Source: Wikimedia Commons
The name Henry Bell is familiar to anyone interested in the history of King’s Lynn. He designed the Custom House, one of the finest buildings in the town, and served twice as mayor before his death in 1711. But there is a problem. The borough’s official list of mayors records another Henry Bell taking office in 1789, nearly eighty years after the architect’s death. Who was this second man, and was he related to the first?
The answer is more surprising than it initially appears. There were actually three different men called Henry Bell who served as Mayor of King’s Lynn, while a fourth Henry Bell belonged to the family of the later mayor. Their lives take us from the merchant society of seventeenth-century Lynn into the world of eighteenth-century lawyers and Norfolk country houses. Along the way, they leave us with a family mystery that has still not been solved.
The merchant and his famous son
The first Henry Bell was a prosperous mercer, a merchant dealing principally in textiles, who became mayor in 1658 and again in 1670. His two terms of office fell on either side of the restoration of Charles II, a period of considerable political upheaval. Bell belonged to the wealthy trading community that dominated Lynn’s corporation, and his position was sufficiently secure for him to serve under two very different political regimes.
His son, also Henry, was baptised at St Margaret’s Church on 8 July 1647. He inherited his father’s business in 1686, but it was his interest in architecture that secured his lasting reputation. Bell designed the Custom House, completed in 1683 for the merchant Sir John Turner, whose commercial interests made him one of Lynn’s leading citizens. The building originally accommodated a merchants’ exchange on the ground floor, with customs business above. Its elegant classical design proclaimed the confidence and prosperity of a port whose merchants traded far beyond Norfolk.
Bell’s architectural work extended elsewhere in the town. He is associated with the Duke’s Head on Tuesday Market Place and with the rebuilding of All Saints’ Church at North Runcton. He was also an active member of Lynn’s governing establishment, serving as mayor in 1692 and again in 1703. He was therefore much more than a talented designer. He was a businessman and civic leader whose architectural interests were closely connected with the ambitions of the town’s prosperous merchants.
The architect died in 1711, although his death was incorrectly dated to 1717 in some earlier histories. The destruction of his memorial during the collapse of St Margaret’s spire in 1741 contributed to this confusion. Research published by H. M. Colvin and L. M. Wodehouse in 1961 helped establish the correct dates of his life.
Another Henry Bell becomes mayor
Nearly eighty years after the architect’s death, another Henry Bell appears in Lynn’s mayoral records. The official list identifies him as mayor in 1789, rather than 1790, although his term would have extended into the following calendar year. This was no clerical mistake or belated reference to the architect. He was a different man altogether.
Photo © Richard Humphrey
The third mayor was Henry Bell (1748–1820), a solicitor in King’s Lynn and the owner of Wallington Hall, near Downham Market. His background is unusually well documented in a genealogical study published in 2023 by Nick Kingsley, who traces the history of the Bell families of Beaupré Hall and Wallington Hall.
Born in 1748, the later Henry Bell inherited Wallington Hall following his father’s death in 1753. He married Elizabeth Browne, daughter and heiress of Scarlet Browne of King’s Lynn, in December 1773, and the couple had nine children. His marriage strengthened his connections with the town, while his legal profession and ownership of a country estate placed him among Norfolk’s prosperous families.
The difference between the two mayors is revealing. The architect had belonged to a world in which overseas commerce and mercantile wealth provided a route into borough government. His eighteenth-century namesake was a lawyer and landowner, reflecting another established route to influence in Georgian society. Both men occupied the same civic office, but their careers illustrate different aspects of Lynn’s governing class.
We know relatively little about the later Bell’s activities as mayor, although the borough’s Hall Books may contain further information. He died following a riding accident on 20 September 1820 and was buried at Runcton Holme. His executors subsequently sold Wallington Hall in 1828, bringing the family’s ownership of the estate to an end.
The missing family connection
Were the architect and the solicitor related? It is tempting to assume that they were, particularly as both belonged to prominent Norfolk families and shared the same Christian name. The Wallington Hall family can be traced back through several generations to the wider Bell family associated with Beaupré Hall. Among its distinguished ancestors was Sir Robert Bell, Speaker of the House of Commons in 1572 and a former MP for King’s Lynn.
The architect’s immediate ancestry is equally clear. His father was the Henry Bell who served as mayor in 1658 and 1670. What remains uncertain is whether this branch of the family shared an ancestor with the Bells of Wallington Hall.
Nick Kingsley, whose research provides much of the information about the later family, considers a connection likely but acknowledges that it has not been demonstrated. It would therefore be misleading to describe the later mayor as a direct descendant of the architect. The missing evidence may lie in Norfolk parish registers, wills, or property records.
There was, incidentally, a fourth Henry Bell. The solicitor’s son, born in 1776, was baptised at St Nicholas’ Church in Lynn and educated at the town’s grammar school before attending Trinity College, Cambridge. He entered the Church and became rector of Bawsey, among other Norfolk parishes. His life provides another example of how the Bell family remained connected with Lynn and the surrounding villages.
The repeated appearance of Henry Bell in the town’s records is more than a genealogical curiosity. Three men of that name served as mayor over a period of 131 years. One gave Lynn its most celebrated seventeenth-century building, while another belonged to a family whose connections reached into the Norfolk landed gentry and the Elizabethan Parliament.
Whether they were all members of one extended family remains an open question. The Bell who designed the Custom House and the Bell who became mayor in 1789 may yet prove to have shared an ancestor. Until someone finds the missing documentary evidence, however, the question remains unresolved.
There is a useful lesson here for anyone researching the history of King’s Lynn. When a familiar name appears in an old document, it is worth checking the dates before deciding that you have found the person you were looking for. In the case of Henry Bell, you might have found somebody quite different.
© James Rye 2026
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References
Borough Council of King’s Lynn and West Norfolk. List of Mayors of King’s Lynn, 1248–2025. https://www.west-norfolk.gov.uk/downloads/download/819/list_of_mayors_of_kings_lynn.
Colvin, H. M., and L. M. Wodehouse. “Henry Bell of King’s Lynn.” Architectural History 4 (1961): 41–62. https://doi.org/10.2307/1568244.
Historic England. “Duke’s Head Hotel, King’s Lynn.” National Heritage List for England, list entry 1212229. https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1212229.
Kingsley, Nick. “(535) Bell of Beaupre Hall and Wallington Hall.” Landed Families of Britain and Ireland, 22 February 2023, updated 26 October 2023. https://landedfamilies.blogspot.com/2023/02/535-bell-of-beaupre-hall-and-wallington.html.