Here you will find the archive of all my published blogs.
-
The mystery of Fin Cop
Fin Cop lies on the route of the Portway, about two kilometres north of Ashford in the Water. It is perched on a headland high above the sharp curve in…
-
Waterloo sunset?
In an age of instant news, when an election result in the USA is available instantly on our phones, it’s hard to imagine a time when news of events even…
-
Mr Brown’s girls
By 1878 the painter Ford Madox Brown, at the age of 57, was suffering from severe gout, that classic Victorian ailment. His wife and model Emma had become alcoholic, probably…
-
The Clarion call
The invention of the safety bicycle in the late nineteenth century created the possibility of leisure travel for working-class people. Derbyshire and the Peak District, close to the industrial cities…
-
Uphill work in the Dale
The importance of public rights of way – both footpaths and bridleways – in England is shown by the tremendous effort expended on settling disputes when these routes are challenged.…
-
Canal competition
For thousands of years goods had to be carried by roads, and a horse and cart could move about a ton of stone or coal. But with industrial growth in…
-
Comfort at the crossroads
Roman military dominance depended on its well-known road system, which not only allowed troops to move quickly, but also allowed messengers to ride rapidly with news or orders. To accommodate…
-
Comings and goings at Haddon
Haddon Hall, near Bakewell on the River Wye is such a remarkably well-preserved late medieval house it has been irresistible to film makers. Firebrand, the story of Henry VIII and…
-
Driven by drovers
Well into the twentieth century herds of cattle or flocks of sheep were a common feature of rural roads. Even after the coming of the railways, farmers often had little…
-
On the road – in style
Although few people could have predicted it, in 1900 thousands of years of horse-drawn transport were coming to an end. Since the Bronze Age horses had provided the fastest means…
-
Fixing a hole …
Repairing holes in roads must have been one of the worst jobs in the pre-industrial world. Courbet was not the only artist attracted to the subject: his pair of stone…
-
The name of the bridge
Whatstandwell must be one of the more bizarre place names in Derbyshire, mispelt on some old maps as ‘Hotstandwell’. In fact it commemorates Walter (Wat) Stonewell, who lived near the…
-
Derby at the crossroads
This early plan of the town of Derby, drawn about 1760, shows how small the town was 250 years ago. The central area is framed by the Derwent to the…
-
All you ever wanted to know about paths
Jack Cornish is Head of Paths at the Ramblers, which must be an excellent qualification to write on the subject. His recent book, The Lost Paths, sets out to be…
-
What’s in a name?
There are several ‘portways’ in England, such as the route over the Long Mynd in Shropshire, but the Derbyshire Portway seems to be the longest and the best-researched. The route…
-
Romantic Buxton?
Arnold Bennett’s masterpiece, The Old Wives’ Tale, published in 1908, is set in the mid-nineteenth century, and tells the contrasting stories of two sisters, Sophia and Constance. The latter spends…
-
Peripatetic post people!
In the age of electronic messaging it is easy to forget the revolution in communication caused by the introduction of the penny post in 1840. This novel system of using…
-
Millstoned
The stone I found in my local woods recently is typical of the thousand-odd millstones scattered around the Peak District – and are used as a symbol for the National…
-
Come back, Blind Jack
John Metcalf, known as ‘Jack’, was a pioneer road builder in Yorkshire and Derbyshire, despite being blind from the age of six. His remarkable career began in 1717, when he…
-
Rambling around Ryknild
Ryknild Street was the only long-distance Roman road that crossed Derbyshire, coming from Lichfield to the camp at Little Chester and then on to Chesterfield. Part of its route is…
-
Leashaw: A road to nowhere?
Road building in Derbyshire can be fraught, especially on steep-sided valleys. At times roads become too expensive to maintain, as happened with the road below Mam Tor, which was abandoned…
-
Down Ashover way
These unusually colorful figures on the Babington tomb at Ashover are a reminder of a long-distance packhorse route that can be traced as far as Wirksworth to the west. Ashover…
-
Reading the stone
The Wirksworth Stone must be one of the most remarkable examples of sculpture from the Saxon era in England. Discovered in 1820 face down, buried under the church floor, it…
-
Highways and Byways in Derbyshire – a good read
Macmillan published the first book in their Highways and Byways series in 1898 and, remarkably, the last in 1948; a total of nearly 40 titles covering most of Britain. All are…
The Old Roads of Derbyshire 