Darley Dale

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For other Darleys, see Darley
Darley Dale

Image:087882 cf786e35-by-Roger-May.jpg
Church at Darley Dale.
Darley Dale (Derbyshire)
Darley Dale

Darley Dale shown within Derbyshire
Population 5,167(Parish)
OS grid reference SK270632
Parish Darley Dale
District Derbyshire Dales
Shire county Derbyshire
Region East Midlands
Constituent country England
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town MATLOCK
Postcode district DE4
Dialling code 01629
Police Derbyshire
Fire Derbyshire
Ambulance East Midlands
European Parliament East Midlands
UK Parliament West Derbyshire
List of places: UK • England • Derbyshire

Coordinates: 53°09′58″N 1°35′46″W / 53.166, -1.596

Darley Dale, also known simply as Darley, is a town in Derbyshire, England, with a population of around 6,000 people. It lies north of Matlock, on the River Derwent and the A6 road.

Contents

[edit] History

A Benedictine Abbey was built here under the reign of Henry I[1] in the twelfth century.

The town grew in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries around the lead mining and smelting industries. It is also a commuter town for workers in Matlock.

Between Darley Dale and Matlock is the Cawdor Quarry which supplied stone for Hyde Park Corner and the Thames Embankment in London.

[edit] Famous people

Famous people associated with Darley Dale include

[edit] Notable buildings and attractions

Notable buildings in the town include its fourteenth century parish church St. Helens, with a yew tree which is thought to be two thousand years old. The south transept has a stained glass window by Burne-Jones and William Morris. Other attractions include the Peak Rail railway which runs from Rowsley South to Matlock via a station at Darley Dale and the Whitworth Park, a large park located next to the railway.

It was the winner of the 2003 Britain in Bloom, in the category of 'Large Village'.

There is a bi-annual arts festival, the Darley Dale Arts Festival, held in July in odd-numbered years.[4]

In nearby Two Dales, Ladygrove Mill was built for spinning cotton by Abraham Flint, but converted to flax spinning in 1789 by Daniel Dakeyne of Knabb House. It was expanded by his sons, Edward and James, who built a series of three dams on the Sydnope Valley rising to 96 feet. To cope with the water pressure, they invented a revolutionary water-pressure powered "disc engine", which they patented in 1830 as the Dakeyne hydraulic disc engine[5][6]. It was the progenitor of a type, now known as a "Nutating disc engine" (which has been the subject of entrepreneurial interest in the 21st century). The mills and equipment have virtually disappeared but the remains of the dams can still be seen.

At the bottom of Station Road lies Darley Dale railway station. Although national rail services ceased in the 1960s, the station has been for over 15 years occupied by the railway and heritage preservation group Peak Rail. From here, a heritage steam service operates south to Matlock and north to Rowsley South, with a route distance of approximately five miles.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Pigot and Co's Commercial Directory for Derbyshire, 1835
  2. ^ Tom Chambers' biography at IMDb accessed June 2007
  3. ^ Whitworth bought Stancliffe Hall and supplied four six-ton blocks of stone from its quarry, for the lions of St. George's Hall in Liverpool. He endowed the Whitworth Institute, where the hospital was later founded in memory of his wife.
  4. ^ The bi-annual Arts Festival
  5. ^ "The Romping Lion" - The story of the Dakeyne Disc Engine by Phil Wigfull
  6. ^ [1] Inventors - The Romping Lion, Peakland Heritage site

[edit] External links

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