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Chellaston
was once mainly a farming community, but is now a rapidly expanding
suburb, like so many more up and down the country, where houses proliferate
close to busy road networks. In Chellaston’s case the expansion
of Derby and the recent opening of the A50, giving it rapid access
to fast roads and the M1 Motorway, have led to the growth of massive
housing developments.
The story of Chellaston though is not just one of a once quiet village
expanding rapidly because of its location. As from the Middle Ages,
it became internationally famous as the centre of the English alabaster
industry, a form of gypsum. It was at its peak between about 1360
and 1460, when a flourishing export trade developed. Great blocks
of alabaster were taken to the River Trent and then transported by
boat to Hull, for shipment across the North Sea.
The alabaster produced at the Woodlands Quarry in Chellaston, now
an area where wildlife thrives, was particularly attractive and easy
to carve. The purest white alabaster was originally found close to
the surface and that made it easily accessible to work. Coloured deposits
were found deeper down and used until new layers of white alabaster
were located.
Over 3,000 alabaster carvings have been identified overseas, a large
collection of which have been recovered and are now in the Victoria
and Albert Museum, most of which probably started life in Chellaston.
In the warmer, drier countries like Spain, alabaster could be preserved
out of doors, but the wetter, colder climate experienced in this country
forced its use inside.
Chellaston had its own sculptors, Robert Sutton and Thomas Prentys
the most notable, but Nottingham was where most of the carving was
done. Westminster Abbey and St George’s Chapel, Windsor and
many other churches have fine alabaster monuments.
The Act of 1550, which banned mass books and images, but not tombstones,
reduced the level of output in the industry. The trade died with the
Reformation, but sprang up again briefly in the late Victorian era,
when a pulpit was carved for Worcester Cathedral and monuments for
Westminster Abbey and Eton College Chapel. Good quality alabaster
was not found in large quantities after the Second World War, but
gypsum was extracted until 1978, when the pit finally closed down.
For centuries, the extraction of alabaster and gypsum at the Woodlands
Quarry had necessitated the removal of large quantities of clay from
the earth. Little use had been made of the clay, until the latter
part of the 19th century, when brick making commenced. Many of Derby’s
council houses were built with Chellaston Bricks, as was the original
Celanese factory at Spondon. Originally, facing bricks were hand made
at an output of about 200 per day, but as demand grew more modern
methods were employed and by 1953, production had increased to 120,000
common bricks per week. The brickworks finally closed in 1978.
Only about one third of the gypsum extracted was suitable for ornamental
use, much of the remainder was called plaster as it was used for making
plaster of Paris. Demand increased enormously with the introduction
of pottery manufacture. In the region of five hundred tons was shipped
annually from Chellaston to the Potteries, for use in production of
tableware.
St Peter’s Church dates back to the medieval period, but radical
alterations were carried out in the 19th century. It has a Norman
font, but surprisingly, it did not have any alabaster ornamentation
for many years, until the author (John Young) of a book on the subject,
gave the church a small carved replica of St Peter’s. The lack
of ornamentation arose in 1817 when the church was restored, and a
churchwarden used the alabaster slabs to pave his stable floor! Alabaster
on the other hand at the Methodist Chapel is well represented.
Harold Gresley, who was born in 1892 and lived all his life in Chellaston,
along with his brother Cuthbert, father Frank and grandfather James,
was a landscape painter. After serving in the First World War, he
studied at Nottingham School of Art and during 1925-26, he produced
a series of Derby townscapes that later became part of the Goodey
Collection. In addition, he produced many views of Derbyshire beauty
spots and country houses.
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