Lowick is a village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority ...

forming part of the district of

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

Northamptonshire Northamptonshire (; abbreviated Northants.) is a county in the East Midlands of England. In 2015, it had a population of 723,000. The county is administered by two unitary authorities: North Northamptonshire and West Northamptonshire. It is ...

, England, about north-west of

Thrapston Thrapston is a market town in North Northamptonshire, England. It was the headquarters of the former East Northamptonshire district, and at the time of the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2011 census, had a population of 6,239. The town's name mea ...

. It appears in the

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manusc ...

as ''Luhwik'', and later as ''Lofwyk'' and in 1167 as ''Luffewich''. The name derives from

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, Anglo ...

"Luhha's or Luffa's dwelling place", wic being cognate to ''vicus'' in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

. At the time of the 2011 census, the parish's population was 298 people.

Buildings

Drayton House Drayton House is a country house south-west of the village of Lowick, Northamptonshire, England. History Aubrey de Vere I participated in the Norman conquest of England and was awarded the manor of Drayton near Northampton. In the early thir ...

is south-west of the village. St Peter's Church was built by the Greene family of Drayton between the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. The former school building in Drayton Road was built by Sir John Germaine and his wife and dates from 1717 to 1725. The

George Eliot Mary Ann Evans (22 November 1819 – 22 December 1880; alternatively Mary Anne or Marian), known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, poet, journalist, translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era. She wro ...

book ''

Middlemarch ''Middlemarch, A Study of Provincial Life'' is a novel by the English author Mary Anne Evans, who wrote as George Eliot. It first appeared in eight installments (volumes) in 1871 and 1872. Set in Middlemarch, a fictional English Midland town, ...

'' was written, at least in part, in the village's old rectory, which is mentioned in the book itself.

Iron ore quarrying and mining

Iron ore was obtained in three places close to the village. All of the ore was taken to the Islip Ironworks site. Most of the ore was used at that works until it closed in 1942. The rest of the ore was loaded into railway wagons at Islip and taken elsewhere for smelting. After 1942 it was taken to Corby Works. Quarrying began to the south of the village in 1901 and continued on and off until 1948. A mine adit was started in the quarry face in 1923. This mine connected with another underground in 1933 and from then the two mines were worked as one with an entrance closer to the Islip Ironworks. There was another quarry to the north west of the village. Quarrying began there in 1902 and extended into Sudborough parish later. The Lowick part of the quarry was worked out by 1939. Work in the Sudborough part continued until 1952. There was a smaller quarry to the west of Lowick which was worked during 1908 Ore from all of these quarries was taken to Islip by three-foot gauge tramway worked by steam locomotives. Quarrying was done by hand with the aid of explosives at first. Steam quarrying machines were introduced from 1915 and diesel machines from 1932. In the mine there was a 2-foot 6-inch gauge tramway that used horse haulage but diesel locomotives were used for some of this work from 1932. There was also a limestone quarry south east of the village (east of the Islip road) which was worked between 1918 and 1931. This was served by a branch of the 3-foot gauge tramway. Traces of the quarries and tramway remain although much has been landscaped. part of the mine roof had collapsed and it was possible to walk into the mine tunnel.

External links

Villages in Northamptonshire North Northamptonshire {{Northamptonshire-geo-stub