Wainfleet Castle Hill (The Gatehouse Record)

In the civil parish of Wainfleet All Saints.
In the historic county of Lincolnshire.
Modern Authority of Lincolnshire.
1974 county of Lincolnshire.
Medieval County of Lincolnshire.

OS Map Grid Reference: TF497586
Latitude 53.10443° Longitude 0.23472°

Wainfleet Castle Hill has been described as a Timber Castle although is doubtful that it was such.

There are no visible remains.

Comments

Leland reports being informed by Mr Paynell that there was a place called Castle Hill in Wainfleet. This does seem slight evidence but the significant coastal change, land reclamation and intense agriculture in the area could have caused such a feature to be lost. Wainfleet was an important port in C14 but ruinous and deserted by the mid C15.
Map reference is for All Saints church, a C19 replacement of one of the medieval churches. The actually location of Mr Paynell's 'Castle Hill' is unknown and identification can only be speculative. Green Hill, at TF501593, is a mound in the grounds of lost Northolme Manor, a Tudor moated house. This is identified as any of several artificial mound types (Beacon; Windstead; Burial mound; gazebo mound) but not as a motte. However, if Northolme manor was a Tudor rebuild of an earlier medieval manor house (of the manor of Wainfleet St Thomas) is it possible this stood in the bailey of a motte and bailey castle?

Sources of information, references and further reading

Further information may be available from the holder of the county Historic Environment Record.

Antiquarian (Histories and accounts from late medieval and early modern writers)
- Chandler, John, 1993, John Leland's Itinerary: travels in Tudor England (Sutton Publishing) p. 300
  Toulmin-Smith, Lucy (ed), 1909, The itinerary of John Leland in or about the years 1535-1543 (London: Bell and Sons) Vol. 4 p. 181 online copy

Most of the sites or buildings recorded in this web site are NOT open to the public and permission to visit a site must always be sought from the landowner or tenant.
It is an offence to disturb a Scheduled Monument without consent. It is a destruction of everyone's heritage to remove archaeological evidence from ANY site without proper recording and reporting.
Don't use metal detectors on historic sites without authorisation.

The information on this web page may be derived from information compiled by and/or copyright of Historic England, County Historic Environment Records and other individuals and organisations. It may also contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence. All the sources given should be consulted to identify the original copyright holder and permission obtained from them before use of the information on this site for commercial purposes.
The author and compiler of Gatehouse does not receive any income from the site and funds it himself. The information within this site is provided freely for educational purposes only.

The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

Please help to make this as useful a resource as possible by contacting Gatehouse if you see errors, can add information or have suggestions for improvements in functality and design.
Help is acknowledged.

Data >
Maps >	Streetmap	NLS maps	Where's the path	Old-Maps
Data/Maps >	Magic	V. O. B.	Geology	LiDAR	Open Domesday
Air Photos >	Bing Maps	Google Maps	Getmapping	ZoomEarth
Photos >	CastleFacts	Geograph	Flickr	Panoramio