The innumerable secrets of Mousehold Heath.

Alright?

I walked the dog through Mousehold Heath today and, in a moment of absently gazing up at the ceiling of deciduous goodness above my head, thought to myself, “This is probably pretty old. I’ll Google it when I’m home.”

(Hey - newsletters have been written off the back of far less.)

I definitely didn’t expect to unearth so much about this seemingly innocuous chunklet of woodland on the city’s outskirts. As it turns out, Mousehold Heath is the glue that holds a lot of Norwich’s most famous and well-documented moments together.

From its unique geology to the old aerodrome, I’m going to share an assortment of interesting tidbits about Mousehold Heath with you today. The hope is that, next time you find yourself there, you’ll have enough factoids to bore the person you’re with for the entire walk.

Some important context.

Right, here’s a bit of fourth-wall-breaking newsletter action for you: I’m writing this section after the rest of the newsletter is written. That’s because it dawned on me that a brief overview of what Mousehold Heath actually is might be helpful.

Back in Roman times, Mousehold Heath was a much bigger stretch of land that blended into the woodland of Norfolk. The Domesday Book describes it as substantially wooded, but as human activity in the area increased, the woodland was felled for fuel and building materials.

So for much of the last 500 years, it’s been more of a clearing than a wood, where animals were reared and land was farmed. Trees weren’t really given a chance to grow there because animals would eat the saplings. Here’s a picture of Mousehold Heath by John Crome, painted around 1820:

Mousehold as a woodland is both an ancient - and a relatively modern - concept. These days, it covers 184 acres.

Where does “Mousehold” come from?

Disappointingly, the word “mousehold” doesn’t denote some sort of rodent-controlled conclave either. Most likely, it derives from the Anglo-Saxon “moch-holt” (“thick wood”).

Mousehold Heath has been many things over the years, but having done some research, one thing seems clear: It hasn’t ever been consistent. It’s seen everything, from a seabed to a pitch-and-putt golf course.

From Maastricht to Mousehold.

It’s not often that I get to go back 75 million years in these newsletters, but alas, it would be rude not to in this case.

You see, Norwich wasn’t always Jarrolds and Colman’s mustard and kick-it-off-throw-it-in. 75 million years ago, it was a warm, tropical sea (although fossilised versions of a primitive Jarrolds logo have allegedly been found, so we can only assume that the dinosaurs that inhabited the area were dressed in tasteful seasonal knitwear).

Chalk was deposited on the site of Mousehold Heath by this sea, and that chalk deposit now has a name - St James’ Pit. It’s an 8.6-acre Site of Special Scientific Interest to the south of Mousehold Heath. It earned that lofty status because Mosasaur jaw and vertebra fossils were found there.

For anyone unfamiliar with your dinosaurs, the Mosasaur is an aquatic reptile that might’ve been as big as 12m long. It probably looked something like this:

The fossils of Mosasaurs were first discovered in chalk quarries in Maastricht, a city in southeastern Netherlands. Perhaps KLM was operational back then, because one way or another, at least one of them died in what is now Mousehold Heath.

The body of a boy.

I talked about William of Norwich in one of my first newsletters, which focused on the underrated history of The Lamb Inn.

William probably deserves his own newsletter, but as a quick reminder, he was a 12-year-old boy who, in 1144, was found dead on Mousehold Heath with wounds that resembled the sort of injuries you might find on a victim of crucifixion. Norwich’s Jewish population were wrongly blamed, and William’s death was the catalyst for a sad sequence of events that culminated in the Jews being expelled from England in 1290.

Young though he was, William’s death inspired an almost cult-like response. Though he was never formally canonised, he was revered as a martyr by the Christians of Norwich (and beyond). So much so that, after his body was found in Mousehold Heath, a chapel was soon erected on the site of the discovery.

You can still see the remnants of that chapel today. It’s marked by an information board, which I photographed this morning during the aforementioned dog walk:

I know what you’re thinking - not much of a chapel. And you’re right, it’s not. Most of it has been consigned to the soily depths. But the flint remnants of the foundational structure are there.

It’s a hidden reminder of one of the most morbid and shameful parts of Norwich’s history.

RAF Mousehold Heath.

Mousehold Heath was also the site of an aerodrome, and later, an RAF base.

The base was built in 1916, but the RAF didn’t exist in 1916, so it was home to the No. 9 Reserve Aeroplane Squadron at first. When the RAF was formed in 1918, it became home to the No. 117 Squadron.

It won’t shock you to hear that the base is no longer being used. It was decommissioned in 1933.

But that doesn’t mean its legacy has been totally lost. You can still see old hangars from the base on the Salhouse Industrial Estate, like this one:

The playing field of the Open Academy near Mousehold Heath (formerly Heartsease High School) was an old airfield from the base, too.

Whilst we’re on the topic of vaguely-forces-related transportation solutions, it would be remiss of me not to mention the Mousehold Light Railway, an old trainline used for transporting munitions during World War 1 that dissected Mousehold Heath back in 1918.

You can’t see the railway line anymore, but you can see where it used to be. It’s quite a distinct channel - if you walked from Zaks towards Dunelm, you’d likely find yourself walking along it.

Honourable mentions.

I’ve mentioned Kett’s Rebellion no end of times in these newsletters - I promise it’ll get its own newsletter soon. Mousehold Heath was used by Robert Kett and his men to camp outside of Norwich, ahead of their storming of the city in 1549.

Remarkably, it was also the temporary site of a prisoner-of-war camp for Germans during the Second World War. The precise location of this camp has not been verified.

And in 1942, it was the site of two warplane crashes - both belonging to British forces, and both fatal. A plaque commemorating both of these crashes can be found near the football pitch opposite Zak’s.

So, Mousehold Heath - much more than just an old wood that my dog enjoys. As it turns out, it’s a burial ground for aquatic dinosaurs, medieval chapels and war relics.

See you next time,

Secret Norwich