Chapter 6: A second look at the Map
here were two batches of Saxon that came from Germany, the first arrived on the east coast and settled straight away in Suffolk. One argument against the Limmers settling in Suffolk with the first batch of Saxons that come from Germany around 400 AD, was the non existence of place names in Suffolk. When People Emigrate, they like to take with them a part of their history. Such were those that emigrated to America from Britain. They took with them the place names like New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Buckingham, and so on. There is no evidence of this in Suffolk.
This is not true in the area of Buckingham, Berkshire, Hampshire and Wiltshire where the second batch landed. Take a map and put the pin of a compass in a little village called Lower Froyle in Hampshire. Then draw a thirty-mile radius around that point. Within that circle, we find any number of references to Limmers. This, second batch, arrived around 800 AD landing on the south coast because the king of Kent had set up a coast guard.
Looking at this map, we find the most likely origin of the early Limmer family. Records of people before 1400 AD are a rare commodity –unless, of course, they belong to the foremost families of England. Any one not belonging to the twenty or so ruling families before the middle ages would have left few clues as to their existence. Documentation belonged to aristocracy and nobility. They documented everything to do with themselves but little to do with subservient England. Establishing a detailed picture of Limmers by documents alone is not possible. Even the acclaimed Doomsday Book only gives information of large allocations of land centred on Manors. It gives no clue as to many yeoman, tradesmen, local village elders and vast numbers of villagers subjected to the landowners.
Fortunately for us, however, Limmers, while not of these ruling classes were good servants to them. Mainly skilled practical people or business people with a good education, they set about establishing themselves as good social citizens and hard working tradesmen, (with a few black sheep). They brought and sold land rights and houses using the manorial system. This was a system invented stop monopolies, (although you could get round the many manorial rules and regulations if you were of the right breeding).
Limmers left footmarks as evidence of existence in history. Among these are:
Great Limmer Farm, Limmer Hill farm, Limmer Copse, two Limmer ponds, Limmer cottage, Limmer Fealds , Limmer Tenement, two Limmer Lanes, Limmer Messuage , Limmerstone in the Isle of white, ‘Thomas lane of Lymmer’ and Limmers Manor to name but a few.32
Hampshire Limmers
he mention of Saxons leads us into the discussion that Limmers came from Germany. Limmer, a town of Germany, was in the middle of Saxon lands. History books tell us that Rome drafted fighting Saxons into its army, especially during the decline of its empire. Saxons were among the Roman troops that built Hadrian’s wall. Limmers were certainly fighting people having their own Castle in the upper region of Germany, which they defended regularly. This they did successfully until the army of Hanover overpowered them turned them out as refugees and used heir castle as a Monastery33.
Early Saxons were among those who made up the II, VI and XX legions of Rome as they built Hadrian’s Wall C 130 AD. 34 However, the identity of these people as far as these isles were concerned, was Roman. To identify as anything else would have been unthinkable to anyone serving in the army of Rome. Such contempt for the Roman army gave rise to the term ‘ Sassenach’35 not ‘ limmer’36.
It has been argued that Northern Limmers came over with the Romans and stayed. But again, Limmer Hill in the north has little evidence of other settlements around it to suggest a Limmer infiltration during this period.
One attractive theory arises from recent archaeological digs in West Stow, Suffolk. As the population of Saxon Germany declines around 400 AD, the presence of Saxons increases in Suffolk. Dr. Gebuhr, curator of Schleswig museum, claims that in a period of nine years, the large boats built by these Saxons, could have carried at least 30,000 people to settle in Britain.37 Given the prominence of Suffolk in the family line of Limmer after C1500 AD, where the first wave of Saxons settled, we must ask the question did the name originate there. While the argument against is the lack of place names associated with Limmer in Suffolk holds, Buckinghamshire and Berkshire are, littered with Limmer place-names. This also fits with history.
In 409 AD, Rome came under threat from Vandals and other growing forces. Under this threat, it withdrew its forces from England. Saving face, they declared England fit and ready to defend its own land for Rome. Meanwhile, The Angles and Saxons in Germany were facing hunger from a famine and looking for more lands that are fertile for its people. Thus, they came to England. This first influx in the sixth century was in main Jutes and Angles who were generally the more aggressive tribes. During this time, Limmers appear to be still firmly grounded in their wooden castle near Hamburg, Germany38 fishing, (or more probably pirating the Danes), in the North Sea. During this period, while aggressively deforesting the forestland, they attracted the attention of the Hanoverian39.
More likely then, Limmers came with the second wave of angles Saxons immigrating England40. After the exile from their own lands, forced out by the armies of Hamburg around 540 AD, they came to these shores as refugees in search of another land. Being excellent long boat builders,41 they transported their families by the hundred to England. Unable to land on the east coast at Essex as their predecessors had done, (This was now under the control of the King of Mercia), they continued round the coast to a little cove at Felpham.
At Felpham we find our first landmark - Limmer Lane. Limmer Lane is still there today, although it is now a tarmacadam road on private land. At one time, this lane ran down to a little village cove, long since claimed by the sea. Now the lane comes to a halt at a sea wall. None the less, it is easy to see Saxon ancestors landing in their thirty-foot wooden boats and arriving as refugees from the continent. History has moved on little from those days. Disembarked, our ancestors could quickly scramble up the steep narrow tracked path into the Kings Forest where at last they could relax and feel safe in a landscape similar to the one they had left behind.
Perhaps pioneer relatives welcomed Limmers as they docked, guiding them up the narrow track. This lane, later called Limmer Lane, was a common route for Saxons to travel in and out the dense woods to fish – (or loot). The first Limmer settlement in Hampshire was less than five miles into the forest at a town named Norton.
This is where they left their second mark when they cleared a few trees and dug their first pond42. Saxons, being good fishermen, could travel this route to the coast without being noticed. Limmers, having entered Britain this way, no doubt had a boat or two hidden in the little cove that once existed at the end of Limmer lane. This was a little known path in a deserted part of countryside and surrounded by forest, small wonder then, a few hundred years on from this moment of history, Limmer lane would be the ideal spot for smugglers to transport their contraband between shore and woodland. Strangely enough, the heavily taxed contraband being smuggled at this later date was wool.
A limekiln and builders yard at the seaward end of the lane existed some time before the eighteenth century. Limmers, thought to have owned the land for several hundred years, worked the kiln until around 1880. A number of Limmer families grew up around this landmark between 1700 and 1880, but the four hundred year gap between the tracks origin and its later occupants in no way proves them direct descendants.
Of course, safe arrival in Britain had no guarantee. Navigation was good for the day but weather forecasting was not. It may have been bad weather or an unwelcoming committee of solders that turned a few boats away from the mainland. Whatever the reason, at least one boat with Limmers on board landed on the Isle of White. Having landed, they were not going back, so they built their camp and marked the land as Limerstone.
I digress, let us return to the immigrants arriving at Felpham. Let us move with them up the steep but narrow Lymmers track, for about 500 metres. Now we are safe in the king’s forest. On, through the forest for another four miles we tramp just as our ancestors did. Here, within the vast forest a Limmer community had set up camp. Arriving at a village now called Norton;43 Saxon Limmers felled trees, and built houses. However, more than this, they dug the pond bearing their name, after all water is so essential to the village life. That they dug the pond at all suggests they intended to settle here, at least for a while. The Saxon villagers called the amenity Limmer pond, grateful no doubt for this asset. We too are grateful as it served as a landmark to their presence more than a thousand years later. Take note of this pond digging skill - it passes down the generations of Limmers and we will see it again as we examine other sites in Hampshire.
Unfortunately, the pond is no more. It survived long enough to be on the 1845 ordinance survey map but not long enough to survive the intensive farming practices of late twentieth century. There is a landscaped pond nearby at the nursery. This pond can be dated around the mechanical digger era ( C1990 AD). Some of the people to whom I spoke on a recent visit, referred to it this present water feature as Limmer pond, but others, (who had lived in the village all their lives), still remembered the old landmark. Limmer Pond House, likewise a product of the expanding agricultural nursery complex, takes its name from the ancient pond once at the end of its Garden.
How long those first Limmers stayed in this village cannot be determined. For myself, I feel sure they were there when the monks of Lindsey in Norfolk felt the call to evangelise this area. Who knows if these resident Limmers were the skilled labourers who laid the foundations for the early Saxon church at Aldingbourne C700 AD. Limmers certainly co-operated with the church; if this was not the beginning of a long relationship, it began soon after.
After the king had conquered and unified southern England, these lands were handed over to the Bishop of Winchester. All the Limmer landmarks we mention in this chapter came under the See of Winchester and have a connection to it. Although there is no record of Limmers joining the church as monks or priests, they certainly work within the church organization, (at Guildford Friary and possibly Abingdon for example).
We must hurry along in History by skipping a few hundred years. Not that this is our choice, rather we have no evidence of what Limmers got up to in those between years. The end of the first millennium and the beginning of the second marks a time when we can pick up the story again.
