Place:Duffield, Derbyshire, England

Watchers
NameDuffield
Alt namesShottle and Posternsource: from redirect
Shottlesource: from redirect
Turnditchsource: from redirect
Hazlewoodsource: from redirect
Windleysource: from redirect
Duuellesource: Domesday Book (1985) p 69
TypeAncient parish, Civil parish
Coordinates52.983°N 1.483°W
Located inDerbyshire, England
See alsoAppletree Hundred, Derbyshire, Englandhundred in which it was located
Belper Rural, Derbyshire, Englandrural district 1894-1974
Englandrural district 1959-1974
Amber Valley District, Derbyshire, Englanddistrict municipality covering the area since 1974
the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Duffield is a village and civil parish in the Amber Valley District of Derbyshire, 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Derby. It is centred on the western bank of the River Derwent at the mouth of the River Ecclesbourne. It has an area of 7.859 km2 (3.034 sq mi) and had a population of 5,046 according to the UK census of 2011.

Wikipedia has a very lengthy article outlining the history of the parish starting in the prehistoric period and continuing on to the 20th century.

The following description from John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72 is provided by the website A Vision of Britain Through Time (University of Portsmouth Department of Geography).

"DUFFIELD, a village, a township, a parish, and a [registration] sub-district, in Belper [registration] district, Derbyshire. The village stands on the river Derwent, adjacent to the North Midland railway, 4¼ miles N of Derby; was known, at Domesday, as Dunelle; and has a station on the railway, a post office under Derby, and fairs on the Thursday after 1 Jan. and 1 March.
"The township includes the village; extends into the country; and carries on cotton spinning, lace-making, stocking-making, glove-making, and mining. Real property: £11,872. Population: 2,639. Houses: 571.
"The parish contains also the townships of Hazlewood, Turnditch, Windley, and Shottle and Postern, and the chapelries of Holbrook and Belper. Acres: 17,390. Real property: £43,292; of which £145 are in quarries. Population: 16,776. Houses: 3,518.
"The property is much subdivided. Duffield Hall, Duffield House, and Duffield Bank are chief residences. A castle was built, about 1096, by Henry de Ferrars, on a spot now called Castle-orchard, at the north-west end of the village; and demolished, in 1325 by Henry II. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Lichfield. Value: £185. Patron: the Bishop of Lichfield. The church is good.
"The chapelries of Belper, Bridge-Hill, Hazlewood, Heage, Holbrook, Milford, and Turnditch are separate benefices. There are several dissenting chapels, a free school with £124 from endowment, and other charities with £253."

Duffield was an ancient parish and included the following townships and chapelries:

Research Tips

  • Derbyshire Record Office website
  • British History Online (Victoria County Histories) does not appear to cover Derbyshire geographically. A History of the County of Derby: Volume 2, edited by William Page is a part-volume covering the religious houses of the county. No further volumes have been found.
  • GENUKI main page for Derbyshire which provides information on various topics covering the whole of the county, and also a link to a list of parishes. Under each parish there is a list of the settlements within it and brief description of each. This is a list of pre-1834 ancient or ecclesiastical parishes but there are suggestions as to how to find parishes set up since then. GENUKI provides references to other organizations who hold genealogical information for the local area. There is no guarantee that the website has been kept up to date and therefore the reader should check additional sources if possible.
  • The FamilyTree Wiki has a series of pages similar to those provided by GENUKI which may have been prepared at a later date and from more recent data. The wiki has a link to English Jurisdictions 1851 which gives the registration district and wapentake for each parish, together with statistics from the 1851 census for the area.
  • A Vision of Britain through Time, Derbyshire, section "Units and Statistics" leads to analyses of population and organization of the county from about 1800 through 1974. There are pages available for all civil parishes, municipal boroughs and other administrative divisions. Descriptions provided are usually based on a gazetteer of 1870-72 which often provides brief notes on the economic basis of the settlement and significant occurences through its history.
  • For a more detailed view of a specific area try a map from the following selection. The oldest series are very clear at the third magnification offered. Comparing the map details with the GENUKI details for the same area is well worthwhile. Sections of the 1900 map showing parish boundaries only have been reproduced on some (but not all) parish pages here in WeRelate.
  • Map of Derbyshire illustrating urban and rural districts in 1900 produced by UK Ordnance Survey and provided online by A Vision of Britain through Time. Parish boundaries and settlements within parishes are shown.
  • Map of Derbyshire urban and rural districts in 1944 produced by UK Ordnance Survey and provided online by A Vision of Britain through Time. Parish boundaries and settlements within parishes are shown. This is not a repeat of the first map. There were some changes in urban and rural district structure in the 1930s.
  • Ordnance Survey map of Derbyshire for 1967 This is the last in this series and was made while Derbyshire was experimenting with the non-metropolitan district structure adopted in 1974. It is a much cleaner map for reading the names of the civil parishes, but the smaller villages are no longer visible.
These are only three of the series of maps to be found in A Vision of Britain through Time.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Duffield, Derbyshire. 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.