home page   what's new?   email bobtrubs@indigogroup.co.uk to request updates (please mention Rutland Village by Village) or to offer new information   Rutland Village by Village only WWW Village by Village Ashwell Ayston Barleythorpe Barrow Barrowden Beaumont Chase Belmesthorpe Belton-in-Rutland Bisbrooke Braunston-in-Rutland Brooke Burley Caldecott Clipsham Cottesmore Edith Weston Egleton Empingham Essendine Exton Glaston Great Casterton Greetham Gunthorpe Hambleton Horn Ketton Langham Leighfield Little Casterton Lyddington Lyndon Manton Market Overton Martinsthorpe Morcott Normanton North Luffenham Oakham Pickworth Pilton Preston Ridlington Ryhall Seaton South Luffenham Stoke Dry Stretton Teigh Thistleton Thorpe by Water Tickencote Tinwell Tixover Uppingham Wardley Whissendine Whitwell Wing This site sponsored by   Heart of Albion

Barrowden Barrowden – one of the few village ponds in Rutland. Photograph taken in 2002. Barrowden is on the south-eastern boundary of Rutland, on the north bank of the River Welland. This liminal location is why there were Bronze Age burial mounds, known as 'barrows'. And the village's name simply means 'hill (don) with barrows'. Sadly all the burial mounds have been ploughed away. Viewed nationally, Old English don appears to mean a hill with a summit suitable for settlement. Another example is Hambleton (which was originally Hambledon). Barrowden was in Wrangdike Hundred. The excavation of a medieval building at Main Street Farm in 1998 is described in Rutland Record No.20. the holy well on the boundary A Hallewellescros was mentioned about 1275. It appears in later documents relating to both Barrowden and Seaton, so the well must have been a parish boundary marker. In about 1840 there is also a reference to a St Anne's Close. While it is unusual for saint's dedications to survive so long after the Reformation three hundred years before, there is no other reasonable explanation so we must assume that the holy well was dedicated to St Anne. Indeed it is quite a common dedication, as with the now-lost holy well which gives its name to the St Anne's district of Nottingham. St Peter's Church Barrowden church in 2001. St Peter's church is Romanesque in origin with rather curious proportions – the thirteenth century nave is wide but short. The tower and spire are fourteenth century. It is Grade II* Listed.   The strap hinges on the south door are believed to be late twelfth century; they are similar to those at Brooke. There is graffitti of shoes on top of stone seats in the south porch. In an ancient tradition, rushes or hay are laid on the floors of nave and porch for St Peter's Day, 29 June. There is a monument to Rowland Durant who died in 1588. Marianne Mason (1807–1884), a farmer's daughter who taught at the Baptist Sunday school in Barrowden, married Thomas Cook here on 2 March 1833. attractive buildings around the green and pond Pepperday Cottage, to the north of the church, is late seventeenth century. The village green is overlooked by a number of attractive stone-built houses, including the late sixteenth or early seventeenth century Durant Farmhouse (with its wonderful example of 'polychrome' bands of ironstone and limestone). The Baptist chapel at the east end of the green dates from 1819. A tannery behind the watermill closed in 1885. From about 1914 to 1930 part of the tannery was a large shop and storeroom. During the First World War the main building was used for filling gun cartridges and remained in use for 'packing' until the 1930s. Seemingly it was again used to fill cartridges during the Second World War, after which it was again empty until it became a plastics factory. If this was the first location for Rutland Plastics then it became a factory in 1956. However I have yet to establish if that company started in Barrowden before moving to Oakham, or whether it was a different company operating in the former tannery. Guns are part of Barrowden's history in the nineteenth century as a Mr Tippings operated the smithy on the Green. In addition to a blacksmith's usual work he also made muzzle-loading guns. Tippings Lane is named after him. There was another smithy behind the Exeter Arms. To one side of the green is the pond. Poster for the 2001 Barrowden Duck Race. Barrowden Watermill Barrowden Watermill was a historic mill on the River Welland. Its first mentioned is in 1259 and there are documentary records of structures built in 1637, 1677 and 1688. Most of it was demolished (presumably in the early twentieth century) but on the interior of the remaining wall are incised lines marking the height of major floods, including the 'BF' one in 1705 (BF: 'Big Flood'). A millstone and carved stones from the building are in a garden at the Old Tannery Yard in Barrowden. Wakerley Bridge Wakerley Bridge seen from Barrowby churchyard. There is a fine fourteenth century bridge (later widened) over the River Welland on the road to Wakerley. There is a carved face above one arch which marks the exact boundary between Rutland and Northamptonshire. Curiously this boundary is not in the centre of the bridge. Presumably because it has five arches and each arch needs to be maintained by the same local authority. It is a Scheduled Ancient Monument. Wakerley and Barrowden railway station Barrowden's nearest railway station was across the Welland in Wakerley. Passenger trains ran between 1879 and 1966. It was owned by the London and North Western Railway but from 1883 to 1916 Great Northern Railway services also used the line. More details on Wikipedia. Victoria County History page for Barrowden. Back to top of this page     Back to home page   This website does not gather or store any visitor information. Copyright Bob Trubshaw 2026 No unauthorised copying or reproduction except if all following conditions apply a: Copy is complete (including this copyright statement). b: No changes are made. c: No charge is made. www.hoap.co.uk/rutland

Rutland's history home page what's new? glossary bibliography Rutland's geology Rutland's boundaries Rutland's rivers long, long ago prehistoric Rutland Roman Rutland long ago Anglo-Saxon Rutland Rutland's place-names waterborne transport around the sixth century Rutland's early churches Anglo-Saxon sculpture in Rutland The Matter of Rutland what the Normans did for Rutland Romanesque sculpture in Rutland Rutland's royal forests Rutland in medieval times Rutland's scratch dials Rutland's medieval carvings Rutland's sepulchral effigies Rutland's saltways Rutland in Tudor times Dissolution in Rutland not that long ago Rutland in the 17th century pinfolds and pounds in Rutland dovecotes in Rutland Rutland in the 18th century turnpiking Rutland Rutland's springs and wells changes in Rutland's agriculture since 1800 seems like yesterday Rutland's dialect Rutland's folk customs travellers in Rutland watermills and windmills in Rutland breweries in Rutland gasworks in Rutland ironstone quarrying in Rutland Zeppelins over Rutland redundant telephone exchanges in Rutland Second World War in Rutland WWII airfields and pillboxes in Rutland the making of Rutland Water Rutland Weekend Television free online history resources Victoria County History: Rutland volume one Victoria County History: Rutland volume two free PDFs of Rutland Record issues 1 to 50 old OS maps Historic England Listed buildings database Sepulchral Effigies of Leicestershire and Rutland Open Domesday English Place-Name Society database Wikipedia list of places in Rutland (with links to village entries) Wikipedia list of people from Rutland researching and writing local history getting started free advice from 2005 asking curious questions (YouTube video) local history groups in and around Rutland Belton-in-Rutland History Society Cottesmore History and Archaeology Group Langham Village History Group Lyddington Manor History Society Rutland Local History and Record Society with free PDFs of over forty issues of the Rutland Record Uppingham Local History Study Group you may also be interested in free PDFs written by Bob Trubshaw Earliest Churches in Nottinghamshire How Anglo-Saxons Found Their Way Anglo-Saxon Leicestershire Conversations in Churchyards Little-known Leicestershire and Rutland Bob Trubshaw's YouTube channel Introduction to medieval carvings Anglo-Saxon and Romanesque carvings How Anglo-Saxons found their way Anglo-Saxon shrines at fords Meetings at triangles Rota's Land and Franni's Land Reading Romanesque fonts Church and manor The significances of square headdresses Early churches and waterborne trade Charnwood slate gravestones and C18th trade routes Ironstone quarries of Leicestershire Roman roads in north-east Leicestershire Salt ways in Leicestershire Why Melton Mowbray needed to called 'middle town' Evolving Anglo-Saxon agriculture Nottinghamshire's earliest churches Ploughs not piety? Economic regeneration in the C7th Were Anglo-Saxon weaving huts women-only places? Vale of Belvoir Chronicle Barrowby Until Now website