White's Directory 1853

Woodborough

Woodborough is a large, straggling village, in a narrow vale near the Dover Beck, 8 miles north-east by north of Nottingham. The parish comprises 852 inhabitants and 1,940 acres of land. The common was enclosed in 1798, when 252 acres were allotted to the three prebendaries of Oxton and Woodborough, 66a 1r 1p to William Taylor Esq., and 53a 3r 11p to the late John Bainbridge Storey Esq., in lieu of the great tithes and their manorial claims, they being both impropriators and lords of the manor, which is now in three divisions called the Prebendal, the Copyhold, and the Freehold estates. The latter now belongs to William Taylor Esq.

The hall was anciently the residence of the Strelleys and Bainbridges, and is now the seat and property of Mansfield Parkyns Esq. The church is a large structure, dedicated to St Swithin, and has some fragments of ancient armorial glass in its windows which, when perfect, was exceedingly beautiful. It is a curacy, and has been augmented with Queen Anne's Bounty. The Chapter of Southwell is the patron, and the Rev. Samuel Lealand Oldacres is the incumbent. The Baptists, Methodists and Primitive Methodists each have a chapel here. The Free School, founded by the Rev. Montague Wood in 1736, now possesses a yearly income of £95, arising from a farm of 38a 2r 1p at Blidworth, and a cottage and 7a 1r 31p at Stapleford. The poor have 20s, and the singers 20s, yearly, from the bequest of William Edge in 1796, and the former have 50s yearly as the rent of the Nether Close, in Calverton parish, which was awarded to them at the enclosure. The feast is on the Sunday after the 2nd of July.

[Transcribed by Clive Henly]