East Winch

East Winch's name is of Anglo-Saxon origin and derives from the Old English for the eastern pasture farmstead. In the Domesday Book, East Winch is listed as a settlement of 51 households in the hundred of Freebridge. In 1086, the village formed part of the East Anglian estates of King William I, Roger Bigod, Ralph de Tosny, Hermer de Ferrers and a freeman by the name of Rainer. Crancourt Manor was a medieval residence of the Howard family, built as a fortified manor house. By the mid-nineteenth century, the manor was ruined apart from a single chimney stack, which remains the case today. In May 1944, a de Havilland Mosquito of No. 23 Squadron RAF crashed within the parish after technical…