Gainsborough, Lincolnshire

The place-name Gainsborough first appears in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle of 1013, as Gegnesburh and Gæignesburh. In the Domesday Book of 1086 it appears as Gainesburg: Gegn's fortified place.[6] It was one of the capital cities of Mercia in the Anglo-Saxon period that preceded Danish rule. Its choice by the Vikings as an administrative centre was influenced by its proximity to the Danish stronghold at Torksey.[7]

In 868 King Alfred married Ealhswith (Ealswitha), daughter of Æthelred Mucel, chief of the Gaini, whence the town gets its name.[8][9]

Historically, Gainsborough is the "capital that never was." Towards the end of July 1013, the Dane Sweyn Forkbeard and his son and heir Cnut (Canute) arrived in Gainsborough with an army of conquest. Sweyn defeated the English opposition and King Ethelred fled the country. Sweyn was declared King of England and returned to Gainsborough. Sweyn and Cnut took up high office at the Gainsborough Castle on the site of the present-day Old Hall, while his army occupied the camp at Thonock (now known as Castle Hills).[9] However, Sweyn died, or perhaps was killed five weeks later in Gainsborough. His son Cnut established a base elsewhere. So Gainsborough was named as capital of England and of Denmark for five weeks in the year 1013.[10]

Cnut may have performed his unsuccessful attempt to turn the tide back in the River Trent at Gainsborough.[11] Historians believe he may have been demonstrating on the aegir, a tidal bore. He and his supporters may have known Gainsborough was the furthest reach of the aegir, and ideal for his demonstration. However, the story was only written down a century later by Henry of Huntingdon, who gives no location, and it may have been a myth or a fable.

The Domesday Book (1086) records that Gainsborough was exclusively a community of farmers, villeins and sokemen, tenants of Geoffrey de Guerche.

The Lindsey Survey of 1115–1118 records that Gainsborough was held by Nigel d'Aubigny, the forebear of the Mowbray family, whose interest in Gainsborough continued until at least the end of the 14th century.

A weekly market was granted by King John in 1204.

Thomas Burgh acquired the manor of Gainsborough in 1455. He built Gainsborough Old Hall between 1460 and 1480, a large, 15th-century, timber-framed medieval strong house, and one of the best-preserved manor houses in Britain. It boasts a magnificent Great Hall and strong brick tower. King Richard III in 1483 and King Henry VIII in 1541 both stayed at the Old Hall. The manor was sold to the Hickman family in 1596.

The town was garrisoned for the King in January 1643 and began cooperating with the garrison at Newark in raiding the surrounding countryside and harassing Parliamentarians there. With the Great North Road blocked to Parliamentarian traffic, Gainsborough became significant as part of a route around Newark by way of Lincoln and the line of the modern A15 road. It was in Royalist interests to obstruct this, which gave rise to battles at Gainsborough and Winceby. Parliament captured Gainsborough in the battle on 20 July, but it was immediately besieged by a large Royalist army and forced to surrender after three days.

Parliament captured Gainsborough again on 18 December 1643, but had to withdraw in March 1644, razing the town's defences to prevent their use by the enemy. The Earl of Manchester's army passed through Gainsborough in May 1644 on its way to York and the Battle of Marston Moor.

After the Civil War ended in 1645, several people in Gainsborough were fined for Royalist sympathies, including Sir Willoughby Hickman, 1st Baronet at the Old Hall, who had been created the first Baronet of Gainsborough by Charles I in 1643.[12]

All Saints Church, Gainsborough

The first record of a church at Gainsborough is in 1180, when the rectory there was granted by Roger de Talebu to the great Preceptory of the Knights Templar in Lindsey, at Willoughton. In 1547, following the English Reformation, the parish of Gainsborough came under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Lincoln for the first time.

The medieval Church of All Saints fell into disrepair after the Civil War. In 1736 it was demolished to make way for a new parish church completed in 1748 in a mix of perpendicular Gothic and Classical Revival styles. All that remains of the medieval church is the west tower, 90 feet high with a ring of eight bells. A monument to Richard Rollett, master sailmaker on Captain James Cook's second voyage, is located in the porch.[13] All Saints' remains the main parish church of the town.

The town's rising 19th-century population called for a second church in the south of the town; Holy Trinity Church opened in 1843. This was followed by St John the Divine Church in Ashcroft Road in 1882, and St George's Church in Heapham Road in the 1950s. Holy Trinity closed in 1971 and is now the Trinity Arts Centre. St John the Divine church was closed in 2002 and it is now used for a cafe and community centre.

Non-conformism flourished in Gainsborough. It has often been claimed that some of the Mayflower Pilgrims worshipped in secret at the Old Hall before sailing for Holland to find religious freedom in 1609; no historical evidence for this has been found, whereas the congregation of John Smyth that met in the town developed into the Baptists and some returned to England. The John Robinson Memorial Church in Church Street was dedicated in 1897; the cornerstone was laid by Thomas F. Bayard, US Ambassador.[14] Now the United Reformed Church, it was named in honour of John Robinson (1576–1625), pastor of the "Pilgrim Fathers" before they left on the Mayflower.

John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, preached in Gainsborough several times between 1759 and 1790. The town's first Methodist chapel opened in Church Lane in 1788, moving to a new site in North Street in 1804, and rebuilt there as St Stephen's in 1966. The Primitive Methodists set up in the town in 1819, with chapels in Spring Gardens (1838), Trinity Street (1877) and Ropery Road (1910). St Thomas's Church in Cross Street caters for the town's Roman Catholics.[7]

Gainsborough suffered its only large-scale air raid of the war on the night of 10 May 1941. High-explosive bombs and incendiaries were dropped, but many fell harmlessly on the surrounding countryside. There was only minor damage in the town and no casualties.

On the night of 28–29 April 1942 a single Dornier 217 dropped a stick of bombs on the town centre, causing extensive damage and the loss of seven lives. On 31 December 1942, a RCAF Bristol Beaufighter aircraft on a training exercise crashed on Noel Street, killing both airmen and a three-year-old girl. On 22 May 1944 a RAF Spitfire fighter, in a training exercise, collided with a Wellington bomber and crashed into a Sheffield-bound goods train as it was passing over the railway bridge on Lea Road. The pilot was the only casualty.

In the early hours of 5 March 1945 a single Junkers 88 fighter/bomber made a low-level attack over the town, dropping anti-personnel bombs on Church Street and the surrounding residential area. Three people died and 50 houses were damaged.[15]

There was a proposal to develop Gainsborough as a new town linked to Sheffield, but the plan was not pursued. New housing was instead built to the south-east of Sheffield.[16]

The Guildhall, former offices of the West Lindsey District Council

The town was before 1974 in the Gainsborough Urban District in the county of Lindsey. West Lindsey District Council was formed from five former councils. Gainsborough Town Council was established in 1992, and in the same year Gainsborough's first mayor was appointed.

Sir Edward Leigh has been Gainsborough's Member of Parliament (MP) since 1983.

In July 1958, BP discovered oil at Corringham, then at Gainsborough in January 1959.[17]

Gainsborough has a long history of industry. It was the manufacturing base of Marshall, Sons & Co., a boiler-maker founded by William Marshall in 1848, who died in 1861 and was buried in the cemetery in Ropery Road. His business became one of the joint-stock companies run by his sons James and Henry. It occupied the 16-acre Britannia Ironworks, the biggest in Europe when built. Marshall's Works' steam engines were sold worldwide until it closed in the 1980s.[7] The site is now split among various companies. Tesco in Beaumont Street and Dransfield's occupy about nine acres; the remainder is held by local companies.

Entrance to Marshall's Yard, 2008

Tesco, on the corner of Trinity Street and Colville Terrace, demolished much of the works to create its store some twenty years ago. It had intended to replace their current store with a 100,000 sq ft (9,300 m²) Tesco Extra store on stilts, with parking beneath, but these plans were scrapped. Dransfield remodelled about nine acres (36,000 sq. m) of the site to include a shopping area and a new heritage museum. The site Marshall's Yard opened during Easter 2007, with additional shops opening after that.

There is a Morrisons branch in Heapham Road South, and Co-ops at Morton by Gainsborough and on the site of the Jack and Jill pub by St Georges Community Hall.

Another area of Gainsborough industry is Rose Brothers,[18] named after William German Rose and Walter Rose, the co-founders. In 1893 William Rose invented the world's first packaging machine. Two years later it bought the Trentside Works site and started to expand into many other areas, producing items such as starch, razor blades and sweets such as Cadbury's chocolates, its name appearing on the Roses selection. The firm produced seaside rock-making machines, cigarette-making machines and bread-slicing and wrapping machines. When it closed, A. M. P. Rose bought the confectionery packaging side.[7]

By the east bank of the Trent near the railway bridge is a large mill owned by Kerry Ingredients (headquartered in Tralee).

Gainsborough is the home of two of the largest importers of jokes and novelties into the UK: Smiffy's (formerly known as RH Smith & Sons, founded in 1894),[19] and Pam's of Gainsborough, a smaller firm founded in 1986. Smiffy's were the only wigmaker left in the UK until December 2008, when bulk production moved to the Far East and over 35 jobs were lost. The firm has set its future goals on a more mature fancy dress and party market.

Another local business is Eminox, founded in 1978. It started by building replacement exhausts for the local bus company, then expanded into manufacturing large stainless steel exhaust systems for buses and commercial vehicles. It also builds low-emission catalytic systems for the London low emission zone.

The town has two railway stations on different routes. The main station is Gainsborough Lea Road in Lea Road (A156) in the south of the town, serving the Sheffield-Lincoln and Doncaster-Lincoln lines with mainly hourly services to Lincoln, Sheffield and Doncaster. Sheffield services generally call at Retford, Worksop and Sheffield only, then continue towards Leeds. The other station is Gainsborough Central near the town centre. It serves the Brigg branch line and is the terminus of an hourly service to and from Sheffield on Mondays to Saturdays, calling at all stations. On Saturdays there are three services to Cleethorpes via Brigg and Grimsby Town.

Where the railway crosses the Trent, the four lines come together at two junctions on either side of the river. The lines from Lincoln and Cleethorpes meet at East Trent Junction, east of the river. Those from Sheffield and Doncaster meet at West Trent Junction on the opposite side in Nottinghamshire.

West Burton Power Station is three miles (4.8 km) to the south-west of the town, next to the Sheffield-Lincoln Line.

The town bus station in Hickmen Street has frequent services on Monday to Saturday, but no Sunday services. Most town routes are served by Stagecoach. Two local services connect the uphill area of the town and Morton to the town centre, one running clockwise, the other anti-clockwise. The town has a connection hub with hourly services to Lincoln, Scunthorpe and Retford and a service to Doncaster every two hours. These serve several villages along the route. Other bus services run during school terms.

River Trent in Gainsborough, 2009

Gainsborough is claimed as the British port furthest inland.[23][24] It has had a long history of river shipping trade.

There is still one wharf, but ships no longer navigate this far up river. Commercial shipping remains further down the river at Gunness Wharf, Grove Wharf and Flixborough Wharf, which has direct rail links. This leads to some to argue that Goole, 23.7 miles (38.1 km) to the north of the town, is now the most inland port in the UK.[25][26]

At the A631 Trent Bridge, there was a ferry before 1787, a distance of 235 feet. The bridge was completed for £12,000 in the spring of 1791, but it meant that taller river traffic of the day could no longer go further upstream. Originally a toll bridge, it was bought by the Ministry of Transport, Lindsey County Council, Gainsborough Urban District and Nottinghamshire County Council for £130,000 in 1927 and declared toll-free on 31 March 1932.[7]