Packed audience at King’s Lynn Town Hall for annual lecture

Lynn’s Town Hall was packed with a 200-strong audience for the Diana Bullock Annual Memorial Lecture on Sir Robert Walpole and Houghton Hall.

Hailed a great success by organisers at Lynn Town Guides, Chris Boxall held the audience captive for over an hour as he recounted the life of one of Lynn’s most celebrated and notorious historical characters.

Town Guides’ Chairman Bob Price said: “This was one of our best attended lectures and we are immensely grateful to Chris for providing such a fascinating talk. This is one of the highlights of the year for the Guides and it remains an important fund-raising event.”

Facing the giant portrait of Walpole, Chris commenced the lecture by explaining how his own childhood had provided him with a historical playground in the streets of Lynn that had fuelled his own lifelong interest in history.

Chris went on to recount the history of the Walpoles and Houghton – or “high town” – from the Walpole family’s support for the Crusades of King Richard in the 12th Century right up to the opening of the Damien Hirst exhibition that took place last weekend.

Chris told the fascinating story of Sir Robert Walpole’s rise to power as Britain’s first and longest-serving Prime Minister, his imprisonment in the Tower of London, his wife, his mistress and their children, and the £40,000 of debt that he left to his heirs.

More information and tickets for Town Guides’ walks available from 01553 763044.