Kilham, East Riding of Yorkshire

Kilham lies on the line of a Roman road from York to Bridlington, now followed by the minor road known as Woldgate.{{sfn|Browne|1912|p=33}} Pevsner notes that the village is more than a {{convert|1|mi|adj=on}} in length along this main street.{{cite book |last1=Pevsner |first1=Nikolaus |last2=Neave |first2=David |last3=Neave |first3=Susan |title=Yorkshire - York and the East Riding |date=2005 |publisher=Yale University Press |location=New Haven |isbn=0300095937 |page=575}} To the south of Kilham there is evidence of a Romano-British settlement from the 4th century.{{cite web |title=Heritage Gateway – Results Monument Number 910829 |url=https://www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=910829&resourceID=19191 |website=www.heritagegateway.org.uk |access-date=29 March 2021}} The settlement is mentioned as Chillun in the Domesday Book, though without a population.{{cite web |title=Kilham {{!}} Domesday Book |url=https://opendomesday.org/place/TA0664/kilham/ |website=opendomesday.org |access-date=12 November 2023}} The name of the village derives from the Old English Cylnum, meaning at the kilns.{{cite book |last1=Smith |first1=A. H. |title=Place-names of East Riding of Yorkshire and York |date=1970 |orig-date=1937|publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=0-521-04907-5 |page=97}}

Kilham, which lies in a narrow valley on the southern edge of the wolds, was once an important market town in the Yorkshire Wolds, bigger and more important than Driffield at one time.{{cite book |last1=Allison |first1=Keith John |title=The East Riding of Yorkshire Landscape |date=1976 |publisher=Hodder & Stoughton |location=London |isbn=0340158212 |page=52}} It held annual trading fairs and had a large number of businesses and a considerable population. The town declined in size and status following the building of the Driffield Navigation, which took trade away from Kilham to nearby Driffield,{{sfn|Purdy|1974|p=247}} however, the village was already floundering in terms of trade long before the canal was cut.{{cite book |last1=Allison |first1=Keith John |title=The East Riding of Yorkshire Landscape |date=1976 |publisher=Hodder & Stoughton |location=London |isbn=0340158212 |page=223}}

In 1823 Kilham civil parish was in the Wapentake of Dickering and the Liberty of St Peter's.{{cite web |title=Genuki: Kilham, Yorkshire (East Riding) |url=https://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/YKS/ERY/Kilham |website=genuki.org.uk |access-date=12 November 2023}} A market had previously been held on Thursdays. The parish church was under the patronage of the Dean of York.{{sfn|Purdy|1974|p=259}} A mineral spring near the road to Rudston was supposed curative for disorders. A further spring, called Henpit Hole, was near the road to Langtoft; during a wet autumn it would spout with "violence". A Methodist chapel was first built in 1789, and a Baptist chapel existed in the village by 1819.{{sfn|Purdy|1974|p=262}} The population at the time was 971.{{cite book |editor1-last=Page |editor1-first=William |title=The Victoria history of the county of York. vol 3 |date=1907 |publisher=Constable & Co |location=London |page=489|oclc=500092527}}

Occupations included twenty-two farmers, seven shoemakers, five grocers, three of whom were also drapers, four blacksmiths, four tailors, four bricklayers, three joiners, two butchers, two glove makers, a brick & tile maker, a draper, a bacon factor (wholesale tradesman), a plumber & glazier, a bookseller, a saddler, a fellmonger, a corn miller, a gardener & seedsman, and the landlords of the Royal Oak, Plough, Star, and Black Bull public houses. Within the parish were two surgeons, a schoolmaster, four gentlemen and two gentlewomen, a Baptist minister, a curate and a vicar, a yeoman, an Esquire, two Royal Navy masters and a Royal Navy lieutenant. Two carriers operated between the village and Driffield, Beverley, Hull, and Bridlington once a week.{{cite book|authorlink=Edward Baines (1774–1848)|last=Baines|first= Edward|year= 1823|title=History, Directory and Gazetteer of the County of York|pages= 359, 360}}

Kilham's Grade I listed Anglican parish church is dedicated to All Saints.{{NHLE|num=1309840 |desc=Church of All Saints|accessdate=16 April 2012}} The church holds an annual flower festival. Outside the church is a grade II listed tethering ring in a stone block – evidence of the cattle trade and bull-baiting which once took place in the village.{{NHLE|desc=Bull Ring |num=1162035 |grade=II|access-date=12 November 2023 }}{{sfn|Browne|1912|p=178}} There is also a cast-iron water pump opposite the church.

At one time there were six schools in the village, but only one now remains, Kilham C. of E. primary school, which was rated as good by Ofsted in 2015.{{cite web |title=Kilham Church of England Voluntary Controlled School URN: 117980 |url=https://reports.ofsted.gov.uk/provider/21/117980 |website=reports.ofsted.gov.uk |access-date=12 November 2023 |date=8 October 2020}} In 1633, Lord John Darcy of Aston opened a grammar school in the village.{{sfn|Browne|1912|p=332}} It was closed by 1880 when the site was redeveloped as a temperance hall.{{sfn|Purdy|1974|p=251}}

In 2010 the Kilham Playing Field Association opened a recreational playing field on Back Lane, to provide a full-sized football pitch, a 5-a-side football pitch, grass tennis courts, adventure playground and cycle track. The Association, a registered charity, has been funded locally and through the Big Lottery fund and Grassroots.{{cite web |title=Kilham Playing Field Association - Prosiect {{!}} Cronfa Gymunedol y Loteri Genedlaethol |url=https://www.tnlcommunityfund.org.uk/welsh/funding/grants/0030090505 |website=tnlcommunityfund.org.uk |access-date=13 November 2023}}

• David Byas, the former Yorkshire cricket captain, is from Kilham.{{cite news |last1=Searby |first1=Martin |title=Byas quits again for life on farm |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/cricket/counties/3039082/Byas-quits-again-for-life-on-farm.html |access-date=29 March 2021 |work=The Telegraph |date=5 December 2002|url-access=subscription}}
• Sir Benjamin Fonseca Outram, naval surgeon, was born in Kilham in 1770{{sfn|Browne|1912|page=349}}
• Sir Henry Thompson, Lord Mayor of York (1663 & 1672), Deputy Lieutenant of the West Riding of Yorkshire (1665) and MP for York (1673–1873){{cite web | url=http://www.archiveshub.ac.uk/news/03011503.html | title=Papers of Henry Thompson | accessdate=28 September 2006 | url-status=dead | archiveurl=https://archive.today/20120720022850/http://www.archiveshub.ac.uk/news/03011503.html | archivedate=20 July 2012 }} was born in Kilham.

{{Reflist}}

{{Refbegin}}

• {{cite book|title=Gazetteer — A–Z of Towns Villages and Hamlets|year=2006|publisher=East Riding of Yorkshire Council|page=7}}

{{Refend}}

• {{cite book |last1=Browne |first1=Horace B. |title=Kilham, East Riding of Yorkshire |date=1912 |publisher=A. Brown and Sons |location=London}}
• {{cite book |last1=Purdy |first1=J. B. |editor1-last=Pugh |editor1-first=R. B. |title=A History of Yorkshire East Riding volume II |date=1974 |publisher=Victoria Counties History |location=London |isbn=0-19-722738-4 |chapter=Dickering Wapentake}}

• {{Commons category-inline|Kilham, East Riding of Yorkshire|Kilham}}
• {{OpenDomesday|OS=TA0664|name=kilham|display=Kilham}}
• [https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/place_page.jsp?p_id=13184&st=KILHAM History of Kilham – A Vision of Britain Through Time]
• [http://www.driffield.co.uk/wolds_village_kilham.htm Driffield.co.uk] – The Villages of the Yorkshire Wolds, Kilham.
• [http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/YKS/ERY/Kilham/Kilham34.html Genuki: Kilham Parish information from Pigot's 1834.]
• [http://www.windmillworld.com/millid/1898.htm Windmillworld] – Kilham Windmill, East Yorkshire.
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20110819105441/http://kilhamplayingfield.org/ KPFA] – Kilham Playing Field Association
• [https://www.kilhamschool.co.uk/ KilhamSchool.co.uk] – Kilham Church of England Primary School

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Category:Villages in the East Riding of Yorkshire

Category:Civil parishes in the East Riding of Yorkshire