Levitt Hagg (sometimes spelled Levit Hagg or Levett Hagg ) is an abandoned hamlet in
South Yorkshire
South Yorkshire is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and metropolitan county, metropolitan county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. The county has four council areas which are the cities of City of Doncaster, Doncaster and City of Sh ...
, located approximately two miles southwest of
Doncaster
Doncaster (, ) is a city in South Yorkshire, England. Named after the River Don, it is the administrative centre of the larger City of Doncaster. It is the second largest settlement in South Yorkshire after Sheffield. Doncaster is situated in ...
and near
Conisbrough Castle. Limestone began to be quarried at the site in ancient times. Levitt Hagg was also the site, along with nearby environs in the Don Gorge, of ancient woodlands rich in yew trees. The old settlement of Levitt Hagg was removed in the 1950s.
Toponymy
The settlement took its name from Hagg, an archaic word which meant 'broken ground in a bog,' and from the
Levett
Levett is a surname of Anglo-Norman origin, deriving from eLivet, which is held particularly by families and individuals resident in England and British Commonwealth territories.
Origins
This surname comes from the village of Livet-en-Ouche, no ...
family, an
Anglo-Norman Anglo-Norman may refer to:
*Anglo-Normans, the medieval ruling class in England following the Norman conquest of 1066
* Anglo-Norman language
**Anglo-Norman literature
* Anglo-Norman England, or Norman England, the period in English history from 10 ...
family prominent in Yorkshire for centuries.
History
The
River Don valley, in which the settlement was situated, was a site given to limestone formations which lent themselves to early mining for building purposes. The area in which Levitt Hagg is located was known as
Conisbrough
Conisbrough () is a town within the City of Doncaster, in South Yorkshire, England. It is roughly midway between Doncaster and Rotherham, and is built alongside the River Don at . It has a ward population (Conisbrough and Denaby) of 14,333.
...
Cliffs and was composed of two quarries: Near Cliff, which had been exhausted by 1791; and "Far Cliff" which included the long-gone early industrial hamlet of Levitt Hagg.
Limestone from the quarries at Levitt Hagg, which had a vertical height of 75 feet, has been widely used in building in the South Yorkshire area since medieval times. The soft dolomite limestone from the banks of the Don east of Conisbrough made ideal building material, which yielded profits for some. An account book from the mid-eighteenth century records the expenses of quarrying limestone at the site, which belonged at that time to the Battie-Wrightson family of Cusworth.
As well as quarrying operations, barges to be used on the canals were also built on the bank by the village, the first one being completed in 1886. Boat building was abandoned in 1901. The only surviving evidence of industrial activity are abandoned lime kilns, the upper portions of which are still visible. Today Levitt Hagg is the site of an abandoned quarry and
landfill site, providing refuge for four species of bats, including
whiskered,
long-eared,
Daubenton's and
Natterer's. (The bats and their habitat are
protected by law.)
Village
The village of Levitt Hagg began to grow around 1815 when the company of Lockwood, Blagden and Kemp constructed six cottages, known locally as 'White Row.' Four more houses had been constructed before 1851 when, according to the 1851 census, the dwellings were occupied by 60 people. During 1875, six more houses were constructed. Each one contained a living room, two bedrooms, an attic and a kitchen. At this time the village population was nearly 100, and in 1878 a small Mission Hall cum Reading Room was built on a site given by
Cusworth Hall
Cusworth Hall is an 18th-century Grade I listed country house in Cusworth, near Doncaster, South Yorkshire in the north of England. Set in the landscaped parklands of Cusworth Park, Cusworth Hall is a good example of a Georgian country house. ...
Estate owner
William Battie-Wrightson
William Battie-Wrightson (6 October 1789 – 10 February 1879) was a British landowner and Whig politician.
He was the elder son of William Wrightson of Cusworth Hall, near Doncaster, MP for Aylesbury. He undertook the Grand Tour of Europe wi ...
.
During 1925, the County Medical Officer made a report on the sanitary conditions at Levitt Hagg, and his findings were that many of the houses were in a state of disrepair, water had to be obtained from wells and drainage was discharged into the river and whenever the river overflowed the houses were prone to flooding. The insanitary conditions and the badly polluted state of the river led to all the Levitt Hagg houses being condemned as unfit for occupation and by 1957 the area had been cleared.
Landfill site
The Levitt Hagg landfill site is run by
Waste Recycling Group
FCC Environment (UK) Limited is a waste management company headquartered in Northampton, United Kingdom and a wholly owned subsidiary of Fomento de Construcciones y Contratas. It was formed in May 2012 through the merger and rebranding of Focsa ...
who have restored 2 acres to
calcareous grassland
Calcareous grassland (or alkaline grassland) is an ecosystem associated with thin basic soil, such as that on chalk and limestone downland. Plants on calcareous grassland are typically short and hardy, and include grasses and herbs such as clover. ...
and installed equipment to supply gas from the site to the grid.
References
{{reflist
Geography of the Metropolitan Borough of Doncaster
Archaeology of the United Kingdom
Conisbrough