Rathmell 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 ...

in the Craven district of

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is the largest ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county (lieutenancy area) in England, covering an area of . Around 40% of the county is covered by National parks of the United Kingdom, national parks, including most of ...

, England. The population of the civil parish in the 2011 census was 305. It is close to the

River Ribble The River Ribble runs through North Yorkshire and Lancashire in Northern England. It starts close to the Ribblehead Viaduct in North Yorkshire, and is one of the few that start in the Yorkshire Dales and flow westwards towards the Irish Sea (t ...

and about three miles south of

Settle Settle or SETTLE may refer to: Places * Settle, Kentucky, United States * Settle, North Yorkshire, a town in England ** Settle Rural District, a historical administrative district Music * Settle (band), an indie rock band from Pennsylvania * ''S ...

. Other towns and villages nearby include

Wigglesworth Wigglesworth is a village and civil parish in the Craven district of North Yorkshire, England. The population of the civil parish taken at the 2011 Census was 379. It is on the road between Long Preston to the east, Clitheroe to the south a ...

Tosside Tosside is a small village on the border of North Yorkshire and Lancashire in Northern England. It lies within the Forest of Bowland, and is between the villages of Slaidburn in Lancashire and Wigglesworth in North Yorkshire. It lies 11.5 miles ...

Giggleswick Giggleswick, a village and civil parish in the Craven district of North Yorkshire, England, lies on the B6480 road, less than north-west of the town of Settle and divided from it by the River Ribble. It is the site of Giggleswick School. T ...

and

Long Preston Long Preston is a village and civil parish in the Craven district of North Yorkshire, England, in the Yorkshire Dales. It lies along the A65 road, and is from Skipton and from Settle. The population of Long Preston in 2001 was 680, increas ...

Origins

The name Rathmell comes from Old Norse 'red' + 'sandbank'. Indeed, the area has a long history of Norse settlement. Rathmell was formerly a

township A township is a kind of human settlement or administrative subdivision, with its meaning varying in different countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, that tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, Ca ...

in the parish of Gigggleswick, in 1866 Rathmell became a civil parish in its own right. On 1 April 1938 432 acres was transferred from

Gisburn Forest Gisburn Forest is a civil parish in the Ribble Valley, in Lancashire, England. Mainly lying within the Forest of Bowland Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, the parish includes the larger part of the village of Tosside and the hamlet of Grunsa ...

Dissenting academy

Rathmell is the birthplace of

Richard Frankland Richard Joseph Frankland is an Australian playwright, scriptwriter and musician. He is an Aboriginal Australian of Gunditjmara origin from Victoria. He has worked significantly for the Aboriginal Australian cause. Biography Richard J. Frank ...

(1630–1698),Stuart Handley
Richard Frankland (1630–1698)
''

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography The ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (''DNB'') is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published since 1885. The updated ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (''ODNB'') was published on 23 September ...

'',

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, 2004. the

nonconformist Nonconformity or nonconformism may refer to: Culture and society * Insubordination, the act of willfully disobeying an order of one's superior *Dissent, a sentiment or philosophy of non-agreement or opposition to a prevailing idea or entity ** ...

divine. He was ordained by

presbyter Presbyter () is an honorific title for Christian clergy. The word derives from the Greek ''presbyteros,'' which means elder or senior, although many in the Christian antiquity would understand ''presbyteros'' to refer to the bishop functioning as ...

s under the

Cromwellian Oliver Cromwell (25 April 15993 September 1658) was an English politician and military officer who is widely regarded as one of the most important statesmen in English history. He came to prominence during the 1639 to 1651 Wars of the Three Ki ...

regime, but was ejected from his ministry at the

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. He retired home to Rathmell, where he founded a

dissenting academy The dissenting academies were schools, colleges and seminaries (often institutions with aspects of all three) run by English Dissenters, that is, those who did not conform to the Church of England. They formed a significant part of England's edu ...

, which migrated to

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...

after his death. This academy was the germ of the institution now known as

Harris Manchester College, Oxford Harris Manchester College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It was founded in Warrington in 1757 as a college for Unitarian students and moved to Oxford in 1893. It became a full college of th ...

. The location of the original Academy at Rathmell is marked by a

memorial plaque A commemorative plaque, or simply plaque, or in other places referred to as a historical marker, historic marker, or historic plaque, is a plate of metal, ceramic, stone, wood, or other material, typically attached to a wall, stone, or other ...

on the end of a small terrace of cottages which still bears the name "College Fold".

References

Bibliography

* Edward Allen Bell, ''The History of Giggleswick School 1499–1912'', Leeds: Richard Jackson, 1912. * Harold Blaxland Atkinson, ''The Giggleswick School Register 1499–1921'', Newcastle upon Tyne:

Northumberland Press Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey. It is bordered by land on ...

, 1922.

External links

{{authority control Villages in North Yorkshire Civil parishes in North Yorkshire Craven District Harris Manchester College, Oxford