Louth

History

Three handaxes have been found on the Wolds surrounding Louth, dating from between 424,000 and 191,000 years ago, indicating inhabitation in the Paleolithic era. Bronze Age archeological finds include a 'barbed and tanged' arrowhead found in the grounds of Monks' Dyke Tennyson College. St Helen's Spring, at the Gatherums, off Aswell Street, is dedicated to a popular medieval saint, the mother of Constantine the Great, the first Roman Emperor to become a Christian, but is thought to be a Christianised Romano-British site for veneration of the pagan water-goddess Alauna. The Anglo-Saxon pagan burial ground northwest of Louth dates from the fifth-to-sixth centuries, and was first excavated in 1946. Æthelhard, a Bishop of Winchester who was made Archbishop of Canterbury in 793, was an abbot of Louth in his early life. Louth is listed in the 1086 Domesday Book as a town of 124 households. Louth Park Abbey was founded in 1139 by the Bishop Alexander of Lincoln as a daughter-house of the Cistercian Fountains Abbey in Yorkshire. Following its dissolution in 1536 it fell into ruin and, today, only earthworks survive, on private land, between Louth and Keddington. Some of the ruins were incorporated into The Priory (now a hotel) by Thomas Espin. Monks' Dyke, now a ditch, was originally dug to supply the abbey with water from the springs of Ashwell and St. Helen's at Louth. In 1643, Sir Charles Bolles, a resident of Louth, raised a 'hastily-got-up soldiery' for the Royalist cause in the English Civil War. Fighting took place in, and around the town and, at one point, Bolles was forced to take refuge under the Ramsgate bridge. By the battle's end 'Three strangers, being souldgeres, was slain at a skirmish at Lowth, and was buryed'. The Louth flood of 1920 occurred in the…

Geography

Louth is at the foot of the Lincolnshire Wolds where they meet the Lincolnshire Marsh. It developed where the ancient trackway along the Wolds, known as the Barton Street, crossed the River Lud. The town is east of a gorge carved into the Wolds that forms the Hubbard's Hills. This area was formed from a glacial overspill channel in the last glacial period. The River Lud meanders through the gorge before entering the town. Directly to the southeast of Louth is the village of Legbourne, to the northeast is the village of Keddington, to the northwest is the village of South Elkington, and to the southwest is the village of Hallington. The towns of Wragby, Market Rasen, Horncastle, Mablethorpe, Grimsby and Alford also are close to Louth. The Greenwich Meridian passes through the town and is marked on Eastgate with plaques on the north and south sides of the street, just east of the junction with Northgate, although this location is known to be incorrect as the line actually passes through a point just west of Eastgate's junction with Church Street. A three-mile (5 km) £6.6 million A16 Louth Bypass opened in 1991. The former route through the town is now designated as the B1520.

Most-observed species

• European water vole

  Arvicola amphibius (Linnaeus, 1758) · Mammalia
  1,639
• Common Wood-Pigeon

  Columba palumbus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,462
• Carrion Crow

  Corvus corone Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,408
• Mallard

  Anas platyrhynchos Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,192
• Eurasian Magpie

  Pica pica (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  1,126
• Eurasian Blackbird

  Turdus merula Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  1,118
• European Robin

  Erithacus rubecula (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  1,062
• Black-headed Gull

  Chroicocephalus ridibundus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  1,046

Most recent

• M 4.1 — 2018-06-09
  7 km NNE of Withernsea, United Kingdom
• M 2.8 — 2015-09-22
  2 km W of Cottesmore, United Kingdom
• M 3.8 — 2015-01-28
  2 km WSW of Market Overton, United Kingdom
• M 2.6 — 2014-10-28
  2 km NNE of Hucknall, United Kingdom
• M 3.5 — 2014-04-18
  3 km WSW of Market Overton, United Kingdom
• M 3 — 2009-04-11
  5 km ENE of Goxhill, United Kingdom