Celebrating magnificence and warning of business scars

As navigation apps chase velocity and effectivity, the brand new Heritage Shell Information to Derbyshire restores depth and perspective, revealing the county’s magnificence and scars with a voice as distinctive as its landscapes, finds John E. Kaye

When John Betjeman launched the primary Shell Information in 1934 along with his now-famous Cornwall, he set in movement a collection that will turn out to be one of the crucial distinctive publishing initiatives of twentieth-century Britain. Sponsored initially by Shell to serve the brand new motoring public, the Guides have been by no means mere handbooks to church buildings and inns however essential works of judgement and persona, written by poets, painters and critics whose voice and perspective mattered as a lot as the data they conveyed. What started as a motorist’s companion quickly became a cultural phenomenon, drawing into its orbit figures akin to John Piper, Stephen Bone and Henry Thorold, every producing volumes that mingled scholarship with eccentricity, anecdote with opinion, and historical past with humour. The end result was a physique of labor that captured the spirit of place extra vividly than any standard gazetteer.

The Heritage Shell Information Belief has lately sought to revive that custom, commissioning new volumes for counties throughout England and Wales whereas sustaining the qualities that outlined the originals. William Glossop’s Derbyshire, newly printed in 2025, is an exemplary addition to this line. It’s each a continuation and an updating of Thorold’s earlier Derbyshire information, increasing the protection, sharpening the main target, and guaranteeing that the distinctive voice of the writer is rarely misplaced within the element.

Glossop is steeped in his topic and writes with the intimacy of somebody who has walked, camped and researched the county for many years, carrying ahead Thorold’s enthusiasm for structure and panorama whereas including his personal mix of candour and concern.

The e-book opens with an expansive introduction that strikes from prehistoric cave artwork at Creswell Crags by means of the Roman exploitation of result in the splendours of Haddon, Hardwick and Chatsworth. It’s a county historical past informed by means of its buildings and landscapes, and Glossop by no means shies away from troublesome truths. He writes with evident admiration of the Peak District Nationwide Park and of the preservation of nice homes and church buildings, however he additionally factors to scars on the panorama: the ravaged quarries of Nice Rocks Dale, the despoliation of coalfields round Swadlincote, and the uneasy legacy of industrialisation. His frankness recollects the custom of Shell authors who mixed celebration with critique, and it provides this quantity an honesty that lifts it above the blandness of most fashionable county guides.

The center of the e-book lies in its gazetteer, operating to greater than 300 pages, which strikes systematically by means of the cities and villages of Derbyshire. Every entry is underpinned by analysis and enlivened by means of private statement. Somewhat than fall again on a budget inventory phrases that fill so many guidebooks, Glossop brings out the character of every place with element and eloquence, exhibiting its buildings, landscapes and historical past in a manner that feels each educated and private.

Ashbourne, as an illustration, is incessantly described as a good-looking market city with a photogenic sq., a scattering of vintage outlets and the promise of a cream tea. Glossop, alternatively, refers it a spot of actual architectural distinction, anchored by St Oswald’s church, which George Eliot as soon as praised because the best parish church in England, and enriched by Georgian homes, historic almshouses and layers of historical past.

Chesterfield, usually dismissed as a former mining city, is right here reclaimed as a “real-life Cinderella” whose Artwork Deco city corridor and huge open market deserve consideration. Bakewell, in the meantime, is seen not simply because the vacationer’s vacation spot for pudding however as a city layered with Saxon, Norman, medieval, Georgian and Victorian historical past, anchored by its nice church and enriched by a dense combine of homes, halls and civic buildings.

All through, Glossop marks “must-see” locations with stars, whereas at all times permitting house for lesser-known gems akin to Somersal Herbert Corridor or the Crispin Inn at Ashover. Glossop, a former barrister and decide, pulls no punches on the subject of how business pressures proceed to form and scar the county’s panorama. His information points an unusually stark warning concerning the scale of quarrying, which he condemns as a blight on its historic panorama.

Huge areas of the county bear the scars of business extraction, with hills hollowed out at Earl Sterndale, valleys flooded by deserted pits, and different vistas left irreparably altered, he writes. Elements of the county are, he says, “a scene of wholesale devastation”, and “an unremarked shame about which environmental campaigners have surprisingly been silent.” Nice Rocks Dale close to Buxton has been blasted into what he calls “an Armageddon”.

Glossop’s warts ’n all tackle Derbyshire exhibits why the Heritage Shell Guides nonetheless have a spot alongside apps and satnavs. Google Maps could be faster at getting you throughout the county, however it’s going to by no means let you know why a church tower leans, how a market city grew, or what a damage as soon as meant to those that constructed it.

The Heritage Shell Information to Derbyshire by William Glossop will likely be printed in paperback on 1 November 2025. The richly illustrated quantity options greater than 500 images and artworks — an unusually complete visible document for a county information — and is obtainable from Waterstones priced at £25.

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_{Important Picture: The ruins of Peveril Fortress, perched excessive above Castleton, are amongst Derbyshire’s most evocative landmarks and a reminder of the county’s lengthy historical past set towards the drama of the Peak District. © Provided/iStock}