Ollerton

For other places with the same name, see Ollerton (disambiguation).
Ollerton

Saint Giles Parish Church
Ollerton
 Ollerton shown within Nottinghamshire
Population 9,840 (2011)
OS grid referenceSK655675
Civil parishOllerton and Boughton
DistrictNewark and Sherwood
Shire countyNottinghamshire
RegionEast Midlands
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post town NEWARK
Postcode district NG22
Dialling code 01623
Police Nottinghamshire
Fire Nottinghamshire
Ambulance East Midlands
EU Parliament East Midlands
UK ParliamentSherwood
List of places
UK
England
Nottinghamshire

Coordinates: 53°12′N 1°01′W / 53.20°N 1.02°W / 53.20; -1.02

Ollerton is a small town in Nottinghamshire, England, on the edge of Sherwood Forest in the area known as the Dukeries. It forms part of the civil parish of Ollerton and Boughton and is in Newark and Sherwood District .[1] The population of this civil parish at the 2011 census was 9,840.[2]

Formerly a rural village with a tradition of hop-growing, from the 1920s onwards the main industry was coal mining with Ollerton expanding greatly during the 1960s and 1970s. The colliery was sunk in the 1920s and completed during the General Strike of 1926, which led to a saying of "Ollerton was ever built with scab labour".[3] During the expansion of the pit, many miners from closed collieries in north-eastern England and Scotland moved to work at Ollerton.[3] There was a large Polish community amongst the miners at Ollerton, estimated to make up roughly half the workforce at the time of the 1984-1985 strike.[4]

As Ollerton Colliery was considered one of the most left-wing pits in Nottinghamshire, it was subject to heavy picketing at the time of the ballot by the Nottinghamshire NUM in March 1984.[5] A miner from Ackton Hall Colliery, near Featherstone, West Yorkshire died at Ollerton when picketing during the miners' strike on 15 April 1984.[6] David Gareth Jones[7] was hit in the neck by a brick thrown by a local youth when he was picketing,[8] but the post-mortem ruled that it had not caused his death and that it was more likely to have been caused by being pressed against the pit gates earlier in the day.[9] News of his death led to hundreds of pickets staying in Ollerton town centre overnight.[10] At the request of Nottinghamshire Police, Arthur Scargill appeared and called for calm in the wake of the tragedy.[10] However, several working miners in Ollerton reported that their gardens and cars had been vandalised during the night.[11] A memorial bench was sited near the spot where David died.[8] As a mark of respect for David Jones, Ollerton Colliery closed for a few days afterwards.[5]

Ollerton features in a connected song by Australian singer Darren Hayes called "A Hundred Challenging Things A Boy Can Do" on his 2007 album, This Delicate Thing We've Made.

The mine closed in 1994. Subsequently, the land around the mine was reclaimed and redeveloped as an ecologically sustainable "village" of commercial offices, including a large nearby Tesco superstore.[12]

Hop Pole Hotel in Ollerton old village with River Maun in foreground

In the old part of the original village, Ollerton Watermill was built in 1713 on the River Maun. It operated commercially producing flour until 1984. Restored in 1993, it now houses a teashop and exhibition.[13] Ollerton Town has a local football team, Ollerton Town F.C.

Transport: Ollerton is served by Stagecoach Mansfield, Travel Wright. Stagecaoch Bassetlaw run the Sherwood Arrow between Worksop/Retford-Ollerton-Nottingham every 60 minutes.

Ollerton is the birthplace of Tim Flear MVO (Royal Victorian Order), career member of the British diplomatic service and a HM Consul-General in the city of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. Flear's father was the local butcher.

There is some ambition to reinstate passenger train services to the town by using the current freight only line from Shirebrook on the Nottingham-Worksop route.[14]

References

  1. ↑ OS Explorer Map 270: Sherwood Forest: (1:25 000):ISBN 0 319 24040 1
  2. ↑ "Civil parish population 2011". Neighbourhood Statistics. Office for National statistics. Retrieved 13 April 2016.
  3. 1 2 Strike: 358 Days that Shook the Nation. London: Sunday Times. p. 58. ISBN 0-340-38445-X.
  4. ↑ Douglas, David John. Pit Sense versus the State: A history of militant miners in the Doncaster area. London: Phoenic Press. p. 96. ISBN 0-948984-26-0.
  5. 1 2 Adeney, Martin; Lloyd, John (1988). The Miners' Strike 1984-5: Loss without limit. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. p. 99. ISBN 0-7102-1371-9.
  6. ↑ BBC, Bradford and West Yorkshire, March 2009. Mining Stories - The Strike: Remembering David. Retrieved 2014-02-11
  7. ↑ England and Wales Deaths, Retrieved 2014-11-21
  8. 1 2 Mullins, Helen Chad (Mansfield local newspaper), 18 March 2009, p.8 Miners' Strike 25th Anniversary, interview with Mark Jones. Accessed 2014-11-21
  9. ↑ Strike: 358 Days that Shook the Nation. London: Sunday Times. pp. 59–60. ISBN 0-340-38445-X.
  10. 1 2 Strike: 358 Days that Shook the Nation. London: Sunday Times. p. 61. ISBN 0-340-38445-X.
  11. ↑ Strike: 358 Days that Shook the Nation. London: Sunday Times. pp. 61–62. ISBN 0-340-38445-X.
  12. ↑ Chad, local newspaper 13 July 2001. Tesco to create 300 jobs at Ollerton. Retrieved 2014-02-11
  13. ↑ Ollerton Watermill & Tea Shop Retrieved 2014-02-11
  14. ↑ Lambourne, Helen (22 July 2009). "New bid to extend rail link to Ollerton". Worksop Today. Retrieved 21 February 2010.
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