Flixborough Local History Pack

• The name
• The place
• Population history
• Entry from Kelly's Trade Directory for 1900.
• Holdings in North Lincolnshire Local Studies Library.
• References in the Star Newspaper Index.
• Related websites.

The name

Flixborough has had many different spellings through the centuries, from Flichesburg in the Doomsday Book to Flikesburg, Flyxburgh and Flixburrow. Eminson suggests that the first section of the name is an early form of the word cliff and as the original settlement stood on a sloping cliff overlooking the River Trent the villages name can be translated as 'fortified dwelling on the cliff slope'.

More information can be found in:

• Eminson, T.B.F. Place and River Names of the West Riding of Lindsey, Lincolnshire.
• Mills, A.D. A Dictionary of English Place Names.

The place

The village of Flixborough is situated to the north of Scunthorpe. A famous son of Flixborough is Sir Edmund Anderson who was Chief Justice of the Common Pleas during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.

On the 1st June 1974 Flixborough was at the centre of the UK's worst industrial accident when the Nypro Works was devastated by an explosion. Twenty nine people died and more than 100 were injured with around 100 homes in the village itself being destroyed or badly damaged.

Population history

Entry from Kelly's Trade Directory for 1900

Flixborough is a parish and pleasant village, 3 ½ miles north-west from Frodingham station on the Penistone and Cleethorpes branch of the Great Central (late M. S. and L.) railway, 7 east from Crowle and 21 north from Gainsborough, in the North Lindsey division of the county, parts of Lindsey, north division of Manley wapentake, Winterton petty sessional division, Glanford Brigg union, Brigg county court district, rural deanery of Manlake, archdeaconry of Stow and diocese of Lincoln. Here is a ferry over the Trent to Amcotts, and the Gainsborough and Hull steam packets call here on Tuesdays and Fridays. The old church of All Saints, a very plain edifice of stone, erected in the year 1789, was taken down and rebuilt in 1886, at a cost of £1,710; and is now an edifice in the Late Decorated style, consisting of chancel, nave, south porch and a western belfry of wood, with spire, containing one bell: the church retains a Norman font and a handsome carved oak chancel screen: there are 150 sittings. The register dates from the year 1573. The living is a rectory united with the vicarage of Burton-upon-Stather, joint net yearly value £429, including 163 acres of glebe and two houses, in the gift of Sir B. D. G. Sheffield bart. and held since 1882 by the Rev. Francis Amcotts Jarvis M.A. of Trinity College, Cambridge, rural dean of Manlake and J.P. Lincs. who resides at Burton. A new rectory house was built in 1884 by the rector, and is occupied by the Rev, Peter Tivy Tomkins of St Aidan's, who is curate. About half a mile from the village traces of an old church and the moat belonging to a mansion, formerly, it is believed, the seat of the Anderson family, are still visible: this place is supposed to have been the birthplace of Sir Edmund Anderson, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, who died Aug 1, 1605, and was interred in the church of Epworth, Beds, where there is a monument with effigies to himself and his wife. Here was formerly a Roman settlement. Sir Berkeley D. G. Sheffield bart of Normanby Park, is lord of the manor and principal landowner. The soil is loam, clay, sand and warp; subsoil, various. The chief crops are wheat, barley, turnips, potatoes and beans, and some land is pasture. The area of the township is 2,651acres of land, 72 of tidal water and 17 of foreshore; rateable value, £2,417; the population in 1891 was 242. Parish Clerk, G. Gillatt. Post Office - Samuel Tate, sub-postmaster. Letters arrive through Doncaster 8.15 am and are dispatched 6 p.m. Postal orders are issued here, but not paid. The nearest money order and telegraph office is at Burton-upon-Stather, 3 miles distant. Parish School (mixed) built in 1877, for 80 children; average attendance, 34; Miss Mary E. Ives, mistress.

Holdings in North Lincolnshire Local Studies Library

• House of Commons Parliamentary debate Flixborough Explosion 1974.
• Marshall, V.C. Disaster at Flixborough. 1979.
• Frost, H. Flixborough Wharf. 1951.
• Foster, C.W. Flixborough: Parish Church. 1926.

References in the Star Newspaper Index

• J, Lysaghts Ltd to build wharf SFS 16.01.1937 7a.
• Licence granted for erection of new Inn SFS 12.03.1938 1c.
• First steamer leaves wharf SFS 14.05.1938 16b.