Newark-on-Trent

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Newark-on-Trent
The Market Place in Newark-on-Trent
Newark-on-Trent shown within Nottinghamshire
Population	25,000
OS grid reference	SK801537
District	Newark and Sherwood
Shire county	Nottinghamshire
Region	East Midlands
Constituent country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	NEWARK
Postcode district	NG24
Dialling code	01636
Police	Nottinghamshire
Fire	Nottinghamshire
Ambulance	East Midlands
European Parliament	East Midlands
UK Parliament	Newark
List of places: UK • England • Nottinghamshire

Coordinates: 53°04′29″N 0°48′12″W / 53.0746, -0.8034

Newark-on-Trent (generally shortened to Newark) is a market town in Nottinghamshire in the East Midlands region of England. It is located on the River Trent, with the River Devon also running through the town. Situated at the intersection of the Great North Road and the Fosse Way, Newark originally grew around Newark Castle - now ruined - and a large market place - now lined with historic buildings. According to the 2001 census, it had a population of 25,376, but Newark forms a continuous built-up area with the neighbouring parish of Balderton. The combined population of the two is 35,674.

Newark's position as one of the few bridges on the Trent in the area, its location along the Great North Road, (the A1), and later with the advance of rail transport being at the junction between the East Coast Main Line, and the route from Nottingham to Lincoln has informed its growth and development. Originally a centre for the wool and cloth trade, it industrialised to some extent during the Victorian era, and later with an ironworks, engineering, brewing, and a sugar refinery. It was a major town standing for the Royalist cause during the Civil War, only surrendering finally when Charles I himself ordered it.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Pre Norman history 1.2 Mediæval history 1.2.1 Church of St. Mary Magdalene 1.3 Tudor era 1.4 Stuart era 1.4.1 The Civil War 1.5 Georgian era and early 19th century 1.6 Victorian era 1.7 Recent history 2 Political history 3 Places of interest 4 Churches 4.1 Church of England 4.2 Roman Catholic 5 Transport links 5.1 Railway 5.2 Roads 6 External links 7 References 7.1 Notes 7.2 Bibliography

[edit] History

[edit] Pre Norman history

Newark (Newerca, Nouwerk) owes its origin, possibly beginning in Roman times, to its position on the great Roman road called the Fosse Way, in the valley of the Trent. In a document which purports to be a charter of 664, Newark is mentioned as having been granted to the Abbey of Peterborough by Wulfhere. A pagan Anglo-Saxon cemetery, used from the early 5th to the early 7th centuries, has been found in Millgate, in Newark, close to both the Fosse Way and the River Trent in which cremated remains were buried in pottery urns.^[1]

In the reign of Edward the Confessor it belonged to Godiva and her husband Leofric, Earl of Mercia, who granted it to the monastery of Stow in 1055, who retained its incomes even after the Norman Conquest as came under the control of the Norman Bishop Remigius de Fécamp. After his death it changed to, and remained in the hands of, the Bishops of Lincoln from 1092 until the reign of Edward VI.

There were burgesses in Newark at the time of the Domesday survey, and in the reign of Edward III, there is evidence that it had long been a borough by prescription. The Newark wapentake in the east of Nottinghamshire was established during the period of Anglo-Saxon rule (10-11 centuries AD).

[edit] Mediæval history

The castle was erected by Bishop Alexander of Lincoln in 1123, and the bridge about the same time under charter from Henry I, also St. Leonard's Hospital. He also gained from the king a charter to hold a five-day fair at the castle each year. He gained a charter under King Stephen to establish a mint in the town.

The town became a local centre for the wool and cloth trade, certainly by the time of Henry II a major market was established.

King John died of dysentery in Newark in 1216. Following his death as Henry III tried to bring order to the country the mercenary Robert de Gaugy refused to yield Newark Castle to the Bishop of Lincoln, its rightful owner, leading to the Dauphin of France (later King Louis VIII of France) laying an eight day siege on behalf of the king, ended by an agreement to pay the mercenary to leave.

Around the time of Edward III's death (1377) records of the poll tax show that at that time the adult (over 14) population of Newark was 1,178, excluding beggars and clergy, making it one of the larger towns in the country at that time.

[edit] Church of St. Mary Magdalene

The church of St. Mary Magdalene, one of the largest parish churches of England, is notable for the tower and the octagonal spire (223 ft. high) by which it is surmounted. The central piers remain from the previous church, dating from the 11th or 12th century. The upper parts of the tower and spire were completed about 1350; the nave dates from between 1384 and 1393, and the chancel from 1489.

The sanctuary is bounded on the south and north by two chantry chapels, the former of which has on one of its panels a remarkable painting from the Dance of Death. There are a few old monuments, and an exceedingly fine brass of the 14th century. There is a hole in the spire which was supposedly made by a cannon ball during the Civil War, although there is some doubt locally as to the truth of the story. This hole is visible from some parts of the town centre.

[edit] Tudor era

In 1457 a flood swept away the bridge over the Trent and, although there was no legal requirement for anyone to replace it, the Bishop of Lincoln, John Chaworth, financed the building of a new bridge, built of oak with stone defensive towers at either end.

Following the break with Rome in the 16th century, the subsequent establishment of the independent Church of England, and the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Henry VIII had the Vicar of Newark, Henry Lytherland executed when he refused to acknowledge the king as head of the Church. The dissolution affected Newark's political landscape heavily, and even more radical changes came in 1547 when the Bishop of Lincoln exchanged ownership of the town with the Crown. Newark was incorporated under an alderman and twelve assistants in 1549, and the charter was confirmed and extended by Elizabeth I.

[edit] Stuart era

Charles I, owing to the increasing commercial prosperity of the town, reincorporated it under a mayor and aldermen, and this charter, except for a temporary surrender under James II, continued to be the governing charter of the corporation until the Municipal Corporations Act 1835.

[edit] The Civil War

During the English Civil War, Newark was a mainstay of the royalist cause, Charles I having raised his standard in nearby Nottingham. It was attacked in February 1643 by two troops of horsemen, but beat them back. The town fielded at times as many as 600 soldiers, and raided Nottingham, Grantham, Northampton, Gainsborough, and others with mixed success, but enough to cause it to rise to national notice. At the end of 1644 it was besieged by forces from Nottingham, Lincoln and Derby, the siege was only relieved in March by Prince Rupert of the Rhine.

Parliament commenced a new siege towards the end of January 1645 following more raiding, but this was relieved by Sir Marmaduke Langdale after about a month. Newark cavalry fought with the king's forces which were decisively defeated in the Battle of Naseby, near Leicester in June 1645.

The final siege began in November 1645, by which time the town's defences had been greatly strengthened. Two major forts had been constructed just outside the town, one, called the Queen's Sconce, to the south-west and another, the King's Sconce to the north-east, both close to the river, together with defensive walls and a water filled ditch 2¼ miles in length, around the town. In May 1646 the town was ordered to surrender by Charles I, which was still only accepted under protest by the town's garrison. After the surrender most of the defences were destroyed, including the castle which was left in essentially the state it can be seen today.

[edit] Georgian era and early 19th century

Around 1770 the Great North Road around Newark (now the A1) was raised on a long series of arches to ensure it remained clear of the regular floods it experienced. A special Act of Parliament in 1773 allowed the creation of a town hall next to the Market Place. Designed by John Carr of York and completed in 1776, Newark Town Hall is now a Grade 1 listed building. In 1775 the Duke of Newcastle, at the time the Lord of the Manor and a major landowner of the area, built a new brick bridge with stone facing to replace the dilapidated one next to the castle. This is still one of the major thoroughfares in the town today.

A noted advocate of reform in the late 18th century at Newark was the local-born printer and newspaper owner Daniel Holt (1766-1799). He was imprisoned for printing a leaflet advocating parliamentary reform and selling a Thomas Paine pamphlet. An account of his life by Alan Dorling is in the Nottinghamshire Historian journal, spring/summer 2000, pages 9-15 and further details in the autumn/winter edition of 2003, pages 8-12.

J.S. Baxter, who was a schoolboy in Newark from 1830 to 1840, contributed to The hungry forties: life under the bread tax (London, 1904), a book about the Corn Laws: "Chartists and rioters came from Nottingham into Newark, parading the streets with penny loaves dripped in blood carried on pikes, crying 'Bread or blood.'"

[edit] Victorian era

The Victorian era saw a lot of new buildings and industry, such as Independent Chapel (1822), Holy Trinity (1836-37), Christ Church (1837), Castle Railway Station (1846), Wesleyan Chapel (1846), The Corn Exchange (1848), Methodist New Connexion Chapel (1848), W.N. Nicholson Trent Ironworks (1840s), Northgate Railway Station (1851), North End Wesleyan Chapel (1868), St. Leonard's Anglican Church (1873), Baptist Chapel (1876), Primitive Methodist Chapel (1878), Newark Hospital (1881), Ossington Coffee Palace (1882), Gilstrap Free Library (1883), Market Hall (1884), Unitarian Chapel (1884), The Fire Station (1889), Waterworks (1898) and the School of Science and Art (1900). Most of these buildings can still be seen today.

These changes and the other industrial expansion that went with them saw the population of the town grow from under 7,000 in 1800 to over 15,000 by the end of the century.

[edit] Recent history

The current population of Newark is around 25,000.

The clothing, bearings, pumps, agricultural machinery, and sugar refining were the main industries in Newark in the last 100 years or so. There have been many factory closures^{[citation needed]}, especially since the 1950s, as with much of Britain's manufacturing industry. The largest single employer is a bearings factory (part of the NSK group) with around 800 employees. Another notable employer in the town is Laurens Patisseries, part of the UK's largest food group Bakkavör, claims to be the largest cream cake manufacturer in the UK.

Breweries in the town in the 20th century included James Hole and Warwicks-and-Richardsons.

With its pleasant environment, including the surrounding villages, and its good transport links, the town is becoming a popular commuter town for the expanding city of Nottingham (around 20 miles away) and even increasingly for London (1 hour and 20 minutes by rail). Newark is also home of Newark Rugby Union Football Club, which has produced past players such as Dusty Hare, John Wells and Tom Ryder.

[edit] Political history

Main article: Newark (UK Parliament constituency)

Newark returned two representatives to the Unreformed House of Commons from 1673. It was the last borough to be created before the Reform Act. William E. Gladstone, later Prime Minister, was MP for Newark in 1832, and re-elected in 1835, 1837 and 1841 (twice), but possibly due to his support of the repeal of the Corn Laws and other issues he stood elsewhere after that time.

Recently, Newark elections have been central to two interesting legal cases. In 1945, a challenge to Harold Laski, the Chairman of the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party, led Laski to sue the Daily Express when it reported him as saying that Labour might take power through violence if defeated at the polls. Laski vehemently denied saying this but lost the libel action.

In the 1997 general election, Newark returned Fiona Jones of the Labour Party. The defeated Liberal Democrat candidate questioned her election expenses and the police investigated and eventually prosecuted. Jones and her election agent Des Whicher were convicted of submitting a fraudulent declaration of expenses, but the conviction was overturned on appeal. Had the conviction stood, Jones would have been disqualified from Parliament.

Newark's current MP is Patrick Mercer, Conservative. Mercer held the position of Shadow Minister for Homeland Security from June 2003 until March 2007, when he was forced to resign following racially contentious comments made to The Times.^[2]

[edit] Places of interest

• Newark Museum
• Millgate Museum of Folk Life
• Newark Air Museum
• Newark Castle
• The Market Square
• Buttermarket
• St. Mary Magdalene
• Newark Cemetery
• Riverside (Trent)
• The Queens Sconce

[edit] Churches

[edit] Church of England

• St. Mary Magdalene, in Market Square
• Christ Church, on Boundary Road
• St. Leonard's, on Lincoln Road

[edit] Roman Catholic

• Holy Trinity Church, is the parish church for Newark-on-Trent. Mgr. B. Dazeley is the parish priest.

[edit] Transport links

[edit] Railway

Newark has two railway stations linked to the national network. The East Coast Main Line runs through Newark North Gate railway station providing links to London, Leeds, Newcastle upon Tyne and Edinburgh. The Newark Castle railway station lies on the Leicester - Nottingham - Lincoln line providing cross country regional links. These two lines cross on the level, which is the only such crossing in Britain.^{[citation needed]} A grade separation is proposed, but no money has been found for it at present.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Roads

The A1 and A46 roads have bypasses around Newark.

The A17, Newark to King's Lynn, Norfolk

The A616, Newark to Huddersfield, Yorkshire

The A617, Newark to Chesterfield, Derbyshire

[edit] External links

• Thoroton Society bibliography Comprehensive bibliography
• Newark Town council official web site.
• Newark Advertiser, Newark's local newspaper.
• Boundary Sound, Newark's local radio station.
• Virtual Newark, Panoramic tour of Newark-on-Trent.
• Heartof Newark, Guide to Newark's niche retailers and independent shops.
• Venues & Events, A Comprehensive list of local attractions.

[edit] References

[edit] Notes

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.

[edit] Bibliography

A comprehensive bibliography for Newark is available at the Thoroton Society website.

v • d • e Ceremonial county of Nottinghamshire Unitary authorities Nottingham Boroughs or districts Ashfield • Bassetlaw • Broxtowe • Gedling • Mansfield • Newark and Sherwood • Rushcliffe Cities and towns Arnold • Beeston • Blidworth • Carlton • Cotgrave • Eastwood • Hucknall • Kimberley • Kirkby-in-Ashfield • Mansfield • Mansfield Woodhouse • Newark • Nottingham • Rainworth • Retford • Ruddington • Stapleford • Southwell • Sutton-in-Ashfield • West Bridgford • Worksop See also: List of civil parishes in Nottinghamshire