Laneham
Laneham is a village and civil parish on the banks of the River Trent in Bassetlaw District in Nottinghamshire, England. The population of the civil parish at the 2021 census was 392. It is due west of Lincoln and east of Retford.
Geography
The Parish of Laneham had a total population of 279 people at the 2001 census, at the 2011 census was 312 people, and in 2021 the count grew to 392, approaching the 410 people who lived in the village in 1851. The parish covers an area of, and includes the two settlements of "Town" Laneham and "Church" Laneham, separated by the village beck and a short stretch of low-lying ground. The eastern boundary is formed by the River Trent. Prior to 1884, the parish included of land used for parture on the eastern bank of the Trent, but most of this was transferred to the parish of Kettlethorpe. Communication to the east was once easier, as a ferry crossed the river here until 1922. The ferry had a very long history, since a list of stock held by the manor in 1388 included two gangways, which were used by passengers boarding the ferry. The last known ferryman was William Johnson.In earlier times the parish suffered some flooding from the Trent and the village beck, but the situation was improved by an Act of 1768–9 which set up drainage commissioners who were to protect Laneham and several other villages from flooding and improve the drainage of the land.
Periodic flooding by the Trent caused problems with the supply of fresh water for drinking from wells. This led to the unusual arrangement where wells at Church Laneham were sunk into the top of the flood bank.
Infrastructure
There are a number of listed buildings in the village, including Manor Farmhouse, with three bays and two storeys, built in the early 19th century, and Binge Farmhouse, with five bays and two storeys, together with a basement and garret, built in the middle 18th century. Willow Tree Cottage is a single-storeyed 18th-century building with three bays and an attic, while Willow Tree Farmhouse is an L-shaped building, consisting of a 17th-century gable-ended wing and a 19th-century wing. As a result of the influence of the enclosure movement, the village prospered, and this is reflected in the substantial farmhouses and the well-ordered field system surrounding the village. Laneham was enclosed by an act of Parliament, the Laneham Inclosure Act 1772, the 12th year of George III's reign; the enclosure involved 1,073 of the parish's then. Enclosure was first mentioned in October 1767, but it was another five years until an act of Parliament was obtained. There was local opposition to the idea of enclosure, but it is unclear how many people were involved, as the opposition is listed as property on which it was assessed, and consisted of nine messuages and cottages, 83 acres of enclosed ground, 129 acres of open arable and meadow, and 52 beastgates. No breakdown of who owned this property exists.The village had three public houses: The Butchers Arms, The Ferryboat, and the Ring o' Bells which stood on the site of the present senior citizens' bungalows. The Ferryboat Inn continues to operate as a free house in Church Laneham under new ownership following a period of closure in 2019. A village hall makes use of the former school building. The Parish Church of St. Peter remains open, and is a grade I listed building. Various parts were constructed in the 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th centuries. It was restored in 1891, and the porch was renovated in 1932. The church is the focal point of Church Laneham; it is built on a small knoll above the river and contains a large, elaborate alabaster memorial to Ellis Markham and his son Jervase, which dates from 1636.
A small, disused Methodist chapel still stands in the village. A Laneham Methodist congregation was first recorded in the Society Book of the Epworth Circuit in 1799. The chapel was erected in 1834, and renovations to it were carried out in 1884.
Church Laneham has two caravan sites. Manor Park which has a residential park home & holiday static caravans operating from March to the end of October. Trentfield Farm caters for Caravans, Motorhomes & Tents. This is a popular site with families with its close proximity to Lincoln, Sherwood Forest, Clumber Park and Sundown adventureland.
Laneham formerly had a wharf adjacent to the ferry steps. It used by the packet boats Robin Hood and Little John which ran from Gainsborough-Nottingham until the 1840s. Other loads being sent from the wharf included cheese. It was also used to deliver materials for Rampton Asylum in 1912.
Schools
Laneham had a school in Tudor times since biographical records indicate that Gervase Markham attended it for four years before going to Cambridge. A Government report of 1809 said there was no school in the village but by 1832 a street directory recorded the presence of a schoolmaster Thomas Wildman. The Government report of 1835 listed two daily schools, one for boys with 28 pupils and one for girls with 20 pupils; both of these were fee-paying. In the early 1830s a Mrs Lackenby ran a girls' boarding school; she sued for non-payment of fees and lost. In 1844 a school was built at Dunham-on-Trent to serve five parishes.In 1853 John Pickwell, later described as 'farmer and carrier', was stated to be the occupier of a three-acre orchard but also a 'school room, garden and outbuildings.' Pickwell later lived at White Villa in Rampton Road.
There was no school in the 1860s, when local children were having to go to Dunham, as is the case now. The village school opened in September 1899 and closed in December 1965. Its pupil numbers were considerably swollen during the Second World War with 27 pupils and two teachers from Great Yarmouth, who arrived in June 1940, and 16 pupils with one teacher from Birmingham who arrived December 1940. One of the Yarmouth teachers was married at Laneham church. From 1936 until closure the headteacher was Miss S D Ashton, who returned to re-open the building in its new guise as the village hall in 1975.
Charities
Information about village charities is displayed in the church and hall. The Laneham poor charity has existed since at least 1700. In that year four Laneham men 'surrendered' a close of about two acres, the revenues of this being used to feed the poor of the parish. Every three years this land was put up for rental on Easter Monday, yielding around £11 6s a year in 1827. The money was paid to the Overseer of the Poor who then commissioned a village baker to provide two shillings worth of bread every Sunday, to be given out as penny and twopenny loaves at the Church. This only cost £5-5-0d a year, so the rest was used to buy coal for the poor.During the 1820s the Overseer was also receiving 13s from the occupier of three closes in Laneham which belonged to the Vicar of Applethorpe, but no one knew how this arose. More money came from the bequest of William Skelton, who had left £20 for the poor of Laneham. Half of this had been 'vested' in a Rampton farmer, Elizabeth Draper, who paid 10 shillings a year interest; the other half was vested in John Popple, who paid nothing until his death in 1815 when Mrs Anne Warrener took the capital and started to pay out. A woman called Sarah Fillingham also left a close called Clay Half to provide 20 shillings a year for distribution to 'honest widows'.
The population of the village in 1811 was 337, and in 1815, 25 of these were officially "poor", representing 7.42 per cent of the population. This was slightly higher than the 6.96 per cent average for Nottinghamshire at the time.
Archbishop of York's estate and palace
The archbishops of Canterbury held Laneham Manor from an early date, certainly by the time of the 1086 Domesday Book, when 100 acres of pasture at Newton were said to belong to the Archbishop's manor. One who seems to have benefited was William of Laneham who was on the Archbishop's staff in the early 1200s and became Archdeacon of Durham by 1224. William was Prebendary of Bole by 1212 and Archdeacon of Durham by 1224 but in October 1243 'some men were imprisoned at York under suspicion of being concerned in his death.'King Henry III stayed at Laneham on 3 October 1255 and King Edward I on 15–16 April 1303. Edward then travelled by boat to Beverley.
Thomas de Corbridge, Archbishop of York, decided to spend the summer months in his residence at Laneham in July 1303, to which he presumably travelled by water. However, while staying in the village he became ill and died on 22 September. He was known as a hard-working archbishop and was still handling his business until five days before his death. His body was taken to Southwell for burial, presumably again by water, with most of his final journey being via the Trent. The archdiocese of York properties of Laneham, Scrooby and Askham were leased to Samuel Sandys by his father, Archbishop Sandys, just before his death in 1588 and reputedly on advantageous terms.
Samuel Sandys, who lived in Worcestershire, seems likely to have leased the manor house, some land called The Hades, a fishery, and two 'ferry passages on the Trent' to John Wastnes. In 1601 John Wastnes brought a case against Sandys.
During the Parliamentary era in 1647 the Manor of Laneham was sold to Robert Sweete and Anthony Markeham for £647, though such sales were commonly negated after the Restoration. The Sandys family retained an interest in the Laneham manor for several generations and in 1663 it was held by John Sandys 'of Laneham' and Francis Sandys 'of Scrooby.' There are old references to the remains of a moat from the palace, but these were apparently ploughed out in the 1970s.
Archaeological studies have considered how 'Town Laneham' was laid out by the archbishops as a commercial venture. It has been suggested this involved realigning the main road through the area as Main Street. Evidence of a former road way can be seen alongside the public footpath which connects Rampton Road with Broadings Lane, immediately behind Top Farm.