Worlaby 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

Worlabys' name is defined as 'Wulfric's farmstead or village'. Since 1086 when it was known as Uluricebi or Vluricebi in the Doomsday Book it has also been spelt as Wulfrikeby, Wolrickby and Werliby.

More information can be found in:

• Cameron, Keith. The Place-Names of Lincolnshire.

• Mills, A.D. A Dictionary of English Place Names.

The place

Worlaby is a small village located on the western edge of the Wolds near Brigg. The parish church of St Clement was rebuilt in the 1870s by W Scott Champion but its tower dates to the eleventh century. There are also two chapels; the Wesleyn dates from 1858 and the Primitive Methodist from before 1856.

Close to the church is an almshouse known as Worlaby Hospital. Built in 1663 by Lord Belasyse as, it is thought, a thanks offering for his life being spared during the Civil war when as a Royalist he was imprisoned in the Tower.

Legend has it that there was once a teetotal squire of Worlaby that would not allow an inn in the village. Farmworkers were not to be stopped though from the occasional tipple, and brewed their own beer. They stored it in a well and when they wanted a drink they just went down the well. Villages still go down the well for a drink today, The Wishing Well pub that is which opened in 1964.

Population history

Entry from Kelly's Trade Directory for 1900

Worlaby near Brigg, is a large parish and pleasant village, 2 ½ miles north from Elsham station on the main line of the Great Central (M.S. and L ) railway, 5 north-east from Brigg and 6 south-west from Barton and 4 from Barnetby, in the North Lindsey division of the county, parts of Lindsey, northern division of the wapentake of Yarborough, petty sessional division of Brigg, union and county court district of Brigg, rural deanery of Yarborough No 1, archdeaconry of Stow and the diocese of Lincoln. The church of St Clement, rebuilt in 1873-7, on the ancient site, at a cost of £2,674, defrayed by the trustees of the late T G Corbett esq. is an edifice of stone, in the Early English style, consisting of chancel, nave, aisles, south porch and a western tower with a small spire, containing a clock and three bells: the piers, north aisle window and tower arch are all either Saxon or Norman and were carefully preserved and reset: in the porch there is an ancient tombstone, inscribed to a lady of the time of James I. : the south-east window of the chancel is a memorial to William and Thomas Hesseltine, and was placed by William Hesseltine, of Beaumont Cote, eldest son of the former, and by the daughter of the latter: there is an inscribed stone to John, 1st Baron Bellasyse, of Worlaby, ob. 1689: the church plate includes an ancient cup and cover of hand-beaten silver, dated 1569. The register dates from the year 1559. The living is a vicarage, net yearly value £220, including 11 acres of glebe, with residence, in the gift of Sir Francis e. G. Astley - Corbett, and held since 1895 by the Rev. Arthur Hutchinson Lamb M.A. of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. There are Wesleyan and primitive Methodist chapels here. Here is a well built hospital, founded by John Bellasyse, Baron of Worlaby, in the year 1663, for four poor women; it is a structure of brick, in good preservation, and under the control and direction of the vicar and two trustees; each inmate receives 2s. per week. The property now belongs to the Duke of Newcastle, who has lately (1900) put it in thorough repair. In the centre of the village is a drinking fountain, erected in 1873 by the late Sir John Dugdale Astley bart. at a cost of £100. In 1897 an oak tree was planted on the village green in commemoration of the Queen's Jubilee. Sir Francis E G Astley-Corbett bart. of Elsham Hall, is lord of the manor and chief landowner. The soil of about one-half the parish is of fine chalk subsoil and highly fertile; the other part of the parish, viz. the Carrs, consists of a clay subsoil of rather black nature. The chief crops are wheat, barley, oats and good pastureland. The area is 3,341 acres of land and 8 of water; rateable value, £4,751; the population in 1891 was 540.

Post and M.O.O.& S. B. & Annuity & Insurance Office. (Railway Sub-Office. Letters should have R.S.O. Lincs. added). - George Rowson, sub-postmaster. Letters arrive from Lincoln at 8 am and 3pm; dispatched at 9.10am and 5.15pm. The nearest telegraph office is at Elsham railway station, 3 miles distant.
National School (mixed), erected in 1872, at the sole cost of the trustees of the late T. G. Corbett esq. for 100 children; average attendance, 96; the school was enlarged in1884 to receive 45 additional children; it is supported by the trustees and managed by a committee, consisting of the vicar, churchwardens, overseers and ten parishioners; George Chandler, master.

Carriers to
Barton - George Girdham, Mon.; George Green, Mon. Wed. Fri. and Sat.
Brigg - Geo. Girdham, Thurs.; Thos. Hoodlass Thurs. and Sat.
Hull - Thomas Hoodlass, Tues. and Fri.; Geo Girdham, Tues. and Fri.

Holdings in North Lincolnshire Local Studies Library

• Machin, Nanette. One hundred years of Worlaby school. 1990.
• Machin, Nanette. Worlaby: a miscellany of a North Lincolnshire village between 1870-1970. 1989.

References in the Star Newspaper Index

• Child killed [ASHTON] on level crossing - train LLS 09.08.1902 page 8d
  struck cart.
• Roman bronze coin found LLS 19.11.1904 page 4c.
• 24 year old tame pigeon lays egg SFS 20.05.1933 page 11c.
• Resume of diptheria epidemic earlier in the year SFS 26.08.1933 page 11f.