White's Directory of Nottinghamshire, 1853

Bleasby, Notown, Goverton and Gibsmere

Bleasby is a pleasant but straggling village and parish, on the north bank of the Trent, 4 miles south of Southwell. Its parish, which is all in the liberty of Southwell and Scrooby, comprises the neighbouring hamlets of Goverton, Gibsmere and Notown, and contains 361 inhabitants and 1,468 acres of land, which was enclosed in 1777, when the tithes were exonerated by an allotment of 57a 2r 24p to the vicar, and 20a 1r 10p to the Chapter of Southwell.

The principal landowners are the Archbishop of York, Sir Richard Sutton, bart., the vicar of Strelley, R. K. Kelham Esq., the Trustees of Retford School, Mr. W. Alderidge, Mr. S. Potter, Mr. T. Hind, Mr. Francis Brown and Mr. J. Marriott, the former is lord of the manor. The church is a small structure, dedicated to St. Mary, and its vicarage is valued in the King's books at £4, now £107. The Chapter of Southwell are the patrons, and the Rev. John William Marsh is the incumbent, and resides at the vicarage house, a neat mansion near the church erected in 1843. The curacy of Morton was consolidated with the vicarage of Bleasby in 1841. Bleasby Hall is a neat mansion, the property and residence of Robert Kelham Kelham Esq.

Notown and Goverton are two small hamlets. The former is a quarter of a mile, and the other half a mile north-west of the village.

Gibsmere is a small hamlet about half a mile south of the church, and about a quarter of a mile further is Heaselford ferry, where there is a good inn, near to which the Trent takes two channels, and encompasses an island of 20 acres of land, called the Knabs. The poor have 20s out of the Townend Close, left in 1720 by Elizabeth Crossland.

[Transcribed by Clive Henly]