Croxall
Croxall is a parish that was historically in Derbyshire, but is now in Staffordshire, England. Croxall is still very near to the border with Derbyshire. The settlement today is mainly the Church of England parish church of St John and Croxall Hall.Population details for the 2011 census can be found under the civil parish.
History
Croxall is in the Domesday book where it is mentioned as an outlying farm of Weston-on-Trent and listed amongst the lands given to Henry de Ferrers [1] by the King. The land given to Henry[2] included 2 acres (0.81 ha) of pasture that was valued at four pounds.
The lordship of the manor of Croxall was held for several centuries by underlords of the Ferrers, the Curzon family, an early Anglo-Norman family seated at Derbyshire since the 12th century. A Curzon heiress carried the manor and Croxall Hall to the Sackvilles, Earls of Dorset, who in turn conveyed the manor to the Prinsep family, heirs of John Prinsep, an early Anglo-Indian merchant and later Member of Parliament.[3]
On the death in 1849 of Thomas Prinsep, High Sheriff of Derbyshire, the manor of Croxall was inherited by his nephew Thomas Levett-Prinsep.[4] The St John's parish church contains memorials to all four families, as well as the Horton family of nearby Catton Hall, a member of whom (Anne Wilmot-Horton) prompted the poet Lord Byron to write his famous poem beginning with the lines: "She walks in beauty, like the night...."[5]
See also
References
- ^ Domesday Book: A Complete Translation. London: Penguin, 2003. p. 745 ISBN 0-14-143994-7
- ^ Henry de Ferrers held a considerable number of manors including a massive number in Derbyshire given to him by the King. These included obviously Croxall and Edingale which are now in Staffordshire but also Stretton en le Field which is now in Leicestershire.
- ^ Croxall, Derbyshire, Kelly's Directory of the Counties of Derby, Notts, Leicester and Rutland, Published at London, 1891, Genuki.org
- ^ The Old Halls, Manors and Families of Derbyshire, Vol. 4, Joseph Tilley, Printed by Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co., London, 1902
- ^ Guide to Staffordshire and the Black Country, The Potteries and the Peak, Michael Raven, 2004, ISBN 978-0-906114-33-9