An intriguing present

[duckweed]

A lady approached my husband and said
"your wife is a historian would she like some history books I have? "
My husband thinking I probably had enough explained that I was only looking up local history really. Lady comes back with a 300 year old conveyance document and said "would she like this?"

So he comes home with this parchment document in a plastic bag. It is a lease agreement for a piece of land 39 yards square on a road called Shude Hill in the middle of Sheffield between the Duke of Norfolk and a cutler called John Grundy. So now I am trying to establish exactly where this land is.

She just knew it was Sheffield. Her husband brought it home from his law practice. They were chucking things out many years ago (wince)

I am doing the research, putting it on display for a few months and then putting it into the Archives where it belongs.

Anyway what sparked my interest especially is that I had been doing research about a George Blythe from Norton Lees who married and went to live in Shude Hill next to this land John Grundy rented, as next to Grundy is an old piece of land called Shemeld Croft and George lived next to Shemeld Croft. However George lived there in 1628 before Sheffield Castle was demolished and it mentions other lands and people who rented there, so using the 2 together it may give us an idea of Elizabethan Sheffield and possibly even further back. As yet no one knows the exact layout of Sheffield before the 18th century.

There is no drawing of the castle and no map and the castle is buried under shops and markets. Lately archeaology found evidence of a pottery and a very old well not far from the Cathedral dating back to the same time as the Stone Castle was built.

So what a document to be given to me. Last month I was given a book of antique maps by another person who approached my Husband.

 

[leefer]

Hi Duckweed...that is such a nice gesture,must be exiting.

Silly question but when you say the Duke Of Norfolk was that an ancient public house.

 

[duckweed]

Duke of Norfolk Earl of Shrewsbury and Arundel, basically the Lord of the Manor and owner of Sheffield.

 

[leefer]

With you..

I was suprised to learn they were coal mining in the 16th century....think they even had a coliery next to the old Sheffield Manor.

 

[duckweed]

They were mining earlier than that as it is in the Beauchief Abbey records that the monks were mining.

Not sure when the mining started on the manor as the mines go right up to the Manor Lodge buildings and they wouldn't have then, as the Lord was living there and so was Mary Queen of Scots, and there was a huge deerpark which went down to the River and on the other side was the Castle.

There are all these tales of tunnels between the castle and the Manor which is plainly silly from a security point of view as people could have used them to creep up the tunnels into the castle. The tunnels they have found are in fact old mines.