greens of Hingham. A fire in 1688 destroyed many of the town's buildings, leading the better-off local families to build the handsome Georgian homes for which the town is now known. It was claimed that the Hingham gentry were "so fashionable in their dress that the town is called by the neighbours Little London".
The town sign depict the emigration of Hingham people to America, two of those were Samuel Lincoln, an ancestor of President Abraham Lincoln, and Edward Gilman, an ancestor of Nicholas Gilman, the New Hampshire delegate to the Continental Congress and a signatory of the U.S. Constitution