Church Walk from Market Square, Higham Ferrers Photo by A. J. George

Higham Ferrers, formerly the oldest and the second smallest borough in Northamptonshire, has had a long and eventful history.  Its commanding position high above the River Nene gave it strategic importance of which the Saxons were quick to take advantage.  They called the place ‘Hecham’ and made it a burgh of no little importance.  Although facts are rather scarce, there is evidence that the site of the town was occupied in even earlier times by the Romans.  Relics of their period have been unearthed and, of course, the town is but three miles from the camp set up by them in AD 43 on the banks of the Nene at Chester House.

The Normans strengthened the rough Saxon fortifications of the town and William the First gave ownership of the place to William Peverel, a most capable general who is said to have built the first of the two local castles on this hill-top site.  Another was built later, either by the Earl of Lancaster or by the Ferrers family, but of these two fortresses nothing but a few earthworks now remain.  The history of the castle was in fact not marred by wars and the accent was on peaceful prosperity with hunting in the adjacent forest as the major local interest.  The Lord of Higham, a great man who possessed over a hundred and fifty ‘Lordships’ in the Midlands, was Lord of the local manor, but in the 13th century it passed to the hands of the Ferrers, one of whom – William de Ferrers – freed the serfs and their kin.  In 1251 Higham added Ferrers to its name and took on the dignity of a borough.

The town grew slowly through the next centuries.  Its first Royal Charter granting borough status is enrolled on the Charter Rolls.  Another was granted in 1556 by Philip and Mary.  This gave the town the right to send a member to parliament, a right that was kept right through until the Reform Act of 1832.

The 14th century saw the birth of Higham’s greatest son, Henry Chichele.  He was born in 1363, son of a local draper who was Mayor several times.  Henry’s exceptional talent was soon recognised and he was sent to Winchester School and then to New College, Oxford.  He entered the church, rose quickly to prominence and in 1413 became Archbishop of Canterbury, an office he held for thirty years.  A famous figure and a man of ‘enduring worth’ he was buried in Canterbury Cathedral but he left splendid memorials here in Higham Ferrers – the Bede House and remains of the college that he founded and which was suppressed at the Dissolution.  Chichele also founded All Souls College at Oxford.

In the Lancastrian period, Higham Ferrers became one of the centres of the Duchy of Lancaster’s administration.  The manor and most of the farmlands still belong to the Queen in right of her Duchy, but other estates passed to the Dacres and Fitzwilliams before eventually passing to local ownership in the 19th century.

Higham Ferrers, despite its ancient charter and privileges, was conservative in outlook and, although industry was carried on from early times, it grew comparatively slowly.  For many years it was larger than its neighbour, Rushden, but in later years the position was reversed.  Even the fairs and markets of the town have gradually faded from the scene.  At one time Higham held seven fairs every year and the market, held in the Square until comparatively recent times, is now no more a feature of local life.

The development of the boot and shoe industry was slow in Higham Ferrers.  The Crown and the Fitzwilliams, who held most of the land, would not sell sites for factories which went elsewhere.  Exactly when the trade began is not certain, but leather testers were recorded in the town in the 16th century.  The Nene valley has long been a famed cattle grazing area and hides were thus abundant.  This fact, together with the many local oak trees whose bark yielded the liquor needed for tanning, led to the establishment in the towns on or near the Nene in Northamptonshire of leather and footwear industries.  The Nene provided easy and cheap transport in days when roads were bad and thus in such places as Higham Ferrers, Raunds and Rushden, the tanners and shoemakers set up in business.

In the early 19th century the working population of the town was almost solely engaged in making shoes or pillowlace, the latter an industry now defunct.  At that time the Nene carried a considerable river traffic, but the coming of the Railways put an end to that.

A gazetteer of 1866 had this to say of the town:— “Higham Ferrers, a town, parish and hundred, stands on a rocky height above the Nene in Northamptonshire.  It has a station on the Northampton and Peterborough railway.  The town is of plain appearance, about a mile long and contains some houses of the 15th century.  An ancient cross is in the market place and the shaft of another is in the churchyard.  The church has been thoroughly restored at a cost of £6,000 and measures 119 feet by 69 with a tower and hexagonal spire 180 feet high.  An old Baptist chapel, noted for preachings by John Bunyan, is now a stable.  There are a Wesleyan Chapel, an endowed grammar school and charities of £30.  The college, founded by Archbishop Chichele, a native of the town, was suppressed at the dissolution of the monasteries, but his Bede House, on the south side of the churchyard, remains and is used as a Sunday School.  The town hall is a small edifice of 1808.  Markets used to be held thrice a week but have now closed.  Fairs are still held on the Thursday before 5th February; on 7th March; on Thursday before 12th May; on 28th June; the Thursday before 5th August; on the 11th October and 6th December.  Shoe making and lace making are carried on.  The town has a head post office and a good inn.  The parish comprises 2,260 acres, has 246 houses and a population of 1,152.  Real property is £4,775 of which £20 are in gas works.  The manor belongs to the Hon G W Fitzwilliam and living is a vicarage united with the papal curacy of Chelveston in the diocese of Peterborough.  Value £300 and patron, the Hon G W Fitzwilliam.”

The Napoleonic wars did much to help the county’s shoe industry as military orders poured in.  As the industry developed so the towns in which it was concentrated grew.  Since 1845 it had enjoyed the benefits of a rail service (ostensibly built to serve Irthlingborough but a not too distant walk from Higham) in the Nene Valley on the line from Northampton to Peterborough via Wellingborough.  The industrialists of both Rushden and Higham, however, wanted a railway actually in the towns themselves and agitation grew after the Midland Railway in 1857 extended their line south from Leicester, through Wellingborough and the village of Irchester.  Eventually a branch was built from this line to Higham Ferrers and in 1894 trains at last “arrived”.  It was intended to continue the route through to Raunds – and thus link up with the Kettering-Huntingdon line – but this was never done.  Today events have gone ‘full circle’ as both the Higham Ferrers branch line and the Nene valley lines are closed.  The town is thus again rail-less and the nearest services are at Wellingborough.

In this century Higham Ferrers has grown far less rapidly than its neighbour and has thus retained many of its pleasing and mellow medieval buildings including the beautiful group around the church.  A high proportion of the total working population is employed in the boot and shoe and leather dressing industries, although other factories have been built in recent years to provide a greater variety of employment.  Though more people work in the large shoe factories, there are more leather dressing firms in the town and the dressing of upper leathers is of major importance.  It was said that in the 1930s Higham produced each year enough leather to lay a foot wide carpet through to London.

The town, despite modern development (including large housing estates) retains its historical “quarter” (having been designated a Conservation Area) and has, far more successfully than most towns, kept the factories of its staple industry from intruding into this quiet and pleasing part of the town.

More recently the upheaval of Local Government Reorganisation has resulted in the loss of ‘borough status’ but the ‘successor’ Town Council retains all the civic ceremonial of the former authority in addition to its important function in the sphere of sport and recreation and it will continue its predecessor’s aim of maintaining the balance of the old and new which forms one of the town’s most pleasing attributes.