St Lawrence Road, part of the A6175, runs north-east to south-west from the junction of The Green and Williamthorpe Road down to the junction of Church Lane and Market Street, a distance of about half a mile (830 metres). It falls about 40 feet (12 metres) and is fairly straight, so traffic often passes along it at quite a speed, despite the 30mph speed limit. It is part of the main road through North Wingfield for traffic from Clay Cross to the motorway, and on this length there is only one pedestrian refuge and no other obstacles for traffic, making it extremely difficult at times for pedestrians to cross.
Although the latest Annual Casualty Report for Derbyshire (2018) shows road casualties at their lowest level since WWII, there have been at least 8 accidents in which people have been injured on this short stretch of road in the past five years. The junction with Little Morton Road is particularly dangerous.
On the 1921 and 1955 OS maps the road is called ‘Chesterfield Road’. Chesterfield Road ran all the way through the village to Grassmoor. By 1967 (before the road had been straightened) Chesterfield Road started at The Green and this section had been named St Lawrence Road.
Starting the walk along the road by The Green, the odd numbered houses on the left were built on fields once owned by lawyer William Drabble, who became mayor of Chesterfield and lived at Bank Close House, Hasland. The fields were farmed by his tenant James Woodward.
In 1843 there was very little settlement on St Lawrence Road. There was a cottage opposite The Green occupied by Robert Lynam, and further down the farmstead which became The White Hart, with some outbuildings on both sides of the road. South of the entrance to what is now Bright Street, was another farmstead now called Step Farm, which was then a public house (the first White Hart) occupied by Mr George Bower. A later landlord, George Allen, applied for the licence to be transferred to the building across the road in 1877, and it became the White Hart as we know it today.
After the houses, surgery and bungalows, number 43, once called Cross Cottage, is the next notable building on the left, just before the junction with Little Morton Road. This property was once the home of Richard Woodruff Potter (died 1907) who came to this area to work for George Stephenson at Clay Cross, and was the site of the village smithy until Mr William Alexander Taylor, a local builder, purchased the house in 1918 to live in, and took down the blacksmith’s shop, replacing it with a two storey extension to create two shops. He built a new blacksmith’s shop across the road (now a house, he named this building ‘Rusper’ after the house in Sussex he had worked on as a young man). Mr Taylor moved next door, to the house called ‘St Lawrence’, in 1928, which had formerly been the curate’s house.
Most of the housing along St Lawrence Road, on both sides, between The Gate and the junction with Station New Road, was built between 1920 and 1940. The next buildings on the left, are, however, much older.
Gate Terrace, a row of four cottages, was built in the 1850s, on the land belonging to The Gate. The property behind it, Cordwainer’s Cottage (pictured at the top of this blog), is even earlier in date. It was in existence in 1824, and in 1843 it was described as a house, with a yard, stackyard and garden owned by the church trustees and occupied by John Mottershaw. The Mottershaw family occupied the cottage for three or four generations.
Shoe maker John Mottershaw (1762-1844) and his family lived in Tupton township in the 1790s, but had moved to the cottage in North Wingfield before 1824. His son Richard (1794-1872) was also a shoe maker, sometimes calling himself a cordwainer, and so the property became known as Cordwainer’s Cottage. His son Joseph (1827-1881) also lived here. Joseph Mottershaw was working as a shoemaker in 1855, but he later worked as a labourer.
The 1843 tithe map shows The Gate (top) and Cordwainer’s Cottage, with a lane running from the cottage to Little Morton Road. John Mottershaw occupied the cottage and also the croft to the south, and two other fields in North Wingfield, all glebe land, owned by North Wingfield Church Trustees.
At the time of the tithe map (1843) there was no settlement on the road south of the cordwainer’s cottage. Most of the land bordering the road was owned by John Wilkinson Clay, and William Drabble, two of the largest landowners in the area.
Most of the development along St Lawrence Road dates from circa the 1930s, but there was some infilling in the 1950s-1960s.
Most of the houses along the road were given names, a common suffix being ‘dene’ (meaning valley). Here you could find ‘Lyndene’, ‘Brambledene’, ‘Gladene’, and ‘Ivy Dene’. Far flung places were also chosen as names, ‘Wembury’, ‘Clovelly’, ‘Lyndhurst’, ‘Lynton’, ‘Eveshot’, ‘Sunbury’, and ‘Ellesmere’ all feature, while there is a nod to the area’s history in the house name ‘Deincourt’.
‘Deincourt’ deserves a mention as in 1939 it was the home of Mrs Austin and her daughter Mrs Nesbit. Mrs Austin was the daughter of Mr James Christmas Hayes, who lived at Croft House by The Green in North Wingfield. Mr and Mrs Nesbit were closely connected with the scouting movement in North Wingfield.
‘Wembury’ also deserves notice. From 1931 it was the home of Miss S.J. Whitehurst (1871-1953), the first headmistress of Heath County Council Girls’ School, and her niece Miss H.E. Heathcote, who was a teacher at the school.
In 1939 the occupiers of the houses called ‘Harfra’ and ‘Somerville’, were Mr (William) Frank Salway (1877-1952), and Mr Robert Salway (1888-1969), sons of the Hepthorne Lane draper, Mr William Thomas Salway (1848-1937). I assume ‘Somerville’ is a nod to their parents’ home at Hepthorne Lane, ‘Somerset Villas’.
At the far end of the road, opposite the rectory, there used to be a field owned by church. It was used for church events, and the 1921 OS map shows a sports pitch marked out on it. At the end of the 1990s W.G. Homes built a small estate here, called Glebe Gardens.
St Lawrence Road ends with a sharp turn onto Church Hill (called Market Street from this point on modern maps), at the junction with Church Lane.
I have to end with a comment on traffic hazards again. The turn is too tight for HGVs, and they frequently mount the kerb coming up from Clay Cross. Going the other way, there is also the occasional spill.
North Wingfield 
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