DRONFIELD, a parish in the hundred of SCARSDALE,
county of DERBY, 6 miles (N. W. by N.) from
Chesterfield, comprising the chapelries of Dore and
Holmesfield, the townships of Coal-Aston and Unstone,
and the hamlet of Totley, and containing (exclusively
of part of the township of Barlow which is in this
parish) 3680 inhabitants. The living is a discharged
vicarage, in the archdeaconry of Derby, and dio- .
cese of Lichfield and Coventry, rated in the king's
books at £10. 2. 1., endowed with £600 private benefaction,
£200 royal bounty, and £600 parliamentary
grant, and in the patronage of the Crown. The
church, dedicated to St. John the Baptist, has a tower
and spire at the west end, opposite to which there was
once a chantry chapel now converted into an inn. There
are places of worship for the Society of Friends, Independents,
and Wesleyan Methodists. Dronfield, in
Domesday-book called Dranefield, had formerly the privilege
of a market, but on account of its proximity to Chesterfield
and Sheffield, it has been long discontinued. There
is a fair for cattle and cheese on April 25th, and another
fair on August 11th. Scythes, sickles, and edge-tools,
are manufactured here; and there are manufactories for
cast ware, various articles in cutlery, and saddlers ironmongery,
also for spindles for cotton works. A great
quantity of coal is obtained in the neighbourhood. The
grammar sehool was erected in 1579> by Thomas Fanshawe,
Esq., in pursuance of the will of his father, dated
in 1567, by which it is endowed with lands now producing
an annual income of £200. Queen Elizabeth, by letters
patent, empowered the above-named executor to make
the necessary statutes for its government, and ordained
that the vicar and churchwardens, or in default, six
wise and honest men, to- be chosen by his heirs, should
be constituted a body corporate, by the name of " The
-governors of the grammar school of Henry Fanshawe,
-Esq." The master's salary is £130, the us-her's £66,
besides which they have each a dwelling-house; pne hundred
and thirty children are educated upon this foun-,
dation. There are two other free schools in the parish,
one at Dore, and another at Holmesfield. At Cawley
is a sulphureous spring, with a bath annexed. About
two miles from the town are the remains of Beauchief
abbey, founded in 1183, for Premonstratensian, or White
canons, by Robert Fitz-Ranulph, Lord of Alfreton, one
-of the executioners of Thomas a Becket, to whom it
was dedicated; on its dissolution, in the 26th of Henry
VIH., the revenue was valued at £157. 10. 2.