Dewsbury, West Riding : Historical writing

Descriptive gazetteer entries

These other entries in our collection of descriptive gazetteers are also about Dewsbury. You may be able to find further references to Dewsbury in the descriptive gazetteers by doing a full-text search here.

Place Type of entry Source
Dewsbury parliamentary and municipal borough, market town, parish and township Bartholomew
DEWSBURY a town, a township, a parish, a sub-district, and a district Imperial

This additional information from our descriptive gazetteers is for locations within the parish or parishes associated with Dewsbury.

Place Type of entry Source
BATLEY-CARR a hamlet and a chapelry Imperial
Chidswell hamlet Bartholomew
CHIDSWELL a hamlet Imperial
Clifton village Bartholomew
CRICKENLY a hamlet Imperial
Daw Green hamlet Bartholomew
DAW-GREEN a hamlet Imperial
Dewsbury Moor ecclesiastical district and estate Bartholomew
DEWSBURY MOOR a chapelry Imperial
Earls Heaton ecclesiastical district and railway station Bartholomew
EARLS-HEATON a chapelry Imperial
Gawthorpe hamlet Bartholomew
GAWTHORPE Imperial
Hanging Heaton ecclesiastical district and hamlet Bartholomew
HANGING-HEATON a hamlet and a chapelry Imperial
Hartshead township Bartholomew
HARTSHEAD a hamlet and a chapelry Imperial
Kirklees village Bartholomew
KIRKLEES a village Imperial
OSSETT a village and a chapelry Imperial
OSSETT (South) a village and a chapelry Imperial
OSSETT-STREET a hamlet Imperial
Ossett (with Gawthorpe) town and township Bartholomew
OSSETT-WITH-GAWTHORPE a township and a sub-district Imperial
Soothill township Bartholomew
South Ossett ecclesiastical district Bartholomew
West Town ecclesiastical district Bartholomew
WEST TOWN a chapelry Imperial

Travel writing

This website includes the complete texts of books describing journeys around Britain, written between the twelfth and nineteenth centuries. Selecting one of the links below will take you to the first reference to Dewsbury within the selected text. This will not always be a description of a visit: travellers often mention places other than where they are, for example as a basis for comparison.

This website includes two large libraries, of historical travel writing and of entries from nineteenth century gazetteers describing places. We have text from these sources available for these places near your location:

Place Mentioned in Travel Writing Mentioned in Historical Gazetteer
Thornhill Lees 0 2
West Town 0 2
Earlsheaton 0 3
Soothill 0 2
Ravensthorpe 0 1
Thornhill 1 2
Dewsbury Moor 0 2
Lower Whitley 0 2
Batley Carr 0 1
Hanging Heaton 0 2
Middlestown 0 2
Gawthorpe 0 2
Mirfield 0 2
Purlwell 0 1
Ossett 0 3
Staincliffe 0 2
South Ossett 0 2
Whitley Upper 0 2
Horbury Bridge 0 2
Heckmondwike 0 2

Names from historical writing

The following appear as names for Dewsbury. Follow the links for what the author actually said:

Name Author Source
DEWSBURROUGH William Camden Britain, or, a Chorographicall Description of the most flourishing Kingdomes, England, Scotland, and Ireland (London: George Bishop and John Norton, 1610).
DEWSBURY John Bartholomew Gazetteer of the British Isles (Edinburgh: Bartholomew, 1887).
John Marius Wilson Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (Edinburgh: A Fullarton & Co., 1870-72).

NB: These variant names come from our collections of historical travel writing and descriptive gazetteers:

  • The above links take you to the first reference to this particular version of the name within a book of travel writing, or to the relevant gazetteer entry.
  • Some names may derive from research by antiquarian writers such as William Camden and Thomas Pennant into the Roman, Saxon and medieval names of places. Their claims are not always supported by modern place-name researchers.
  • References by travel writers to the place using its "normal" name are not included. Descriptive gazetteer entries are included only if the name does not appear anywhere else.