Rotherham The Unofficial Website An unofficial website about the Town and Borough of Rotherham

Stuart Rotherham

The Stuart monarchs, James I, Charles I, Charles II, James II, William III and Mary II, and Anne ruled Britain from 1603 to 1715, except for a break from 1649 to 1660 when the Commonwealth was in charge.

By the time James I came to the throne Protestantism was firmly established in Rotherham. I have found little evidence of Catholic sympathies, worship or indeed persecution in the area though doubtless there was some. As the century progressed the town appears to have become more Puritan in outlook. In 1652 the Quaker, Elizabeth Hooton, was arrested for preaching to the congregation leaving the Parish Church. At one time even the vicar Luke Clayton was a dissenter until he was replaced with another who would toe the party line. In 1662 he was imprisoned for refusing to observe the Act of Uniformity and after his release returned to the town to help establish the Non-Conformist Cause.

The parish church of All Hallows was the most dominant feature of the town. To ensure that the murals which had once decorated the interior walls didn't grin through, the inside of the church was regularly limewashed. At the top of High Street were the gates leading to the church and the beautiful stone-built rectory, which in 1684 bounded the churchyard on the west side. The church bells chimed out loudly over the town announcing the hours of the day and the regular services: they cost an absolute fortune to keep in order.

The Town Hall was such a lath and plaster building of two storeys with a colonnade running around it. In front of the Town Hall was a square containing the Market Cross, the stocks and the pillory. The weekly market was held there. I expect that the buildings of the old College Of Jesus, reported as decaying in 1590 decayed a good deal more in the 17th Century. Most of the buildings in Rotherham were of the same timber frame construction.

In 1616 Earl of Shrewsbury who owned much of Rotherham died and as he had no sons the title passed to a distant branch of the family. His lands and property however were left to his three daughters. I'm not all all sure I have the property settlement right but the Talbot estates in South Yorkshire seem to have gone to Mary Talbot (died 1649) and her husband the Earl of Pembroke (died 1630): there were no children. This then went to Mary's younger sister Alethea, widow of Thomas Howard Earl of Arundel and Surrey who died in 1646. After Alethea died in 1654 her estate was involved in a long court battle over reparations to the Commonwealth government but it eventually passed to her grandson Thomas Howard, later Duke of Norfolk. Much of the Rotherham and Kimberworth areas therefore passed under to the control of the Howards including the churches and manors. The Howard family were the grandees of Rotherham for a very long time.

During the Civil War Rotherham was divided like most parts of the country between King and Commonwealth. The mayor was a Royalist but much of the town seemed to have held Roundhead sympathies. Citizens from the town and schoolboys from the grammar school got involved on the Roundhead side in some very unseemly skirmishes. These led to more unseemly fines which I suspect the town could ill afford. I don't expect that they got the money back when the Parliamentarians won and came to power but I'll bet that they had a good try. During the war and its aftermath the town of Rotherham and the surrounding area went through a period of depression and local trade suffered

In 1639 Leonard Copley and his associates leased various sites including the Holmes and Kimberworth. Although there had been small-scale mining of iron ore and smelting of pig iron in the Rotherham area since Celtic times, this was the beginning of large-scale iron production in Rotherham. For more visit onsite at The History of Rotherham >> Trade & Industry in Rotherham >> Iron & Steel >> 17th Century Iron & Steel.

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