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ILKESTON AND DISTRICT HERITAGE
LOCAL HISTORY
(Back to Ilkeston and District  Heritage Introduction)

DALE ABBEY: THE FLOURISH
This is the site of the former Stanhope Arms which was one of the earliest meeting places of the Freemasons in the district at a location known as Linrick in the medieval period. A local legend has it that a notorious outlaw known as Uthlagas, lying in wait for travellers, fell asleep and dreamed of the Abbey at Depedale, which so impressed him he became a reformed character and lived thereafter as a hermit. This may reflect the hazardous journeys of travellers along the track from Derby to Nottingham.

DALE ABBEY: LOCKO PARK
(Grade 2)
Locko Park passed from the Byrd family, in the late 16th century, to the Gilberts who rebuilt it starting with the chapel consecrated in 1673. In 1720 Robert Ferne purchased it and the present house dates mainly  from 1725-30. Re-purchased by the Gilberts for ten years before sale in 1747 to John Lowe whose descendants still occupy it.

DALE ABBEY: THE LEPER COLONY
The preceptory of Locko, near Spondon, was a religious house of the Order of St.Lazarus of Jerusalem which was founded to support lepers and members of all military orders. Contributions were sent to the mother house in Paris until the end of the war with France in 1360, when all property of the Lazarites was transferred to the Burton Lazars and Locko ceased to exist as a preceptory. However it continued as a hospital until dissolved by Henry the Eighth.

ILKESTON: MINES RESCUE STATION
(Manners Road) SK 461424
The Ilkeston Mines Rescue Station, opened in 1916, was situated in Manners Road near the corner that used to lead to Manners Colliery. It was one of three operated by the North Midlands Coal Owners' Rescue Co Ltd. In the early days thirty men were based there providing cover for the sixty odd plus pits in the South Nottinghamshire area which Ilkeston formed a part. The main block was flanked on each side by two cottages for four married men and their families. On the ground floor of the main block were the instructor's office, duty room, charging room, apparatus room, liquid air plant room, dressing and drying rooms, store, spray baths and toilets. Adjoining the main building were the observation and drill halls, hose tower, recruits training gallery, garage and recreation room. On the first floor was the committee room and quarters for four single men, including kitchen, scullery, bathroom and two double bedrooms, with a balcony fronting them. The Recreation Room contained a full-size billiard table for the use of the members of the resident corps. The basement provided the underground training gallery, gas testing chamber and boilers for the heating apparatus. The station closed in 1988 and has since been converted into Victoria Park Care Centre.

ILKESTON: STANTON ROAD CEMETERY
(Stanton Road)
This Victorian cemetery, founded in 1863 by an independent local company was used mainly by the town's non-conformist community. Most of Ilkeston's 19th century factory owners, civic leaders and other business people are buried here, as are many of their employees. Perhaps the best-known occupant is Samuel Taylor, the Il'son Giant who was reputed to have been 7 feet 6 inches tall.

ILKESTON: LITTLE HALLAM HALL
(Grade 2)
A 16th century half-timbered house and Ilkeston's oldest existing domestic building, it was the home of the family of John Flamstead, the first Astronomer Royal.

ILKESTON: ST.BARTHOLOMEW'S CHURCH
(Tower Grade 2)
A red brick building built in 1896 to a design by P. Curry of Derby, it cost £3,500 and could seat 450 members. A clock tower was added in 1905 with a chiming mechanism and four more bells being added in 1911. The last service was at Christmas 1969.

ILKESTON: RUTLAND CHAMBERS
(Lord Haddon Road)
This building was erected in 1899 was the local estate office for the Duke of Rutland. The upper floor was later occupied by Harry Tatham Sudbury, the local architect, who eventually bought the whole premises in 1920 for £1000.

ILKESTON: RUTLAND HOTEL AND SPA BATHS
The Rutland Hotel, now demolished, was built around 1820 and was a stop for the Sheffield to Nottingham stagecoach known as the speculator. When the railway arrived in the 1840s, the hotel expanded and publicans such as Thomas hives provided additional accommodation and entertainment for visitors to the adjacent spa baths. The spa baths were built for Thomas Potter around 1830. As a result Town Street was renamed Bath Street. People were able to bathe or drink the waters which were reputed to have remarkable curative properties.
Behind the hotel were the Vauxhall Gardens dating from before 1850 and named after the famous 18th century pleasure gardens. They offered "music and spectacle" in the shape of Quadrille bands, hot-air balloon ascents and firework displays.

ILKESTON: GENERAL HOSPITAL
(Heanor Road)
Built in 1893, this redbrick building was opened by Lord Belper and is at present a nursing home.

ILKESTON: GALTEE HOUSE
(Heanor Road)
Galtee House was built for Dr James Willis. The exterior is an impressive example of decorative brick. Unfortunately the elaborate exterior woodwork has not all survived. It is said that successful bets on a famous racehorse, Galtee More, helped Dr Willis pay for his new house.
ILKESTON: DALBY HOUSE
(High Street. Grade 2)
Dalby House, now the home of the Erewash Museum, is one of the oldest buildings in Ilkeston. According to an early map there was a house on the site in 1598. During the 1780s the three storey Georgian section was added and then in the 19th century there were further large extensions at the back, the front and to the north side.
ILKESTON: STANTON INSTITUTE
(Hallam Fields Road)
It was opened in 1937, by local Councillor Ernest Adams. It is of modern style with art deco features inside and was designed by Harry Tatham Sudbury. The BBC TV series, 'Playing the Field' about a ladies football team was largely filmed there.

ILKESTON: VICTORIA PARK
(Bristol Road)
Eight acres of ground presented to the town by the Duke of Rutland to celebrate Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, the official opening taking place 20th August 1902 when the Duke and Mayor of Ilkeston both planted oak trees. It was laid with trees, shrubs and flower beds for walking, sitting and gentle recreation and a condition imposed by the Duke prohibits its use for adult cricket or football matches. It is a popular venue for band concerts during the summer.

ILKESTON: MARKET PLACE
The original market place lay on the north side of the church and in the 18th century had a butter market and round house with a school room over - all since demolished. The market place was extended to the west of the church when a large school building was removed towards the end of the 19th century and extended further south in 1904 when the library replaced the Market Hall (a former school) and was set back 90 feet from the former building line.
The buildings on the north side of the market place appear to be late 19th/early 20th century re-facings of earlier buildings, whilst to the east is the church of St.Mary the Virgin. The south side is enclosed by the Church Institute and the Carnegie Library. To the west is the Ilkeston Co-operative Department Store which has been extended in a range of style thereby illustrating the change in shopping architecture over the 20th century. The Co-operative Society began trading in Bath Street during 1837, moving to 10-12 South Street a year later and building the first of its new premises there in 1904.
Further expansion took place in 1922, 1925 and 1938-40 closer to Wharnecliffe Road and later additions were made along South Street in the 1960s and 1980s. The north west corner of the market place is enclosed by the Town Hall and the Sir John Warren public house - a former 19th century farm.
Two free standing structures which deserve a mention are the Cenotaph War Memorial designed by Harry Tatham Sudbury and the combined drinking fountain lamp standard and horse trough built in 1889 by A Handyside and Company of Derby.

MORLEY: SACHEVERALL ALMSHOUSES
(Grade 2)
Erected by Jacinth Sacheverall in 1656, the building consists of six dwellings all under one roof, each containing two rooms providing accommodation for three poor aged folk from Smalley and three from Morley. In the late 19th century, there was also a two shilling per week allowance for their sustenance.

STANLEY: STANLEY GRANGE
Originally a grange farm belonging to Dale Abbey before the dissolution, the Grange became a school for Roman Catholic young gentlemen in 1625 under the patronage of the Powtrells of West Hallam. It was a local loyalist centre during the English Civil War, when it suffered a raid by Parliamentary forces who forced the school to close after discovering a secret passage and hiding place there. Parts of the 17th century structures survive in the present 18th and 19th century farm buildings.

STANTON-BY-DALE
Designated a conservation area in 1978, the village has a well preserved character stemming from its origins as an estate village. In addition to the buildings, some of which are mentioned elsewhere, there are many smaller objects of interest. The stone village cross has a weather-worn shaft and a fleur-de-lis profiled head with the date 1632 on it. The large block base may well cover the original steps. Nearby the village pump, made at Coalbrookdale Ironworks, was erected by the women villagers to celebrate the reign of Queen Victoria. A little further down the road is the only surviving example of a tyring platform (but no wheelwright's hearth) in Erewash. There is also an early cast iron boot scraper on the wall of 29 Main Street and further east on Quarry Hill are the remains of a stone pinfold.

STANTON-BY-DALE: STANTON IRONWORKS
Founded by Benjamin Smith and Son. Three early open-top blast furnaces produced the first iron. Owned by the Crompton family from 1852 until Nationalisation in 1948. Tank parts and bombs for WW2 were among the many products including cast iron pipes, concrete pipes and street furniture. See also A Brief History of Stanton Ironworks.

STANTON-BY-DALE: BIRTHPLACE OF THE SHORT BROTHERS
The three famous aeronautical engineers spent some of their formative years at 3 Lows Lane, Stanton-by-Dale, one of a pair of substantial semidetached houses located at the rear of the Stanton works complex near the main offices. The names of the two elder brothers appear on the 1881 census but on the death of their father in 1891 the family, including a third younger brother moved to Ilkeston.

WEST HALLAM: CINDER HOUSE
(Grade 2)
This experimental house, composed of cinders made from burning large pieces of local clay, was built in 1833 at the time of the birth of the squire's son Francis Newdigate. It featured on local photographs and was a local tourist attraction.

WEST HALLAM: THE WAR MEMORIAL
(Grade 2)
Dedicated on 12 August 1921, the memorial is in the form of a tall alter or chest tomb executed in Darley Dale grit-stone surmounted by a handsome sculpture, carved from a single block of Sicilian marble, of two soldiers with a machine gun on a tripod base. The memorial contains the names of those who fell and served in the Great War (1914-1918) and those killed in the Second World War (1939-1945). The memorial was designed by Messrs Beresford and Sons of Belper.

EREWASH CANAL / TRENT LOCK / RIVER SOAR
The Erewash Canal built in 1779 contains 14 locks in its 11 3/4 mile journey from Trent Lock to Langley Mill. The engineer was John Varley. The Steamboat Inn, originally the Erewash Navigation Inn, was built in 1791 alongside the Trent Lock at the start of the canal. The River Soar provided the transportation link for the movement of coal from the Erewash Valley coal fields to Leicester. A horse ferry provided the means whereby the horses which pulled the boats were transferred across the Trent from the mouth of the Soar to the Erewash Canal.