Acle
Acle is a small market
town on the
River Bure in
Norfolk within
The Broads National Park. It is located halfway between
Norwich and
Great Yarmouth and has the only bridge across the River Bure between
Wroxham and
Great Yarmouth.
[Ordnance Survey (2005). OS Explorer Map OL40 - The Broads. ISBN 0319237699.]The civil parish has an area of 9.46 square
kilometres and in 2001 had a population of 2732 in 1214 households. For the purposes of local government, the parish falls within the area of the
district of
Broadland.
[Office for National Statistics & Norfolk County Council, 2001. "Census population and household counts for unparished urban areas and all parishes". Retrieved December 2, 2005.]The name "Acle" means "in the lea of the oaks", that is, a clearing in an
oak forest. In
Tudor times, hundreds of oaks were felled here for timber to construct
Elizabeth I's war ships.
In
Roman times, Acle was a port at the head of a large
estuary named Gariensis. Acle is mentioned in the
Domesday Book, and in 1253 it was granted a
market. In 1382, it received the right for a "turbary", that is, the right to dig
peat.
Acle railway station, which was built in 1883, lies on the
Wherry Line from Norwich to Great Yarmouth. In 1892 a foundry was constructed that specialised in building
windpumps for land drainage, including the very last windpump built for the Broads, at Ash Tree Farm. The three-mile £7.1m dual-carriageway
A47 bypass opened in March 1989.
The church of
Acle St Edmund is one of 124 existing
round-tower churches in
Norfolk.
* for Acle.
*
Information from Genuki Norfolk on Acle.
*
Website with photos of Acle St Edmund, a
round-tower church
