CHAP. I
HUNDRED OF BASSETLAW.
RETFORD being the principal market town in the Hundred of Bassetlaw, a short account thereof will not be unacceptable at the commencement of this history.
All historians agree that King Alfred caused England to be divided into shires or counties, and thus again to be subdivided into hundreds or wapentakes: a proceeding at that period rendered necessary to the due administration of justice, as well as to reduce the inhabitants, who were fierce and licentious, to the salutary restraint of law and wholesome government.
The Hundreds in the county of Nottingham are now reduced to six*; these are Rushcliffe, Bingham Newark, Bassetlaw, Broxtow, and Thurgarton. These Hundreds are very unequal in size, (as much so as the various counties,) and are supposed to have been so called because they contained a hundred towns each; this supposition is evidently erroneous, for, as Thoroton justly observes, " Such we have none, but more ‘likely of that number of free sureties, or frankpledges for the peace, or else of able soldiers for the war, which number in some places, exceeded more, in others less, as we may well suppose; and in process of time (if nothing else did) made the inequality."
The Hundred of Bassetlaw (called in Nomina Villarum, about the year 1315, Bersetelowe, afterwards we find it written Bernedsetlawe, Bernedeslawe, and Bassetlawe,) is somewhat of an oval shape, and extends along the bank of the river Trent (in two instances it verges to the opposite side) from Heck Dyke, a little below West Stockwith, to the parish of Fledborough; it there joins the hundred of Thurgarton, and proceeds nearly as far as Shirewood Inn, on the Forest, where it takes the boundary line of Broxtow hundred till it joins the county of Derby, near Nettleworth; it is then limited by that county, and likewise Yorkshire, until it approaches to an apex below Finningley, where Lincolnshire again determines its extent to the entrance of the heck Dyke into the Trent. This Hundred consists of three divisions, viz. Hatfield, and North and South Clay: the first embraces all the laud on the west side of the river Idle, which as Thoroton states has ever been famous "for woods and pleasant waters insomuch that in it alone have been founded well nigh as many Monasteries as in the whole county besides." The two remaining divisions include the district between the Idle and the Trent, which, from the nature of the soil, is considered highly fertile both as arable and pasture land.
The latitude of the Hundred of Bassetlaw extends from fifty-three degrees, nine minutes, to fifty—three degrees, thirty—two minutes north; it is about twenty— seven miles long, and seventeen broad ; its circumference is estimated at upwards of eighty miles, and its superficial content at 174000 acres. It contains sixty-six parishes in which are eighty—four villages, and four market towns, viz. Retford, Tuxford, Worksop, and Ollerton, and part of Bawtry and according to the parliamentary census taken in 1821, it has a population of 36445 souls.
This Hundred has been distinguished from time immemorial for the number of seats of noblemen and gentlemen comprised within its limits, so much so as to have received the appellation of the "DUKERY". During the late discussions in Parliament, this term was not infrequently introduced to prove that the return of two members to serve in Parliament for the Hundred, would altogether rest with one or two of the said noblemen. The following list* however will prove that whatever influence those distinguished individuals do possess, there is an interest—an independent interest, paramount to the whole of their’s combined, which, in the event of a contest, would prove the truth of this assertion.
|
The DUKE of NEWCASTLE, Clumber Park |
Hon. & Rev. J. L. Saville Rufford |
|
The DUKE of NORFOLK, Worksop Manor |
G. S Foljambe, Esq. Osberton |
|
The DUKE of PORTLAND, Welbeck Abbey |
H. G. Knight, Esq. Langold |
|
Earl Manvers, Thoresby Park |
E. E. Dennison, Esq. M. P. Ossington |
|
Lord Middleton, Wollaton |
A. H. Eyre, Esq. Grove |
|
Earl Bathurst, Langwith |
W. Mason, Esq. Morton |
|
Lord Howard, Wellow |
J. Angerstein, Esq. Ragnall |
|
Lord Galway, Serleby Hall |
P. B. Thompson, Esq. Eskrick |
|
Lord Althorpe, M. P. Wiseton Hall |
H. Walker, Esq. Blyth |
|
Sir T. W. White, Bart. Wallingwells |
D. Walters, Eaq. Barnwood, Gloucester |
|
Hon. J. B. Simpson, Babworth |
|
* Formerly
there appears to have been eight. In Doomsday book, what
is now termed the North Clay Division, was then called the Soke of Oswardbec
that is a wapentake, or hundred and so late as the 15th century the Hundred
of Hatfield merged into a Division of the Hundred of Bassetlaw.
+ In the 12th of Edward the second, (1318) Robert de Perepont,
Richard de Willugliby, and Richard de Whatton, were created’ assignen
justices to enquire of the transgressions made by John de Lanum one of
the Kings Bayliffs the Wapentach of Bersetelowe.
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