This is a summary
of the history of the village of Gilberdyke, which today has a population
of over 3,000 people. It was once a tiny farming community on the
edge of the swampy common of Wallingfen and situated alongside Gilbert's
dyke. Below is information about Gilbert Hansard and the dyke, about
Gilberdyke windmills, chapels, the flax mill and the pole yard.
Gilbert's dyke - Gilberdyke
chapels - Windmills - Flax
mill - Pole yard
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photos of Gilberdyke available for order.
Gilbert's
dyke
The site of the village of Gilberdyke was originally
a marshy waste, part of the manor of Howden, granted to the Bishops
of Durham by William the Conqueror. Hugh de Puiset, who was Bishop
of Durham from 1154 to 1190, made several land grants to tenants
in the area on the understanding that they would improve the land.
Between 1154 and 1160 a grant of land was made to Gilbert
Hansard who originated from Walworth Castle in County Durham.
In return for a quarterly payment of three marks (£8 a year)
Gilbert became the hereditary tenant of "the territory of Blacktoft
and the fishery appertaining thereto" apart from the land which
already belonged to William de Blacktoft and the bishopric's own
fishery. More importantly, Gilbert was granted the right to build
a mill on his property and bring water to power it through from
the "land in Foulney". [ie near the River Foulness].
Gilbert Hansard constructed a new water-course
or dyke which ran from east of Hive (Sandholme probably did not
exist then) to the river Ouse at Blacktoft. It was dug by 1191,
since it is referred to in a document of that date as "fosse
of Gilbert Hansard".
By 1399 the dyke was described as 16 feet wide and 8 feet deep.
A settlement developed along the banks of the dyke, in particular
where it crossed the Howden to Cave road. By 1234 the settlement
was known simply as "Dyc". This became extended to "Gilbert's
dyke" and was first recorded as Gilberdyke by 1376. The dyke
itself was probably navigable by small boats.
It ran - and still does-down the west side of Clementhorpe
Road, across the crossroads and alongside Sandholme Road. It continues
down Hansardam [Hanserrdam on some road signs] towards the 'Foona'
[River Foulness].
Above is Clementhorpe Road, Gilberdyke with
'Bunt' Cook's shop on the left.
The nearby settlements of Bellasize, Bennetland and Sandholme also
first appear in the fourteenth century - no doubt as a result of
the improved drainage of the area. The settlement of Scalby is probably
of an earlier date.
The presence of the nearby five thousand acre common
of Wallingfen probably explains why the three arable
fields round the village of Gilberdyke consisted of only a hundred
and fifty acres altogether. These fields were known as North, South
and Middle Fields and were used to grow wheat and barley. However
these grain crops could be supplemented by food from Wallingfen.
The village grew only slowly. In 1539 there were 52 able-bodied
men in "Dyke cum Sandholme". In 1672 there were 58 households
in Gilberdyke and by 1801, there were 64 houses and 337 people living
there.
In 1777 the 3000 acre Bishopsoil Common was enclosed. Laxton
Grange was built - so called because the land on which
it stands was allotted to Laxton in the enclosure of Bishopsoil.
In fact adjoining land is still owned by Laxton Church.
In 1822 Gilberdyke had two carpenters (Thomas Oldfield and John
Ward), two blacksmiths (John Handley and John Wade), a shoemaker
(John Ramsey), a miller (Nathaniel Bell) and a schoolmaster (William
Sharp). Five farmers were listed - Isaac Hairsine, William Lee,
John Pacy, John Rennison and John Waterhouse. Also listed was Joseph
Hutchinson, the landlord of the Cross Keys. William Lawton was the
overseer of the poor.
The Act of Parliament to enclose the open fields around the village
was passed in 1830 and the work was complete by 1833. The surveyor
was John George Weddall of Selby and the Commissioner John Bell
of nearby Portington.
Chapels
Wesleyan Methodist
In 1846 a Wesleyan Methodist Chapel was built north
of the Howden/Hull road. This was converted into a private house
in 1920 and is now known as "Norgill". The present Methodist
chapel was opened in 1893.
 .
This house on the corner of the entrance to
The Peppercorns was once a chapel.
Primitive Methodists
Also in 1846, a Primitive Methodist Chapel was
built just to the north of the village smithy which stood on the
site of the present village hall.
Above is Gilberdyke Primitive Methodist chapel
which was funded by the Walmsley family. Until recently it was Claytons'
agricultural engineers and is now the site of Claytons Fold.
In 1899 a new Primitive Methodist chapel was built
opposite the school. This was later used from about 1940 as an agricultural
merchants by Messrs Clayton. It has now been demolished and houses
built on the site.
Church of England
On April 18th 1855 a combined Church of England
school and chapel was opened between Gilberdyke and Newport, paid
for by the Reverend J. Dunnington-Jefferson who preached "three
powerful sermons" that day. The building was used as a school
[Scalby School] during the week and as a church on Sundays. It became
redundant when the Scalby Board school was built at Gilberdyke [
now a residential and nursing home] in 1895 and Newport Church was
opened in 1899. It is now a private house.
Windmills
Gilberdyke had at least two windmills. The earliest
mill was Bishopsoil Mill which stood on the eastern edge of the
old Bishopsoil common and today is the site of Mill Farm, west of
Thornton Dam Lane. Bishopsoil Mill was originally a post mill. The
mill and Mill Garth were owned by Nathaniel Bell in the early 1800s.
In 1812 it was described as "a post windmill with substantial
dwelling house, brick and tiled, situate at Sandholme".
In January, 1839 there was a terrible storm which
blew down several local mills, including the Bishopsoil one. It
was probably after this that the mill was rebuilt in brick. It was
sold in 1854 to John Jewitt. The mill was sold again in 1865 to
the Morrell family, who also owned Laxton Grange. The mill fittings
were offered for sale in 1893, as were 70,000 bricks. It seems likely
that this was the demolition date of the mill.
The second Gilberdyke mill was built on the east
of Greenoak Lane after the enclosure of Bishopsoil Common. Locally
it is remembered as 'Stather's Mill'. It was built on land which
was allotted to the parish of Bellasize in the 1777 enclosure, known
as Bellasize Green. When the 1851 census was taken Nathaniel Bell
aged 79 years was recorded as living there. He said he was born
there and described himself as a retired miller and farmer. Also
living there was Nathaniel Bell junior, aged 40 who was the existing
miller, with his own family.
In October 1827 Thomas and Robert Bell, aged four
and two years, were both killed by the sails of Gilberdyke mill.
They were living at Scalby and their burials are recorded in Blacktoft
Parish Registers.
Nathaniel Bell died in 1898, but by then the mill was being run
by the Harrison brothers. Some people will remember the Stather
family who were the next owners of the mill.
Above is a picture taken in the Mill yard when
Gilberdyke mill was run by the Bell Harrison family.
Mr Harrison Stather operated the mill, mainly grinding
grain for cattle feed. His son Mr J. Stather, who was the last owner
of the mill, remembers that his father frequently had to get up
in the night to take advantage of the wind, and it was this unreliability
which led to the removal of the sails. The mill was then powered
by a tractor which stood in a shed behind the house. Most of the
grinding was done during the winter months, since the Stathers were
also farmers and worked the land the rest of the year.
The mill building consisted of four storeys. The bottom storey was
the working platform; the second storey housed three sets of grinding
stones; the third storey held the storage bin for the grain and
the fourth storey had a chain and pulley for raising sacks of grain.
The mill began to be uneconomical when farmers began to grind their
own grain and was then closed and later demolished. It was the last
local mill to close, following the Anti-mill and Newport Mill.
From the late nineteenth century the village of
Gilberdyke began to expand and develop as an industrial site. The
flax mill and the pole yard brought new families into the village.
The local
flax industry
Gilberdyke had a flax industry from about the 1870s
until the 1930s. There were flax mills in other local villages before
this time. For example Barmby on the Marsh was
described in1851 as a 'well built village housing two manufactories
of coarse linens' although by the 1870s there was only one sacking
manufacturer, John Solomon Thompson, and by 1892 there were none:
John Thompson was by then a yeoman at 'Spring field house'. At Howden
there was a sacking mill in the 1830s/40s but this closed in 1842
(it was in what today is still called Mill yard).
At Eastrington in 1851 thirteen
men were employed in dealing in flax, dressing it and weaving it
into coarse cloth suitable for sacking. Four men described as ‘flax
dressers’ were locally born, as were the two dealers; William
Turner and Thomas Holmes. The weaving however was done by men from
further afield: John Lazenby, aged 33 was born in Hull, although
his wife, Margaret was from Carnforth. He was a 'master weaver'
and employed six men. The birthplaces of the couple's children suggest
that they spent some years at Rawcliffe and then in the mid 1840s
moved to Butterwick. John Taylor, aged 36, was from Carnforth andhis
wife was from Kendal. Thomas Prush, aged 20 and a 'sacking weaver',
was from Nottingham while another weaver, George Naylor, was originally
from Rawcliffe. William King was from Leicestershire but was married
to a Barmby girl. John Linley, who described himself as a sailcloth
weaver, was from Owston. However by 1861 there was no weaving industry
in Eastrington and no mention of flax.
At Gilberdyke there was no flax industry in 1861 but a few men in
Sandholme and Hive worked with flax. In Sandholme
there were: William Baxter aged 25, a flax dresser born at Apperley
Bridge in Lincolnshire; John Jackson, a flax trader born locally
at Bennetland and John Greensides a flax scutcher born in Sandholme.
In the adjoining hamlet of Hive was William Brown
aged 70, a flax dealer employing one man and three boys and originally
from Bubwith.
Staddlethorpe Flax Mill
The Gilberdyke [a large part of what is today Gilberdyke
was originally part of the settlement of Staddlethorpe] flax mill
seems to have developed in the 1870s. Edward Oliver, the owner,
was a Staddlethorpe farmer in 1871 but by 1881 he was described
as a flax scutcher who was employing 35 men, 10 boys and 27 women.
He lived with his wife Hannah and his son Thomas Blossom Oliver
who was then 28, unmarried and managing the flax mill. There were
also daughters Ann, Marguerite, Hannah and Alice and another son,
William, an engineer..
The main mill building was west of Station Road
and there were scutching rooms, retting ponds, an engine shed, a
large chimney, a joiner's shop and a smith although there were other
storage buildings across the road and a railway track. All that
remains today is the Flax mill pond.
A block of 6 cottages [Flax mill cottages] was
built to house some of the workers on the west side of Station Road.
Some of the families who worked in the flax mill were the Winter,
Coates, Poole, St Paul, Clayton, Nunn, Carroll and Cooper families.
The Staddlethorpe flax mill declined in the early
20th century until the First World war when it was taken over by
the Yorkshire Flax Company and around 300 acres of locally grown
flax was processed. The linen fibre produced was needed for military
purposes and particularly for aeroplane wings. Production continued
after the war but stopped about 1930.
The pole yard
Wade's pole yard occupied the site of the present
Gilberdyke industrial estate. The firm of Richard Wade and Sons
was originally based in Hull on Raven Street. They imported timber
from the Baltic and expanded as the need grew for more sleepers
and telegraph poles. More space was needed and so around 1902/3
they bought the site at Staddlethorpe adjacent to the Hull and Selby
railway. Wade's Creosoting Works began operations in 1905 and several
families were transferred from Hull to the new works. These workmen
included members of the Seaman, Hayward, Exley, Grimoldby, Whitehead,
Freer, Martin, Nicholson, Hunter, Robinson, Simpson and Goodhand
families.
Pole yard workers pictured near Gilberdyke railway
station [then known as Staddlethorpe Station]. The bridge is in
the background.
They were housed in a row of 12 cottages - Wade's
Cottages - and two wooden bungalows on the road to Blacktoft which
were built in 1905/6. Vast numbers of poles arrived by rail every
day [there was a line right into the yard], wet from being in the
Hull timber pond. Sometimes as many as two trains of wagons a day
were teemed into rough stacks and then later stacked upto thirty
feet high to dry out. After about a year they were checked by GPO
inspectors, cut into shape and then creosoted. The creosoting plant
was steam driven and the creosote arrived by rail from Knottingley..
The poles and sleepers remained in the vacuum tank for about an
hour. It was a dangerous business and two men at least were killed
- George Hunter and Clifford Norton - when a stack of poles once
became dislodged.
The yard employed about 50 men but trade began
to decline in the 1960s; the yard closed in 1970.
This picture was taken shortly before the pole
yard closed.
Back: Freddie Nicholson, unknown, Johnson Norton,
Ken Goodhand, unknown, Tommy Goodhand, Fred Featherstone, Arthur
Crisp, unknown, unknown, Ron Goodhand.
Middle: Arthur Jewitt, unknown, Alf Goodhand, ? Thornham, Dick Walmsley,
? Benson.
Front: Jack Kean, Bert Exley, Stan Hayward, unknown, Charlie Seaman,
Stuart Walter, unknown, unknown, George Simpson.
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