Spilsby

Spilsby is a market town and civil parish in the East Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England. The town is adjacent to the main A16, east of Lincoln, north-east of Boston and north-west of Skegness. It lies at the southern edge of the Lincolnshire Wolds and north of the Fenlands.

The town has been a rural market town for more than 700 years. It has changed little in size since the beginning of the 19th century. The town centre includes a range of small supermarkets,traditional newsagents, baker, butchers, jewellers and clothing stores, together with public houses, cafes and fast-food takeaways.

At the centre of town is an open square or traditional market place, from which the four main town streets radiate. Markets take place on a Monday. As Spilsby is located within a predominantly agricultural area, much of the market produce consists of locally grown vegetables and meat.

The population of the town was 2,336 in the 2001 census, increasing to 3,045 at the 2011 Census.

History

Early history The area has been occupied by humans since prehistoric times. Evidence for this can be found at nearby West Keal, where an Iron Age hill fort and defensive terraced earthworks were built at the tip of the Wolds promontory, overlooking the present town.

The Spilsby area was visited and occupied by the Romans during the 1st century and held by them until the 4th century AD. During the 1960s, an archaeological dig and field walk at nearby Keal Cotes, in a large field south of the village (where the A16 meets Hagnaby Lane), discovered tessellated mosaic floor tiles and roof tiles. These indicated that a substantial Roman villa or high-status Romano-British farmhouse once stood on the site. The recorded finds from the site are stored at the Museum of Lincolnshire Life in Lincoln, Lincolnshire. In 1849 six Roman funeral urns were dug up in nearby Fulletby.

Spilsby was probably named before or no later than the 9th-century period of Danish rule, which had extended for centuries. It derives from the term Spila's-by, where by is old Old Norse for "place of dwelling". Hence, it meant "Spila's village", Spila (pronounced "Spiller") having been the local Viking warlord or chieftain, who acted as head of the immediate area. The town was recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as "Spilesbei". In 1082 it was not much more than a large farmstead and a few surrounding crofts under the squireship of the Bishop of Durham.

In 1255 a charter was granted to a John de Beke (or John Beck) to hold a weekly market in Spilsby each Monday and a three-day annual fair in July.Graham Platts, Land and People in Medieval Lincolnshire (History of Lincolnshire), Vol. 5, 1985 Four years later, in 1259, the same John de Beke was granted a further charter to hold a three-day Christmas fair from 5–8 December. The next recorded charter to hold a weekly Monday market in the town and an annual fair in July was granted in 1302 to the Lord of the manor, Norman noble Robert de Willoughby. A copy of this charter is in the parish church.Graham Platts, Land and People in Medieval Lincolnshire (History of Lincolnshire, Vol. 5, 1985

At the east end of the town centre's marketplace stands a medieval buttercross monument. The architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner suggests that the Spilsby Buttercross dates from as early as the 14th and certainly no later than the 16th century.Pevsner, Nikolaus; Buildings of England – Lincolnshire The stepped bases of these monuments were used by early traders on market day to display their goods, usually milk, cheeses and butter.

Standing in the centre of the marketplace is the Old Town Hall. More recently it has been used as a store and petrol station. In the 18th century the town civic offices, a small courtroom, and the town gaol, were in the upstairs level supported by the arches. The ground level was an open covered space used as the local corn exchange and for stalls by market traders that were protected from the weather.

The Manor of Eresby An oft-repeated historical myth is that the Manor of Eresby, including the lands and parish of Spilsby, was awarded to Walter de Beke, sometime after 1083, by William the Conqueror. This myth is one of several generated in the writings of William Dugdale. However, the Domesday Book of 1086 shows that the manor of Spilsby was held in 1086 by the Bishop of Durham (St Cuthbert's) as both Lord and tenant-in-chief. The only Domesday entry for Walter of Bec is as Lord of Singleborough, under Walter Giffard, the tenant-in-chief.

Other sources indicate that another Walter de Bec, who may or may not be related to the aforementioned Walter, married Agnes of Tattershall, daughter of Hugh, son of Pinco FitzEudo. She brought Spilsby, and the Manor of Eresby, with her, those lands being gifted to her by William I."The Battle Abbey Roll: With Some Account of the Norman Lineages, Volume 1", Catherine Lucy Wilhelmina Powlett, Duchess of Cleveland 1889

The manor was held by the Beke family until the male line died out, leaving Alice, the daughter of John Beke, 1st Baron Beke of Eresby, and the sole heiress of Walter, 2nd Baron Beke de Eresby, her brother who died in about 1310. The manor passed to Robert de Willoughby by way of his father William de Willoughby's marriage to Alice de Beke in about 1254.Eresby Manor The Willoughby family originated in nearby Willoughby in the Marsh. In 1313, Robert was summoned to parliament as the first Baron Willoughby de Eresby, a family line that continues to the 28th Baroness Willoughby de Eresby.

The original manor house from the 14th century stood near the site of the later mansion. It was probably demolished when the new manor was built. During excavations in the mid-1960s, fragments of the earlier dwelling were discovered. Many examples of medieval and post-medieval pottery shards were recovered from the site of the Eresby Manor's moat by archeologist E. H. Rudkin in 1966."Pottery Finds at Eresby", English Heritage

The new Eresby manor house was built by Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk, in 1535. He acquired the property after marrying his ward, the fifteen-year-old Catherine Willoughby, daughter and heiress of the William, 11th Baron Willoughby de Eresby.

In 1769, the Manor House was destroyed by fire during the stewardship of the 19th Baron, who was also Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven. It is believed that a carpenter accidentally started a fire with his candle while he was working in the roof space. A 1771 plan shows that the house was built in an 'H' shape. The plan also shows details of the grounds, which included an orangery, cherry orchard, bowling green, dovecote, and an ash grove, all near to the house. The Manor House had originally been moated, but by 1771 the moat had been adapted as an ornamental fishing lake.

The Church of England parish church of St James is built of the local Spilsby green sandstone. Parts of it date from the late 14th century, although it has been much added to over the centuries. The church has important funerary monuments. The greenstone is a soft and porous stone that absorbs water. The church was recased in Lancaster stone. It can seat a congregation of around 750. The parish churchyard was closed to further burials when it ran out of available space in 1884.

To mark his inheritance of the title in 1349, the 3rd Baron, Sir John de Willoughby, built a private chapel on his estate. Dedicated to the Holy Trinity, it was endowed with collegiate status, with a master and up to twelve priests. When the head of the family founded the King Edward VI Grammar School in 1550, the school initially had no school building. The twenty or so children were taught in the Eresby chapel building for the next sixty years.

The Willoughby family provided a school house in 1611, by converting an agricultural building on the edge of the estate. In 1839 the school house of 1611 was replaced by a new school building that was constructed on its current site, with funds provided by the 25th Baron, who was the first Earl of Ancaster.

The site of the Manor House was partially excavated in the mid 20th century by archaeologist and folklorist Ethel Rudkin.

Bolingbroke Castle Bolingbroke Castle was built in the nearby parish of Bolingbroke after 1220 by Ranulph de Blondeville, Earl of Chester and Earl of Lincoln. Henry de Bolingbroke, later to become King Henry IV at the age of thirty-two, was born at Bolingbroke Castle in 1366.

The castle was much damaged during the English Civil War and, after the nearby Battle of Winceby in October 1643, only the lower sections of the outer walls remained. The last standing section of the castle, the gatehouse, collapsed in 1815.

Bolingbroke's original walls, also constructed of Spilsby greenstone, were in an irregular hexagon, with round towers on five of the corners. The gatehouse consists of two towers built about 3 yards apart. Leading to a portcullis further inside was a drawbridge that spanned the moat. The moat encircled an area about 87 yards in diameter. The six walls were 6½ feet wide and varied in length from long. There was a small priest door in the rear wall just above the moat water line. The castle garrison was supported and supplied by an important market village outside the castle walls. It included several small farms, a friary and salmon lakes, two mills, and the chantry church of St. Peter & St. Paul.

Gunby Hall

According to the dated keystone on the west doorway, Gunby Hall was built in 1700 by Sir Henry Massingberd. The mansion still stands in several acres of landscaped and wooded parkland, including gardens containing a blue gazebo. Locally born Poet Laureate Alfred, Lord Tennyson described it as "an English home... all things in order stored and a haunt of peace". The original words, written in his own hand, are framed and preserved in the hall's library.

During the Second World War, the Air Ministry attempted to build an airfield at Gunby that would have covered the estate and necessitated demolishing the mansion. The then-owner, Field Marshal Sir Archibald Montgomery-Massingberd, personally appealed to King George VI. The Air Ministry relented, redrawing the plans that resulted in building RAF Spilsby further south at Great Steeping. The runway eventually ended only a few yards short of the Gunby estate boundary hedge.

Gunby Hall was one of the first major British mansion houses and estates to be presented to the National Trust in 1944. It is open to the public on limited days of the week during the summer, while remaining a private family residence for the remainder of the year.

Hundleby Hundleby was an ancient parish that fell within Spilsby. It has not changed greatly in size or layout for the past two hundred years. The village population in 1801 was 218, and in 1901 it reached a peak of 528, mostly agricultural farm workers and their families. By 1971 the population had fallen to 439. It has remained fairly stable ever since with only minor fluctuations."Hundleby", Vision of Britain

Hundleby's Anglican St Mary's parish church was rebuilt between 1853 and 1855, and seated around two hundred parishioners. The parish had a long-standing right to send three children to the Raithby parish free school. Hundleby's elementary school was built around 1860 and was enlarged in 1884 to accommodate up to 120 children.

Grace Swan Memorial Cottage Hospital was built in Hundleby during the late 19th century as a 25-bed in-patient facility. It was split between charity and private fee-paying wards, with its own operating theatre, maternity unit and resident surgeon. Closed by the local health authority as part of a rationalisation programme during the 1990s, the building is now a local health centre.