In this blog we celebrate the centenary of another Peak District bus operator – but unlike our previous 2021 blog on Hulleys you won’t find this operator – the North Western Road Car Company – about today. Yet it was once an important bus service provider in the area.
The North Western Road Car Company’s logo-type was once a familiar sight on the side of their fleet across the north west, including the Peak District and around Matlock.
The beginning
On 1 April 1923 the Peak District Committee’s assets of the British Automobile Traction Company (BAT) were transferred into a new North Western Road Car Company. BAT had operated some local services in the area before the First World War including Buxton in 1920 – where they had a garage.
A year later services in Stockport started. Here were garages and offices at Great Egerton Street. In 1924 the North Western’s HQ was transferred to Stockport’s Charles Street, from Macclesfield. With the company on an expansionist phase, operations were expanded into the area around Stockport and Manchester. Services were running into the city centre from Buxton, Hayfield, Macclesfield, Warrington and elsewhere by 1930, with an expanding network of express coach and local services.
Derbyshire depots
In the Peak District and Derbyshire area bus depots were established in Buxton (1920, closed and replaced in 1963, closed by Trent in 1999), Castleton (1935, closed 1979 by Trent – only two buses were stabled here); Glossop (1927 closed 1979 by Stagecoach) and Matlock (first part purchased in 1933 – still in part use today by trentbarton).
Not on its way to Buxton! In fact it’s outside the Museum of Greater Manchester Transport during the very successful company centenary events of 22/23 April 2023.This 1963 Leyland Leopard is in the coach livery of North Western. In the 1971/72 company timetable the route 27 – a Stockport to Buxton service – ran at frequencies of up to every 30 minutes on weekdays and Saturdays. On Sundays it extended to Manchester with a maximum hourly frequency.
Operating area
Centred on Stockport, Manchester and Macclesfield the North Western empire, with its once familiar red and white buses, stretched down to Matlock (where it also ran a network of town services), into Buxton, down to Biddulph, across to Northwich, Warrington and beyond – a significant operator. It also once reached as far as Chesterfield (on its way to Mansfield) with its joint express service with East Midland Motor Services – the X67 – and as far as Barnsley with another express service. North Western also had a once thriving and extensive coaching and excursion operation. Trips out into the Peak District from Manchester and Stockport were once a favoured destination.
North Western Road Car Company territory. A route map taken from the company’s winter 1971/72 timetable. Matlock is to the bottom right, with Stockport and Manchester towards the centre. (Download the full map below as a higher resolution Jpeg).
We won’t go into a detailed company history here, suffice to say that North Western ended up in the hands of the National Bus Company (NBC), which was formed in 1968. But its demise was really sealed by the setting up of passenger transport executives (PTEs). South East Lancashire and North East Cheshire PTE purchased some 272 buses from North Western in 1972 – plus depots at Altrincham, Glossop, Oldham, Stockport and Urmston for its directly operated bus services. This left the reminder of the operations; which were ‘sold’ to other NBC operators – generally to either Trent Motor Traction (Peak District and Derbyshire) or Crosville – in the same year. At that time North Western were left operating only coaching and express services, but even this was later to cease as other operators took over.
But to those of certain age, relying on North Western and its services to get them to work, home, shopping or leisure, the company was a well-known part of the social and economic fabric of the area. The company itself has been gone for over 50 years, but is still remembered in some quarters for the role it played in everyday community life.
For a short-lived company, North Western has perhaps had something of a cult following amongst enthusiasts. As perhaps an indicator of this there are at least three modern vehicles painted in the company’s livery to mark the centenary of its foundation. Here are two Stagecoach examples at the Manchester museum, with, on the right, a 1960 ‘dual purpose’ Leyland (fitted with coach style seats). A third example in heritage livery is operated by Hulleys of Baslow.
Further informatiuon and sources
If you are interested in the history of the company and would like more information, we would particularly recommend a recent publication by the Museum of Transport, Greater Manchester, ‘North Western Road Car Company a centenary history’ (£8 plus postage). For those who want an in-depth account there is also a two-volume history of the company published in the early 1980s, edited by Eric Ogden. The Greater Manchester Transport Society have published a bibliography of the company in their Journal, ‘North Western 100’ special issue, May 2023. We particularly used these in our account here along with the company’s timetable for winter 1971/72.
Originally purchased from Hand’s Garage (1933) with an addition made a year later when North Western purchased the interests of Alfreton Motor Transport, this still familiar building on Bakewell Road, Matlock, is the most visual reminder of the company in the Derbyshire area. It passed to Trent in 1972 and is still used as a small outstation for trentbarton services in the Matlock area – though most of it is used by a tyre fitting business. The gables were added in alterations undertaken in the 1950s. The final allocation of buses here (or ‘cars’ as the North Western styled them) was 20 single deckers. Tacked on to right of the building, immediately adjacent the pavement, was once an enquiry office. Long gone are the days when you could pop into a staffed office in Matlock and get bus information! (Google Earth).The south-east corner of the former North Western Road Car Company territory. A route map enlargement of the Matlock and eastern Peak District area taken from the company’s winter 1971/72 timetable.The thick red lines are those of the North Western’s routes. A key to the map can be found on the previous map showing the entire North Western territory.
This blog was revised on 26 April 2023 to add a downloadable higher resolution copy of the 1971/72 company route map.
In this blog we’ll take a look at Ford and his 1839 history of Chesterfield. Did he really write it and what became of him?
Ford’s history
Title page of Ford’s 1839 book.
Ford’s 1839 published ‘History of Chesterfield’ is a well-known book (at least amongst local historians). Of some 504 pages, it is still a valid and quoted source of Chesterfield’s history. It also contains some now well-known illustrations of the town and its buildings. Indeed, until the 1974 and onward volumes of the Borough Council’s sponsored history of Chesterfield series, instigated by the late John Bestall, perhaps little of any great consequence on the town’s history had been published since Ford.
For convenience, and for the most part, we’ll still refer to the 1839 history as Ford’s in this blog.
Though we haven’t been able to positively identify Ford’s Irongate premises, we think that the most likely candidate is the four-storey building to the centre of this photograph – now without a shop window.
Figaro in Chesterfield
Before the 1839 History of Chesterfield book Thomas Ford was possibly best known as the printer and publisher of ‘Figaro in Chesterfield’, in the early 1830s. This was published from Ford’s then offices in New Square.
Figaro… was a mixture of newspaper and pamphlet, but spent most of its time in what could be scathing attacks on its enemies, of which there were seemingly many. It was described by Pendleton and Jacques in their ‘Old and new Chesterfield’ book (of 1903) as a ‘very scathing publication, trouncing friend as well as foe… If exercised now “Figaro” would have been chin high in writs for libel’.
The 1839 history
The 1839 History of Chesterfield that Ford published was nominally a revised second edition of the Rev George Hall’s history of 1823, which compromised just over 140 pages. Hall’s history was printed by Thomas Ford’s father – John Ford (d. 1830, aged 68).
On announcing the project, Thomas Ford, who had followed in father as a printer, but also a bookseller and stationer, by then based in Irongate, received favourable support. Ford had originally intended to republish Hall’s history in parts, with additional information, but went much further and included new illustrations. He started publishing the edition, in 21 parts, from March 1837 until early 1839. In the spring of the latter year, they were drawn together in a book described as ‘newly published’. A cloth and board edition of the complete history cost 20 shillings.
In May 1839 the plates were made separately available for framing. They were ascribed to the names C [Charles] and W [William] Radclyffe. They were son and father of an originally Birmingham based business.
Who wrote the history?
For some years it’s been believed that Ford didn’t actually write the history, though he may obviously have contributed to it. Ford is not named as the author on the book’s title page.
Illustrated on page 278 of Ford’s history is this ‘ancient seal’ found at Broad Oaks. Ford was able to include a plate of it following an appeal he made in the Derbyshire Courier newspaper back in February 1838.
It appears that historical material in this book was mostly (if not entirely) written by Robert Wallace, Unitarian minister, who had succeeded George Kendrick (1814-1815) and before Kendrick a Thomas Astley (1773 – 1813). This assertion first seems to appear in the Derbyshire Courier newspaper in 1877. A history of Elder Yard Unitarian Chapel, published in 1967, also claims Wallace wrote the majority of the book.
Like Ford, Wallace is not credited as author on the title-page either. Why this is so remains a mystery – perhaps both Ford and Wallace agreed that the source material gathering and authorship (possibly shared) were of a level that did not warrant one or either being acknowledged. We will probably never know. But the book is now well-known as ‘Ford’s History of Chesterfield’. Ford would have known Wallace as he was presumably a worshipper at Elder Yard Unitarian Chapel.
That doesn’t mean to say that Ford was not interested in collecting material for the book or didn’t contribute. For example, he wrote a letter to the Derbyshire Courier in February 1838 inquiring about the potential loan to him of a copy of the Gentleman’s Magazine, describing a seal found near ‘the Broad Oak’ in about 1798. If one refers to the Ford history this seal is actually illustrated – albeit not from the Gentleman’s magazine. (The illustration is taken from a casting made at the time it was found ‘by the Rev Richard Astley, of Shrewsbury’. This is not the Astley who proceeded Robert Wallace as minister at the Elder Yard Chapel, but could be related).
Ford’s history gave us a useful collection of plates, including this of the Elder Yard Unitarian Church, where Ford would have presumably worshipped, guided by the minster there, the Rev Robert Wallace, who is regarded as the chief author and editor of the book.
Wallace had arrived in Chesterfield from Manchester College, York in September 1815. During his time as minister (until 1840) at the Elder Yard Chapel he made many improvements there.
Ford’s completed history was published in two editions. Pages were sized at 8 ½ by 5 ½ inches, with a larger edition sized at approximately 10 ½ by around 8 ½ inches – though the same printing blocks and plates were used in both editions. It’s not known how many of each edition were published, or the print-run of the parts.
Ford and his father were well-known in Chesterfield as stationers, printers and booksellers. As we have discussed, Thomas had published ‘Figaro in Chesterfield’, from his then office at New Square, during the early 1830s.
Thomas Ford sold the printing business, by then at Irongate in the Shambles, at auction, in early March 1841. By June 1841 C Gallimore is advertising his takeover of the former Ford business at the shop in Irongate. The Gallimore enterprise actually consisted of brothers, who were Quakers and also printers. Their father was a well-known auctioneer. Both Ford and the Gallimores also sold patent medicines. The Gallimores were selling up in Jun 1864. They were followed into the building by another Chesterfield printer – John Edward Roberts – who was there in August 1867.
Ford’s printing business was for sale in March 1841, as advertised in the Derbyshire Courier, 20 February 1841. Note the reference to the history of Chesterfield.
In 1872 an RJ Smithson (also a printer) is trading from Ford’s and Gallimores’ old shop. Later, in October 1881, the premises were described as ‘desolate’. In June 1886, it was advertised as to let, complete with five large rooms above the shop, ‘formerly occupied by Messrs Gallimore’.
Hard times
Thomas Ford was living in London by the 1851 census with his wife, daughter and two sons. His residence contained a total of 15 people. He died in London on the 28 November 1859, aged 58. He had been pursuing his former business – in 1854 he is noted as publishing books and pamphlets from his premises in Gloucester Street, Queen Square.
We don’t know why he moved to London and exactly when – but further research may reveal this. He had apparently fallen on somewhat hard-times before his death. An unfitting end to someone who had contributed, at the least with Robert Wallace, and certainly printed, what is still regarded as an important source for the history of Chesterfield.
Ford left the district and later fell on hard times as witness this appeal, made just a few months before his death, in the Derbyshire Times of 24 September 1859.
Sources
We’ve used the following sources in this post:
Non-conformist and non-parochial registers – Elder Yard Chapel (TNA RG4/516).
Derbyshire Courier 21 January 1837, 4 March 1837, 17 February 1838, 16 February 1839, 16 March 1839, 25 May 1839, 20 February and 5 June 1841, 27 August 1853, 3 June 1854, 10 December 1859, 24 September 1859, 20 February 1841, 10 January 1874 and 13 January 1877, 15 September 1881, 22 June 1886.
Derbyshire Times, 18 June 1864, 17 and 28 September 1867, 21 December 1872.
Vallance and Robinson, The history of Elder Yard Chapel, Chesterfield (1967)
Pendleton and Jacques, Modern Chesterfield, 1903
Pendleton (‘Tatler’), Old and new Chesterfield (1882)
The Derbyshire Courier was prepared to speculate who had written ‘Ford’s’ history in its edition of 13 January 1877, following a query by one of its readers (above). But in 1881 John Pendleton in his ‘Old and new Chesterfield’ book was still referring to the history as Ford’s.
This account was edited on 15 May 2023 to include new information on the possible site of Ford’s Irongate shop. Our thanks to Janet Murphy for this information.
Shipton & Hallewell Solicitors business has been subsumed into the Anderson Partnership – and their historic offices at 23 West Bars is now for sale. In this blog we mark the end of another era in Chesterfield. For the premises is the only purpose-built solicitors’ offices of the period in Chesterfield – occupied as such since it was built, probably around the 1830s.
Our Chesterfield Streets and Houses book looks in some detail at the history the area around 23 West Bars. We use this as our main source for this blog.
23 West Bars. The late Georgian property of solicitors Shipton and Hallewell is now for sale after the business was recently subsumed into the Anderson Partnership.
Early history of the site
William Senior’s early 17th century survey of Hercules Foljambe’s former estate, which had been bought by Bess of Hardwick and her son William Cavendish in 1599–1691, includes four premises said to be on West Bars.
One was a small ‘toftstead’, which does not appear to have stood on a street frontage and cannot be located.
Another was a long ‘burgage plot’ which (mainly because of its length) can be securely identified with the present 87 New Square. The measurement of the other two plots suggests they shared a common back boundary, with both having street frontages. One was occupied by John Crookes, the other occupied by a John Holland.
Cavendish estate
In 1803 the Cavendish estate on or near West Bars included only three parcels belonging to that estate. One was what is now 87 New Square. The other two were the plots on which 19–23 West Bars later stood. Their combined dimensions fit very closely to those given by Senior for the plots held by Crookes and Holland in 1610.
One of the two houses on the plot in 1803 was occupied by George Holland. It could conceivably have been held by successive members of his family since at least 1610. In 1803 Holland’s house had an outbuilding used as a hat factory. This property was re-let in 1806 to Henry White on behalf of Ellis Holmes and himself.
The other house was occupied by Widow Pinder. It was said to be ‘all tumbling down’ in 1803. The plot was later redeveloped with the building of a new house (no. 23) on the left-hand side (as viewed from West Bars) set back from the road. This entailed the demolition of one of the houses standing on the street frontage in 1803 and the rebuilding of the other as a semi-detached pair, which later became nos. 19– 21 West Bars.
23 West Bars is built
By 1836, 23 West Bars had been sold by the Cavendish estate and it is possible that the rebuilding of the property took place soon after this sale.
In 1849 the whole plot belonged to John Charge, a solicitor and clerk of the peace, who occupied 23 West Bars and used it as an office. He lived at Spital House so had no need for a residence nearer the town centre.
Chesterfield’s first purpose built solicitors has been occupied as such since at least the 1830s. It is grade II listed building.
Architectural details
Number 23 is a two-storey, 17 three-bay red-brick building with a hipped, slated roof. The sash windows have engraved lintels. The central moulded wooden doorcase to the main entrance is set back in a moulded stone architrave with inset half-round fluted wooden pilasters. The door comprises six fielded panels and a segmental fanlight. It is set back from West Bars, fronted by a garden. It is listed Grade II.
Despite being a ‘stone’s throw’ away from the New Square and the centre of Chesterfield, its position is relatively secluded, particularly as it is now bounded on one side by the Shentall Memorial Gardens.
Front door name-plate, for this once-well known business of solicitors. How many times has this plaque been polished?
A dynasty of solicitors
As we have speculated, the house appears to have been built around the 1830s.
John Charge was articled to Bernard Lucas junior in 1795 and was in practice on West Bars in 1828, if not before. He died in 1849, aged 71. Five years earlier Charge had taken into his office as managing clerk a solicitor named Joseph Shipton, who succeeded to the practice on his principal’s death.
Shipton & Hallewell were once part of the fabric of everyday Chesterfield. Like other such solicitors their ‘bread and butter’ work saw them act as solicitors for property conveyancing. One such example is this sale of Belmont near Holymoorside, as reported by the Derbyshire Times of 20 June 1941.
In 1851 Shipton took into partnership a John Hallewell, who had been articled to Charge. Thus was founded the firm of Shipton, Hallewell & Co., which, until earlier this year was still in practice at 23 West Bars, the only purpose-built solicitor’s office in Chesterfield (though, of course, there are more modern examples).
Shipton died in April 1880 aged 65, having lived since around 1857 at Thornfield, on Sheffield Road in Stonegravels. At the time of his death the Derbyshire Times speculated that ‘It is perhaps indisputable that no firm of solicitors in Chesterfield have such an extensive private practice as this, and without prejudice it must be accorded the memory of Mr. Shipton that he was the main cause thereof, Mr. Hallewell devoting his attention chiefly the important duties of clerk to the county…’ Unlike his partner Shipton was active in local politics, becoming a town councillor and mayor.
Hallewell, who was born in 1828, lived at Walton Cottage and later Newbold Fields. He died in December 1892. He had been clerk to the Chesterfield gas and water company, and clerk to the county magistrates and was associated with many other bodies in the town. Known as a keen sportsman he was particularly interested in shooting and was the first captain of the Chesterfield Volunteer’s ‘A company’. According to his obituary in the Derbyshire Courier, in his earlier years at Shipton and Hallewell ‘he liked nothing better than an adjournment to an outbuilding and a smart round with the gloves at a good man’!
The end of a dynasty
Now the practice of Shipton, Hallewell & Co has been subsumed into the Anderson Partnership. The offices at 23 West Bars have been closed and are for sale. Unless another firm of solicitors decides to buy the West Bars premises another link with Chesterfield’s past will be broken – the continuous occupation of a property built in around the 1830s purposely for a solicitors will end.
Sources used in this blog
All sources used in the blog are fully referenced in our Chesterfield Streets and Houses book. They have, however included the following:
Chesterfield Tithe Award (1849) (copy in Derbyshire Record Office).
Peter Potter, ‘General Map of the Borough of Chesterfield showing more particularly the several estates which belong to His Grace the Duke of Devonshire as surveyed in 1803’. Photograph of map (A292) and what appears to be the original terrier in Chesterfield Local Studies Library (CLSL).
George Unwin, ‘General Map of the Borough of Chesterfield showing more particularly the several estates which belong to His Grace the Duke of Devonshire’ (1836). Photograph of map in CLSL (A309); terrier in Devonshire Manuscripts at Chatsworth.
William Senior’s Survey of the Estates of the First and Second Earls of Devonshire c.1600–28 (Derbyshire Record Society, 1988).
Contemporary Derbyshire Times and Derbyshire Courier newspaper reports.
White’s Directory of Derbyshire (1857); Bagshaw’s Dir. Derb. (1846); Pigot’s Dir. Derb. (1828).
Historic England, listed building entry no. 1203453.
Our Chesterfield Streets and Houses book is still available to purchase at Waterstone’s Chesterfield branch, the town’s visitor information centre or direct from the publishers – [email protected].
Apparently it was formerly not unusual for the local sessions (court) to meet at the offices of Shipton and Hallewell – hence this report from the Derbyshire Times of Wednesday 26 January 1881.
In this blog we’ll take a look at the former Penmore Hospital Hasland. What follows is a shortened version of an account in our History of Hasland book.
The newly-built Penmore Hospital, pictured in TP Wood’s Almanac for 1905. The almanac states that the Chesterfield Joint Hospital Committee, who had commissioned the building, comprised ‘representatives of the Corporation and of neighbouring Urban Councils of Brampton and Walton, Newbold and Dunston and Whittington. It is not intended for small-pox cases, which will still be dealt with at the Spital Hospital’.
Beginnings
In 1894–5 Chesterfield corporation purchased just over 12 acres of land at Penmore from the duke of Devonshire for an isolation hospital.
Plans for a 30-bed hospital were prepared in 1899 by G.E. Bolshaw of Southport (Lancs.), with construction tenders sought in 1902.
The hospital consisted of several blocks of buildings to the rear of Penmore House. Access was from Hasland Road. The building was opened in 9 December 1904. It was commissioned by the Chesterfield joint hospital committee. An earlier smallpox hospital off Spital Lane was not replaced by this building, which was to continue handling such cases.
Extensions
In 1912 Penmore had 38 beds. 1916 saw extensions, designed by the local architect T.S. Wilcockson, completed at a cost of £9,000. Built of brick with stone dressings to harmonise with the older buildings, the extensions comprised a male ward with eight beds, a female ward with five, and a doubling of the accommodation in the administrative block. Electric light was installed in 1924. In 1922 Penmore had 50 beds for infectious diseases.
After escaping closure during a reorganisation of isolation hospitals in north-east Derbyshire in 1930, the number increased slightly to 59. Six years later the Chesterfield joint hospital committee was dissolved and Penmore isolation hospital, with 58 beds, was transferred to Chesterfield corporation.
In 1942 a scabies cleansing station was established at Penmore by the corporation.
The Penmore Hospital some ten years after the facility had opened. The entrance was from a driveway off Hasland Road (not shown on this map extract). 25-iches to 1 mile, Ordnance Survey map, Derbyshire sheet XXV.11, Revised: 1914, Published: 1918. (Courtesy National Library of Scotland).
Post-war reconstruction and refurbishment
The rest of the buildings appear not to have been used as a hospital during the Second World War, since after they passed to the National Health Service in 1948 they had to be repaired before the wards could be reopened. From that date Penmore was one of several hospitals, in addition to the Chesterfield Royal, administered by the Chesterfield hospital management committee. In 1945 Penmore was said to consist of old buildings on an uneven site subject to mining subsidence and lacked a resident medical officer.
Welbeck Ward, Penmore Hospital. An AR Wilsher photograph taken from a 1972 guide to hospital services in Chesterfield
The first of three blocks at Penmore, containing 35 beds, was ready for use in May 1951, when the rest of the hospital was expected to be completed by August. The Sheffield regional hospital board determined that Penmore would be used for long-stay orthopaedic and medical cases. With authorised accommodation 25 for 60 beds, the hospital had 12 patients in June 1951 increasing to 45 in November.
A 1950 scheme by management committee proposed to purchase Penmore House as accommodation for residential staff did not go ahead. Instead the former tuberculosis pavilion adjoining the hospital was adapted to become a nurses’ home. In 1953 Penmore House (not to be confused with the adjacent Penmore Hospital) was taken over by Chesterfield College of Art.
At the hospital there were problems with subsidence in 1952–4, for which the National Coal Board accepted liability. In 1952, after an inspection by the General Nursing Council, Penmore was accepted as a training centre for nursing assistants, subject to certain conditions, which the management committee undertook to meet. These included the improvement of sanitary accommodation on the wards, the provision of fridges in ward kitchens and the creation of day rooms for patients.
The training school opened until 1956, when a nurse-tutor was appointed (who had herself to take a training course). The first intake of ten students was admitted in January 1957.
The training centre moved to Spring Bank House in Chesterfield at the end of 1961, when the accommodation at Penmore was briefly used as a chapel and later became a patients’ day room.
Staffing
1952 saw the staffing levels set for the hospital were a matron, assistant matron, night sister, three ward sisters, three staff nurses and 14 enrolled auxiliaries. There were also 28 non-nursing staff. Twelve months later the hospital lost a ward sister and a staff nurse and was given five orderlies instead; the non-nursing staff was reduced to 20.
When another ward was opened in 1954, an additional sister and staff nurse were appointed, together with four enrolled auxiliaries and two orderlies. In 1954 the hospital had difficulty recruiting nursing staff and remained heavily reliant on overtime working for several years.
The first matron retired in 1957. When her successor was appointed the nursing establishment was increased to 29, including (in addition to the matron, assistant matron and tutor) a night sister in sole charge, three ward sisters, four staff nurses, 12 state enrolled nurses, four pupil assistants and two auxiliaries. The hospital then had just under 50 patients.
When the last ward to be refurbished opened in 1958 the figure rose to about 60. In 1960 Penmore had accommodation for 60 chronic sick cases. By this date the ‘blocks’ of the old isolation hospital had been named Clumber, Thoresby and Welbeck wards and efforts made to improve the grounds.
This extract from a July 1967 ‘Particulars of hospitals etc’ in the the then Chesterfield Hospital Management Committee group shows the staffing and patient accommodation at Penmore Hospital. Note that the Scabies Department, which first seems to have opened in 1942, is still in operation and the responsibility of the borough council. (Collection P Cousins).
Gifts
In 1956 staff at the Chesterfield Co-operative store raised funds to present television sets for two of the wards, for which they were warmly thanked, as were 15 students of the college of art who provided Christmas decorations.
From 1958, when £123 was raised, a sale of work was held every summer. By 1963 these events had raised a total of £1,232 for the hospital.
Successive rectors of St Paul’s, Hasland, served as hospital chaplains from 1951, joined by a minister from Hasland Methodist church from 1958.
Declining years
In 1962 student nurses from the Royal Hospital were accommodated in the former administrative block at Penmore. In this period the NHS also owned a pair of semi-detached houses, 38–40 Penmore Street, acquired with the hospital, which were generally let to junior medical staff, as were two flats in the old pavilion, part of which was demolished in 1962.
In 1967 the use of the administrative block as a nurses’ residence was thought likely to be reduced in the near future. The following year the regional hospital board suggested that surplus land at Penmore might be sold. Despite these signs of decline, in 1972–3 a new dayroom was built at the hospital, sanitary facilities improved, and colour televisions bought for the wards.
After the opening of the new Chesterfield & North Derbyshire Royal Hospital at Calow in 1984, Penmore was retained as a 60-bed geriatric unit. It continued to be used in this way in 1987, when it was planned to be run down to closure in 1994.
After the hospital closed, the buildings were demolished and the land sold for housing. The houses on Penmore Street passed into private ownership.
Penmore Hospital in the 1960s. The denoted ‘College’ includes the still extant Penmore House, which was then occupied by the Chesterfield College of Art. (Ordnance Survey 6-inches to 1 mile. SK36NE – A. Surveyed / Revised: 1960 to 1967, Published: 1967. Courtesy National Library of Scotland).
Sources used in this blog
All the sources used in this blog are fully referenced in our History of Hasland book. Although this book (published in 2022) is not now in print, copies can be consulted in Chesterfield local studies library.
Research at The National Archives in London by our county editor has revealed a possible attempt to make steel in Chesterfield in the period around 1600. We’ll take a brief look at this potentially important discovery in this blog.
The Leakes and the Foljambes
Hidden away in what are called Star Chamber depositions (witness statements taken as part of legal proceedings) taken in 1608 is a reference to what seems to have been an experimental iron mill. The case centred on whether the mill was in Walton or Brampton. At this date Walton manor was held by the Foljambes, and Brampton held by the Leakes of Sutton. The River Hipper formed the boundary between the two. The Foljambes and Leakes were the two leading gentry families in the Chesterfield area in the sixteenth century and it was not unknown for violence to occur where they disagreed!
The last head of the direct male line of the Foljambe family, Godfrey Foljambe, died in 1598, leaving a young widow, Isabel, who married Sir William Bowes of County Durham. There was already an ‘iron mill’ powered by the Hipper on the Foljambe estate, but Bowes claimed in the court case that he had spent £300 building another one.
An experiment in steel making
Witnesses in the Star Chamber case gave conflicting accounts of a dispute between servants of Sir William Bowes and Sir Francis Leake in September 1605, but both sides described the new works as a mill to make ‘steel and iron’. This is an unusual phrase for this date, added to which Bowes is said to have kept the works locked, suggesting that he was experimenting with a new process there. Attempts to make steel were just getting underway around the start of the seventeenth century, in the Sheffield area as elsewhere, and it is possible the Bowes was trying to make steel at the mill on the Hipper, using iron smelted at another iron mill higher up the river. The experiments probably came to an end when Bowes died in 1611, if not before.
This ground-breaking illustration, which appeared in Philip Robinson’s 1957 book ‘The Smiths of Chesterfield’, attempted to reconstruct the area around the Griffin Foundry in the period around 1788. The surviving Cannon Mill is to the right of centre, behind the smoking chimney. It was in this vicinity that much earlier attempts may have been made to produce steel.
The location
In his deposition Bowes stated that when he gained control of the Foljambe estate through his marriage to Isabel there were already six corn mills, one lead mill and one iron mill on the Hipper in Walton. The first of these figures refers to the number of mill stones, rather than separate buildings, but it is clear that the river was already being intensively exploited by industry in the late sixteenth century.
Bowes’s new works stood on a piece of ground called Upper Whitting Holme, which in the 1770s became the site of Ebenezer Smith’s Griffin Ironworks and Francis Thompson’s engine-building forge. The only surviving built from either enterprise is Cannon Mill, built by the Smiths apparently for boring cannon during the Napoleonic War, which ended in 1815. The date 1816 on a cast-iron plaque on the building commemorates its use during the war, not when it was built.
The mills on the river in the early seventeenth century are marked on a map of the Foljambe estate in Walton surveyed in 1622. This marks the mill built by Sir William Bowes downstream from the corn mill, iron mill and lead mill. The corn mill remained in use until modern times and the storage pond which supplied water to this and other mills survives as Walton Dam off Walton Road. One of the other mill sites was later taken over by Hewitt’s cotton mill, which also survives and is one of the very few late eighteenth-century fire-resistant textile mills still standing anywhere in England.
Research on the history of the Foljambe estate at Walton in the early seventeenth century, for which the main source are the voluminous records of litigation in Star Chamber and other courts, is continuing and it is possible that more will be discovered about what Sir William Bowes was trying to do at the iron mill on the Hipper.
In this blog we take a look at a long-forgotten narrow gauge railway which ran for only a few years at Wingerworth’s Lido. No doubt it gave pleasure to many, but was probably a victim of the Second World War. We are currently researching Wingerworth for our next VCH spin-off book. The Lido and its railway will be included – we’d love to see pictures of it!
Captured in time. The Wingerworth Lido railway is shown on this extract for the 1938 Ordnance Survey 25-inch to one mile map. Described as ‘miniature railway’ its 2ft gauge actually makes it a narrow gauge railway! (National Library of Scotland).
A narrow-gauge railway at the Lido, which skirted the western and northern edges of the site, with a bridge over the north-west corner of the pond, was first mentioned in the Derbyshire Times of 5 July 1935.
The Lido narrow gauge railway’s steam locomotive may well have looked like this – an illustration taken from manufacturer – Kerr Stuart’s – 1924 catalogue.
The single-track line had a large balloon loop at its north-eastern end and a smaller loop near Nethermoor Road, giving a total run of about a half a mile out and back. There was also a short siding at the western end of the line, adjacent to Nethermoor Road, next to a shed that presumably served as a station, and a longer siding which left the main line near the eastern balloon loop.
The track was laid to a gauge of 2 ft. The motive power was provided partly by an 0-4-0 saddle tank steam locomotive built by Kerr Stuart in 1915 bought second-hand (through T.W. Ward, the Sheffield merchants) from Sheffield Corporation. It was previously used at their Ewden Valley waterworks from 1931, during a phase that saw remedial works carried out. It was repurchased by Wards in December 1935, who sold it simultaneously to T. H. Austin. Other motive power at Wingerworth Lido was provided by a four-wheel petrol mechanical loco, fitted with an 11 horse-power Morris engine, which may have been home-built.
1 shilling and 3 old pence return to Wingerworth Lido by bus, as advertised in the Derbyshire Times, 19 June 1936.
Originally part of the Hunloke Estate, the Lido itself had been purchased by Thomas Henry Austin (later the sole operator) and Frank Norman, both of Wingerworth, who developed the site commercially. In May 1934 the promoters announced the opening of ‘Ye old Smithy Pond’ for swimming, sunbathing and boating in and around the 5½ acre pond (which in the centre was 26 ft deep). There was an 18 ft diving stand, 12 rowing boats and several punts for hire, and two motor boats offered trips round the pond. The promoters were negotiating with East Midland Motor Services to provide a bus service from Chesterfield to Wingerworth, which apparently had not previously existed.
The end of the Austin enterprise occurred after he was required, in 1939, by the Chesterfield rural district council, to construct better sanitary accommodation at the Lido. Austin’s plans to address this were presumably overtaken by the outbreak of war, when the venue appears to have closed down.
End of a short-lived era. The sale at Wingerworth Lido on 8 October 1941 included materials from the narrow gauge railway.(Derbyshire Times, 3 October 1941).
In October 1941 an auction was held of much of the equipment from the Lido, including the railway track and wagons, but not the locomotives. It appears that these had previously been returned to Wards. The rails, sleepers and wagons may have been requisitioned as scrap, since a newspaper report of the ‘remarkable’ sale makes no mention of them. It does, however, refer to the second-hand timber, sectional buildings, catering equipment and furniture, for which ‘extraordinarily good prices’ were realised, possibly because none of the items offered were obtainable new.
Austin, who lived at ‘Blackhill’, Wingerworth, died in March 1944, leaving effects valued at £4,570.
So ends this story of Wingerworth’s own narrow gauge railway. A short-lived affair, which never-the-less was doubtless enjoyed by many. And, among with the rest of the Lido attractions, helped bring a bus service to the village!
They’ll be much more about the Lido and lots more about Wingerworth in our forthcoming ‘History of Wingerworth’ VCH spin-off book, which we hope to publish later this year.
In the meantime, if you’ve any photos or recollections of the railway we’d love to hear from you.
Our thanks to R.T. Gratton, S.R. Band and the Industrial Railway Society for information in this blog, also to Rob Marriott and his Chesterfield History and Genealogy Facebook page for a useful discussion thread on the railway. We’ve also used contemporary newspaper accounts and Howard Bowtell’s 1977 book ‘Reservoir Railways of Manchester and the Peak’.
In this blog we look briefly at a failed attempt by Chesterfield neighbours Bryan Donkin and the Chesterfield Tube Company to enter the commercial vehicle gas propulsion market.
We looked at the history of the former Chesterfield Tube Company in our blogs back in April and May 2022.
Front cover of the Chesterfield Tube Company booklet.
In our April blog we briefly mentioned the following: ‘An attempt in 1933, pioneered by the Tube Company and Bryan Donkin, to introduce compressed coal gas as a means of propulsion for cars and lorries was unsuccessful because of the lack of filling stations and the taxation of road vehicles by weight.
We thought we’d share these photographs with you, which are taken from a 26-page booklet produced by the Chesterfield Tube Company in 1933, promoting the idea and the trials that were then taking place. They are presented courtesy of one of our members, but we believe there is a copy in Chesterfield Local Studies Library. The booklet must have been popular at the time, as it was reprinted a year later.
The tube company were interested as the gas was compressed into cylinders – hopefully produced by the company. Donkins were interested in the compression of the gas (they produced compressors) and in the filling station’s other apparatus.
The publication goes into some detail about how the experiment came about. One of the drivers was that coal gas was, at the time, being wasted in coke production, particularly in south Yorkshire and more locally. There was a failure to capture this gas and use. Issues around explosion fears, robustness of the traction cylinders to be employed, conversion of the petrol vehicles alongside ‘cruising range’ were all explored, in an upbeat publication.
The converted ex-petrol Chesterfield Corporation bus.This was a 1925 Bristol, number 65 in the fleet, originally with 31 seats, but with 32 by the time of the conversion. Road trials commenced in October 1932.The vehicle is seen here at the British Industries Fair. The gas charging station doors are conveniently open on the bottom photograph revealing the Bryan Donkin compressor set.
Illustrated in the booklet were a Chesterfield Corporation bus – having been converted – along with one of the tube company’s own lorries, a Whitwood Chemical lorry (not illustrated here), a Chesterfield Corporation refuse lorry and a gas department lorry.
As we stated, the experiment petered out. Today the production of coal gas is now non-existent.
The illustration captions from the booklet have been retained in the selection reproduced here.
The converted Chesterfield Corporation refuse lorry is splendidly illustrated here. At this time these lorries would mainly have removed coal ash from open fires. In this pre-plastic packaging era most rubbish would be burnt on open fires, with food waste going on the garden compost heap. Many local people nick-named these lorries ‘dust carts’ as that is generally what they carted away – dust or ashes, unless these had been used on the garden footpath. As if to emphasise this the slogan on the vehicle reads ‘Reuse your ashes and save cartage on 3000 tons of cinders per year’.
It’s little known today but for a few years from 1936 until 1968 nearly 400 acres of land were part of an experiment in agricultural management, animal husbandry, horticulture and land tenancy, which we briefly look at in this blog.
This map of the Oxcroft Estate appeared in Fred Kitchen’s 1947 book of his experiences there – ‘Settlers in England’.
In February 1936 Derbyshire County Council bought Oxcroft farm (399 acres, about two miles north of Bolsover) from the 9th duke of Devonshire. The same year it was leased to the Land Settlement Association. Forty smallholdings were formed, intended to give unemployed men and their families a chance to make a living from the land.
Each holding had a semi-detached, three-bedroom house, 5 acres of land, a piggery and other buildings. A ‘central farm’ or ‘estate service depot’ was managed by the estate manager.
By the 1960s there were problems, which include a poor tenancy rate and air pollution from Coalite (Bolsover) and Staveley works – so much so that tomatoes were reported as having a taste problem.
The estate was closed in 1968 – the land and buildings were sold off.
Taken from Fred Kitchen’s 1947 book ‘‘Settlers in England’, is this line-drawing by EJ Brown, which shows the then community centre, which is still extant though is now dwellings.
Fred Kitchen wrote about his experiences as a tenant at Oxcroft in his book ‘Settlers in England’, published in 1947, by JM Dent & Son. The book is now fairly rare. Two of EJ Brown’s line-drawings for the book feature in this post.
The wary can still spot these semi-detached houses scattered on the near 400 acres of the Oxcroft estate. All were built to a near-standard pattern and included glasshouses and accommodation for animals, fowls and particularly pigs.The estate houses are not difficult to spot, once you know what to look for, but most have been altered since construction.
Recently (January 2023) Bolsover District Council announced that they were looking into the possibiloity of a conservation area in the former Oxcroft Settlement area.
This post was first published on our Facebook page on 10 October 2020, but has been edited for this website blog.
Next time you’re near Bolsover Library have a look and indeed sit awhile on a memorial seat to local author Fred Kitchen, who we remember in this post.
The sculptured seat to Fred Kitchen outside Bolsover Library.
We only briefly mentioned Kitchen in our Bolsover and adjacent parishes VCH ‘big red book’, mainly in connection with the Oxcroft Settlement, where his 1947 publication ‘Settlers in England’ helped record what it was like to live there.
The seat (in reality it’s much more than that) been made possible by local partners including Bolsover Civic Society, local councils and businesses.*
The seat was installed in 2021. It’s in the form of a central wooden seat with sculptured stone ends representing Kitchen’s books. Sculptor Andrew Tebbs was responsible for the stonework. There’s also a plaque which gives further details about Kitchen, who was born in Edwinstowe in 1890 and died in 1969.
A closer view of the seat, with the sculptured stonework at either end representing books that Fred Kitchen published.
From a farming community Fred Kitchen worked in what would have then been hard manual work as a farm labourer. He improved his basic education by enrolling in a Workers’ Educational Association class at Worksop, studying creative writing. His talents developed and he ended up having 16 books published, along with various other works. ‘Brother to the Ox’, an autobiographical work, was perhaps his most famous. It was even adapted as a television and radio play.
A lesser-known work is ‘Gosslington’ a fictious part of the Derbyshire moors, first published in 1965. This is the front cover of the 1967 paperback edition.‘Settlers in England’ published in 1947 documents Fred Kitchen’s experience of living on the Oxcroft Settlement, near Bolsover.It contained a series of line-drawings by EJ Browne and a map of the estate.The front cover shows a typical small-holding.
Bolsover library also has a small display on Fred Kitchen and a collection of his books, so is well-worth a visit to find out more about this interesting character who wrote about local life and community.
*Bolsover Civic Society, Old Bolsover Town Council, Bolsover District Council, Derbyshire County Council, Rothstone, Morrisons Supermarket, NAL Plant, Stephen Wakelam and Bolsover Rotary.
We’ll be taking a little break from our blogsover the Christmas and new year period.
We hope you have enjoyed our posts during 2022 and look forward to welcoming you back in mid-January 2023.
Season’s greetings from us all at Derbyshire VCH.
If you have purchased our Hasland book, published in the summer of 2022, we hope you have enjoyed it and found it interesting. We hope to publish a volume on Wingerworth in the first half of 2023 – so please keep a look out for this.
Our thanks to everyone who has supported us 2022, whether it has been through Derbyshire VCH membership, a member of our volunteer research group, contributing to our blogs, website and Facebook posts, buying our publications or simply reading this blog.
We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year.
