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William White's 'History, Gazetteer and Directory of Leicestershire and
Rutland' was originally published in Sheffield in 1846 and is republished here
on fully-searchable CD-ROM. Containing more than 700 printed pages, the
full-title of this publication gives a good indication as to the scope of the
work: History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Leicestershire, and the small County
of Rutland; together with the adjacent towns of Grantham and Stamford;
comprising Surveys of both Counties, and Separate Historical, Statistical and
Topographical Descriptions of all the Hundreds, Towns, Parishes, Townships,
Chapelries, Villages, Hamlets, Manors, Liberties and Unions. Indeed, the title
goes on to state that the History, Gazetteer and Directory of Leicestershire
also contains alphabetical listings of residences, gentlemen's seats as well as
all of the churches, chapels, patrons and values of the parishes in the counties
covered by the directory.
In his preface, William White offered this publication to the public as 'the
first essay towards a popular history, topography and directory of the counties
of Leicester and Rutland' and to a great extent White was successful in his
aims. White claimed that every parish in Leicestershire and Rutland had been
visited during the compilation of his publication and he also claimed 'that
almost every house in both counties' had also been visited, which was probably
somewhat of an exaggeration. However, the scope of the publication cannot be
denied. The 'History, Gazetteer and Directory of Leicestershire and Rutland' is
introduced with general historical and descriptive surveys of Leicestershire and
Rutland. These record the extent and population of each, mainly taken from the
statistical abstracts of the 1841 Census and also describes the nature of
industry and agriculture, gentlemen's seats as well as those of the nobility,
clergy and magistrates, for both counties.
The majority of this publication is comprised of the alphabetical gazetteer
and directory; initially arranged by hundred and then by parish, these contain
topographical, historical details on all of the towns, villages and hamlets in
the county, providing the population of each parish, township, chapelry and
extra-parochial liberty, together with their 'owners of the soil', Lord of the
Manors and nature and value of the church livings, places of worship, their
patrons and incumbents. In addition, information is provided on public and other
buildings of note, public charities, institutions, trade and commerce,
communications, remarkable local occurrences, objects of interest and
curiosities. The directory portion for each denomination contains an
alphabetical listing of the seats of the gentry and other principal residents as
well as a classification of trades and professions.
For principal places such as the town of Leicester in addition to the
information detailed for other locations, White's 'History, Gazetteer and
Directory of Leicestershire and Rutland' also provides an alphabetical directory
of names, trades, professions and residences, which in the instance of the town
of Leicester runs to some forty-eight pages.
Republished here on fully-searchable CD-ROM, Whites History, Gazetteer and
Directory of Leicestershire and Rutland has to be one of the best and one of the
earliest directories for the county and is a highly recommended purchase for
anyone with a historical or genealogical interest in the county.
High quality scanned images of the whole of the original book. This CD has
been bookmarked for easy navigation, and pages can be searched, browsed,
enlarged and printed out if required.
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System Requirements
- Any computer using Adobe (Acrobat) Reader 4 or later
- Adobe Reader 6 or later is recommended for CDs with searchable text
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