Leece
| Leece | |
| Lancashire | |
|---|---|
 Moss House | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | SD242693 |
| Location: | 54°6’50"N, 3°9’32"W |
| Data | |
| Post town: | Ulverston |
| Postcode: | LA12 |
| Dialling code: | 01229 |
| Local Government | |
| Council: | Westmorland & Furness |
| Parliamentary constituency: |
Barrow and Furness |
Leece is a village on the Furness peninsula of Lancashire, between the towns of Ulverston and Barrow-in-Furness.
Amenities
The village is built around a tarn and a village green, and Henry Armer & Son, a smithy established in 1914 that has since become an agricultural engineering business.[1]
History
The name Leece is probably from the Old English leah, which means 'woodland clearing', the plural of which is Leas. It is recorded in the Domesday Book as Lies, in the Manor of Hougun held by Earl Tostig before the Conquest.[2] It appears later, in 1269, as Lees.[3]
Leece used to contain a United Methodist Free Church, founded in 1881, but which closed in 1912. The building, which was taken down in the late 1920s, can still be seen on some photographs from the period. [4]
St Matthew's Church, in the hamlet of Dendron, built in 1642, also served the village, as both a church and a school. It was funded by Robert Dickinson, a citizen of London, who had formerly lived in Leece.[5]
In the 1990s and 2000s, Leece played a part in the infamous Lady in the Lake murder trial. Gordon Park, a resident of Leece, bludgeoned his 30-year-old wife Carol to death with an ice axe, then dumped her body in Coniston Water, telling police investigating her disappearance that she had left their home for another man.[6]
Pictures
-
A postcard of Leece, dated 1904 -
The Leece tarn
Outside links
 |
("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Leece) |
References
- ↑ Henry Armer and Son
- ↑ Explore Low Furness
- ↑ Mills, David (1976). The Place Names of Lancashire. B. T Batsford. ISBN 0-7134-3248-9.
- ↑ United Methodist Free Church, Leece: GENUKI
- ↑ St Matthews Church, Dendron on 'Explore Low Furness'
- ↑ 'Justice for the Lady in the Lake as husband gets life for murder': Russell Jackson in The Scotsman 29 January 2005
- Swain, Robert: 'Furness and Cartmel Peninsulas Photographic Memories' (The Francis Frith Collection) ISBN 1-85937-816-1