Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for MELBOURNE

MELBOURNE, a village, a parish, and a sub-district, in the district of Royston and county of Cambridge. The village stands 1 mile S of Meldreth r. station, 2½ N of Ickuield-street and the boundaries with Herts and Essex, 3 NE of Royston, and 10 S by W of Cambridge; is a large place and a seat of petty sessions; and has a post office‡ under Royston, and a police station. The parish comprises 4,688 acres. Real property, £11,139. Pop. in 1851,1,931; in 1861,1,637. Houses, 368. The property is much subdivided. The manors belong to R. W. Hitch, Esq. H. J. Hitch, Esq., and the Dean and Chapter of Ely. Melbournebury is the seat of J. E. Fordham, Esq. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Ely. Value, £250.* Patrons, the Dean and Chapter of Ely. The church is of the 14th century; comprises nave, aisles, S transept, chancel, and S porch; and has a memorial window to the Hitch family. There are chapels for Independents and Baptists, an endowed school with £109 a year, and charities £56. The old Independent chapel was built in 1723, and renovated in 1848; and is now used only for Sabbath-school teaching and kindred purposes. The new chapel was built in 1865, at a cost of £2,300; is in the Italian-Gothic style, of varions coloured bricks; and has a front wheel window, and two flanking towers.—The sub-district contains also twelve other parishes. Acres, 27,236. Pop., 8,450. Houses, 1,752.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a village, a parish, and a sub-district"   (ADL Feature Type: "populated places")
Administrative units: Melbourn CP/AP       Melbourn SubD       Cambridgeshire AncC
Place: Melbourn

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