New release: GOOLE, A PICTORIAL HISTORY, VOL. 4 by Susan Butler.
Now available from local shops and to order online.

Keep up with local history news and information in the area on my blog - East Yorkshire History

Howden, an East Riding market town

By Susan Butler and Ken Powls

Paperback, 140 pages, ISBN 0 9515498 2 0. Published 1994.

Cover Illustration: Highbridge, by Frances Hutchinson

Howden is a town with a long and fascinating history. The story of the development of church and town from Anglo Saxon times until 1900 is told by Susan Butler and Ken Powls, two local historians whose families have long lived in and around Howden.

The people mentioned in Howden's story are many and varied: from 'Saint' John who sat up in his coffin in the church, to Prince John who spent Christmas at Howden; from Thomas Ward, a Howden boy who became a baron, to the girl from Howden Hall who wrote secret letters to her lover next door.

There are chapters on Howden's hermit, on the treatment of the poor, on the town's part in the struggle between Cromwell and King Charles and on stagecoaches and railways.

The history of each of Howden's 28 inns is described in detail and many local families feature in the chapters on Victorian shopkeepers.The story of Howden is that of an ordinary East Riding market town - but one which was owned for centuries by the Bishops of Durham and which once hosted the biggest horse fair in England. Almost 40 maps, drawings and photographs illustrate the text.

Unfortunately this book is currently out of print.