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Ockbrook (All Saints)

OCKBROOK (All Saints), a parish, in the union of Shardlow, hundred of Morleston and Litchurch, S. division of the county of Derby, 5½ miles (E. by S.) from Derby; containing 1765 inhabitants. The manor belonged at the Domesday survey to Geoffrey Alselin: the Bardolfs had a park here in ancient times, and the abbot of Dale possessed another, which had been made by the Grendons in the 13th century. In 1583, Frederick, Lord Windsor, conveyed the manor to the principal freeholders. The parish comprises 1678 acres of land, having a soil partly light, but chiefly strong clay, on a gravelly bottom: it is bounded on the south by the river Derwent, and situated on the road from Derby to Nottingham, on the Midland railway, and the Derby canal. On the banks of the Derwent are extensive cottonmills, affording occupation to several hundred persons in the manufacture of bobbin and lace-thread for the Buckingham, Nottingham, and Loughborough markets. The village is large and well built. The living is a vicarage; net income, £154; patron and impropriator, Thomas Pares, Esq.: the tithes were commuted for land in 1772. The church has portions in the Norman style: it has been twice enlarged, the last time in 1835, by the erection of a south aisle, at a cost of about £700. There is a place of worship for Wesleyans; and adjoining the village is a settlement of the United Brethren, commonly called Moravians, founded in 1750. The principal buildings of the establishment stand in a regular line, and consist of the single sisters' house, containing thirty or forty females, who are employed in fine muslin work and embroidery; a smaller house for single men, two boarding-schools for boys and girls, a commodious chapel of brick, with galleries at each end; and a range of private houses, of which some are for the ministers: these, with an inn and a shop, constitute the settlement. There are four Church of England schools, one of them supported by the patron of the living, and the others by subscription. In excavating for the canal, and afterwards for the railway, great numbers of skeletons were found; also arrow-heads; and a beautiful small altar, probably Saxon.

Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.

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