Monument record WPT 022 - Kiln Lane Brick Works

Site of brick works shown on Ist (1880s) & 2nd edition (1904) OS maps (S1) and shown to be disused on 1958 OS map (S2). Adjoins `Kiln Lane' shown on (S1-S3) and 1981 OS map (S4). Site adjoins `Kiln Farm' shown on 1981 OS map. Some confusion exists over the locations of the 3 or 4(?) brickworks in Woolpit. (S4) lists the Kiln Lane works as being operated by Thomas Abraham Cocksedge 1819, William Caldecott 1820 - 1858, Causton Stutten 1864-1868, Thomas Plowman 1869-1879, Woolpit Brick & Tile Co 1883-1948.
Cut through by construction of A45 dual carriageway in 1970s/80s. Major oval kiln structure presumably destroyed although may underlay dual carriageway (road construction details may specify?).
Extent of HBSMR mapped site increased to include further 'old pits' after 1880s OS mapping (Dec 2009). Other pits may extend further to the N & NE.
'The first record of a brick kiln appears in the Manorial Extent of 1574 when two separate people lived or farmed by ‘le bryckell’, and clay-pits were mentioned too. By the eighteenth century the Brickworks were an important part of the village and three working pits continued to provide employment throughout the nineteenth century. They changed hands several times, eventually being purchased by the London Brick Company. In a modified form they continued to work until just before the Second World War, when the government ordered that the kilns should not be lit because of fears that enemy bombers would be able to see them from the air' (S5).
'In 1946 there was an attempt to re-open a pit. Unfortunately, late one day, a workman using a pickaxe hit a spring, and when the men returned the next morning the workings were flooded and unusable. So Woolpit no longer makes bricks, but the industrial tradition survives because there are light industrial units on some of the land which used to belong to the old brickworks '(S5).