Neepsend
Encyclopedia
Neepsend is a suburb of the city of Sheffield
, it stands just 1 miles (1.6 km) north east of the city centre. The main area of Neepsend covers the flood plain of the River Don from Lady's Bridge
at the Wicker
up to Hillfoot Bridge. The adjacent district of Parkwood Springs is often regarded as part of the suburb.
language, with the word "nypr" meaning a peak, the "end" part was added as Neepsend lies in the Don valley at the termination of a high ridge which descends from Shirecliffe and over Parkwood. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Place Names gives the word "Nipa" as of Swedish and Norwegian origin and means a crag or steep river bank. In a 1297 subsidy roll the suburb was referred to as Nipisend and in 1637 as Nypysend.
of the Sandbed Tilt Company
was constructed on the Don just upstream from Hillfoot Bridge. Further development continued when the Neepsend Tannery
was opened in 1821, the 1853 OS
map showing the Neepsend Tavern and a brewery on Rutland Road. The adjacent Kelham Island
district was one of Sheffield’s most important early industrial areas it now houses the Kelham Island Museum
. In the second half of the 19th century, Neepsend was changed radically by the population explosion of Sheffield as in 1852, Neepsend Gas Works, one of the area's most famous landmarks, was built by the newly formed Gas Consumers Company.
The neighbouring district of Owlerton
was supplied with gas by the rival Sheffield United Gas Light Company, and eventually an amalgamation solved any problems between the two companies. The Neepsend Rolling Mills were established in 1876, just downstream from Neepsend Bridge, and produced crucible steel
for the cutlery industry. After being demolished, it was the subject of an archaeological dig in 2003 before apartments were built on the site. Other industrial heritage buildings in the area are the Globe Works
and Cornish Place
, which have been converted into offices and apartments respectively while the Green Lane Works
are at present disused.
In December 1845, the Sheffield, Ashton-Under-Lyne and Manchester Railway
opened, and Neepsend was a key point on the line with Neepsend engine shed
being built to supply and overhaul locomotives for the nearby Sheffield Victoria railway station. The Neepsend shed even built a number of locomotives for the line. The Parkwood Springs district was developed as a housing area in the 1860s for the railway employees, and, in 1888, the Neepsend railway station
was opened but closed to passengers in 1940.
, with approximately 77 people killed by the deluge. The whole locality was more or less flooded. The gas works suffered substantial damage losing more than 1,000 tons of coal as well as boilers and engines. Many of the industrial mills on the River Don were badly damaged and all the boundary walls by the river were swept away. The Neepsend Bridge managed to withstand the onslaught although a large amount of debris was piled up against it. Hillfoot Bridge, then made of timber, was swept away and later replaced by a stone structure.
s newer stations on the River Trent
starting to feed the national grid. In 1905 the electric Sheffield Tramway
route between the city centre and Owlerton
opened and passed through Neepsend, going along Neepsend Lane.
The last remnants of the Old Park Wood were felled during the General Strike
of 1926 for firewood. The Parkwood Ganister
and Coal
Mine operated between 1938 and 1963, the coal being sold to the power station and the Ganister to make fire bricks. Neepsend suffered damage from air raids in 1940 during World War II
, the gas works was severely damaged as three million cubic feet of gas stored in four gas holders was ignited. Neepsend Lane was badly damaged by bombing and the main gas main hit, nine cottages were destroyed by a large bomb in Parkwood Road.
, and its resident population was greatly reduced. This resulted in Boyland Street School closing in 1946 and Neepsend Hillfoot School closing in 1975. The gas works reopened in 1943 after the bombing, but today gas is no longer produced at the works although the largest of the holders is still standing and is used to store North Sea gas. In 1978 the Parkwood Springs estate was bulldozed and then landscaped, in 1988 the Sheffield Ski Village
was opened on the site. The village includes eight ski runs, ski lodge, retail shops and restaurants.
Neepsend formerly had many public house
s, but the Gardeners Rest, Forest, and the Farfield are the only ones remaining in the main part of Neepsend. The Kelham Island area, which is being regenerated to a fashionable residential district, has The Harlequin, The Riverside, The Fat Cat, The Kelham Island Tavern
and The Milestone as pubs. Aizlewood's mill is a grade two listed building and is a former six storey flour mill built in 1861 and it is on Nursery Street, close to the city centre. The derelict building was restored and opened as a business centre in 1990.
The New Testament Church of God also on Nursery Street is a Grade II listed building built by Flockton, Lee & Flockton it was financed by Anne and Elizabeth Harrison, who stipulated that it should be an exact copy of Christ Church in Attercliffe
(1826) and therefore has an old-fashioned look with thin pointed buttresses, a crenellated parapet and a square tower.
In June 2007, the Neepsend area was badly flooded when the River Don burst its banks. Many businesses and properties were affected.
Sheffield
Sheffield is a city and metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. Its name derives from the River Sheaf, which runs through the city. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and with some of its southern suburbs annexed from Derbyshire, the city has grown from its largely...
, it stands just 1 miles (1.6 km) north east of the city centre. The main area of Neepsend covers the flood plain of the River Don from Lady's Bridge
Lady's Bridge
Lady's Bridge is the oldest bridge across the River Don in the City of Sheffield, England. It is located in the central section of the city, linking the Wicker to the north with Waingate to the south.-The first bridge:...
at the Wicker
Wicker (Sheffield)
The Wicker is an arterial street in Sheffield, England, noted for its history and the Grade II* listed Wicker Arches viaduct that crosses it. It runs in a north-east to south-westerly direction between Lady's Bridge and Wicker Arches...
up to Hillfoot Bridge. The adjacent district of Parkwood Springs is often regarded as part of the suburb.
Etymology
The origin of the word Neepsend is believed to come from the Old NorseOld Norse
Old Norse is a North Germanic language that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
language, with the word "nypr" meaning a peak, the "end" part was added as Neepsend lies in the Don valley at the termination of a high ridge which descends from Shirecliffe and over Parkwood. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Place Names gives the word "Nipa" as of Swedish and Norwegian origin and means a crag or steep river bank. In a 1297 subsidy roll the suburb was referred to as Nipisend and in 1637 as Nypysend.
History
There is no evidence of ancient settlement in Neepsend, the area being heavily forested with the steep ground to the north covered by the dense woodland of Old Park Wood. The Scandinavians arrived in the 10th century and started to clear the woodland and turn the valley floor by the River Don into fields and meadows. The wood was further cleared between the early 17th century and the mid 19th century for timber and by charcoal burners. A network of fields were left on the high ground and a local well or spring probably gave this district its name of Parkwood Springs.Industrialisation
The first industrial development in the Neepsend area came about in the early part of the 18th century when the Sandbed WheelWater wheel
A water wheel is a machine for converting the energy of free-flowing or falling water into useful forms of power. A water wheel consists of a large wooden or metal wheel, with a number of blades or buckets arranged on the outside rim forming the driving surface...
of the Sandbed Tilt Company
Trip hammer
A trip hammer, also known as a helve hammer, is a massive powered hammer used in:* agriculture to facilitate the labor of pounding, decorticating and polishing of grain;...
was constructed on the Don just upstream from Hillfoot Bridge. Further development continued when the Neepsend Tannery
Tanning
Tanning is the making of leather from the skins of animals which does not easily decompose. Traditionally, tanning used tannin, an acidic chemical compound from which the tanning process draws its name . Coloring may occur during tanning...
was opened in 1821, the 1853 OS
Ordnance Survey
Ordnance Survey , an executive agency and non-ministerial government department of the Government of the United Kingdom, is the national mapping agency for Great Britain, producing maps of Great Britain , and one of the world's largest producers of maps.The name reflects its creation together with...
map showing the Neepsend Tavern and a brewery on Rutland Road. The adjacent Kelham Island
Kelham Island Quarter
Kelham Island is one of Sheffield's eleven designated Quarters. Formerly an industrial area, the island itself was created by the building of a goit, or mill race, fed from the River Don to serve the water wheels powering the workshops of the areas' industrial heyday...
district was one of Sheffield’s most important early industrial areas it now houses the Kelham Island Museum
Kelham Island Museum
The Kelham Island Museum is an industrial museum on Alma Street, alongside the River Don, in the centre of Sheffield, England. It was opened in 1982.-The site:...
. In the second half of the 19th century, Neepsend was changed radically by the population explosion of Sheffield as in 1852, Neepsend Gas Works, one of the area's most famous landmarks, was built by the newly formed Gas Consumers Company.
The neighbouring district of Owlerton
Owlerton
Owlerton is a suburb of the city of Sheffield, it lies northwest of the city centre near the confluence of the River Don and River Loxley. Owlerton was formerly a small rural settlement with its origins in the Early Middle Ages, it became part of Sheffield in the early 1900s as the city expanded...
was supplied with gas by the rival Sheffield United Gas Light Company, and eventually an amalgamation solved any problems between the two companies. The Neepsend Rolling Mills were established in 1876, just downstream from Neepsend Bridge, and produced crucible steel
Crucible steel
Crucible steel describes a number of different techniques for making steel in a crucible. Its manufacture is essentially a refining process which is dependent on preexisting furnace products...
for the cutlery industry. After being demolished, it was the subject of an archaeological dig in 2003 before apartments were built on the site. Other industrial heritage buildings in the area are the Globe Works
Globe Works
The Globe Works are a former cutlery factory situated in the City of Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England on Penistone Road in the suburb of Neepsend. The Works are a Grade II* Listed Building which in the late 1980s were renovated to provide modern office space...
and Cornish Place
Cornish Place
Cornish Place is a Listed building situated in the Neepsend area of the City of Sheffield. The building was formerly the factory of James Dixon & Sons, a Britannia metal, Sheffield plate and Cutlery manufacturer...
, which have been converted into offices and apartments respectively while the Green Lane Works
Green Lane Works
The Green Lane Works are a disused industrial facility situated in the City of Sheffield, England. The entrance gate to the works is particularly ornate and has been designated as a Grade II* listed building. Nikolaus Pevsner called the gate “the most spectacular survival of factory architecture in...
are at present disused.
In December 1845, the Sheffield, Ashton-Under-Lyne and Manchester Railway
Sheffield, Ashton-Under-Lyne and Manchester Railway
The Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway was an early British railway company which opened in stages between 1841 and 1845 between Sheffield and Manchester via Ashton-under-Lyne...
opened, and Neepsend was a key point on the line with Neepsend engine shed
Neepsend engine shed
Neepsend engine shed was an engine shed in Neepsend, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. It was built by the Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway to provide and service locomotives for passenger trains originating or changing at Sheffield Victoria and goods trains from various...
being built to supply and overhaul locomotives for the nearby Sheffield Victoria railway station. The Neepsend shed even built a number of locomotives for the line. The Parkwood Springs district was developed as a housing area in the 1860s for the railway employees, and, in 1888, the Neepsend railway station
Neepsend railway station
Neepsend railway station was a railway station on the former Great Central Railway in England. Ski Village railway station is a proposed station to occupy the former Neepsend station site.-History:...
was opened but closed to passengers in 1940.
Sheffield flood
On 12 March 1864, the Neepsend area was devastated by the Great Sheffield FloodGreat Sheffield Flood
Not to be confused with the floods in Sheffield in 2007.The Great Sheffield Flood was a flood that devastated parts of Sheffield, England, on 11 March 1864, when the Dale Dyke Dam broke.- Collapse of Dale Dyke Dam :...
, with approximately 77 people killed by the deluge. The whole locality was more or less flooded. The gas works suffered substantial damage losing more than 1,000 tons of coal as well as boilers and engines. Many of the industrial mills on the River Don were badly damaged and all the boundary walls by the river were swept away. The Neepsend Bridge managed to withstand the onslaught although a large amount of debris was piled up against it. Hillfoot Bridge, then made of timber, was swept away and later replaced by a stone structure.
20th century
The 20th century brought the opening of the Neepsend Power Station, erected on the site of the Old Parkwood brick works in 1902. It was ideally situated on the banks of the Don where water could be used for condensing purposes and close to the railway station which supplied coal. The power station was expanded on several occasions, a cooling tower was added in 1937 and a second in 1947. It became obsolete and was decommissioned in 1976 when the CEGBCEGB
The Central Electricity Generating Board was the cornerstone of the British electricity industry for almost 40 years; from 1957, to privatisation in the 1990s....
s newer stations on the River Trent
River Trent
The River Trent is one of the major rivers of England. Its source is in Staffordshire on the southern edge of Biddulph Moor. It flows through the Midlands until it joins the River Ouse at Trent Falls to form the Humber Estuary, which empties into the North Sea below Hull and Immingham.The Trent...
starting to feed the national grid. In 1905 the electric Sheffield Tramway
Sheffield Tramway
Sheffield Tramway was an extensive tramway network serving the English city of Sheffield and its suburbs.The first tramway line, horse-drawn, opened in 1873 between Lady's Bridge and Attercliffe, subsequently extended to Brightside and Tinsley...
route between the city centre and Owlerton
Owlerton
Owlerton is a suburb of the city of Sheffield, it lies northwest of the city centre near the confluence of the River Don and River Loxley. Owlerton was formerly a small rural settlement with its origins in the Early Middle Ages, it became part of Sheffield in the early 1900s as the city expanded...
opened and passed through Neepsend, going along Neepsend Lane.
The last remnants of the Old Park Wood were felled during the General Strike
General strike
A general strike is a strike action by a critical mass of the labour force in a city, region, or country. While a general strike can be for political goals, economic goals, or both, it tends to gain its momentum from the ideological or class sympathies of the participants...
of 1926 for firewood. The Parkwood Ganister
Ganister
A ganister is hard, fine-grained quartzose sandstone, or orthoquartzite, used in the manufacture of silica brick typically used to line furnaces...
and Coal
Coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...
Mine operated between 1938 and 1963, the coal being sold to the power station and the Ganister to make fire bricks. Neepsend suffered damage from air raids in 1940 during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the gas works was severely damaged as three million cubic feet of gas stored in four gas holders was ignited. Neepsend Lane was badly damaged by bombing and the main gas main hit, nine cottages were destroyed by a large bomb in Parkwood Road.
Present day
Neepsend was designated as an area for industry after World War II by Sheffield City CouncilSheffield City Council
Sheffield City Council is the city council for the metropolitan borough of Sheffield in South Yorkshire, England. It consists of 84 councillors, elected to represent 28 wards, each with three councillors...
, and its resident population was greatly reduced. This resulted in Boyland Street School closing in 1946 and Neepsend Hillfoot School closing in 1975. The gas works reopened in 1943 after the bombing, but today gas is no longer produced at the works although the largest of the holders is still standing and is used to store North Sea gas. In 1978 the Parkwood Springs estate was bulldozed and then landscaped, in 1988 the Sheffield Ski Village
Sheffield Ski Village
Sheffield Ski Village is an artificial ski slope complex in the Parkwood Springs area of Sheffield, England. It is believed to be the largest artificial ski resort in Europe with a sports shop, bar, restaurant and a range of slopes which include a snowflex nursery slope, a dendix recreational...
was opened on the site. The village includes eight ski runs, ski lodge, retail shops and restaurants.
Neepsend formerly had many public house
Public house
A public house, informally known as a pub, is a drinking establishment fundamental to the culture of Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. There are approximately 53,500 public houses in the United Kingdom. This number has been declining every year, so that nearly half of the smaller...
s, but the Gardeners Rest, Forest, and the Farfield are the only ones remaining in the main part of Neepsend. The Kelham Island area, which is being regenerated to a fashionable residential district, has The Harlequin, The Riverside, The Fat Cat, The Kelham Island Tavern
Kelham Island Tavern
The Kelham Island Tavern is a public house in Sheffield. It is the only pub to have become the Campaign for Real Ale National Pub of the Year two years running....
and The Milestone as pubs. Aizlewood's mill is a grade two listed building and is a former six storey flour mill built in 1861 and it is on Nursery Street, close to the city centre. The derelict building was restored and opened as a business centre in 1990.
The New Testament Church of God also on Nursery Street is a Grade II listed building built by Flockton, Lee & Flockton it was financed by Anne and Elizabeth Harrison, who stipulated that it should be an exact copy of Christ Church in Attercliffe
Attercliffe
Attercliffe is an industrial suburb of northeast Sheffield, England on the south bank of the River Don.-History:The name Attercliffe can be traced back as far as an entry in the Domesday book -Ateclive- meaning at the cliffe, a small escarpment that lay alongside the River Don...
(1826) and therefore has an old-fashioned look with thin pointed buttresses, a crenellated parapet and a square tower.
In June 2007, the Neepsend area was badly flooded when the River Don burst its banks. Many businesses and properties were affected.