Ecclesall - History

History

Ecclesall electoral ward was created 1934 when the old Ecclesall Bierlow ward was divided into Ecclesall, Broomhill and Hallam.

The boundaries of the ward include about half of the area that was historically known as Ecclesall Bierlow—one of the six 'townships' that made up the old Parish of Sheffield. Ecclesall Bierlow encompassed most of the land between the River Sheaf and the Porter Brook from The Moor to Ringinglow. It also included the areas of Broomhall and Crookesmoor to the north of Porter Brook. Though this area contained numerous small villages and hamlets, there was never a village called Ecclesall.

In ancient times this area was part of the Barnsdale Forest that, together with Sherwood Forest, made up the forest of the Robin Hood legends. The River Sheaf marked the boundary between the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of Mercia and Deira (later Northumbria). In fact the earliest historical record of this area refers to the submission of the Northumbrian army to Egbert of Wessex at nearby Dore in 829.

The name Ecclesall (either from Heeksel-Hallr meaning the witches' hill, or Eccles (church) halh (hollow)) is not mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086—at that time Ecclesall was a part of the manor of Hallam. The name is first found about 150 years later in the name of Sir Ralphus De Ecclesall a knight of the realm who had settled in the area. The De Ecclesall family gave land to the monks at Beauchief and established a corn mill on the river Sheaf, which they subsequently also gave to Beauchief Abbey. Many of the buildings of Ecclesall corn mill can still be seen at the northern end of Millhouses park—the district of Millhouses taking its name from this mill. In payment for the mill the monks of Beauchief were to provide a canon to say prayers daily at the Ecclesall chapel. These services continued at the chapel until the Dissolution of the Monasteries when Beauchief Abbey was abandoned. The chapel was restored in 1622 but was demolished when the present church was built nearby in 1788.

Until the 19th century Ecclesall Bierlow was very sparsely populated—in 1801 there were just 5362 people. This changed with the coming of the industrial revolution and the subsequent expansion of nearby Sheffield and by 1831 the population had increased to 14,239. In 1837 the Ecclesall Bierlow Poor Law Union came into being. As well as Ecclesall Bierlow, this encompassed Nether Hallam, Upper Hallam, Beauchief, Dore, Norton, and Totley. A workhouse was built on Cherry Tree Hill at Nether Edge. In 1929 the Ecclesall Bierlow Workhouse was renamed Nether Edge Hospital and it remained in use as a hospital into the 1990s.

Historic sites within the ward include Abbeydale Industrial Hamlet and Shepherd Wheel (both now museums). Ecclesall Wood has many examples of white coal kilns and the grave of a wood collier who was killed here when his cabin burned down on 11 October 1786.