Methodists

By the 19th century nonconformity had become established in the village with the Methodists meeting in Chapel yard. A Wesleyan chapel was erected in Woodall Lane in 1879-80 from stone quarried on the chapel site.

Agriculture and Industry

Harthill has always been primarily an agricultural village. Villagers spun and wove the wool from the local sheep for their own purposes and locally grown flax was turned into linen sheets and pillow cases. Apart from farming, the main local industry was quarrying the local gritstone. The major product of the quarries was whetstones for sharpening knives and agricultural implements. In the early 19th century over 40,000 stones were being produced each year. As the bulk of the land was owned by the Duke of Leeds was able to enclose the land as he saw fit. As a result only some 250 acres of waste ground, known as Woodall Moor, remained to be dealt with by the Harthill Enclosure Award of 1761. The lion’s share of the land, 231 acres, was awarded to the Duke.

Chesterfield Canal

In the 1760s the Chesterfield Canal was constructed through Kiveton Park. The Derbyshire Dyke was dammed between Harthill and Woodall to form a chain of three reservoirs to supply water for the canal. When the canal fell out of use, the water was used to feed the boilers at Kiveton Park Colliery.

Coal Mining

The colliery had been sunk on the northern edge of the parish in 1866-8 and provided employment for many Harthill men. The Duke of Leeds, however, resolutely refused to allow colliery houses to be built on his land in Harthill. As a result there are still open fields between the village and Kiveton. Many miners, however, lived in houses at Fir Vale which were erected in 1868-70 on an island of land not owned by the Duke. The Parish Church established a mission room and school at Fir Vale in 1875.

Population

In 1801 the population of Harthill with Woodall was 660. The population fell slightly in the early 19th century, reaching 632 in 1831, but recovered to 739 in 1851 and 1,396 in 1891. In the early part of the 20th century the population fluctuated between 1,100 and 1,300 but since the War figures have grown steadily, reaching 1,795 in 1981 and 1,834 in 1991.
Growth and Development

The village began to expand in the years after the First World War. The first council houses [the Hillside and the Crescent] were built in 1920-1. Further council houses were built in the Crescent and east of Whinney Hill in 1926-7 and at Hop Inge in 1935. The Miners’ Welfare Institute was built in 1924, funded partly under the National Scheme (of 1d for each ton of coal raised) and partly by money raised within the parish. Despite its rural isolation, Harthill played its part in the Second World War and even suffered its own air raids. In August 1940 19 bombs fell in the eastern side of the parish and a landmine fell near Woodall the following March. The only casualties were a few broken windows. In the 1960 the M1 Motorway was driven through the western side of the parish and Woodall became the site for a motorway service area.

Since the war the village has been consistent in winning honours in the Britain-in-Bloom competition and marked the centenary of the parish council by winning the South Yorkshire Best Kept Village competition.

(Extracted from:- R.M.B.C, Patchwork of parishes, 1997)

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