Nottinghamshire 
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A Description of the Town and Parish
East Bridgford, or Bridgeford on the Hill, is a large and well built village, on the summit of a precipitous bank, that rises on the south side of the Trent, opposite Gunthorpe Ferry. The parish contains 1,155 inhabitants, and 1,910 acres of loamy land, which was enclosed in 1798, when 326 acres (now called New Bridgford), were allotted in lieu of rectorial tithes. The greater part of the parish belongs to Magdalen College, Oxford, with the remainder belonging to several freeholders.
In the parish is found both opaque and transparent gypsum, the latter of which is very beautiful, and during the last twenty years has been in great demand amongst the lepidaries of Derby and other places, who turn it into beads and various other ornaments, in which it looks as brilliant and richly variegated as the Derbyshire spar. There are several neat mansions on the village, occupied by Captain Geo. Bohun Martin, Mrs Brooks, and Geo, Beaumont Esq.
After the Conquest, the manor was given to Roger de Busli, who gave the tithes of the hall in Brugeford to the Priory of Blyth. The manor was successively held by the Carpenters, Bisets, Caltofts, Brabasons, Hasingburns, Deynecourts, and Botcelars, the latter of whom, in the 8th of Edward the 4th, gave their moiety to William, Bishop of Winchester, who bestowed it on Magdalen College, which he had founded at Oxford. The other moiety afterwards passed from Lord Sheffield to the Hackers, Chaworths, Scroops, &c. &c.
Religious History and the Church
The church, dedicated to St peter, is an ancient fabric, and has evidently been much larger than at present. In the church are numerous armorial bearings of the former lords of the manor; but most of the ancient monuments have been destroyed or defaced, and some of them turned out into the churchyard to perish through the attacks of the weather. Three mutilated effigies of knights in armour, one of them a Crusader, were lying under the eaves of the church roof in Thoresby's time. In the chancel are several handsome modern monuments, belonging to the Palmer, Beaumont, Hacker, and other families, and in the body, to the Heathcote family. The church is neatly pewed, and contains a gallery used for the children of the National School. The Rev. R. William Hutchins B.D., enjoys the rectory, which is valued in the King's books at £19 18s 6½d, now at £752, and is in the patronage of Magdalen College.
The Wesleyan chapel was enlarged in 1835, and a Sunday School built in 1839. A Primitive Methodist chapel was erected in 1836.
The National Schools, where 100 boys and 63 girls are educated almost entirely at the expense of the Rector, were built on the glebe land in 1829, at a cost of £430, towards which the present Rector gave £235, Magdalen College £25, and a grant from the National Society £170.
£290, three percent Consols, were purchased in 1792, with several benefactions, left by the Revs. H. Smith, C. Overend and P. Priaux, John Wilson, Sarah Kirk and two unknown donors. The yearly dividends, £8 14s, are given to the poor in February. In 1827, Thomas Holland left £40. In 1828, the Rev. Peter Broughton, who was rector of this parish 44 years, left £50 to the poor. In 1837, the Rev. Thomas Beaumont gave £200, in the three percent Consols, the interest to be distributed by the Rector for the time being.
In modern history, Bridgford is remarkable as being the birth-place of "the regicidal parliamentarian, Colonel Hacker, who attended the unfortunate King Charles to his last scene, for which he afterwards suffered as a traitor, and his estates were confiscated; yet his two brothers were active partisans in the royal cause, in which one of them was slain".
But it is in ancient history that this place stands most conspicuous, for Stukely says, it lies within a mile of the Roman station Ad Pontem, and adds that there was here in Roman times, a bridge across the Trent, with "great buildings, cellars, and a quay for vessels to unload at". Near the place called Old-wark Spring, he found "the Roman foundations of walls, and floors of houses composed of stones set edgeways into clay, and liquid mortar run upon them". Upon an eminence of the road beyond Bingham Lane, he also found a tumulus, commanding "a fine prospect of Belvoir" &c. Horseley differs from Stukely, and considers Old-wark, near Bridgford, to be the Margidunem of Antonius. The great Fosseway passes within a mile west of the village, through which an upper Fosseway proceeds from the ferry to East Stoke.
White's Directory of Nottinghamshire 1853
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[Last updated: Sunday, 22nd June 1997 23:33 BST - Clive Henly]
© Copyright C.R.G. Henly 1997