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The Lost Houses of Derbyshire – Netherthorpe Old Hall

The Lost Houses of Derbyshire – Netherthorpe Old Hall
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Netherthorpe Old Hall was a stone built Elizabethan small manor house situated in Netherton, one of the group of modest hamlets which surround Staveley – Barrowhill, Mastin Moor, Norbriggs, Poolsbrook and Woodthorpe. Built of coarse ashlar of thin coal measures sandstone, there were hefty quoins and at one time dressings to the doorcases, windows and gables. The roof must once have been of stone slate too, but was latterly of Welsh slate, brought in by rail of the back of the rapid industrialisation of Staveley itself. 

When new, the house no doubt had a great hall set to one side of the central section, for the bold innovation of a through hall, being introduced by Robert Smythson at Wollaton, Worksop and Hardwick, were still in the future, and without doubt the house will have had all the accoutrements of that of a well-to-do minor gentleman: linenfold wainscotting, ribbed plaster Sheffield School ceilings, and a grand oak staircase. The hearth tax, however, tells us that it was taxed on a modest five hearths in 1670, probably because, with a great hall being the focus of domestic life, there were only four other heated rooms, one of which would have been the kitchen. In the only surviving view of the house, the chimney to the right probably served the great hall and that to the left the kitchen, with the other three sharing one or the other. 

Generally speaking, it probably looked like an expanded version of Staveley’s Furnace House, a building of similar vintage which ended up in the middle of the giant Staveley Works, surrounded by railway lines and which seems to have literally fallen to pieces around 1906. Yet over the centuries, Netherthorpe Old Hall managed to get modernised, losing its mullioned windows in favour of sashes and later casement openings. There had probably originally been stone copings to the gables with finials, and the great hall was later divided both horizontally and vertically from the seventeenth century to down-grade the accommodation quality in favour of extra space.

The history of the place is a trifle complex, but readers of this element of Country Images will evince no surprise at that, one imagines. At Domesday, Staveley was held in chief by a Breton ‘baron’ called Hascoit or Acuit Musard, whose descendants held on there until 1294 when the dynasty ended somewhat chaotically. 

Ralph Musard who died in 1265 held two knight’s fees in Staveley, and his house was most likely on or near the site of the hall. His grandson John died without issue in 1294, leaving as heir an uncle, Nicholas, who was then rector of Staveley, who had children. At that time, parish priests were still allowed to marry, but that state was one that managed to pass Nicholas by, leaving his children illegitimate, although they were left in his will modest pieces of land locally and one sired the line of de Steynesbys from having acquired land at Stainsby.

Therefore, when Nicholas died in 1301, his three sisters inherited the extensive estate in three portions. The eldest, Amicia married Anker de Frecheville, another man of Norman descent, whilst her sister Margaret married John de Hibernia (‘of Ireland’) and the youngest, Isabel, married William de Chellaston. The Frechevilles’ portion included the Musard seat.  This three-way split soon reduced to two, though, for the Chellaston marriage left no issue and the Ireland portion, which included Netherthorpe, soon became forfeited to the Crown. 

In November 1308 as a sort of coronation present, Edward II granted this two thirds of Staveley to Robert de Clifford, 1st Lord Clifford, who was in attendance on the occasion. He immediately settled it, for life only, on the husband of his aunt, Idoine de Vipont, who was John, 1st Lord Cromwell, an old comrade-in-arms of Clifford’s from a campaign in France some years before. The quid pro quo was that Clifford in exchange took a portion of the manor of Appleby, Westmorland, giving him control over the whole Hundred of Appleby.

Cromwell probably did not visit his two thirds of Staveley, and it is doubtful if there was at this time any house on it, as all the Musards’ successors had perfectly good houses elsewhere – the Cliffords at Skipton Castle and the Cromwells at Tattershall. On Cromwell’s death in 1335, however, the property reverted to the Cliffords, which family held on to it (presumably granting the manor house to a tenant or bailiff) until John, 9th Lord Clifford was killed in action during the Wars of the Roses fighting on the Lancastrian side in 1461. He was posthumously attainted and his lands once again reverted to the Crown and the estate was again tenanted under the Crown a situation which pertained until 1544.

During this time, the Crown’s tenants at Netherthorpe in the later fifteenth century at least, appear to have been called Carter. Indeed, the Christian name of Anker Carter, who surrendered his lease in 1543, suggests that his father John, of Netherthorpe, must have been married to a daughter of one of the Frechevilles, for that family had enthusiastically adopted that distinctive name from their Musard ancestors. Thus in 1543, the new tenant was Robert Sitwell, from nearby Eckington.

In 1544, Henry VIII granted the Crown’s two-thirds portion of Staveley to Francis Leake of Sutton Scarsdale, who within a year had sold his unexpected windfall to Sir Peter Frecheville of Staveley Hall, who was keen to re-unite the manorial estate. Needless to say, he also inherited Robert Sitwell, whose lease was almost certainly for ‘three lives’ a medieval system whereby a property could be held until the death of the third person to inherit it from the original grantee, when they could either pay to renew, extend, or merely surrender it.

Sitwell was the descendant of a family much more famous now than then, although he was the founder of the family’s fortunes. The family’s origins are obscure. One Walter de Boys, or de Bosco (from French, bois = wood and cf. bosky = wooded) died in 1301 en route to the Holy Land, and left a son called Simon Sitewell (sic). The origin of the name is obscure: either a phrasal nick name (‘sit(s) well’) or a lost place, presumably in Eckington, which the charter which records his parentage tells us is where Simon lived. It is also presumed that Roger Cytwell, the co-founder of the Guild of St. Mary, Eckington, was a grandson of Walter, but this cannot be actually confirmed, nor the precise relationship between Roger and John Sitwell who is presumed to be Roger’s son, especially as his fourth son was another Roger. Roger was father to Robert, the new tenant of Netherthorpe’s grandfather.

Robert Sitwell of Netherthorpe must have been born about 1520, nine years before his grandfather died, his father having pre-deceased him. He was thus only 23 when first granted his tenancy, and it is without doubt he who built Netherthorpe Hall (it was only called ‘old’ hall in the 19th century, after a Georgian house was built near by which an owner with pretentions called the hall). It is not impossible that the house was much larger by 1599 when Robert died but had been reduced again by 1670 when tax was paid on the five hearths.

Sitwell was an outstandingly successful merchant who invested in land extensively in the NE corner of Derbyshire, including the estate at Renishaw of later fame, which was later increased by purchase by a successor from the Wigfull family. Robert’s first wife died young, leaving no surviving issue, but his second marriage was to Elizabeth Bingham, a Catholic lady. There was no direct heir but Robert’s cousin, also Robert, who lived with him at Netherthorpe from 1587 when he was 23 was his heir apparent.

In 1585 Sitwell co-founded the extant grammar school at Netherthorpe with Mrs. Frecheville (from whom he had received a legacy in 1582) and Judge Rodes of Barlborough Hall and, by his death, he had ‘a very great estate in land and goods’ valued at £10,000. Gervase Holles said of him 

‘He was an honest and worthy gentleman of good erudition and a great lover of learning and of learned men. He was a good housekeeper, and the best land lord to his tenants; I think I may truly say in England and the person of most principled account, and had the greatest power of any in the county.’

Young Robert seems to have surrendered his lease to the Frechevilles at the hall, and they installed a new tenant. Not so long afterwards, the Civil War may have gained Sir Peter Frecheville a barony, but it ruined the family, and in 1681 he sold the estate to the 3rd Earl of Devonshire, to whose posterity, the Dukes of Devonshire, it belonged down to the 20th century.

Since 1599, then, the house was tenanted, a gentleman called Ralph Heathcote residing there in 1670 (by which time the house may well have been reduced) and after 1682 it became a farmhouse, and during the years following it was shorn of most of its earlier features. The last tenants were the Garfitts and the Fletchers (the dukes’ farm bailiffs for Staveley) but the house was summarily demolished in 1935, leaving only an avenue of limes, now also long gone.

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