| Description | Family and estate papers
Primarily title deeds including marriage settlements and wills relating to property in Barlborough, Whitwell, Clowne, Elmton and Killamarsh, 13-19th centuries.
The estate records include rentals 1868-1916, tenancy agreements 19th century, estate accounts 1722-1729 and 1829-1839, correspondence 1857-1918, Brookhill Hall wages book 1825-1826, labourers wages books 1864-1915 and diaries/account books of agent 1856-1867. There are also repair bills for the Dower House at Barlborough 1767, joiner’s account book for work done for CH Rodes 1806-1814 and plans and correspondence about proposed alterations to Barlborough Hall 1854-1910.
Plans of the Hall and estate 18th-20th centuries include an estate map dated 1723. There are household accounts for 1847.
The collection includes
- deeds and correspondence relating Barlborough advowson 14th-17th centuries, Barlborough tithes 16th-17th centuries and Barlborough enclosure including plans 1798-1805
- deeds and papers relating to Elmton advowson 1603-1650 and Elmton enclosure award 1850
Manorial court rolls survive for Barlborough 1701 and Elmton 1651-1743.
Barlborough civil parish records include overseers of the poor valuation 1800 and survey 1805, expenses 1757-1802 and a census of inhabitants with information aboutoccupations and places of settlement 1790.
There are also financial records relating to the endowed school c1743, a list of Barlborough volunteers 1803 and Clothing Clubaccounts 1867-1894.
Outcounty records include substantial series of title deeds to property in Gateford, Sturton le Steeple and Worksop, Nottinghamshire, 12th-18th centuries, including a plan of Gateford estate 1825. There are some title deeds for property in Yorkshire, Leicestershire and Lincolnshire 16th-19th centuries, as well as copy court rolls for themanor of Hatfield, Yorkshire 1614-1725 and manor court rolls 1663-1665 and estate accounts 1673-1691 for Digby, Lincolnshire.
Coalmining was an important source of income in the late nineteenth century. The records include correspondence and plans 1860s-1890s which reflect the estate’s relationship with Appleby & Co which worked Cottam Colliery in Barlborough.
There are very few personal records reflecting non-estate matters. These include sheriff’s accounts for Derbyshire 1594 and for Nottinghamshire 1600, 1617 and 1671, medical qualifications of Cornelius and Gilbert Heathcote 1718-1719 and papers relating to the clerical career of Revd CH Reaston 1815-1816. |
| Administrative History | The Rodes family, originally from Lincolnshire, came into property in Staveley Woodhouse by marriage in the fifteenth century. Francis Rodes (?1530-1588), a Justice in the Court of Common Pleas, bought Barlborough and in 1583 built Barlborough Hall. He endowed a grammar school at Netherthorpe in Staveley and acquired property in Great Houghton, county of Yorkshire. His son (Sir) John (1562-1639) sold Staveley Woodhouse and made Barlborough the family’s main holding in Derbyshire. John’s son Francis (d. 1645), who was knighted and created a baronet in 1641, brought Gateford and other Nottinghamshire property into the family through marriage. The title became extinct on the death of Sir John (1670-1743), a Quaker who corresponded with William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania. The estate passed to his great-nephew Gilbert Heathcote (died 1768), Gilbert’s nephew Cornelius Heathcote (1755-1825) and Cornelius’ nephew Revd Cornelius Heathcote Reaston (1792-1844), all of whom added the surname Rodes on succeeding to the estate. The estate was eventually inherited by William Hatfield of Hatfield, Yorkshire (1824-1883) who added the surname de Rodes. His grand-daughter sold Barlborough Hall in 1938 to the Society of Jesus for use as a preparatory school (known as Barlborough Hall School) for Mount St Mary’s College at Spinkhill in Eckington (which had been established in 1842). The estate was sold not long afterwards to the Sitwell family of Renishaw. |
| Custodial History | These records were first deposited by Mount St Mary's College in October 1967, May 1981 and July 1986. |