The Gazette is published when there is something to say. It does not take sides in the census dispute. It does not speculate about the Seventh Drain. It reports.
Tuesday’s Council meeting ran to nearly two hours as the parish considered the Drainage Committee’s revised population figure. The Committee is now claiming a count of seven hundred and forty-three, inclusive of Willow Bend; the Council’s 2024 figure of seven hundred and twelve remains on the parish precept.
An examination of three published maps of the north-west marsh - the Improvement Commissioners’ 1826 plan, the post-war 1947 revision, and a 2022 contour survey - shows the modern channel does not match either of the earlier plans.
Our corner-shop correspondent writes to point out that a count, properly taken, ought to include anyone who buys a paper from his shop. He counts three hundred and twelve.
Statutory notice of the seventy-ninth Drain Day, to be held on the Saturday nearest 14 February 2027, commencing with the Morrowfen Silence at noon.
Six small advertisements this week, including one from an unnamed correspondent seeking information about a chain found in 1991 in the cellar of a Bell Street property.
Past issues, where they have survived, are kept in the Old Library. Selected items are reproduced in the town archive.