Leece

Leece

Moss House
Leece
 Leece shown within Cumbria
Civil parishAldingham
DistrictSouth Lakeland
Shire countyCumbria
RegionNorth West
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post town ULVERSTON
Postcode district LA12
Dialling code 01229
Police Cumbria
Fire Cumbria
Ambulance North West
EU Parliament North West England
UK ParliamentBarrow and Furness
List of places
UK
England
Cumbria

Coordinates: 54°06′53″N 3°09′37″W / 54.114767°N 3.160415°W

Leece is a village on the Furness peninsula in Cumbria, England, between the towns of Ulverston and Barrow-in-Furness.[1]

Amenities

The village[1][2] is built around a tarn and a village green,[2] and Henry Armer & Son, a smithy established in 1914 that has since become an agricultural engineering business.[3]

History

Historically part of Lancashire, the name Leece is probably from the Old English leah, which means 'woodland clearing', and the plural of which is Leas. It was recorded in the Domesday Book as Lies, in the Manor of Hougun held by Earl Tostig.[4] It appears later in 1269 as Lees.[5]

Leece used to contain the United Methodist Free Church. It was founded in 1881, but closed in 1912. The building, which was taken down in the late 1920s, can still be seen on some photographs from the period. The church did not have a cemetery.[6] St. Matthew's Church, in the hamlet of Dendron, built in 1642, also served the village, as both a church and a school. It was funded by Robert Dickinson, a citizen of London, who had formerly lived in Leece.[7]

In the 1990s and 2000s, Leece played a part in the Lady in the Lake murder trial. Gordon Park, a resident of Leece, bludgeoned his 30-year-old wife Carol to death with an ice axe, then dumped her body in Coniston Water, telling police investigating her disappearance that she had left their home for another man.[8]

Gallery

Sources

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Bolt, Alison (2006-04-25). "The End". BBC. Retrieved 2007-03-03.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Swain, Robert. Furness and Cartmel Peninsulas Photographic Memories. The Francis Frith Collection. ISBN 1-85937-816-1. See excerpt.
  3. ↑ "Henry Armer and Son". Henry Armer & Son. Retrieved 2007-03-03.
  4. ↑ Explore Low Furness
  5. ↑ Mills, David (1976). The Place Names of Lancashire. B. T Batsford. ISBN 0-7134-3248-9.
  6. ↑ Stringer, Phil (2007-02-14). "United Methodist Free Church, Leece". GENUKI. Retrieved 2007-05-22.
  7. ↑ "St. Matthews Church, Dendron". Explore Low Furness. Retrieved 2007-05-22.
  8. ↑ Jackson, Russell (2005-01-29). "Justice for the Lady in the Lake as husband gets life for murder". The Scotsman. Retrieved 2007-01-26.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Leece.