Hereward the Wake
| ONE MAN WHO is reputed to
have opposed the Normans when they arrived here is the Saxon rebel,
Hereward the Wake, who now enjoys a reputation in the list of English
heroes second only to Robin Hood although his exploits that are recounted
today are mainly fictional written by the Victorian novelist, Charles
Kingsley. According to these tales, Hereward was the son of the Earl Leofric of Mercia and his wife Lady Godiva who owned the manor of Bourne and the castle that reputedly stood in the Wellhead Gardens which was Hereward's birthplace. After being outlawed for the rough treatment of certain monks at Peterborough, young Hereward is alleged to have had numerous incredible adventures in Britain and the Low Countries before returning home to challenge the Normans and clearing them from Bourne, hiding in the woods with his band of outlaws where he was eventually killed and then buried in the chancel of the Abbey Church. These colourful accounts were once taught to children in school but little of this is accurate although there is a core of truth in the story of Hereward which is a complex one in that he did own lands in the area and so he may therefore have been active in the locality during these years. But his title of "the Wake" may have been bestowed by John, the Abbott of Peterborough, or more likely by the Wake family, the Norman landowners who took over his estates and became Lords of the Manor of Bourne, claiming him as an ancestor in later years.
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