Melbourne, Derbyshire
From Freepedia
Melbourne is a small Georgian market town in South Derbyshire, England. It is about eight miles south of Derby and two miles from the River Trent.
Melbourne Parish Church has been described as a "cathedral in miniature". Melbourne Hall is open in August to the public and its gardens are open from April to September. Calke Abbey and Staunton Harold Hall are within 3 miles of the town. The nearby villages of Ticknall, Swarkestone, Stanton-by-Bridge, Kings Newton, and Breedon-on-the-hill are also well-worth visiting.
Melbourne hosts an Arts' Festival in September each year.
A brief history
Melbourne has a long and notable history. Its name derives from "mill on the brook". It was recorded in Domesday Book (1086) as a royal manor.
A castle was built here and the licence to crenellate (fortify) date backs to 1311. John 1, Duke of Bourbon, the most important French prisoner taken at the battle of Agincourt (1415), was detained here for 19 years.
Mary 1, Queen of Scotland, was to be imprisoned here but the castle was in too ruinous a condition. By the early 17th it had fallen into decay.
The parish church dates back to the late 11th or early 12th and is exceptional.
The Hall was originally owned by the church and is mainly now 17th and 18th century in construction.
In 1837 a tiny settlement in Australia was named after William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne.
Thomas Cook was born here in 1808.
The town contains many respectable Georgian buildings and in the 19th was a centre for framework knitting and boot and shoe manufacture. Market gardening has always been important here and continues to be so to the present day.
