Colchester Archaeological Trust

CAT Report 1769: summary

A post-medieval brick kiln at East Bergholt, Suffolk: excavation south of Heath Road, August-September 2021
by Howard Brooks (with contributions from Dr Matthew Loughton, Laura Pooley, Emma Holloway, Ben Holloway, and Robin Mathieson.)

Date report completed: August-September 2021
Location: Heath Road, East Bergholt, Suffolk
Map reference(s): TM 0804 3518 (centre)
File size: 17,154 kb
Project type: Excavation
Significance of the results:
Keywords: Excavation

Summary. Excavation of the area around a burnt brick structure revealed by a 2017 evaluation revealed a heavily robbed, three-flued brick kiln surviving only as footings, and fronted by a large rake-out pit. The absence of the kiln site on both the 1838 Tithe map and the 1st Edition OS sheet of 1887 gives a date range within which it must have been built and operated. There were two brick types in the kiln - unfrogged early 19th-century types and frogged examples of the mid 19thcentury.Together with the map evidence, this suggests a kiln originally constructed circa 1840, repaired in frogged brick circa 1850-60, and abandoned and infilled before the 1876-1884 survey for the Ordnance Survey map published in 1887.