Onehouse

Onehouse
Suffolk
St John the Baptist, Onehouse
Location
Grid reference:	TM022595
Location:	52°11’50"N, 0°57’27"E
Data
Postcode:	IP14
Local Government

Onehouse is a small village in Suffolk, about three miles west from the centre of Stowmarket. The population of the village at the 2011 Census was 810.

Recorded in Domesday variously as Aneus, Anehus, Anuhus and Anhus, name of the village is exactly as it seems in Modern English, and appears to indicate a single or lonely house. Today there are a fair few more houses, and the village mainly consists of modern housing for commuters, with a few scattered older buildings.

Parish church

The parish church, St John the Baptist, is one of 38 existing round-tower churches in Suffolk. It is a beautiful, small flint, stone and brick built structure, its round tower containing two bells. It stands close by the ancient site of Onehouse Hall, in the fields midway between Lower and Upper Road.

There was a church here in Anglo-Saxon times, as recorded in the Domesday Book, but the present church is thought to have started its life during the great Norman build and rebuild period following the Conquest. Archeologists now date the earliest part of the building as of the 12th century. The round tower of the parish church has recently been restored.

History

The first record of Onehouse is in the Domesday Book of 1086.

In 1510, Robert Drury was granted licence to crenellate his three Suffolk manors of Hansted Hall, Buknahams and Onhowshalle (which is to say to add battlements to them). Three fragments of a moat are stil visible around the site of Onehouse Hall. The [[Victoria County History records:

Homestead Moat, in good condition, comprising two waterfilled arms and one dry arm. The remaining N. arm has been destroyed by farm buildings. The Hall was pulled down before 1847 (Copinger), probably in the mid C17 when the Callum's (the Drury heirs) constructed Hardwick House. They seem to have destroyed the other two properties at this time.

'The House of Industry' was built in 1779 to serve the entire hundred of Stowe. Later it became the Union Workhouse on Union Road in the east if the village. Nearby are the Paupers' Graves, now a conservation area owned and maintained by the parish council.

Until the 1950s Onehouse was no more than a scattering of some dozen houses along Lower Road (to the south) and about fifteen houses on Upper Road (to the north) with another five on Union Road leading to Stowmarket. By the late 1960s housing development had begun but there are still people in the village who remember streams and ditches where houses and roads now stand. With the major build of 150 houses in the 1970s, Upper Road became 'Forest Road' and the Northfield Estate came into being.

Community

With a population of 920, Onehouse has a small number of businesses including a computer company and a local hair stylists. There is also a community centre shared by neighbouring villages, Shelland and Harleston (further northwest), where children and adults alike enjoy a wide number of activities. The three villages also share a monthly magazine named OHSmag.

The Shepherd & Dog is the only pub in the village and is at the east end of Lower Road near to the old animal pound.

Sport and recreation

Stowmarket's golf club is beside Onehouse.

The village playing field has play equipment such as swings and an assault course and two football goals but no current football team.

Outside links

("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Onehouse)

• Onehouse.org.uk
• Round Tower Churches: Onehouse St John the Baptist
• Stowmarket Sport