Oakham, or Okeham (All Saints)

OAKHAM, or Okeham (All Saints), a market-town and parish, and the head of a union, in the soke of Oakham, county of Rutland, of which it is the chief town, 95 miles (N. N. W.) from London; containing 2726 inhabitants, of whom 1902 are in the Lordshold, with Leigh-Fields extra-parochial, and 824 in the Deanshold, with Barleythorpe chapelry and Gunthorpe township. This place is situated in the luxuriant vale of Catmose, so called from the woods with which it abounded (Coed-maes) signifying in the British language a woody plain); and is supposed to have derived its name from the oaks that formerly grew in the vicinity. A castle was erected here soon after the Norman Conquest by Walkelin de Ferrers; in relation to which the following singular custom still prevails: every peer of the realm, on first passing through the town, is compelled to give a shoe from the foot of one of his horses, or, in commutation, a sum of money for the purchase of a horse-shoe, to be nailed upon the castle-gate or placed in some part of the building. Affixed to the castle are many ancient horse-shoes, of which the oldest with a date is of the time of Elizabeth, and is very large and curiously worked and gilt; there are one of bronze and or molu, of George IV. when Prince Regent, one of the late Duke of York, and one of Her present Majesty when princess. Richard II. having advanced Edward, son of the Duke of York, to the earldom of Rutland, assigned to him this castle, which in the reign of Henry VIII. was the baronial seat of Thomas, Lord Cromwell. The hall of the ancient building yet remains, and the assizes are held and public business is transacted in it; the other parts are in ruins.

The houses of the town are amply provided with water, and the air is remarkably salubrious. The inhabitants formerly enjoyed the staple of wool, and many French merchants settled in Oakham, of whose descendants several may still be traced here. A manufactory was established some years since, chiefly for weaving silk shag for covering hats. The town possesses the advantage of a canal to Melton-Mowbray, in Leicestershire, by which coal is brought from Derbyshire, and corn sent to Manchester and Liverpool: the Syston and Peterborough railway, also, completed in 1847, passes by Oakham. The market, which is well supplied with corn, is on Monday; and a market for butchers' meat is held on Saturday. The fairs are on March 15th, May 6th, Sept. 9th, under the original charters, and on Feb. 4th, April 9th, June 2nd, July 16th, August 13th, Oct. 15th, Nov. 19th, and Dec. 15th, as established within the last half century; they are principally for the sale of cattle. Courts leet are held annually by the lord of the castle for the manor of Lordshold, and triennially by the Dean of Westminster for the Deanshold, for the election of parochial and other officers. The assizes and quarter-sessions for the county, and the election of knights of the shire, take place in the town. The powers of the county debt-court of Oakham, established in 1847, extend over the registration-district of Oakham, and part of that of Billesden. The common gaol and house of correction for the county is a commodious edifice.

The parish comprises 2902a. 2r. 11p. The Living is a vicarage, with the livings of Brooke and Langham annexed, valued in the king's books at £28. 3. 1½.; net income, £918; patron, George Finch, Esq.; appropriators, the Dean and Chapter of Westminster. The tithes, with some exceptions, were commuted for land and a money payment in 1820. The church is a spacious and elegant structure of various dates, but chiefly in the later English style, with a fine tower surmounted by a lofty spire. At Egleton is a chapel of ease; and there are places of worship in the town for Baptists, the Society of Friends, Independents, and Wesleyans. The free grammar school was founded about 1584, by Robert Johnson, Archdeacon of Leicester, who established a similar school at Uppingham. These schools, to each of which an hospital is annexed, were incorporated by Queen Elizabeth, who endowed them with certain alienated ecclesiastical property now producing an income of more than £3000 per annum, and placed them under the control of 24 governors, including the Bishops of London and Peterborough, the Deans of Westminster and Peterborough, the Archdeacon of Northampton, and the Masters of Trinity and St. John's Colleges, Cambridge. Belonging to them are, 20 exhibitions of £40 per annum each, tenable for seven years, to any of the colleges of Oxford or Cambridge; four scholarships of £24 per annum each, in Emmanuel College, Cambridge; four of £20 per annum each, in Sidney-Sussex College; four of £20 per annum each, in Clare Hall; and four of £16 each, in St. John's College; all founded by Archdeacon Johnson. Two exhibitions, likewise, of £40 per annum each, were founded by the family of Lovett, for the sons of graduated clergymen, who have been for three years in the school of Grantham, or, these failing, of Oakham. In the hospitals were originally 28 aged men; there are now 100 hospital poor, who receive each £10 per annum at their own dwellings, the buildings of both hospitals being occupied by the schoolmasters for the accommodation of boarders.

The hospital of St. John and St. Anne, originally instituted about the 22nd of Richard II., by Walter Dalby, for two chaplains and twelve aged men, and of which the revenue at the Dissolution was £12. 12. 11., was refounded by Archdeacon Johnson, who increased the endowment. Twenty aged men now receive each £6 per annum at their own dwellings; the warden has £15, and the subwarden £10. The buildings of the hospital have fallen to decay, with the exception of a house for the warden, in which the subwarden at present resides, a chapel, and four separate tenements under one roof. A national school, established in 1816, is supported by subscription; and there are several bequests for distribution among the indigent generally. The poor-law union of Oakham comprises 30 parishes or places, 28 of which are in the county of Rutland, and two in that of Leicester, the whole containing a population of 11,218. Geoffrey Hudson, the dwarf, only three feet nine inches in height, was a native of Oakham.

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