Humberston

Humberston is a village and civil parish south of Cleethorpes in North East Lincolnshire, England. Boundary and population The village's boundary with Cleethorpes runs along North Sea Lane and Humberston Road. Its population, 5,384, in the 2001 Census increased to 5,634 at the 2011 Census. The Prime Meridian runs east of Humberston, through the Thorpe Park caravan site. History The Danes landed at the site of the village in 870. Humberston (or Humberstone, as the village was first known) takes its name from a large boulder, the "Humber Stone", which was deposited on the site of the former Midfield Farm during the last Ice Age. The boulder may be seen at the entrance to the village library, near St Peter's Church. The boulder was discovered in the winter of 1956/7 while deep ploughing was taking place at Midfield Farm. Two years later it was moved to Wendover Paddock in the village, and when the new library was built it was moved there. There is no evidence that this is the stone from which the village gets its name, but it was described by Professor H H Swinnerton and Sir William Pugh of Hull University as a glacial boulder of Scottish origin of the type from which the village may have got its name. The "e" at the end of the name was dropped to avoid confusion with a place with the same name. The oldest and tallest building in Humberston is St Peter's Church. The church was rebuilt about 1710 but its tower is over seven hundred years old. At the rear of the church is the site of the former Humberston Abbey, a monastery of Benedictine monks, which was founded during the reign of Henry II and dedicated to Saints Mary and Peter. Nearly all that remains is the monks' mound in the manor-house garden, stone sarcophagi have been excavated. The Wesleyan Methodists built a small chapel on Humberston Avenue in 1835, and a larger replacement chapel was built in 1907. An early wireless station was built in 1910.