Place:Killamarsh, Derbyshire, England

Watchers
NameKillamarsh
Alt namesNorwood in Killamarshsource: neighbourhood in parish
Nethergreensource: neighbourhood in parish
Upperthorpesource: neighbourhood in parish
Westthorpesource: neighbourhood in parish
Chinewoldemarescsource: Domesday Book (1985) p 69
TypeTownship, Civil parish
Coordinates53.317°N 1.317°W
Located inDerbyshire, England
See alsoEckington, Derbyshire, Englandancient parish of which it was part
Scarsdale Hundred, Derbyshire, Englandhundred in which it was located
Chesterfield Rural, Derbyshire, Englandrural district 1894-1974
North East Derbyshire District, Derbyshire, Englanddistrict municipality covering the area since 1974
the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Killamarsh is a civil parish in the North East Derbyshire District of Derbyshire, England, bordering Sheffield and (since 1974) South Yorkshire to the northwest. Killamarsh is surrounded by, in a clockwise direction from the north, the Rother Valley Country Park, the parish of Wales, Kiveton Park, Harthill with Woodall, Barlborough, Eckington, and the Mosbrough ward of Sheffield. Over the years, Sheffield and South Yorkshire have tried to merge the town into the ceremonial county as part of the city, but disagreements have prevented this, and Killamarsh remains in Derbyshire.

Killamarsh was mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086 with the name Chinewoldemaresc or Chinewolde meaning "Cynewalds Marsh". There are a number of smaller communities within the town; Norwood, Nethergreen, Westthorpe and Upperthorpe surround the main town centre.

The community originally grew from a farming community, self-sufficient in agricultural and dairy produce since the Middle Ages. In the 19th and 20th centuries, Killamarsh became a thriving mining town as the burgeoning Sheffield iron industry demanded coal and transport links with Sheffield became more prevalent. Coal has been mined in Killamarsh since at least the 15th century, but the first major mining operation opened at Norwood resulting in an almost doubling of the Killamarsh population between 1861 and 1871. The last two "pits", Westthorpe and High Moor, are now gone, casualties of the early 1980s pit closure programme.

The river Rother which flanks Killamarsh had provided power to grain mills since the earliest times and was used by ironmongers and smiths from the late 18th century. Killamarsh Forge was owned and operated by Webster & Horsfall. They made crucible steel which was cast into ingots. These were then shipped to their Penns Mill plant in Walmley (Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire) who drew the special wire. This was used in the core of the 2nd trans-Atlantic telegraph cable laid by the SS Great Eastern in 1866 as well as other equipment used in the splicing operations.

Killamarsh was originally a township of the ancient parish of Eckington. From 1894 until 1974 it was part of the Chesterfield Rural District. As at the UK census of 2011 it had a population of 9,445.

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

"KILLAMARSH, a village and a parish in Chesterfield [registration] district, Derby[shire]. The village stands on the Chesterfield canal, near the boundary with Yorkshire, 2 miles NE of Eckington [railway] station, and 8½ NE of Chesterfield; was known at Domesday as "Chinewoldemarese"; and has a post office under Chesterfield.
"The parish comprises 1,646 acres. Real property: £4,810; of which £460 are in mines, and £20 in iron works. Population: 1, 053. Houses: 224. The manor belongs to Chandos Pole, Esq. There are brick fields and chemical works. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Lichfield. Value: £200. Patron: the Crown. The church is partly ancient, partly recent; and has a Norman arch in the S porch, and a tower. There are an endowed school, with £22 a year, and other charities with £69."

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 Killamarsh. 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.