Eckington 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 authorit ...

North East Derbyshire North East Derbyshire is a local government district in Derbyshire, England. It borders the districts of Chesterfield, Bolsover, Amber Valley and Derbyshire Dales in Derbyshire, and Sheffield and Rotherham in South Yorkshire. The popula ...

, England. It is 7 miles (11 km) northeast of Chesterfield and 9 miles (14 km) southeast of Sheffield city centre, on the border with

South Yorkshire South Yorkshire is a ceremonial and metropolitan county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. The county has four council areas which are the cities of Doncaster and Sheffield as well as the boroughs of Barnsley and Rotherham. ...

. It lies on the B6052 and B6056 roads close to the A6135 for Sheffield and Junction 30 of the M1. It had a 2001 population of 11,152, increasing to 11,855 (including Bramley, Renishaw Marsh Lane and Troway) at the 2011 Census.

History

Ten

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: * Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lett ...

coins discovered in December 2008, near Eckington Cemetery may be evidence of a Roman settlement or road in the area. The oldest of the silver and copper coins is from the reign of the emperor

Domitian Domitian (; la, Domitianus; 24 October 51 – 18 September 96) was a Roman emperor who reigned from 81 to 96. The son of Vespasian and the younger brother of Titus, his two predecessors on the throne, he was the last member of the Fl ...

(AD 81 to 96) while the others are from the reigns of

Trajan Trajan ( ; la, Caesar Nerva Traianus; 18 September 539/11 August 117) was Roman emperor from 98 to 117. Officially declared ''optimus princeps'' ("best ruler") by the senate, Trajan is remembered as a successful soldier-emperor who presi ...

(AD 98 to 117) and

Hadrian Hadrian (; la, Caesar Trâiānus Hadriānus ; 24 January 76 – 10 July 138) was Roman emperor from 117 to 138. He was born in Italica (close to modern Santiponce in Spain), a Roman ''municipium'' founded by Italic settlers in Hispania ...

(AD 117 to 138). Eckington is recorded 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 ...

in 1086 as ''Echintune'',''Domesday Book: A Complete Translation''. London: Penguin, 2003. p.1340 a manor given to Ralph Fitzhubert.who held several manors including some in Derbyshire given by the

king King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen regnant, queen, which title is also given to the queen consort, consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contempora ...

. They included Eckington and lands in Barlborough, Whitwell, Stretton, Ashover, Ogston, Crich, Wessington, Ingleby, Wirksworth and Hathersage Some parts of the parish church of St Peter and St Paul date to 1100.

George Sitwell Sir George Reresby Sitwell, 4th Baronet (27 January 1860 – 9 July 1943) was a British antiquarian writer and Conservative politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1885 and 1895. Biography Sitwell was born in London, the son of Sir Si ...

, son of George and Mary was baptised in 1601 in Eckington. George's father died whilst he was a child but as an adult he acquired the freehold of land in Eckington and exploited it by mining iron ore. In 1625, he built Renishaw Hall which is now owned by Sir Reresby Sitwell's daughter, Alexandra and her family. Sitwell exploited the minerals beneath his estate, chiefly iron and built a blast furnace at Plumbley a mile north west of Eckington in the 1630s with his mother's second husband, Henry Wigfall. In 1652 Sitwell built a furnace at Foxbrooke, close to Renishaw, which became the core of the largest ironworks in Derbyshire. Sitwell made saws at Pleasley and in 1656, installed a rolling and slitting mill at Renishaw to supply the rod iron used by numerous local nailmakers. During the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...

coal and iron ore were mined and local streams, such as the Moss Brook, were harnessed to provide power for factories. The Sitwells built a large

foundry A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal into a mold, and removing the mold material after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals pr ...

and ironworks.

Scythe A scythe ( ) is an agriculture, agricultural hand tool for mowing grass or Harvest, harvesting Crop, crops. It is historically used to cut down or reaping, reap edible grain, grains, before the process of threshing. The scythe has been largely ...

s, sickles and nails were made in the town for local use and for export. The Moss Brook was dammed to provide water power at eight sites including ChapelWheel, Carlton Wheel and Fields Wheel, to grind the blades. The remains of an old forge and drift mines exist in the valley. Eckington had a

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when ...

mine in the eastern part of the village, one of the very few in the country which is still operated.

Governance

Eckington falls under the jurisdiction of Derbyshire County Council, North East Derbyshire District Council and Eckington Parish Council.

Geography

Eckington covers an area of 2,089 acres. The geology is the

coal measures In lithostratigraphy, the coal measures are the coal-bearing part of the Upper Carboniferous System. In the United Kingdom, the Coal Measures Group consists of the Upper Coal Measures Formation, the Middle Coal Measures Formation and the Lower Coa ...

containing coal and ironstone. The Chesterfield Canal and

Midland Railway The Midland Railway (MR) was a railway company in the United Kingdom from 1844. The Midland was one of the largest railway companies in Britain in the early 20th century, and the largest employer in Derby, where it had its headquarters. It ama ...

passed through the parish. The Moss Brook is a tributary of the River Rother.

Schools

The oldest school in Eckington is Camms CE Primary School. In 1702, Thomas Camm endowed a schoolhouse and a schoolmaster to teach 24 poor children in the parish. In 1832, Robert Harrison moved the school to a new building which cost £600, and it was moved again to its current location on Castle Hill in 1975.

Eckington School Eckington School is a coeducational secondary school and sixth form located in Eckington, Derbyshire in England, next to the B6056 road. It has around 1,250 pupils. The school is an academy, and is part of the Chorus Education Trust. Histor ...

is a large comprehensive school, attracting pupils from the surrounding areas of

Killamarsh Killamarsh is a village and civil parish in North East Derbyshire, England, bordering Rotherham to the north and Sheffield to the north-west. Killamarsh is surrounded by, in a clockwise direction from the north, Rother Valley Country Park, t ...

, Renishaw, Beighton, Ridgeway and Mosborough. Despite being closer to several Sheffield residential areas the admissions policy favours pupils from Derbyshire feeder schools. Eckington Grammar School in Halfway became Derbyshire's first comprehensive school in 1957, changing its name to the Westfield School, and since 1967 has been controlled by the city of Sheffield. Eckington is also home to Eckington Junior School and Birk Hill Infants.

Amenities

Eckington has a swimming pool near the library, built in the 1970s as part of a town centre improvement. The town has a bus station (halt). Eckington Woods to the north of the village forms part of the Moss Valley conservation area. They are also known as the Bluebell Wood because of the quantity of bluebells in the springtime.

Transport

Eckington is served by bus services to Sheffield, Chesterfield,

Mansfield Mansfield is a market town and the administrative centre of Mansfield District in Nottinghamshire, England. It is the largest town in the wider Mansfield Urban Area (followed by Sutton-in-Ashfield). It gained the Royal Charter of a market to ...

Clowne Clowne is a village and civil parish in the Bolsover district of Derbyshire, England. The population at the 2001 Census was 7,447 increasing to 7,590 (and including Harlesthorpe) at the 2011 Census. It forms part of the Bolsover constituency. ...

and other surround settlements.

People

Notable people from Eckington include: * Ann Alexander, financier, was born here in the 1770s. * Walter Bussey, footballer * Herbert Henry Elvin, trade union leader * Joseph Gales, Sr., politician and journalist * Joseph Gales, Jr., journalist and

Mayor of Washington, D.C. The mayor of the District of Columbia is the head of the executive branch of the government of the District of Columbia, in the United States. The mayor has the duty to enforce district laws, and the power to either approve or veto bills passed ...

* Joan Hinde, trumpeter *

, ironmaster was born here in 1601Philip Riden, 'Sitwell, George (bap. 1601, d. 1667)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 200
accessed 2 March 2010
/ref> * Paul West, writer *

Zoë Baker Zoë Baker (born 29 February 1976) is a former world record holder in swimming who represented Great Britain until 2005, when she switched allegiance to New Zealand whilst living there. She later returned to the United Kingdom and she switched ...

, swimmer

Photos

Image:EckingtonCenotaph.JPG, Eckington War Memorial Image:EckingtonParishChurchFeb07.JPG, St Peter & St Paul's Image:Eckington_Market_Street_4.jpg, Old Market Street

References

Citations Bibliography * Bowlt, Eileen. M. (1994) ''Ruislip Past''. London: Historical Publications

External links

Parish council

Inside-Eckington Website
*
Eckington Methodist with St Luke's church
{{authority control Villages in Derbyshire Civil parishes in Derbyshire North East Derbyshire District