Manea, Cambridgeshire

Manea
Manea is located in Cambridgeshire
Manea
Manea
Location within Cambridgeshire
Population2,088 (2011)
District
Shire county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townMARCH
Postcode districtPE15
List of places
UK
England
Cambridgeshire
52°29′N 0°10′E / 52.48°N 0.17°E / 52.48; 0.17

Manea /ˈmeɪniː/ is a village and civil parish in the District of Fenland, Isle of Ely, Cambridgeshire, England.

The population (including Welches Dam) of the civil parish at the 2011 census was 2,088.[1]

Landmarks are Manea railway station and RSPB Welches Dam nature reserve on the Ouse Washes.[2]

The village's brass band, the Manea Silver Band, was formed in 1882; it meets at Manea Royal British Legion.[3] Manea men's football team compete in local leagues and cup competitions.

History

Stonea Camp, an Iron Age hill fort is located approximately 1 mile west of the village.

Manea was once a hamlet in the parish of Coveney. In the seventeenth century, as part of a programme to drain the Fens, Charles I planned to build a new town and summer palace, to be called Charlemont.[4] The scheme was opposed by local residents, including Oliver Cromwell, the MP of nearby Cambridge, who called the scheme "contrary to the law of God and nature".[5]

The village's Church of England parish church is dedicated to St Nicholas and was built in 1875 to replace a building dating from 1791.[6] It is a Grade II listed building.[7]

Manea Colony

The Manea Colony was set up in 1838 at Manea Fen as an experimental Utopian community but failed after a couple of years. It was based on the ideas of Robert Owen, a utopian socialist and founded by local farmer William Hodson. One of the earliest members of the colony was Samuel Rowbotham, a proponent of flat Earth theory.[8]

The buildings were built with bricks from the colony's brickworks and slate for roofing. Welsh slate from Porthmadog was already arriving at the Port of Wisbech and King's Lynn by 1830.[9] The colony produced a newspaper the Working Bee on their own press.[10]

On 16 February 1841 Hodson published a notice stating that "The Late Friendly Society, called 'Manea Fen Colony' has been legally dissolved" in the Cambridge Chronicle of 20 February 1841. A model of the colony and copies of the Working Bee are on display at Octavia Hill's Birthplace House, Wisbech.[11]

The Leicester Mercury on 24 April 1841 published details of a trial at Isle of Ely Quarter Sessions of 7 April. Hodson was fined £10 and Thomas Golding £1 for having on 13 February assaulted Maria Ward, a candidate for admission to the colony.[12]

Hodson emigrated and died on 18 April 1880 at Janesville, Wisconsin, US.[13]

In June 1904 a smallholding in the colony, comprising 32a. 0r. 15p. with 5a. 3r. 24p. of fishing pits, occupied by Thomas Rolfe, was knocked down to S. H. Farrington of March for £1240. The Colony Farm 114a. 3r. 35p. with house, cottages, barn, and other farm-buildings, occupied by Samuel Dunhour, was withdrawn at £4020. F. J. Wise was solicitor to the vendors (the trustees of the late Mrs M. A. Wise).[14]

During September and October 2016 the Cambridge Archaeological Unit (CAU) followed up geophysics surveys by Fenland Archaeological Society (FenArch) and conducted fieldwork as part of a HLF-funded project.[15]

References

  1. ^ "Civil Parish population 2011". Neighbourhood Statistics. Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 20 July 2016.
  2. ^ RSPB reserves guide: Ouse Washes
  3. ^ Manea Silver Band website
  4. ^ N. Walker & T. Craddock, The History of Wisbech and the Fens. R. Walker, 1849, page 139.
  5. ^ "Education & History". Middle Level Commissioners. Middle Level Commissioners. Retrieved 26 December 2021.
  6. ^ Genuki information about Manea
  7. ^ Historic England. "Parish Church of St Nicholas (Grade II) (1126582)". National Heritage List for England.
  8. ^ Weill, K. (2022). "Chapter 1". Off the Edge: Flat Earthers, Conspiracy Culture, and Why People Will Believe Anything. Algonquin Books. ISBN 978-1-64375-219-8.
  9. ^ "Lynn". Cambridge Chronicle and Journal. 29 October 1830. p. 3.
  10. ^ "Cambridge General Advertiser". Retrieved 29 October 2019 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  11. ^ "Octavia Hill". www.octaviahill.org. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
  12. ^ "Leicester Mercury". www.britishnewspaper.co.uk. Retrieved 29 October 2019.
  13. ^ "Bury and Norwich Post". Retrieved 29 October 2019 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  14. ^ "Stamford Mercury". Retrieved 29 October 2019 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  15. ^ "Manea colony". www.arch.cam.ac.uk. Retrieved 11 January 2019.