Whitworth is a former

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. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

, now in the parish of

Spennymoor Spennymoor is a town and civil parish in County Durham, England. It is south of the River Wear and is south of Durham. The civil parish includes the villages of Kirk Merrington, Middlestone Moor, Byers Green and Tudhoe. In 2011 the paris ...

, in

County Durham County Durham, officially simply Durham, is a ceremonial county in North East England.UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. The county borders Northumberland and Tyne an ...

, England, centred on

Whitworth Hall The Whitworth Building is a grade II* listed building on Oxford Road and Burlington Street in Chorlton-on-Medlock, Manchester, England. It has been listed since 18 December 1963 and is part of the University of Manchester. It lies at the south ...

. In 1931 the parish had a population of 6096. It was one of several parishes abolished on 1 April 1937 to create the parish of

. Whitworth Hall (now a hotel) is on the road between Spennymoor and

Brancepeth Brancepeth may refer to: *Brancepeth, County Durham, village of England *Brancepeth, Saskatchewan Brancepeth is a hamlet in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. History The community is named for Brancepeth, County Durham, England. Demog ...

, and is close to

Tudhoe Tudhoe is a village in the civil parish of Spennymoor, in County Durham, England. It lies just outside Spennymoor, a short distance to the west of the Great North Road. Tudhoe lay at the centre of a network of roads: one ran to Durham by way o ...

. The house was in former times the home of the Shafto family, whose most famous member (from the 18th century) was

Bobby Shafto Robert Shafto (sometimes spelt Shaftoe) (circa 1732 – 24 November 1797) was a British politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1760 and 1790. He was the likely subject of a famous North East English folk song and nursery rhyme, " B ...

, subject of a famous English

nursery rhyme A nursery rhyme is a traditional poem or song for children in Britain and other European countries, but usage of the term dates only from the late 18th/early 19th century. The term Mother Goose rhymes is interchangeable with nursery rhymes. Fr ...

References

Former civil parishes in County Durham 1937 disestablishments in England {{Durham-geo-stub