The Village
Walsingham is situated 4 miles from the beautiful North Norfolk coast, between Wells-next-the-Sea and Fakenham, and is well worth a visit. The village has Saxon origins and was mentioned in the Doomsday book. The buildings you see today, date from the Mediaeval period when Walsingham was one of the major European centres of pilgrimage. After the reformation pilgrimage ceased. The modern pilgrimage revival began at the turn of the twentieth century and Walsingham is once again a major centre of pilgrimage with both Roman Catholic and Anglican shrines.
History of Walsingham
Walsingham has been a place of pilgrimage since medieval times. According to the Pynson ballad of 1465: in 1061 the Lady of the Manor, Richeldis de Faverches had a series of visions, or dreams, when the Virgin Mary came to her and showed her the house in Nazareth where the Annunciation took place. Our Lady instructed her to build a replica of the Holy House here in Walsingham, which she proceeded to do. The site of the Holy House can now be seen in the Abbey Grounds.
In c.1153 The Augustinian Canons established “The Augustinian Priory to the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary” adjacent to the Holy House. By the fourteenth century so many pilgrims were visiting the “Holy House” that the Priory was enlarged, and the little wooden Holy House was ‘encased’ in a larger stone chapel -described by William of Worcester in 1479 as the ‘Novum Opus’.
The only remaining part of the Priory, which gives us some idea of how magnificent it must have been, is the impressive East Window. Walsingham became known as ‘England’s Nazareth’.
In 1347 the Franciscan Friars, under the patronage of Elizabeth de Burgh, Countess of Clare, established a small Friary on the edge of the village.
The medieval village of Walsingham developed to cater for the increasing number of pilgrims and to meet local needs. By 1252 a charter had been granted to hold a weekly market and an annual fair. At about this time the village was laid out in a ‘grid’ pattern. The fine medieval timber-framed jetted buildings, still visible today, provided hostelries and shops for visiting pilgrims, as they continue to do today. Pilgrims came from all over Britain and Europe, including the Kings and Queens of England from Henry III (c.1226) to King Henry VIII (1511).
Walsingham as a flourishing medieval pilgrimage centre came to an end in 1538 when Henry VIII’s commissioners dissolved the Priory and the Friary.
After the Dissolution, Walsingham continued as a market town and legal centre, with both Quarter and Petty Seasons being held in the village. From 1773 the Quarter Sessions were held in The Shirehall -formerly a hostelry and part of the Augustinian Priory – now an excellent example of Georgian architecture. During this period many of the older timber-framed houses were re-fronted with fine Georgian facades. The Quarter Sessions were held in the village until 1861, and the Petty Sessions were held here until 1971.
In 1787 a John Howard “model” prison, for eight prisoners, was built in the village to replace an existing Elizabethan “House of Correction”. The prison was enlarged in 1822 and 5 tread wheels were added in 1823. The prison was closed in 1861.
The pilgrimage revival began in the late 19th century, with the first modern pilgrimage taking place on 20th August 1897 to the Slipper Chapel at Houghton St. Giles, now the English Roman Catholic National National Shrine of Our Lady. (The pilgrims from King’s Lynn arriving and departing from Walsingham Railway Station – now St Seraphim’s). The Anglican Shrine was built by Fr. Alfred Hope Patten in 1933-37. Since the 1930’s Walsingham has once again become a flourishing Pilgrimage and Visitor Centre.
Other Places of Interest in Little Walsingham include: a Georgian Methodist Chapel built in 1794; St. Mary’s Parish Church, and the Russian Orthodox Chapel of St. Seraphim in the old railway station. In Great Walsingham: St. Peter’s Church is a fine example of an unspoilt “Decorated” Church built in the 1330’s. and the Russian Orthodox Church of the Transfiguration (the building originally a Methodist Chapel).
Header image courtesy Nick Stone © 2015.

Walsingham guided tours
Discover Walsingham’s rich history both as ‘A Place of Pilgrimage since 1061 ‘, the Premier Shrine to Our Lady in England,
and as a Georgian market town and legal centre.
Booked Tours only
Tour 1: Introduction to the History of Walsingham
Abbey Grounds, Shirehall Museum, Georgian Courthouse and Prison
Tour 2: The Churches: Anglican, Roman Catholic,
Methodist & Orthodox, the Friary ruins, Village architecture
Tour 3: The Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham
Numbers per tour 6-25
Smaller groups welcomed at a special rate.
Visit some of North Norfolk’s spectacular Medieval Churches – Special Tours can also be arranged.
To Book a Tour Contact: Scilla Landale (Blue Badge Guide)
Email: scilla.landale@afiweb.net
Mobile: 07747 693235
www.walsinghamvillage.org/see-do/guided-tours-of-walsingham
Walsingham Station
Walsingham Railway Station was on the Wells and Fakenham Railway, later part of the Great Eastern Railway. It opened on 1 December 1857, and served the villages of Great Walsingham and Little Walsingham. It closed on 5 October 1964. This was converted into Saint Seraphim’s Orthodox chapel. Since 1982 there has been a second station created at Walsingham – the southern terminus of the narrow gauge Wells and Walsingham Light Railway.
Photo: Walsingham Station 1964 (Photograph Courtesy of Mr Graham Kenworthy and the Great Eastern Railway Society).

Walsingham Station Memories
We have a few personal memories of the station below, and are always searching for more. If you remember anything about the station, have any fond or amusing memories, or have any photographs or ephemera relating to it’s time in use, please let us know. Please email them to us for inclusion in this site.
We would also appreciate any knowledge relevant to any of the following questions. Please send your answers to this email. Did you travel to Walsingham by train? When were the oil lamps removed from the platform?
Michael Bacon
My first memories of Walsingham Railway was at Christmastime going to Fakenham as a small boy to get toys and presents with my parents. But the best memories were on Saturday afternoons. My parents being Music Hall fans, we used to leave Walsingham Station at 4.30pm, the return fare was £1-6 old money to Thorpe Station, Norwich, then walk to Valori’s fish and chip shop on Prince of Wales road to have our tea.
We would then walk to the Hippodrome for the Evening Show. Sometimes there was a Circus but mostly it was Old Time Music Hall which finished about 10pm. Then we would catch the train at Thorpe station arriving at Walsingham about 11.45pm.Then we would walk back to Scarborough Road, my brother and me with my parents.
Much later on we ordered some bags of Horseshoes and bags of iron washers to come from Stamford. They never arrived. This was in the 1939 to 1945 War. About 3 months later we received a message from Walsingham Station to say they had found bags of rusty Horseshoes and washers in an open wagon in a siding.
Twice a day a pony and milk float came from Wighton to catch the first train in the morning and one at 5 o’clock in the afternoon, I believe bound for London. Cabbages and sprouts for Covent Garden were taken to the Station by horse and cart, tractor and trailer and lorries. I remember one Winter going to the Market place where the Teamsmen took 4 horses out of the wagon because of the snow, while we put frost nails in each shoe because they could not get a grip on Station Road.
There were some cattle pens in the siding where mainly bullocks were loaded. A coal merchant from Hindringham used to deliver sugar beet to the Station with a Model T Ford which as a boy was something after all the horse drawn carts. Taxis from Hindringham and Binham were regular visitors.
Some Coal merchants also had yards at the Station.
By Mr Michael Bacon.
A lifetime resident of Walsingham.
Jeff Rounce
I was born on 12th December 1920, the son of Philip and Emily Rounce (nee Bartram). My parents took up a council tenancy of land at Field House, on the road to Binham from Walsingham. They had been engaged for 6 years and married in 1919, shortly after Dad came home after serving in WW1. Before the war, my Father had experience of the railways as he had worked as a porter at the old Vauxhall Station at Norwich. The station was destroyed during one of the worst nights of bombing on Norwich during the Second World War.
Walsingham Station was very familiar to me during my childhood as I attended foundation school there (now Walsingham Primary School) from 1926. My Dad ran a milk round by pony and trap in the village for many years and I also had friends in Walsingham through our connections with the Methodist Church and later in Boy Scouts.
Field House estate had been brought by the council and divided up into tenancies, of which ours was one. The Wells- Fakenham railway line was vital to the local farming industry and life of the area. The line went on to Norwich or South Lynn, so the whole area was thus connected to the country at large. At the time I was born, all our coal came by rail from South Wales, and corn and livestock were mainly carried by rail.
Walsingham station was extremely busy- hence the large sidings which are now a car park. The sidings were in constant use for goods, livestock etc waiting to be loaded on or picked up and there was always noise. All types of livestock and crops produced locally were carried from the station in railway wagons as the only other way was by carts, tumbrels, tractor and trailer or lorries, at a time when the roads were poor.
Fortunately, the old station and buildings still exist as private dwellings and religious places. The old station building was taken over by the Orthodox Church (SERAPHIM’S CHAPEL). Across the road was a pub called the Kings Head, now a private house called Guisborough House. Although there were five pubs in Little Walsingham before WW2, the Kings Head was busy, catering for people waiting for and coming off the trains, as well as locals.
At the time when I was born there was little or no sugar beet industry in Norfolk. When this started in the early 1920s, the beet were taken by road to Wells and then by barge to Selby factory in Yorkshire. By the end of the 1920s, the Kings Lynn factory had opened and the British Sugar Beet Company took beet from most of West Norfolk to Lynn largely by rail. Beet from Field House Farm; my father’s beet, went by road on carts or trucks to Walsingham Station. These were loaded onto goods wagons and onto the factory at Lynn. In those days, traffic of goods wagons taking beet from Walsingham was very heavy in the winter season, and this carried on until WW2.
The presence of the railway line from Wells to Fakenham, via Wighton and Walsingham, was very obvious by its sounds. You could hear the train whistle being blown from far away at pre-determined places when trains were coming, or when there were cattle on the line, which often happened! You could set your watch by the sounds of the trains, and the presence of the railways could be heard for miles around.
On frosty or foggy mornings, pistols might be used. On frosty days the signals might jam and on foggy days exploding fog pistols were used, as the train drivers couldn’t see the signals.. Exploding pistols were attached to the track, away from the station. When you couldn’t see/ use the signals, these would be used to give coded messages to the train drivers. By the 1930s, if I was in our meadow, the noises from whistles, fog pistols and pistols were easily heard and you began to know what the sounds meant.
My first close encounter with the Walsingham railway and station was in 1932 when I gained a scholarship to go to what became Fakenham Grammar School. That was a single entry of 36, the majority of which were scholarship children. I cycled from home to Walsingham station and then by school train to Fakenham station which later became Fakenham East station. This was a journey of 5 miles or so through some beautiful countryside, followed by a walk of another mile; my journey took over an hour. A season ticket for the railway journey cost £2 which was a fortune in those days.
Walsingham station was a hive of activity at that time of the day. It didn’t take us too long to get to know the staff. There was no station master at Walsingham and the ticket office was also the waiting room. Most of the work such as issuing tickets etc fell to the signal men. They had the job of seeing that the waiting room was clean and tidy. In winter they also had to make sure that there was fuel for the open grate coal burner and kept it stoked up.
There were two signal men but I can only remember the name of one. He was Tom Everett and he lived on Knight’s St, where you now go from the Shrine to the War Memorial. It was on the right hand side, just after the opening to Dr Sturdee’s house and surgery. Mr Everett and his wife had two daughters; the elder went to Fakenham Grammar School and married Dick Pegg from Walsingham, eventually leaving the village. The younger one; Myrtle, went to Wells School and married Tom Parsons from Wells.
Perhaps because he had no sons, Tom Everett was very good to us boys and, if we were early enough, a fortunate few (me included) might go up the signal box. There we watched as he was sent coded messages which made sense to him. He taught us what the various levers etc did; points, signals etc. Gradually, under his instruction, we were allowed to operate various levers. Tom Everett explained it all often so in the end we became quite adept at working the signals, points etc. We probably shouldn’t have been there; it was all probably quite illegal and punishable. However, as far as I know, nothing ever happened because of it and we learnt a lot about how the railway worked.
We (the group of us boys travelling to the Grammar School), were sometimes invited to travel in the guards van and to operate the handbrake as we approached Fakenham station. After two years, all that stopped as we decided to go to school by cycle, a journey of some seven and a half miles. It meant that we could start out later and arrive earlier, and we were given a cycle allowance of around £2 a term for maintenance. It wasn’t long before all the other boys and girls from Walsingham joined us.
The only adventure happened as we reached East Barsham where we were met by West Barsham children, there was no love lost between us. While talking about Barsham, when the railway line from Walsingham to Fakenham was opened in the early part of the nineteenth century, the obstacle of the Barsham Hills was overcome by tunnelling. Later on the tunnel was opened up to become the deep cutting as it now is. The old railway line from Walsingham to Barsham, like the Barsham Hills, is now full of wildlife and a few years ago I took my son in law along to show him the old line. He had no idea that it was there!
Things in Walsingham and the railway line, underwent a great change in the 1920s when Rev Hope Patten decided to renew the pilgrimages which stopped centuries earlier. The Church of England didn’t give active support, so it was left to Rev Hope Patten with the support of a group of others to get the scheme underway. Money was found to build the Shrine as we know it and later it was joined by other meeting places of the Christian Church such as the Slipper Chapel. All these affected the Walsingham station and line, as from the 1930s the line became used as the main means of transport for people arriving from all over the country on pilgrimage.
The next great effect was, of course, the Second World War when the railway system was vital to the war effort. It was used to transport everything; munitions, fuel and not least, people. Because of the shortage of petrol and fuel rationing, most private motoring stopped until after the war and the trains were even more important. This put a huge added load onto the railway system which was used even more, and Walsingham was no exception.
Because of all the military stations based around Walsingham, the station was very busy. The line brought Land Army girls (quite an attraction!) who went to the camp at Houghton. Trains brought supplies, equipment and rations. The army came to the area in various guises, including a large searchlight camp just outside Gt Walsingham on the Binham road, to the right. A great number of servicemen used the station to arrive and to go off on leave and postings.
The RAF had several airfields in the area including West Raynham, Sculthorpe, Little Snoring, Langham and North Creake (Egmere). This meant that many servicemen travelled by rail to Walsingham as it was the nearest station. Many of the servicemen and women who came on the train eventually settled in and around Walsingham. The movement around the country and abroad led to a considerable change in the population. I left from Walsingham station to join the RAF in 1940 and travelled throughout the war by rail. I came back at the end of the war as a pilot at Langham, just 5 miles or so away from Walsingham.
Jeff Rounce.
Kenny Dewing
The photo of the last train to Wells from Walsingham, about 9.30 pm on 5th October, 1964, was taken by Mr Kenneth Faircloth, local photographer then resident in Walsingham. In the photograph are Mr Dewing, Mr George Woodcock who owned the farm where the Walsingham Stables now are. The Stationmaster was Mr Tony Ellender.
The Coalmen in those days were Mr Butcher and the Co-op coalman who ran the shop in the High Street. The coalyard was across by the bullock pens. Coombes of corn were stored in the large railway sacks in the goods shed, as was the odd engine.There was a pump with a big wheel (like the one in the Abbey Farm yard today,which was in the garden by the wall just inside the gate where the stationmaster lived. This was the water supply for the station. There was a lovely polished table in the waiting room. Three red fire buckets containing sand hung on the wall (the hooks are still there)
Tom Leveridge was the first stationmaster.He lived in what is now St Claire’s in Knight Street. He always had a wheelbarrow with inflated tyres.
The workshop with the chimney is still standing along the track which was like the one the railwaymen had their dinner in.
Wally Staines was a stationmaster.There was also Tom Yarham and Charlie Wright.Tony Ellender lived at 18 Mt Pleasant. Wally Staines was a shunter.
Sugarbeet was loaded onto the wagons to be taken out, also cabbages.Wet pulp and coal came in.
Brass cartridges from Wells were taken out in the war to Norwich or Kings Lynn scrapyards.Tanks were also taken by train. The workman’s shed was near the allotments on the bank opposite the present garden.
The village policemen living in Constable’s cottage were, Rook, Flynn and Wolf was the last one who lived there. The police house was then built on Mt Pleasant.
Billy Thompson kept the pub, the King’s Head, opposite the station, as did Lenny Reeve. The last landlord, Ray L…. also kept the slaughterhouse in Swaffham.
Vick Frary, Mr Flanagan, Mr Baldwin and Danny Coe were smallholders who sent good by train.
Mr Wace, Gt Walsingham, Mr Joyce Cannister Hall and Mr Crane (who had the farm Mr Fox took over at Houghton St Giles) were farmers who used the railway for goods.
By Mr Kenny Dewing
Walsingham
The photograph was kindly supplied by the family of the late Mr K Faircloth who took the original image.
Geoff Tuck
Geoff worked at Wells Station, starting at the bottom of rung of the ladder as a porter. He was born into a railway family, his father worked on railway and all of his sons. John Tuck worked at Wells as a booking clerk; he is still alive. Geoff worked alongside his train driver father as a fireman.
In 1940’s there were approximately a dozen trains daily.
As a porter Geoff went from Wells Station to Walsingham once a week when he travelled on the 1 o’clock train, returning to Wells on the 3 o’clock. He had to clean the signal lamp, refill it, light it and carry it up 60 feet by ladder to the signal box in one hand and if the light went out he had to climb down to re-light it! The lights faced the Norwich direction. The signal lights were half covered during the war. A feature the two signals was that they were 60 feet to 70 feet high because of the bends in the track the signals had to be this high to be seen. They were some of the highest on the track. It was a big job for a lad porter to change and clean lamps.
There were two sides to the work – either confined to station and platform as porter, for example, or on the locomotive (stoker).
From 1950’s Geoff was a stoker. He knew Wally Staines, the Walsingham porter mentioned in Rod Lock’s memories (Rod Lock, ‘Walsingham in the 1950s’. Great Eastern Journal 77 – January 1994). There were 6 people employed at Walsingham in 1950:
- Mrs Sizeland (who had to be rescued after climbing half way up the ladder to put lamp on signal and could neither go up nor down) which led to Geoff doing the weekly trip.
- Alfred Howlett – signalman
- Dan Knights – porter
- Tom Everett – signalman
- Wally Staines – porter
Tiny Allender – signalman
Every station had a porter’s room. Special pilgrim trains ran from London which were long trains, so platform was extended in the 1930’s so passengers could alight. These trains were not daily but when there were organised pilgrimages.
Goods sent by train
Sugar beet
There were 2 long sidings – wagons empty, farmers loaded the waggons. Also coal merchants did the same.
Some mail came to Walsingham by train and if the handcart was heavy it took two people to push it up the hill. Mr Howe was postmaster. Geoff became a postman because of line closing. Two railway lorries would deliver parcels.
The station was useful for RAF who were stationed close by in RAF camps. There were troop trains into Wells (Stiffkey, Weybourne and Holkham had army camps).
Mrs Baker was the crossing gate keeper (where WWLR is in Egmere Road)
The garden was used as allotments by station workers. Porters were responsible for the trains going in and out safely. Parcels and goods had to be loaded in.
Porters kept platform and station clean.
- Swept platform
- Painted edge white – esp. during war years (someone else mentioned that the platform edges were usually painted using a right angled brush)
- As lights dimmed on platform and trains
There was good quality furniture in waiting rooms
- Table
- Clock
- Leather clad seats
If heavy lifting to be done a lad was sent from Wells.
Inspectors came unannounced to check station was clean and also the toilets.
The Surveyor had the Dereham to Wells area to cover.
Houghton St Giles to Norwich – 3/6D return ticket.
Wells had 12 drivers and 12 firemen.
Wells to Norwich in the milk depot at North Elmham hooked milk wagon onto the back of passenger trains. County School was a fairly new halt, as built for the Bernardo’s Naval School
Signalmen had to wait from train to train – and worked under bell code system.
Clocked on to alert train coming. Signalmen had to wait (could hear bell so may have done some gardening)
Diesel trains 1955.
Geoff entertained in the pub opposite the station by playing music with his banjo.
Geoff’s wife was born at Houghton-St-Giles and remembers as a girl watching the pilgrim trains arrive at the Slipper Chapel halt from her bedroom window. There were makeshift steps for the passengers to alight by. (We have pictures of this). Neither the cottages at Houghton nor the trains are there today!
Geoff said to me that when you look at the station windows, remember I cleaned them all!
Mr Geoff Tuck
Sadly Geoff died on the 16th May 2013.