Little Wilbraham : Local government

LOCAL GOVERNMENT.

In the early 13th century the Chamberlains' manor court met at Michaelmas and Easter. (fn. 1) Although c 1299 they were said to have view of frankpledge and the assizes of bread and of ale, (fn. 2) no leet jurisdiction was otherwise claimed for their manor. (fn. 3) Court rolls for Rycotes court baron survive for 22 out of the years between 1557 and 1626 and for 1681-4, (fn. 4) followed by court books for 1726- 1936. (fn. 5) In the 16th century the court often issued agrarian regulations, but thereafter confined itself to handling copyhold transfers. For the Anglesey manor scattered rolls for courts baron survive from the 1350s, especially from the late 15th century, and on into the late 16th. (fn. 6) Courts were still held c. 1800 for the city of Coventry, then its lord. (fn. 7) Great Wilbraham Temple manor court still dealt with copyhold land in Little Wilbraham in the 19th century, (fn. 8)

At inclosure in 1801 the parish was allotted 20 a. in the fen, later called the Public Works land, to maintain drainage channels and banks. (fn. 9) It was still managed by the parish council in the 1930s. (fn. 10)

Expenditure on the poor doubled to £71 between 1776 and the mid 1780s. By 1803 £82 was spent on regular outside relief for 3 adults and 10 children. (fn. 11) The sum spent on 11 people permanently and up to 16 occasionally assisted fell from c. £230 in 1813 to £150-175 from 1815, but rose again to almost £200 in the late 1820s and in 1834. (fn. 12) From 1836 Little Wilbraham was included in Chesterton poor-law union, (fn. 13) and lay within Chesterton rural district from 1894 to 1974, and thereafter in South Cambridgeshire district. (fn. 14)

The parish council set up in 1894 provided street lighting with oil lamps by 1901. (fn. 15) From the 1910s it tried to protect the village water supply against the lowering of the water table caused by Cambridge's waterworks. (fn. 16)