Burwell House, Burwell
.email: richard.ball@BallFamilyRecords.co.uk
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Burwell House, North Street - This house lies on the east side of North Street. I don't know whether it was called by this name when Edward Ball lived there but Charles Lucas* describes it thus:

About the middle of the village, on the east side of the street, is Burwell House, formerly the residence of Edward Ball, Esq., a large merchant and farmer, the celebrated tenant-farmers' representative for the County of Cambridge Division ... in the House of Commons, and native of the village. His famous speech on protections in which he said he would 'enfurl himself in the banner of protection and die on the floor of the house' is even now occasionally quoted.
photograph from Herbert S. Ball's family photograph album
Burwell House? - looking from the south-west
The Old Home is how my grandfather labelled this picture. The house I saw in 1970, now called Burwell House and an adult education college, I believe to be the same house considerably enlarged - my clue is the two little dormer windows in the roof (to the right of the end gable in the picture above) - the entrance front appears to have been extended sideways to take in the large bay and balcony on either side and upwards by one floor. The modern front has five windows across and three floors.
Burwell House - looking from the south
On the gable end to the right of the two storied block facing us is a initialled and dated plaque, rather like the footstone of a grave.

* quoted from:
Charles Lucas - The Fenman's World, published by Jarrold, Norwich, 1930.


photographs by Richard Ball ©