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CALKE, Derbyshire - Extract from National Gazetteer, 1868

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The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland - 1868

[Description(s) from The National Gazetteer (1868)]
"CALKE, (or Caulk) a parish in the hundred of Repton and Gresley, in the county of Derby, 4 miles to the N. of Ashby-de-la-Zouch station on the Burton and Leicester branch of the Midland railway. Derby is its post town. The parish lies on the edge of Leicestershire, and was the site of a priory of the Augustine order, founded before 1161, and endowed by Ranulph Earl of Chester, and his wife Maud. It was subsequently made a cell to the priory of Repton. Lead is found in the parish.

The living is a donative curacy in the diocese of Lichfield, value £34, in the patronage of Sir John Harpur Crewe, Bart. The church, dedicated to St. Giles, is a handsome Gothic structure with embattled tower, and elegant Gothic windows of cast-iron, erected by Sir George Crewe, Bart., in 1826, on the site of the former structure. In the interior is a marble monument, with the busts of Sir John and Lady Harpur. Calke Abbey, the seat of Sir John Harpur Crewe, was erected at the beginning of the 18th century. It is a noble mansion, surrounded by a park of 500 acres, well-stocked with deer. Harpur's Hospital, at the neighbouring village of Ticknall, is open to the inhabitants of Calke."

[Description(s) from The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868)
Transcribed by Colin HINSON ©2003]