Place:Elsecar, West Riding of Yorkshire, England

Watchers
NameElsecar
TypeVillage
Coordinates53.496°N 1.412°W
Located inWest Riding of Yorkshire, England     ( - 1974)
Also located inSouth Yorkshire, England     (1974 - )
Yorkshire, England    
See alsoHoyland Nether, West Riding of Yorkshire, Englandcity of which it was a part until 1974
Barnsley (metropolitan borough), South Yorkshire, Englandmetropolitan borough of which it has been a part since 1974
source: Family History Library Catalog


the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Elsecar is a village in the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley in South Yorkshire, England. It is near the villages of Jump and Wentworth and south of the town of Hoyland, south of Barnsley and north-east of Sheffield. Elsecar falls within the Barnsley MBC Ward of Hoyland Milton. Like many villages in the area, it was for many years a colliery village until the widespread pit closures during the 1980s.

Elsecar is unique as a name. It is thought to derive from the Old English personal name of Aelfsige (mentioned in Cartulary of Nostell Priory, 1259–66) and the Old Norse word kjarr, denoting a marsh or brushwood.

Contents

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

In 1870–72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described Elsecar as having a population of 1912 and 353 dwelling places.

Industry

Elsecar's development can be seen as a microcosm of the whole Industrial Revolution in Britain.[1] The village was nothing more than a series of farms until the 18th century. Although coal had been mined in the area since the 14th century, the first colliery, Elsecar Old, did not open until 1750. The first proper mine shaft was sunk in 1795 at Elsecar New Colliery. The village was formed to take advantage of the coal resources in the area, the seams of the Carboniferous Middle Coal Measures, the Kents Thick and Kents Thin coal seams.[2] Many of the new buildings were built by the Earl Fitzwilliam, who resided in nearby Wentworth Woodhouse, to house colliery workers. By the end of the century, several pits were opened. The Fitzwilliams dictated the provision of housing and social institutions at Elsecar throughout the 19th century. They also maintained a direct controlling interest in the management of the collieries and the ironworks, which was unusual.

John and William Darwin & Co. of Sheffield opened the first furnace at Elsecar Ironworks (at the bottom of Forge Lane) in 1795. In 1799 another ironworks was founded at Milton by Walkers of Masborough, less than a mile to the west of Elsecar.[2] These came under the ownership of the Fitzwilliam family after their respective companies collapsed. In 1838 a horse-drawn tramroad was constructed to link Dearne and Dove Canal with the Milton Ironworks, Tankersley Park ironstone mines, Lidgett Colliery and the Thorncliffe Ironworks at Chapeltown. Stationary engines were used for the incline sections, and remained in operation until about 1880.[2]

There was also a distillery which opened in 1814; however, this only lasted four years. Two smaller family-run forges were also established in the mid 19th century and survived well into the 20th century. The two main forges were closed by the end of the century.

The last colliery to open was Elsecar Main in 1908: It was also the last to close, in 1983. In 1988 the last pit in the area, Cortonwood, also closed. Elsecar Workshops were sold off by British Coal the following year, ending the village's ties to the coal industry. The village suffered from similar economic problems to all the mining villages in the region. There are still outstanding applications for mining parts of the village but these are unlikely to be acted upon.

In March 2017 Elsecar was designated as one of ten Heritage Action Zones (HAZ) by Historic England with the benefit that the area would receive a share of £6 million. As part of the HAZ project, in 2019 a Historic Area Assessment was developed, "intended to illustrate the varied character and significance of the village and its setting in order to inform interpretation, conservation and development under the direction of revised planning guidance".[1] To inform this, in 2017 Caesium magnetometer, Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) and Earth Resistance Tomography (ERT) surveys were conducted at Elsecar to attempt to determine the location of a number of former industrial buildings.

Elsecar-by-the-Sea

In 1910 a local amateur photographer, Herbert Parkin, took some photographs of the local reservoir and surrounding areas and sent them into the Sheffield Star under the caption Elsecar-by-the-Sea. The name caught on and with the help of a good transport link from Sheffield via the local railway station, a thriving tourism business was established. The Hoyland council decided to create a public park to take advantage of the influx. The name is still jokingly used by some locals and to advertise events around the reservoir.

Research Tips


This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Elsecar. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.