Place:Earls Barton, Northamptonshire, England

the text in this section is a condensation of an article in Wikipedia

Earls Barton is a village and civil parish in Northamptonshire, notable for its Anglo-Saxon church and for shoe-making.

The parish is now in the unitary authority of North Northamptonshire. From 1974 until April 2021 it was part of the Wellingborough District of Northamptonshire, England. At the time of the 2011 UK census, the population was 5,387.

The original Anglo-Saxon village was one of several Spring line settlements constructed along the north bank of the River Nene. Immediately prior to the Norman Conquest in 1066, it was held by Bondi the staller, an Anglo-Danish noble, and senior member of Edward the Confessor's household; around 1070, it passed to Waltheof, Earl of Northumbria. In 1070, he married Judith of Lens, (niece of William the Conqueror), and recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as owner of the land and mill of "Buarton(e)" (Earls Barton). Waltheof was made Earl of Northampton in 1071; it is thought these links, and those with the Earl of Huntingdon, later gave the village its prefix "Earls".

In the 13th century, shoes began to be made from leather bought in nearby Northampton, while the village also had its own tanyard, which remained in operation until 1984. During the 14th and 15th centuries, sheep shearing gave way to the manufacture of woollen cloth, which remained a major cottage industry until it shifted to the newly industrialised north several centuries later.

Census data shows that from 1801 to 1850, the village population grew from 729 to over 2,000. In 1880, the Barker Shoe Company was founded in Earls Barton, and remains there to the present day.

Between 1913 and 1921, ironstone was produced in two local quarries. A 3-foot gauge tramway connected both quarries to the northern terminal of the gas-powered aerial ropeway, where the ore was loaded into buckets. It was then taken across the River Nene to Castle Ashby and Earls Barton station, and dumped into railway wagons.

The Church of England parish church of All Saints has been a feature of the village for many centuries. Its Anglo-Saxon tower dates to ca 970 AD. All Saints' underwent two phases of Norman enlargement, one at either end of the 12th century. [Wikipedia outlines other features of the building.] Apart from the Saxon tower, the church is mainly built from Northamptonshire ironstone and limestone, while the tower was constructed from Barnack stone and infilled with local limestone.

There are three other churches in Earls Barton: Methodist, Baptist and Roman Catholic. Another Anglo-Saxon church can be found nearby in Brixworth. The 200-year-old Methodist Church is on Broad Street.

In the village's small market square there is a pharmacy run by a member of the Jeyes chemist's family, which family invented and manufactured Jeyes Fluid, a form of bleach. The family also ran the Philadelphus Jeyes chemist chain and lived nearby at Holly Lodge in Boughton.

The Victoria County History for Northamptonshire has an article for Earls Barton in Volume 4, pp 116-122.

Research Tips

A Vision of Britain through Time

A Vision of Britain through Time describes parishes and former parishes from a gazetteer of 1871; provides an outline of the historic administration links for parishes. The OS map of 1900, the OS map of 1935, and the OS map of 1965 all show parish boundaries and settlements within parishes. These maps are all expandable to show individual parishes and are useful for inspecting changes occuring over the 20th century.

Archive Centres

• Northamptonshire Archives is located at Wootton Hall Park, Northampton, NN4 8BQ, Telephone from the UK: 01604 767562 (from overseas replace the "01" with "44"). The website gives opening times and facilities available.
• Northampton Central Library, Abington Street, Northampton, NN1 2BA (Telephone from the UK: 01604 26771 (from overseas replace the "01" with "44").

Northamptonshire Family History Society

The NFHS website describes the activities of the society. The Society is presently transcribing the deposited Marriage Registers for the period 1754 through 1837. These transcriptions may provide more details than can be found on other databases where subscriptions are charged.

GENUKI

The main GENUKI page for Northamptonshire lists a number of topics for research.

Victoria County History

• the Victoria County History of Northamptonshire produced online by British History Online (founded by the Institute of Historical Research and the History of Parliament Trust in 2003) contains only some of the Hundreds of Northamptonshire in its collection. Articles that do exist will be referenced under the relevant hundred and parish.

Online Databases

FindMyPast includes (list checked July 2018)

• Northamptonshire Parish Records (Baptisms, Marriages, Burials, and Probate Index)
• Northamptonshire Freeholders 1795-1797
• Northamptonshire Hearth Tax, 1674
• Northamptonshire Military Tribunals 1916-1918
• Northamptonshire Militia Lists 1771
• Northamptonshire, Northampton General Hospital Admissions 1774-1846

While Ancestry offers (list checked July 2018)

• Census & Voter Lists 1841-1911.
• Northamptonshire Birth, Marriage & Death
• Northamptonshire, England, Church of England Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1532-1812
• Northamptonshire, England, Church of England Baptisms, 1813-1912
• Northamptonshire, England, Church of England Marriages, 1754-1912
• Northamptonshire, England, Church of England Burials, 1813-1912
• Other Birth, Marriage & Death collections related to Northamptonshire. (32)
• Northamptonshire, England, Church of England Confirmations, 1870-1911
• Other Schools, Directories & Church Histories collections related to Northamptonshire. (34)
• A calendar of wills relating to the counties of Northampton and Rutland : proved in the court of the archdeacon of Northampton
• Other Wills, Probates, Land, Tax & Criminal collections related to Northamptonshire. (23)
• Reference, Dictionaries & Almanacs collections related to Northamptonshire. (21)
• Maps, Atlases & Gazetteers collections related to Northamptonshire. (7)
• Northamptonshire Stories, Memories & Histories

Genealogy of the descendants of Thomas French: who came to America from Nether Heyford, Northamptonshire, England and settled

Works of Reverend James Hervey, 1713-1758

The Orlebar Chronicles in Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire, 1553-1733, or the Children of the Manorhouse

Descendents of Thomas Chichele of Higham-Ferrers, Northampton, England

Rockingham Castle and the Watsons

Other Northamptonshire Stories, Memories & Histories (14)

FamilySearch also has an extensive database online. It is free, but may not always provide the original images provided by the services one pays for.