Woodforde's career as a clergyman

'A typical Georgian parson'?

Norwich: the gatehouse to the Bishop's Palace. The bishop had oversight of 1296 parishes in Norfolk, Suffolk and part of Cambridgeshire. [drawing by D. Hodgson; engraving by W. Taylor 1830]James Woodforde has often been described as a typical Georgian parson. This page will suggest there was no such being. As demonstrated in the clergy's visitation returns to their bishop, in response to a long series of printed questions, the Church of England rectors, vicars and perpetual curates – all beneficed clerics – and their hardworking assistants, the curates, varied greatly in the way they ministered to the flock.

Oversight was light in Woodforde's time in the huge Norwich see, the second largest in Britain after Lincoln. The Bishop's Palace was ice-cold in winter. Successive prelates sought the comforts of London, where they sat in the House of Lords.

There was no set pattern to clerical life. Some ministers resided in parsonages; some lived in the parish but in other accommodation if no parsonage existed (as was common). Very many beneficed clergy held two or more livings, as one parish might not yield sufficient income.

If beneficed clergy could not serve in person, perhaps through being based too far from the parish or because they were ill or very elderly, they appointed a paid curate to carry out their duties. The clergy in those days did not retire. They died in harness, sometimes years after ceasing to be active pastors. Curates' pay could often be low, perhaps as little as £15 or £20 a year per parish – the wage of a skilled farm servant. As a consequence they too had to accept a number of cures to make ends meet. The age of the 'squarson', the squire–parson in a vast rectory, had not yet come.

One characteristic eighteenth-century clerics did have in common: they had all been ordained deacon. Many curates, realising they had no prospect of gaining patronage and thus a benefice, never sought ordination as priest. They therefore could not administer the Sacrament of Holy Communion, which was usually offered three or four times a year at the great festivals of the Church.

Graduates and non-graduates New College, Oxford: steps trodden daily by Woodforde as student and fellow [photo Margaret Bird 2024]

The clergy were not required to be graduates. Men seeking ordination who had never taken a university degree were known as literates, or literati in the records. An examination of two six-year samples 1754–59 and 1784–89 in the ordination registers for the diocese of Norwich, held in the Norfolk Record Office under the references DN/ORR 3/1 and DN/ORR 3/2, shows that in the first period, out of a total of 196 ordinands, 156 were Cambridge graduates, 22 were from Oxford, three from Scottish universities, and 15 were non-graduate literates.

The figures for the later period, relating to 251 ordinands, are: 197 from Cambridge, 31 from Oxford, three graduates of Scottish universities, and 20 literates. The methodology is explained in part 1 of an article on the Norfolk parish clergy in the April 2021 issue of the Society's Journal: vol. 54 no. 1. Ordinations were held in Norwich Cathedral, in the private chapel of the Bishop's Palace beside the Cathedral and, frequently, in fashionable London churches.

Thus by the time Woodforde gained his Norfolk benefice of Weston Longville in 1774 we can see that he was far from typical. His parish had a habitable parsonage, his 'happy thatched dwelling', where he was an accomplished home-brewer; he was an Oxford graduate and thus greatly outnumbered by his Cambridge brethren; as described below he had been ordained priest at the earliest age permitted (at twenty-four, by the Bishop of Bath and Wells); he was neither a pluralist holding more than one living nor an absentee; and he had one of the wealthiest livings in Norfolk.

A member of the Parson Woodforde Society, using the evidence of the full text of Woodforde's diary, has calculated in an unpublished study that in the year 1796 Woodforde's income from produce, including tithes, was nearly £425. This was at a time when many livings might bring in only £50–£80 a year: hence the need for pluralist clergy.

Destined for the Church at Oxford 1758–63

The Revd Samuel Woodforde (1695–1771), who provided his son James with the opportunity of a good education to fit him for the Church [copy by Samuel Woodforde, RA of an existing portrait, detail: Woodforde Family Collection]James Woodforde, one of three surviving sons all born at Ansford, was the only one to go to a major public school (Winchester) and to university (New College, Oxford). His father, the Rector of Ansford and Vicar of Castle Cary in Somerset, had preceded him at both institutions.

Father and son were very close, as attested by the son's diary. Revd Samuel Woodforde kept a close eye on his outgoings on behalf of young 'Jemmy', recorded in the account book still in the Woodforde family's possession. Much of the expenditure was funded by James's equally beloved mother Jane (1706–66), née Collins, an heiress in her own right.

The securing of a scholarship to New College was the key to the launch of James Woodforde's later clerical career, as the college held a number of valuable livings. Four years after his father's death he started to earn far more than if he had merely succeeded his father in his modest Somerset livings. The award also coincided with the launch of his career as a diarist. He started to write his daily diary aged nineteen while an undergraduate at Oxford University. His first entry, made while still at Oriel College, is dated 21 July 1759: 'Made a Scholar of New College.'

A glimpse of Woodforde's undergraduate years is given in some diary excerpts. The life of an eighteenth-century undergraduate might appear familiar today in some respects:

His student days culminated in his ordination as deacon by the Bishop of Oxford. On 29 May 1763 he recorded, 'At nine o'clock this morning went to Christ Church [Oxford] . . . to be ordained Deacon.' He took his BA degree three days later.

He had been ordained two weeks short of his twenty-third birthday: just under the minimum age for ordination as deacon. And as a graduate he would avoid the fate of the literates, the great majority of whom failed to secure comfortable livings and had to serve as struggling curates.

Four Somerset curacies 1763–73 An exquisite miniature, only 45 mm by 50 mm, of the diarist's great-grandfather the Revd Dr Samuel Woodforde, FRS (1636–1701): the first in the family to go to Oxford and be ordained [by Samuel Cooper (d.1672): Woodforde Family Collection]

Woodforde left Oxford at the end of summer 1763 after five years in residence. He spent the next ten years as a curate in Somerset: for three months at Thurloxton, near Bridgwater, then 1764–65 at Babcary, much nearer his family home at Ansford. At the same time he was assisting his elderly father as curate at Ansford and Castle Cary.

This was a time of overstretch and great pressure, as described in the chronicle of his Babcary curacy. Those who portray Woodforde as enjoying a tranquil lifestyle overlook his years as a very hardworking and conscientious curate.

A year after becoming a deacon he was ordained priest at Wells, in the Bishop's Palace beside the Cathedral:

Out of all the ordinands he was chosen to preach the sermon on the occasion; he had thoughtfully prepared one in advance. The name Woodforde would have been well known at Wells. His great-uncle Robert Woodforde (1675–1762), also of Winchester and New College, Oxford, had served as Treasurer while a Residuary Canon of the Cathedral. The young James was heir to a distinguished family clerical tradition in the form of his great-uncle and his great-grandfather the Revd Dr Samuel Woodforde, a Fellow of the Royal Society and also an Anglican divine and a poet.

The return to Oxford 1773–76

Following his father's death in 1771, and disappointed in his hopes of appointment to one of the paternal livings, Woodforde returned to Oxford where he became a Sub-warden of New College. A flavour of his years as a Fellow of New College is given in the diary excerpts and in the description of the New College memorial tablet erected to him by the Parson Woodforde Society.

He had become an MA in 1767 while a Somerset curate and was awarded the degree of BD (Bachelor of Divinity) in 1775. He describes the series of oral examinations required for both degrees, published in full in the Society's unabridged and annotated transcription of his manuscript available online to members. The printed volumes are also available by post from the Society.

Resident rector of Weston, Norfolk 1776–1803 Unlocking Woodforde's world: 14th-century ironwork and timbers on the south door of Weston Church [photo Margaret Bird 2014]

Weston was Woodforde's first and only benefice. Just once, on the day he was elected to the living, does he refer to the parish by its manorial name of Weston Longueville or Longeville. As well as being patrons of the living New College had been lords of the manor centuries earlier.

On 15 December 1774, after hearing the two candidates presenting their case for two hours in the dining hall, the Fellows of New College voted in favour of Woodforde's appointment to the valuable living in the gift of the college. He went into residence at the Weston rectory in April 1776 and served the parish faithfully until his health failed.

The Church of England operated an elaborate system of cover for those frequent occasions when, owing to illness or absence from home, the usual clergyman could not officiate. Woodforde, somewhat reluctantly, took his turn when the occasion demanded. He records helping out at other churches nearby: Ringland, Mattishall, Great Witchingham and East Tuddenham.

At times he found the task upsetting. As narrated in full in the diary excerpts while he was a rector, he officiated at the compulsory marriage of Robert Astick to Elizabeth Howlett at Ringland:

Ringland Church, in the neighbouring parish to Weston Longville, has a magnificent roof with flights of winged angels. To his great regret Woodforde had to officiate here at a compulsory marriage in 1787 after the pregnant bride had named the alleged father of her child. [photo Margaret Bird 2024]

Apart from his journeys to Somerset Woodforde remained at Weston until his death on New Year's Day 1803. Accounts of his way of life in Norfolk are found across this website, as in many of the twelve objects giving an insight into his world. On that same Features page the section 'Exploring Woodforde country' describes the background to his life of service at Oxford and in Somerset and Norfolk.

Woodforde's unobtrusive style of proselytising

A silhouette of Woodforde in 1773 as a Fellow of New College. It is used as an icon on the volumes of the full diary text available to the Society's members. [New College Archives, 9574/4 © Courtesy of the Warden and Scholars of New College, Oxford]The study of the diarist's quiet spirituality, as expressed in his New College sermon of 1 January 1776, examines his broad, tolerant outlook. While showing very little in the way of missionary zeal his religious beliefs were genuinely held, and it would be wrong to portray Woodforde as lacking in Christian witness. He would have shrunk from adopting the 'enthusiasm' of the Anglican Evangelicals and many of the Methodists. His religion was rooted in tradition, rational thought and the dictates of his conscience as well as in biblical authority.

At the age of 35, having served only as a curate and as a college fellow, Woodforde gave voice to the methods which were to characterise him for the years left to him. By professing his faith quietly and living a goodly life he would bring people to Christ. The long, carefully thought-out sermon is still held in the college archives. It was written for an Oxford audience and not for a village congregation; nevertheless the simplicity of his style of oratory immediately strikes the reader.

Through it we can come to understand why he chose not to give dynamic leadership to his parishioners, as in these passages:

Burial beneath the chancel of the church 1803

Weston Longville: the memorial stone in the chancel floor against the north wall marks Woodforde's burial place beneath [photo Margaret Bird 2024]In All Saints', Weston a small lozenge-shaped tablet is set in the tiled floor close to the sanctuary rail. It lies under the elaborate memorial to Woodforde on the north wall of the chancel and marks the diarist's resting place. 'M.S.' stands for Memoriae Sacrum, Latin for 'Sacred to the memory of'.

The north wall has been extended slightly inwards since the interment, necessitating the cutting away of a corner of the stone.

It was a controversial decision to bury the rector within the church, as William and Nancy Woodforde would have been aware. It is likely they were honouring their uncle's wishes. Their friend Squire Custance however strongly disapproved of the practice of burying prominent parishioners beneath the church building itself.

Such burials are recorded in the diary, the sites being identified by handsome ledger stones bearing deeply incised inscriptions clearly legible today. On 14 January 1797 Woodforde had noted that Mr Mann was given 'a very handsome funeral' and was buried in the church aged 57. Mrs Mann was buried on 17 March 1798 aged 67: 'It was an handsome funeral and many people at it.' On 9 May 1800 John Buck too was laid to rest in Weston Church.

The diarist acknowledged that John Custance did not agree with such interments:

The squire stuck to his principles. Although, given their high social status, he and his wife could have been expected to be buried within the church they chose a plot in the churchyard near the church's east wall, where their eldest son also lies.