The Fressingfield Local History and Archive Group was founded in 2006 and has a strong and enthusiastic membership.  The group has monthly meetings, generally the last Tuesday of the month and organises visits, walks and exhibitions.  Members are collecting and archiving photographs and facts about the village and welcome anything you may have.  They would copy your pictures and documents and return them.

Chairman: Keith Dobson.  Tel: 01379 586221, keith.a.dobson@btinternet.com 

If you have any old pictures or village history details or you are trying to trace a Fressingfield family, please contact: Mary Cufley on 01379 586538, roger.cufley@googlemail.com

On May Bank Holiday 2009, we held a magnificent celebration of the 500th anniversary of our guildhall, the Fox and Goose, with 1509, Fressingfield's Tudor Story.  Click on logo for full details. 

Group Meetings for 2011/2012

Tues 28 June	Show and Tell, 7.30pm, Sancroft Hall. Members bring something that reminds them of the past
Tues 26 July	Invitation to View - A visit to Linden House, Eye
Tues 30 August	Open Houses. An opportunity to view 2 historic houses in Fressingfield
September	TBA
Tues 26 October	We are planning a visit to Bury or Ipswich Registry Office
Tues 22 November	Old Music and Dancing - 'Ye olde instruments and stepping' and a social evening, 7.30pm, Sancroft Hall
December	No meeting
Tues 24 January	Bric-a-brac of past years with speaker Don Andrews, 7.30pm, Sancroft Hall
Tues 28 February	An evening with the archives, 7.30pm, Sancroft Hall
Tues 27 March	Annual General Meeting, 7.30pm, Sancroft Hall

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There are three publications of the history of Fressingfield currently for sale:-

Looking Back at Fressingfield which details aspects of
village life before 1750 and from 1851 to 1951                          £5.00
                    
A Century of a Suffolk Village covering 1750 to 1851               £4.00

Fifty Years of Fressingfield 1952 - 2002                                £5.50

Copies are available by contacting Pennie or Mary, details above.  These are subject to P & P, usually about £2.

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Fressingfield covers 4,618 acres. It is one of Suffolk’s largest parishes - only fifteen, out of more than five hundred, being larger. A population peak was reached in 1851 when the census recorded 1,491: five hundred more than at present.

For centuries the prosperity or otherwise of the parish has reflected its dependence upon agricultural policy - itself dictated by external pressures: wars, particularly the Napoleonic, Crimean and the two World Wars - providing impetus; whilst, typically, depression reigned in between periods of hostility and more definitely so from the late 1870s until well into the twentieth century due to the influx of cheap American grain.

Agriculture remains dominant - but only as far as land use is concerned. Fressingfield has an impressive number of medieval moats - drainage, a ready supply of water and fish and even the demands of fashion (rather than defence) provide one or more of the reasons. Whittingham Hall also has the remains of a medieval deer park.

The Manor of Whittingham was granted a Market in 1267. This was transferred to the centre of the village by 1550.

More village history pages