Thomas Seckford and his Legacy
Thomas Seckford was a nationally renowned Tudor lawyer and patron of cartography. The almshouse he founded in Woodbridge blossomed into the Seckford Foundation which still has a large impact on the town today. For this reason he is often referred to as Thomas Seckford The Benefactor. His ancestors held the manor of Seckford from the twelfth century.
Thomas Seckford was born at Seckford Hall, in the parish of Great Bealings, which is on the outskirts of Woodbridge. Being a younger son he did not inherit Seckford Hall and its estate. Instead he had to establish himself as a lawyer in London. He eventually acquired several properties including the manor of Woodbridge late Priory. The town house he had built there was grander than his ancestral home.
This engraving of Seckford Hall in 1812
is the earliest depiction of it.
Domesday book mentions two allocations of land in Sekeforda and, in 1185, there is the first mention of a manor called Sekforth. By the sixteenth century this manor is called variously called Sackford or Sekford and it is from this that the modern spelling Seckford emerges. It is generally assumed that the name is derived from sedge ford, a ford through an area of rushes. This ford was probably the across the River Fynn which flows through the valley below Seckford Hall. If so it was nearby where the Red Lion, Martlesham, is today. The manor of Seckford had lands in the parishes of Great Bealings, Martlesham, Little Bealings and Woodbridge.
The manor was inherited by Bartholomew de Seckford from his father William in 1185. The next six lords of the manor all had the name de Seckford. After them came George Seckford and there is a painting showing him tilting at a tournament that was possibly attended by Henry VI. The next lord the manor was another George. All of these Seckfords were presumably buried at Great Bealings Church but there is no tangible evidence of this. The first Seckford who was certainly buried there as was the next lord of the manor, Thomas Seckford. He died in 1505 and the North Porch of the Church was subsequently built as a memorial to him and his wife.
The next lord of the manor was also a Thomas. He married the daughter of Sir John Wingfield of Letheringham. The Wingfields were an eminent family and through the marriage the Seckfords became related to other prominent families – the Brandons, the Stanleys and the Sidneys. This Thomas is referred to as The Settler because he sold off the manor of Hackford in Norfolk, which came as a result of a much earlier marriage settlement, and consolidated his lands in Suffolk. This left him with the manor of Seckford and the manor of Boulge. His only public duty appears to have been MP for Orford, which at that time was an important port on the East Coast. He built the present Seckford Hall on the site of the original Hall and it is thought that part of the earlier building was incorporated in it.
Thomas The Settler died in 1575 and he was buried in Great Bealings Church where his wife Margaret had already been interred. A memorial to them on the south wall of the church was erected in 1583 by their son Thomas, who is the subject of this article. An adjacent pew has a tallbut – a broad mouthed, large eared, hound - carved at its end. The original crest of the Seckford’s was the cockerel of St Peter but it was changed to a tallbut passant. This was presumably because the family wanted to avoid any suspicion that they still adhered to Catholicism.
Thomas The Settler and his wife Margaret had 7 sons and 2 daughters. The three sons with most distinguished careers were Thomas The Benefactor, Henry and a younger Thomas. Only the former is considered here.
The 'sedge ford' on the River Fynn after which the manor
of Sekford was named. It was eventually replaced by
the modern bridge on the right
Great Bealings Church where the early members
of the Seckford family are buried.
Thomas Seckford (1515 to 1587) was probably educated at Cambridge University although there is no record of this. He entered Gray’s Inn as a student in 1540 and his name in the entry register is next to that of William Cecil, later Lord Burghley. He was created Chief Secretary of State when Elizabeth came to the throne and Seckford was later to work with him.
In 1542 Seckford was called to the bar. Fourteen years later he was appointed a senior member of Gray's Inn and became involved in its management. Little is known of his early legal practice but in the 1550’s mention is made of him being a council in the Court of Requests, formerly the Court of Poor Men’s Causes. Readers of Sovereign by C J Sansom will deduce from this that Seckford was a lawyer with a social conscious who preferred to help the downtrodden.
From 1554 to 1572 Seckford was a member of parliament and for thirteen of these years he represented Ipswich. He was a very active member and sat on many committees set up to consider the bills to be presented to parliament and he was often the chairman. In 1558 he was made deputy chief steward of the Duchy of Lancaster. At the end of that year, when Elizabeth came to the throne, she appointed him as one of the two Masters of the Court of Requests. Its object was to hear and settle poor men's complaints with as little cost as possible and to exercise compassion as far as this was compatible with speed and justice. Complaints were presented in the form of petitions to the Queen as she moved around the country and one of the two Masters of the Court of Requests always travelled with her. He thus had access to the Queen and at times he must have worked closely with her. He held this position of great significance and influence for 27 years.
Shortly after he became Master of the Court of Requests, Seckford was given the stewardship of Marshalsea. This was a court which dealt with pleas and offences concerning servants of the Royal Household and with offences committed with 12 miles of the royal palace. Serious offenders were committed to the Marshalsea prison. He was also regularly appointed to major commissions set up to consider aspects of national importance, one such being the high commission for ecclesiastical causes, and was a member of numerous commissions set up to examine cases of treason. One of these cases was the trial of the ardent Roman Catholic, John Fenton, who was sentenced to death. Fenton had fly-posted the doors of the Bishop of London's Palace with a copy of a Papal Bull excommunicating Queen Elizabeth.
In 1579 Seckford was made Surveyor to the Court of Wards and Liveries. This Court had the responsibility of administering the estates of the orphans of the gentry. The Master of the Court was Lord Burghley, the Queen's First Minister. The next most senior member was Thomas Seckford who was responsible for the management of the estates. This was a profitable appointment for Seckford because, although the fees paid to the Surveyor were small, they were augmented by grants of wardship.
All these appointments indicate that, as well as being a highly regarded lawyer, Thomas Seckford was also clearly considered to be an able administrator, arbitrator and interrogator. He was also made a custodian of a Royal prisoner.
This painting is of Court of Wards and Liveries. It presided over by Lord Burghley who is in the centre and Thomas Seckford is the second on his right. All later images of Thomas Seckford, such as the one below, were based on this painting.
Because the rights of succession, the children of Henry VIII were challenged by the supporters of Lady Jane Grey and by Mary, Queen of Scotland. All those who arguably had some rights to the throne were viewed with suspicion during Elizabeth's reign. These included the two sisters of Lady Jane Grey and their cousin Margaret who married the eldest son of the Earl of Derby and became Lady Margaret Clifford, Countess of Derby.
Margaret was a catholic and became a Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Mary. When Elizabeth I came to the throne, Lady Margaret did not continue in Royal service; presumably because of her religious background. In 1572 she became estranged from her husband, her health was affected and she became an invalid. Having failed to find relief from orthodox remedies she consulted a Doctor Randell who had a reputation for practicing the occult and who had connections with the Jesuits. When spies informed Elizabeth of this association, she suspected that evil influences were being directed against her. Randell was executed and Lady Margaret was placed under the strict custody of Thomas Seckford. He was a distant cousin or hers by virtue of his grandfather’s marriage into the Wingfield family.
From Margaret’s letters it is clear that she was treated kindly by Thomas Seckford and that she held him in high regard. She survived him and lived on in lonely isolation in Clerkenwell until her death in 1596.
Lady Margaret Clifford, Countess of Derby.
Seckford was also a patron of cartography and this is the achievement for which is best known outside Woodbridge. In 1573, he commissioned the 28 year old Christopher Saxton to produce the first atlas of England and Wales.
The reason for Thomas Seckford’s interest in map making is unclear. He travelled with the Queen as she moved around the country and so he would have appreciated the need for better maps. However, his employment of Christopher Saxton was probably directed at winning favours from the Lord High Treasurer, Lord Burghley, who had used maps throughout his career in government. Thomas Seckford mentioned the project to Lord Burghley and he brought it to the attention of Elizabeth. The Privy Council then produced a letter of authority that gave Saxton access to private property for the purpose of surveying and taking measurements. Proof copies of Saxton’s maps were sent to Lord Burghley and he eventually bound them together with other maps into a working collection and annotated them with the names of Catholics who were likely to cause unrest.
Saxton's surveys were conducted with the help of two assistants and, by 1579, they had completed the set of 35 maps. Every map was adorned by the Royal Arms and those of Seckford.
Saxton's maps were not the first comprehensive survey of a European country but they were acclaimed as a national atlas of high repute and Saxton and Seckford are considered as the fathers of British cartography.
Extract from Saxton's map of Suffolk.
Seckford's coat of arms is in the corner.
A link to an expanded account of Seckfords involvement in mapping will be added latter.
After Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries many of their estates were leased rather than sold. When Elizabeth came to the throne the state’s coffers were low. Consequently many of the estates were sold as their leases expired and Seckford’s frequent contacts with the Queen would have put him in a good position to purchase any land which he required.
After Woodbridge Priory was dissolved in 1536 its lands were leased to the Wingfields. When the lease came to an end in 1564, the Queen sold the property to Thomas Seckford. It consisted of the Priory of Woodbridge and the manor of Woodbridge along with the tide mill and rectory. In addition there were estates at Martlesham, Great-Bealings, Hasketon and Grundisburgh. Seckford had an imposing house built on or near the site of the former priory and he called it The Abbey.
Thomas Seckford was appointed steward of the Liberty of St Etheldreda and in that capacity he erected the building now called the Shire Hall on the Market Hill in Woodbridge. For many years the Liberty was an independent legal entity. Ely monastery was responsible for the courts in the Liberty and they received all the fines that were levied and the goods of those who were executed.
While Seckford was an MP for Ipswich he built a large house there to keep in touch with his constituents. It was variously known as The Great House, St Matthew's House and the Great Place and was situated in Westgate Street. A portion of it was demolished in 1744 but the remainder was left standing until 1852 when it was pulled down to make way for the Ipswich’s first museum. He also built three other houses in Ipswich which he rented out.
Thomas Seckford's house in Ipswich.
The town house which Seckford had built on or near the site of the former priory in Woodbridge. He named the house 'The Abbey'.
All his other properties were in Clerkenwell, London, where he purchased three acres of land from the Queen in 1573. At that time Clerkenwell was on the edge of the city and Seckford refers to it as being ‘where the air is clean and wholesome’. There was also plentiful clean water from the wells that gave the area its name.
By the time Seckford obtained the land, Clerkenwell had already become a popular place to build houses for the nobility. He built a large house for himself and another which was eventually used to accommodate his Royal prisoner, the Countess of Derby. In addition he also built at least three smaller ones. All of these houses were near the former hospital of St John of Jerusalem where his brother Henry had a grace and favour apartment by virtue of being Master of the Queen’s Tents and Pavilions.
Given his grand houses in Clerkenwell, Ipswich and Woodbridge it must have been difficult to decide which was home. At least Seckford was in no doubt about where to be buried. That was to be at Woodbridge, where he was lord of the manor and held the advowson, the right to appoint the rector, of St Mary’s Church. To receive his body, and those of his wider family, he built the Seckford Chapel and vault off the north side of the chancel of the church and directed that he should be buried there. Most of the chapel was pulled down in 1839 and the remainder was converted into an entrance to the church. Portions of Seckford's tomb were removed and fixed to a wall, while its grey marble top was put on the floor of a lumber closet. Subsequently the entrance was converted into organ chamber. The Governors of the Seckford Foundation restored what was believed to be Seckford's tomb in 1874 and it is now beneath the organ.
Seckford’s estate marked on an extract of a Ralph Agas’ map of London in circa 1560-70. It was about 1 mile away from St Paul’s Cathedral where the air "was clean and wholesome".
The remnants of the Seckford Chapel and Vault
is on the lower left of this photograph
What is believed to be Seckford's tomb is now beneath the organ.
Seckford’s final act of preparation, before meeting his maker, was to obtain a licence from the Queen to found almshouses for the constant residence of thirteen poor men. They were to be based on seven tenements he had just built in Woodbridge. Seckford ordained that the 13 almsmen should have a yearly supply of fuel and gowns, and an annual stipend of £5. They were also to have use of a garden, of about 3 acres, near the almshouses.
The Almshouses consisted of ‘seven rooms of brick and stone, and a garret in every one of them’. One of the almsmen, called the ‘Principle poor man’ was held responsible for the good behaviour and discipline of the others. The Principle poor man had a room to himself, but the other almsmen had to share two to a room. Each of these rooms was attached to a piece of garden.
An engraving showing the almshouses (right) and nurses' residence (left) in 1792. The almshouses had been rebuilt in 1733 following a fire. The nurses' residence was built in 1748 because the old one proved to be inconveniently situated and needed repair.
Seckford also ordained that the tenement called Copt Hall, and 2 acres of land, should be used for 3 poor widows to act as nurses to any of the men who should happen to be sick or infirm.
He also specified that, when the almshouse men were walking around the town, they should wear a silver badge bearing the Seckford family escutcheon. Inscribed around the edge, in Latin, was the phrase ‘prayers and alms go up for a memorial before God’.
Seckford lived during a period when parishes were being instructed to make provision for the relief of the increasing number of the poor. Private charity had, however, long been an important source of such relief and it remained so. Throughout the Middle Ages men of fortune had strictly followed the customary practice of leaving from a third to a half of their movable goods towards acts of this kind. Such charitable bequests were not always solely the result of compassion for others. With the closure and of the chantries and the religious guilds, charitable bequests provided an alternative means of safeguarding one’s soul from damnation.
The badge born by almshouse men . Inscribed around the edge, in Latin, was the phrase ‘prayers and alms go up for a memorial before God’.
Seckford died within months of his almshouses being licensed by Queen Elizabeth and in his will the almshouses were endowed with various houses, buildings, yards and gardens in the parish of St James Clerkenwell. The rents from these properties yielded £112 per annum. This provided the £94 needed to cover the pensions, gowns and wood for the almsmen. From the residual Seckford wanted payments to the poor of Clerkenwell and Woodbridge and to Christ's Hospital Ipswich.
Seckford did not marry until he was 51, and then it was to the widow of a former Lord Mayor of London. She died a year earlier than Seckford and, as there were no children, he specified that the affairs of the almshouse were to be managed by two governors namely the Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas and the Lord of the Manor of Seckford Hall. In the event that the male line of Thomas The Settler failed the other governor was to be the Master of the Rolls. It was just as well that Seckford made this provision because the male line was only to last for another 53 years.
The family tree of the last five generations of the Seckford family is shown on the left. The dashed blue and red lines show respectively who inherited the estate of Thomas Seckford The Settler and the estate of Thomas The Benefactor.
Thomas The Settler’s eldest son Francis predeceased him so his estate passed to Francis’ only son Charles. He attended Trinity College Cambridge and, after graduating, was admitted to Gray's Inn. Then, at the age of 22, he was elected MP for Aldeburgh. His marriage to Mary Steyning was intended to further enhance the status of the Seckford family. The bride’s mother, a daughter of the Earl of Oxford, was the widow of the Duke of Suffolk. As part the marriage settlement it was agreed that Charles would inherit extensive lands from his uncle, Thomas The Benefactor.
There is a reference to Charles being appointed to the Queen’s household in 1578 but there is no supporting evidence. Thus he probably led the life of a country squire and attended to his parliamentary duties. Twelve years after Charles’ marriage to Mary Steyning, Thomas The Benefactor died and the bulk of his estate passed to Charles. In addition to the manor of Woodbridge late Priory, this bequest included the manors of Overhall and Netherhall in Dedham along with site of the suppressed Priory of Felixstowe with lands at Walton and Trimley. He also bequeathed to Charles a house and garden in Clerkenwell to become the London residence for the family and to be called 'Seckford's Seat'.
The bequest to Charles was accompanied by the stipulation that he should look after the almshouses and enlarge them, but he soon showed that he had no intention of doing this by disputing whether the endowment of the almshouse was legally valid. The challenge failed and most of the founder’s wishes were implemented. Nevertheless Charles took possession of Copt Hall and the three nurses had to be accommodated elsewhere.
Charles and Mary had two sons and three daughters. When Charles died he bequeathed his younger son, Henry, the Priory of Felixstowe and lands in Walton, the Trimleys and Falkenham. The remainder of his land went to his elder son Sir Thomas. These lands included the manors of Seckford and Woodbridge late Priory.
At the age of 15, Sir Thomas had matriculated from Corpus Christi College, Cambridge and he had then been admitted to Gray's Inn. Nothing is known about his subsequent career apart from the fact that he was knighted at Newmarket in 1608. Two years later he died aged 28. All of his possessions were inherited by his younger son Thomas who was then only 2. He eventually entered Trinity College, Cambridge, and died there at the age of 16. His estates then passed to his uncle Henry who had married but was without an heir. So when he died two years later his estates passed to the nearest male heir Henry, the son of the younger brother of Thomas The Benefactor.
Henry’s right to the estate was challenged by Sir Thomas’ sister Mary who had married Sir Anthony Cage. The suit failed but some of the legal costs incurred had to be borne by the estate that supported the Almshouses. The legal wrangling did, however, have the benefit that new Ordinances and Statutes for the charity were agreed in 1635. These clearly stated that when Henry died, the male line from Thomas The Settler would end. The minister of St Mary’s Church, and the churchwardens, would receive the revenues from Clerkenwell and would manage the almshouse. The and governors of the charity would be Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas and the Master of the Rolls. This effectively removed the charity from the clutches of any member of the Seckford family although, a distant branch, unsuccessfully tried to seize the Clerkenwell estate fourteen years later.
When Henry died in 1638 his wife Dorothy inherited all his estates and possessions and she continued to live at Seckford Hall until her death in 1673. She took a keen interest in Woodbridge and, after the closure of the Free Grammar School established by Thomas Arnott, she and two other townspeople re-established it. Also, in her will, she expressed the wish that the upkeep of the Almshouses must be maintained as a prime responsibility of her Trustees.
When Dorothy died, Seckford Hall, with all its lands in Great Bealings, Little Bealings and Martlesham were put in charge of her executor for nine years so that the legacies she wished to give could be paid out of the income of the estates during that time. After that the properties went to Seckford Cage. He so encumbered the Seckford Hall estate with mortgages that it passed out of the family in 1709.
Dorothy left the manor of Woodbridge late Priory and the house now called The Abbey - to the Norths of Laxford (her family). They held them until Edward North of Benacre died, without issue, in 1707. He bequeathed the manor and The Abbey to his wife Anne with the condition that, on her death, they be transferred to his nephew Thomas Carthew.
Subsequently The Abbey and its 14 acres of grounds changed hands several times. Finally the property was bought in 1949 and it opened as a Junior School a year later.
During the eighteenth century there was a series of changes to the almshouses. They were destroyed by fire in 1733 and were promptly rebuilt. Then, in 1748, the nurses' residence at Copthall was taken down because it had proved to be inconveniently situated and was falling into decay. A new home for the nurses was built close to the almshouses and the inhabitants of Woodbridge contributed £12 (from the poor rate) towards it erection. Finally, in 1754, a pump was built on the paving fronting the almshouses. This pump was in lieu of the of the almsmen’s right to use the well in the park of the Abbey.
By 1767 the Clerkenwell was highly developed and Seckford’s estate there had been subdivided into six parts which were leased for 60 years and yielded a total annual income of £565. By that time the bequest to the poor of Clerkenwell at Christmas was £10 and the Principal almsman at Woodbridge received £27 per annum, the twelve almsmen £20 each, the three nurses £12 each, the Minister £10 and the two Church Wardens £5. This left a sizable surplus income to be left to accrue for future repairs. These reserves were substantially boosted, in 1823, when a portion of the Clerkenwell estate was sold for £39,456 to the Middlesex magistrates for a new prison. The following year the Woodbridge almshouses were ‘new-fronted in a neat and appropriate style’ at a cost of £1,470.
An Act of Parliament obtained in 1826 enabled the Governors to make major changes to the Clerkenwell estate. They were able to demolish or alter buildings, to erect new ones and change the road layout. By 1830 over £20,000 had been spent on transforming the area. A distillery, a factory, a chapel, a public house a school and a number of terraced houses had been constructed and the rental revenue had increased to over £3,000. The road layout has remained unchanged since.
Map showing the Clerkenwell Estate today.
By 1832 the yearly rental of the estate, and the accumulated stock of unapplied income, had so greatly increased that the governors of the charity determined to double the number of alms people by building the Seckford Hospital in Woodbridge.
The Seckford Hospital
Work on the Seckford hospital started in 1834. Three years later the east wing was complete, along with the boundary wall and terrace, and the residents of the old Almshouses were moved in. The western wing was then approved and work on it soon started. This was followed by the building of the Lodge and the installation of massive gates and railings.
The original plans also included a chapel between the east and west wings, but there was initially insufficient money to complete that part of project. The Governors of the Charity eventually agreed to go ahead with the construction of the chapel if the people of Woodbridge would contribute a quarter of the cost, some £500. However, the inhabitants were unable to raise this money owing to ‘the depressed conditions of the agricultural interests which greatly affected the prosperity of the town’. Plans for the chapel then lapsed until the Governors came to inspect the two wings of the new building. They thought they looked incomplete without the chapel so they ordered that it should be built henceforth. The chapel was completed in 1843 at a cost of £1200 and there was seating accommodation for over 150. Following the completion of the hospital there was considerable debate within the town on how to use the surplus money still accruing from the Clerkenwell estate.
The Seckford Hospital circa 1900.
Most of the people of Woodbridge wanted to use the surplus income of the Seckford Charity to relieve the poor, but the governors of the charity were concerned about the danger of ‘pauperising the town of Woodbridge’. Eventually the governors proposed a scheme which was approved by the Court of Chancery in 1861. This scheme amalgamated the Seckford Charity with the Free Grammar School whose income was too small to fund further development. The school had been started in 1662 by Dorothy Seckford, Robert Marryott and Francis Burwell.
The decision to divert money, originally intended for the aged poor, to support the Grammar School was made at a time when it was accepted that the middle and upper classes would have to pay for their children to be educated and there was concern about the number and quality of the schools available to them. This led to a national debate about whether non-educational endowments having arcane obsolete purposes or which had become insignificant in comparison with the endowment, could be converted to educational purposes. The latter became the objective of the Endowed School Commissioners, who were empowered only seven years after the Court of Chancery's ruling on the Seckford Charity.
New Grammar School Erected
The 1861 Scheme empowered the Trustees to erect a new Grammar School and they choose a three-acre site abutting the west side of Bredfield Street. Some 150 townsmen petitioned against the choice of location. They argued that ‘the area was mostly composed of tenements of the worst description and that boys having to pass through these localities would inevitably be brought into daily contact with those residing in the streets and lanes and be made familiar with scenes highly objectionable.’ Moreover, as the area lay between the National and British schools the grammar school boys would therefore be ‘in danger of coming into contact with these pupils, which would be most objectionable and ought to be avoided’. Despite these objections the building went ahead. What is now called Marryott House, was completed by 1864. It included a residence for the Head Master and accommodation for 25 boarders.
The 1861 scheme also specified that the school must offer 20 scholarships to local boys in the form of total or partial exemption from fees. There were 10 Marryott scholarships open to boys of Woodbridge and 10 Seckford Scholarships open to boys of Woodbridge or the adjacent parishes.
Marryott House was erected in 1865 on three acres of land to the east of Burkitt Road.
Expansion of the Services to the Poor
The 1861 scheme also allowed for an expansion of the services offered to the poor of Woodbridge by (1) the refurbishing or rebuilding of the old almshouses, (2) by providing a dispensary, a lending library and a public pump and drinking fountain, (3) by making annual payments to the elementary schools in Woodbridge and (4) by giving grants towards apprenticeships for children educated in these schools.
The old almshouses, and the adjacent nurse’s home, were demolished in 1869 and a two story building was erected on the same site. It was used to accommodate eight married couples, eight single women and a nurse.
The Seckford dispensary started in a room near the chapel at the Hospital soon after the 1861 scheme was approved. It provided medical advice and medicines to the residents of the Hospital and to those inhabitants of the town and neighbourhood who could not afford to pay for treatment. The dispensary could also be used by those who were nominated by subscribers who paid a yearly subscription of 10s and upwards. This facility was used by some employers to provide medical treatment for their employees.
The new almshouses erected in 1869
From 1876 the Dispensary was in the house that had been previously occupied by the Free Grammar School on Seckford Street. Finally, in 1886, the Dispensary moved into a building erected on an adjacent plot. There were two wards named Victoria - after the Queen - and Dorothy - after the last of the Seckfords.
The Lending Library started as a few volumes occupying some shelves in a shop on Market Hill. In 1869 it was moved to a house on St John's Hill, and six years later to the old school room of the Free Grammar School. Some £500 was spent furnishing it and stocking it with books. By 1900, the Charity was allowing the Library committee to spend £50 a year on books, provided they did not include ‘novels of a merely sensational character or of any approaching an immoral tendency’.
A public pump and drinking fountain ‘for the use and convenience of the poor inhabitants of the town and neighbourhood’ was erected on the Market Hill in 1877. It was based on a design by W H Lockwood. He named it ‘Victoria’ because it resembled the peaked hats worn by the Queen.
The Dispensary built on Seckford Street in 1886.
The Schemes of 1880 and 1891
In 1880 the Charity Commissioners, with the powers conferred on them by "The Endowed School Act, 1869", produced a new scheme for the management and regulation of the Seckford Hospital and the Grammar School. The scheme did not foresee any expansion of the facilities provided by the Hospital but it stated that "the residual income of the Charity, if any, may be applied to the purpose of the Grammar School, in improving accommodation …. or generally promoting the efficiency of the school.”
In 1890 the governors of the school prepared for its expansion by purchasing land around the school and eight cottages on Bredfield Street. The grounds of the school were thereby increased to 34 acres. The cottages were demolished in 1891 and, by 1895, the new School House had been erected at cost of £12,000. The latter provided accommodation for 40 boarders, the assistant masters and the headmaster whose previous accommodation in Marryott House was taken over by the Science Master. By the following year a block of seven classrooms and School Hall had been built. Extensive playing fields were also laid out and the present retaining wall along Burkitt Road was built along with the entrance from that road.
School House and its extensive grounds.
Marryott house just out of sight to left.
1908 - The Charity was Split into Two
The Seckford Hospital and the Woodbridge Endowed School had been run by a single charity but, in 1908, the Charity Commissioners produced a new scheme which split it into two. Namely the Woodbridge Endowed School Charity, which was to be under the jurisdiction of The Board of Education, and the Seckford Hospital Charity, which was to remain under the jurisdiction of the Charity Commission.
The Woodbridge Endowed School Charity had the bulk of the original endowment while the Seckford Hospital Charity was given £2,000 a year from the Educational Charity and £891 from government bonds that the Hospital Charity was allocated.
The Seckford Hospital was thus expected to operate on a fixed income, and no longer had the assets to fund expansion. The governors had objected to this, but had been overruled. The governors for both charities were initially the same and could thus transact all the business for both charities in one common meeting. This changed in 1920 when the school became a direct grant grammar school and six members of the East Suffolk local authority were appointed to the governing body of the Endowed School.
The annual income received from the Endowed School Charity remained at £2000 from 1908 to 1956. It was then increased to £3000 and it remained at that until 1967 after that it was raised to £4000.The governors wrote to the Charity Commission in 1921 to point out that they could not manage on this income. They were told to save money by cutting the annual pension paid to residents over 70 years of age from £25 to £12 a year, thereby making the residents eligible for the full State pension of 10s a week. Over the years the pension paid by the charity to the residents was gradually phased out as the rising state pension and the introduction of other state benefits made it unnecessary. From 1963, residents were required to make a small financial contribution towards their accommodation.
In 1930 the governors asked the Charity Commission for permission to sell or let the Dispensary because there was, by then, little demand for the services offered. They attributed the decline to the effect of the National Health Insurance Acts and to the large well equipped and up-to-date Hospital at Ipswich. The latter was offering a comprehensive scheme of weekly payments by Employers and Employees whereby workmen, their wives and children were given free treatment. The Commission agreed with the proposal, but Dispensary continued to provide medical attention for the sick poor until the introduction of the National Health Service in 1948. The building was then used by the Woodbridge Red Cross until 1974, and it has since been converted to flats.
The Charity Commission was keen to make other economies as well. They wanted the Library to be taken over by the council and, if this were not possible, for users to pay a subscription. By 1951, the Seckford Library was a branch of the East Suffolk County Council. They opened the new Oak Lane Library in 1970.
In marked contrast the story of the Woodbridge Endowed School from 1908 until 1975 is one of expansion.
The School Expands
The swimming baths were opened in 1925, the science laboratories in 1926 and the school chapel, built largely by the boys, was dedicated in 1927. Then, from 1968 to 1974 an art and technology block, sixth form centre, sports hall, and music rooms were built on the Burkett Road Site.
The School became co-educational in 1974. Two years later, when comprehensive education was introduced, it opted for independence and ceased to be a direct grant grammar school. The local authority was accordingly deprived of its right to nominate governors to the Charity of The Woodbridge Endowed School. The governing body of this charity then, once again, became the same as that of the Charity of The Seckford Hospital and the two charities were allowed to reunite as the Seckford Foundation in 1980.
An offer of £825,000 was accepted for nearly all the remaining Clerkenwell properties in 1974 and an investment portfolio was created to sustain the charity in the years ahead. By 1987, the value of the investment portfolio stood at £5,000,000 while the Foundation’s properties in Woodbridge were insured for replacement purposes at a combined value of £20,000,000.
In 1980 the two charities had been permitted to unite. Five years previously, in anticipation of the amalgamation, the governors announced their intention in 1975 of providing ‘a care unit and ancillary services’, to make a greater contribution to the Woodbridge community. That year £150,000 was set aside to build Jubilee House which was occupied in 1978.
A major refurbishment of the Seckford Hospital was started in 2005 to bring the accommodation up to modern standards and to make it suitable for wheelchair users. This entailed excavating the bank at the back of the Hospital and using the space for a two-storey extension. Although the new building is larger, the total number of units did not increase, because the new flats are larger than the old bed-sitters, and some of the space that was previously accommodation is now used as community rooms. The new building did, however, enable a considerable expansion of the Day Centre services available in Jubilee House.
The refurbishment cost £4 million. Of this, roughly half was provided by the Seckford Foundation, and the other half by Suffolk County Council, Suffolk Coastal District Council, the Housing Corporation and a number of other charities.
The Seckford Foundation also operates and manages the Deben Family Centre, which provides support for families in the area to help them stay together. It also makes small grants to people in need, provided they are 25 or under or 50 or over. In addition the Seckford Foundation makes grants to develop or enhance services provided by organizations working with the young or old. It also continues to make annual grants to St Mary’s Church of England Primary School and Clerkenwell Parochial School.
The impact of Seckford’s bequest on Woodbridge has clearly mushroomed since 1840 and Seckford is sometimes referred as The Great Benefactor. But it is only fair to stress that expansion of the activities of the charity only happened because of two factors. Firstly, the endowment became more profitable as London expanded and secondly the surplus income of the charity was allowed to accrue for nearly 250 years.
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Jubilee House is set back from The Hospital.
The entrance to it can be seen in the centre of this photograph.
Many other Tudor charities are now either extinct, or have changed little, because the value of their endowments decayed or because surplus income or property was used to provide short term relief to the poor. A good local example of one such charity is to be found in Ipswich and is described in the book Great Tooley of Ipswich by John Webb.
A Tudor Worthy, Dr Daly Brisco.
Seckfordian History, Rev Titcombe.
Statutes and Ordinances for the Government of the Almshouses Founded by Thomas Seckford, Robert Loder.
Directories from 1844 to 1892.
Seckfords of Seckford Hall, Lilian Redstone
Thomas Seckford, R P Mander
The Seckford Foundation, Carol and Michael Weaver
Last edited 21 Aug 23