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A History of the County of Cambridge and the Isle of Ely: Volume 9, Chesterton, Northstowe, and Papworth Hundreds. Originally published by Victoria County History, London, 1989.
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Charities for the poor
The 20 a. which John Bush, the rectory farmer, left to the parish in 1515 for paying the taxes charged on its poor (fn. 1) were possibly the parish lands which in 1662 yielded £5 a year for the church. (fn. 2) Later they were probably absorbed into the Cotton estate which in the early 19th century was supposedly liable to pay £1 11s., in 1871 still given in bread. (fn. 3)
The parish still c. 1811 possessed four or five cottages, called town houses, let until the 1840s to widows and other poor people. All but one were empty and derelict by 1909, and the parish gave the site to Col. Harding. In return he had a new well bored for the village in 1910. (fn. 4)