Source:Souvenir Programme
More than twenty-one different ways of spelling Wickersley have been found in various existing documents covering some seven centuries. The present spelling first appeared in 1587. A tradition, for which no evidence has been found, maintains that it means ‘the witches’ field.’ In the time of Edward the Confessor the two landowners in Wickersley, Aldene and Esten, by name, were described as holding land worth forty shillings, but the parish appears to have been laid waste by William the Conqueror, (doubtless because of stubborn resistance) so that when he came to bestow it as part of the Lordship of Tickhill it was waste land of no value. He gave it to his niece Judith and from her it was held by de Busli, Lord of Tickhill.
When the de Wickersley family came into possession is not quite clear, but Roger Fitz Turgis. the first lord of Bentley the founders of Roche Abbey is referred to in one as Richard de Wickersley - so taking the family to the reign of Stephen. This Richard or Roger have built and endowed a church in Wickersley and the endowment was confirmed by some of his successors. A deed of the thirteenth century and another dated 1315 mention the family as benefactors of Wickersley Church and a later Roger de Wickersley made his will in 1471, during the Wars of the Roses, directing that he should be buried in the Lady Chapel of Wickersley Church. He probably built the second church here, his tombstone (in the centre aisle nowadays) shows that he died on the 24th May, 1472 and clearly indicates his coat of arms which has been copied as the crest on the memorial tablet for the War of 1939-45. The only other relics of this church are part of the tower one bell and a stone coffin traditionally supposed to be that of himself.
The manor of Wickersley remained in the family of that name for about four centuries after which it passed through many hands.
One of our sixteenth century lords was Robert Swyft of Broomhall, Sheffield, who was a member of the famous deputation which besought Queen Mary on 8th June, 1554 to restore to the church certain property confiscated by Edward IV. The success of this visit led to the foundation of the Sheffield Church Burgesses.
In the seventeenth century the manor had passed to Francis Leake, later Lord Deincourt, who was created Earl of Scarsdale by King Charles during the civil war.
The manor changed hands quickly during the eighteenth century. William Sylvester held it together with Mexborough and it passed on to Thomas Gilbert, a captain in the service of the East India Company, and then to Mrs. Reve, the wife of a London doctor.
The holder in 1810 was George Rooke of Langham, Essex, distinguished nationally In connection with the siege of Gibraltar and locally by the fact that his daughter Charlotte married a young clergyman, the Rev. John Foster, who was Rector of Wickersley for fifty-nine years.
In the year 1841 the manor became the property of William Warde-Aldam, the great grandfather of Lt. Col. J. R. P. Ward-Aldman, the present holder.
The church registers, almost continuously in good condition, go back to the reign of the first Queen Elizabeth and on this royal occasion it is a coincidence worth noting that the first baptismal entry (February 10th, 1567) relates to a child named Margaret and the second to one Elizabeth (October 2nd, 1568).
From 1231, probably earlier, the rectors of Wickersley were appointed with few exceptions by the Prior and Convent of Worksop until the Monasteries were dissolved by King Henry VIII. The first recorded rector was appointed in 1240 and the present one is the thirty-fifth in succession.
It is not known how many rectories there have been. Part of the present house was built In 1657 by the Reverend Desired Warren to replace an earlier house destroyed by fire. Part of this house was demolished and the main portion of the existing rectory built on to the remainder by the Reverend John Foster in 1804. The later additions were effected by the Rev. F. Freeman about 1889.
Most of the fifteenth century church was demolished and the existing nave built by the Rev. John Foster in 1834 as part of his campaign for the development of the quarrying industry. There were stone-masons in Wickersley in the seventeenth-century but the great days of our local industry were from about 1830 until the outbreak of war in 1914 which was one of the factors putting an end to an extensive export trade. The chancel was added to the church by public subscription in the time of the Rev. F, Freeman (1886).
The latest major restoration was carried out in 1951-52. The upper portion of the tower with its battlements and pinnacles being renewed and the bells tuned and re-hung. Two of these bells bear eighteenth century dates but the inscriptions on the third, which proved to be a pre-reformatlon design, were not easy to decipher. The kindly offices of an expert enabled the problem to be solved. The founders’ mark shows that it came from the same foundry as the famous bell in the Guildhall at Lincoln and a Latin inscription states Given in the time of me John Elcock. John Elcock came here as rector in 1438 (two years before the invention of printing) and this bell must therefore have been hung in the tower of Roger de Wickersleys fifteenth century church, It was 120 years old when it tolled a warning of the approach of the Spanish Armada and it had hung in the tower 510 years when it an nounced the birth of Prince Charles, Duke of Cornwall on a November night in 1948.
There must be some fascinating history behind our old houses such as the as the Old Hall, the Moat Farm, which may have some connection with the monks of Roche Abbey, the Grange and a fragment of stonework said to be all that is left of the Manor House of the de Wickersleys. What is now the social club used to be an old coaching house under the curious name of The Needless Inn. It then became a farm house and the farmer must have been one of one of the earliest Methodists in the parish. The first Methodist Sunday School was held in his kitchen which was also licensd for marriages. The first Methodist place of worship proper was Woodside Church built in 1828 and followed by the methodist church in Bawtry Road twenty years later which was enlarged in 1874.
The Wickersley Christian Institute is almost unique in its curiously interesting history and its notable service to the village, was built in 1862 by Dr. Holt Yates.
Perhaps the latest interesting landmark in our village history was the collection of the last toll at Brecks Toll Bar at midnight on November 1st, 1879.
Re reference to George Rooke above;
He is not the Admiral
Rooke who took Gibralter- that was Sir George Rooke (1650 – January 24, 1709), English naval commander, born near Canterbury.
The Yorkshire manors of Mexborough and Wickersley and buildings and lands in Richmond and Swinton, were all in the Reeve family at least since the beginnng of the 18th century; Captain Kater was Lord of the Manor from 1822 until 1839. Webmaster