Oxnead

Oxnead is a lost settlement in Norfolk, England, roughly three miles south-east of Aylsham. It now consists mostly of St Michael’s Church and Oxnead Hall. It was the principal residence of the Paston family from 1597 until the death of William Paston, 2nd Earl of Yarmouth in 1732. Under Sir William Paston (1610–1663), Oxnead was the site of several works by the architect and sculptor, Nicholas Stone, master-mason to Kings James I and Charles I.

According to Blomefield, the place takes its name from its site on meadows beside a river known to the Britons and Saxons as the Ouse. At the time of the Domesday survey, the estate belonged to Halden and altogether was worth 30 shillings. It was seven furlongs long and six broad and included a church with twenty-four acres of glebe land. At the time of King Stephen, Oxnead belonged to Albert Greslei, from whom it passed to the Hauteyn family. Around 1368, the estate was acquired by Sir Robert de Salle. After Sir Robert’s death, his widow’s second husband, Sir William Clopton, took control of Oxnead and in the 1420s it was sold to William Paston, of Paston.

William Paston, lawyer and later a judge, settled the Oxnead estate on his wife, Agnes, as part of their marriage agreement. The estate continued to pass down the family. In 1554 Sir William Paston, an eminent lawyer and courtier who had been present at the Field of the Cloth of Gold, bequeathed it to his fourth son, Clement Paston (1515–1597).

Sir Clement Paston (1515–1597) built the Oxnead Hall of which one wing remains today. Blomefield notes that Clement was born at Paston Hall on ‘the sea coast, and having a genius and love for shipping and navigation, was in his youth admitted to the service of King Henry VIII in the navy, and made captain of one of the King's ships’, and in an engagement with the French [in May, 1546, in command of the Anne Gallant, according to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography] took their admiral called the Baron de St. Blankheare, or Blankard, whom he kept a prisoner at Castor by Yarmouth till he paid 7000 crowns, for his ransom, besides considerable things of value, which were found in his ship’. Blomefield also notes of Clement that ‘King Henry VIII called him his Champion; the Duke of Somerset, Protector in King Edward's reign, called him his Souldier; Queen Mary, her Seaman; and Queen Elizabeth, her Father’.

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