Rockingham Hall Graphic ref: G+/G-07

Rev #: G

Date: 5 Sept 2013

Size: 297 x 420

Notes: Village Trail leaflet DL 12pp

www.rockinghamvillage.co.uk

Rockingham Finding Rockingham Village

Rockingham village is situated north of Corby on the Leicestershire border and sits in the Welland Valley below Rockingham Castle and the church on Main Street (A6003). Parking is available for visitors to the Village Hall, Sondes Arms Pub, Gallery and Shop & Tea Rooms on Main Street, Rockingham, Market Harborough, Leicestershire, LE16 8TG. For further directions and visitors information see www.rockinghamvillage.co.uk

Places to visit in Rockingham

Rockingham CastleThis home of the Saunders Watsons has been occupied by the family since 1544 and they continue to run the village estate. Built by William the Conqueror, it has evolved under the Watsons from a Tudor mansion to a Victorian home and is now a popular visitor attraction with a programme of family events. For more information see the castle website.

Tel: 01536 770 240 Email: estateoffice@rockinghamcastle.com Web: www.rockinghamcastle.com

The Village HallOur former Victorian school and recently refurbished hall is available to hire for social occasions and education visits at affordable rates. We also host a regular programme of public events including film screenings, classes, the annual dog and flower shows, bonfire night celebrations and history group meetings every last Tuesday of the month.

Email: info@rockinghamvillage.co.uk Web: www.rockinghamvillage.co.uk

St Leonard’s ChurchThe village church, with roots dating back to 1095, consists of a nave and chancel, with a memorial chapel to the Watson family. It stands on the hill between the Castle and the village. Opening times, services and Warden's details are available from the notice board outside the church and on the village website.

Web: www.rockinghamvillage.co.uk

The Sondes ArmsRockingham’s atmospheric pub, historically frequented by Charles Dickens and Clark Gable is open daily serving real ales, lunch and evening meals.

Email: sondesarms@gmail.com Web: www.sondesarms.co.uk

Village Shop & Tea RoomA hearty welcome awaits those in need of village essentials, breakfast, lunch, coffee and afternoon tea seven days a week.

Tel: 01536 772216

Rockingham GalleryThis contemporary art gallery offers quality original prints from acclaimed British and international artists at highly competitive prices.

Email: info@rockinghamgallery.com Web: www.rockinghamgallery.co.uk

Village TrailU

Early Development of Rockingham Village

Although there is evidence of Iron Age and Saxon occupation, it was the Roman road that helped give Rockingham its strategic, defensive location. The medieval village developed after William the Conqueror built the castle soon after 1066 to establish his rule in the area. The original village was probably centred around the castle. An annual fair was established in 1204 and in 1272 a market charter was granted. The road was probably diverted to lead to the market. The presumed sites of the market, road and early village houses can be seen from the castle. In 1544 the Watsons obtained a lease and later bought Rockingham manor from the Crown and converted the ruined castle into a comfortable Tudor home. The road was moved back to its current position to create a park. By 1615 additional estate housing was laid out along the main road (see map above). The plots remain largely the same today.

Rockingham after the Civil Wars

After the Civil War much of the village was in ruins. Nevertheless the almost bankrupt Edward Watson, 2nd Lord Rockingham, began reconstruction. The Church was one of the first priorities; then the houses you see today were gradually rebuilt on their original plots. Several of the better quality houses were rebuilt and enlarged in the late 17th century, using reclaimed material with the addition of stone from the local quarry and Collyweston slates. Thatched cottages continued to be rebuilt during the first part of the 18th century. Probably the only retail shop was a mercer’s, other goods being sold from workshops within or attached to the cottages. These included ironware, shoes, meat and ale. There were further cottage improvements in the 1950s, but architecturally the village has changed very little over recent centuries.

Rockingham School

The Victorian village school rooms (now the Village Hall) were funded by Richard Watson and his wife Lavinia, who often popped in to help with reading and arithmetic. This National School was opened in May 1844 with visiting dignitaries and a church service where the children sang, coached by Lady Lavinia. The congregation then processed down the Main Street to the school decked with flowers and ribbons and a sign welcoming their honoured patrons. After a display of drilling, the 97 children in new hats and bonnets were treated to a sit down meal of cold beef, plum pudding and oranges.

However, Rockingham can boast a very early charity school, founded in 1716, which ran until the end of the century when it seems to have reverted to a Sunday school. Then in 1832 the Watsons reinstated a charity school in the village, which may have been sited in front of the ‘new’ school.

Detail of St Leonards Church, 1729 etching

Rockingham children by the village market cross circa 1944

Rockingham estate map of 1615Main Street captured between the two World WarsRockingham’s School Room c. early 1930s

Rockingham Hall Graphic ref: G+/G-07

Rev #: G

Date: 5 Sept 2013

Size: 297 x 420

Notes: Village Trail leaflet DL 12pp

1. The Old Rectory (built 1862). The date stone initials “HIB” stand for the first rector to live in the house, Harry John Bigge.

2. No. 19a, Shire House (rebuilt 1745) was one of four farms in the village in the 18th century and as the last house in the village lay next to a field called ‘The Shire’.

3. No. 19, The Old Forge (rebuilt 1792) was last occupied with a working forge by Edward W. Barlow who moved there in 1924. The original forge was on the left and the recess in the wall was probably a water trough.

4. No. 18a is the most important vernacular house in the village. It has a number of high status features, including the size of stones at its corner angles. Rebuilt in 1670, the date stone probably bears Edward Watson’s initials.

5. No. 18, lying at the entrance to the Gretton section of the Jurassic Way and the only cruck framed building in the village, is probably the oldest house in the village. It gives an impression of what the earlier houses might have looked like.

6. The site of one of three former horse/water pumps for the village which were supplied by springs above.

7. The former Victorian Post Office and Village Store is dated 1858. The Post Office part closed in the 1970s, the Village Store in the 1990s.

8. This grade II listed Telephone Box is a type K6 kiosk, designed in 1935 by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott and made of cast iron.

9. The Village Hall, formerly Rockingham’s National School, opened in 1844 with 97 pupils from the surrounding areas and closed in 1946. It is available to

hire and hosts a rolling programme of events including the annual village Flower Show which has taken place since the 1851. The Old School House is to the right.

10. The Market Cross was erected when Queen Elizabeth I reissued Rockingham’s market charter in 1600 and was rebuilt in 1894 – see inscription.

11. The Sondes Arms (rebuilt l668) has undergone internal and external changes over the centuries. The pub was frequented by Charles Dickens and Clark Gable and was once part of a national cycle network (see plaque on northern gable).

12. Rockingham Art Gallery was originally a stable with a hayloft above.

13. Behind the Art Gallery and Sondes Arms are the Village Shop & Tea Rooms, in a converted barn and hayloft. The Jurassic Way to Great Easton is accessed next to the Tea Rooms. For a longer, but not circular walk, you can go on to Bringhurst and Cottingham. Where the route crosses the Welland there are the sites of two of Rockingham’s wind and water mills.

14. Cottons Farmhouse is one of the most elegant late 17th century houses in the village. On the ground floor are two large windows altered in about 1800, but the windows on the first floor and the dormers above are original, the slated sides of the dormers being typical of the Queen Anne period. Note also the circular window in the left gable. Like other quality 17th and 18th century buildings in the village the stonework is local ironstone, with stone window frames and chimney stacks of ashlar lime.

15. The ‘Celtic’ head incorporated into the side of no. 8 Main Street is thought to predate the Norman period.

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16. Nos. 8a and 8b served as a baker’s and butcher’s respectively until the 1950s. 8a’s windows were probably altered for the baker’s shop front. The butcher slaughtered cattle at the back of the house and sold the meat from the front room until it closed.

17. Nos. 2-4. These houses originally had thatched roofs but were destroyed by fire during the Second World War when a spark from a passing steamroller caught. As with many of the houses in the village, changes over time to the structure of the houses can be seen in the stone work, for example the raised roofs here.

18. No. 1 was also used as the toll keeper’s house for the bridge to Caldecott. It escaped the fire that affected numbers 2 to 4 so even the little stable to the left is thatched.

19. Castle Farmhouse, the largest farmhouse in the village, is an example of a traditional hall-and-cross wings U shaped house. It has a Collyweston slate roof with unleaded lace valleys to the wings and stone mullioned windows. Its date stone reads ‘READ 1674’, a Latin contraction of ‘REAEDIFICATUM’ meaning ‘Rebuilt’.

20. This Bus Shelter (disused) was erected to mark the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.

21. At this entrance to the Castle Farm’s mainly Victorian farm buildings you can see the blocked archways to an area previously used to store equipment and machinery.

22. Nos. 4a & 4b were erected in the Victorian era as the village gas works. There was once a circular gasometer to the rear. It was converted to these two houses in the late 1940s.

Castle

To Castle Entrance (right at

roundabout)

Church

Hall Car Park

Jurassic Way to Great Easton

Jurassic Way to Gretton

Phone Box

Map key