The River Drone is a river which flows south from its source on the Sheffield, South Yorkshire, border. It flows through Dronfield, Unstone and Unstone Green in Derbyshire before merging at Sheepbridge to the north of Chesterfield with the Barlow Brook. Below the junction, it is often referred to as the River Whitting. It then flows south-east till it merges with the River Rother at Brimington Road North (B6050) at Chesterfield. It is one of the three main tributaries of the Rother.[1][2]
The River Drone rises as several small streams south of Sheffield. One rises close to the 705-foot (215m) contour near the Hamlet of Mickley and flows east, crossing the Midland Main Line railway by an aqueduct a little south of Bradway Tunnel and then passing under the A61 road Unstone-Dronfield Bypass and the B6057 Sheffield Road, which was downgraded when the bypass was constructed. A second source rises north-east of Bradway Tunnel, on Dore and Totley golf course. It flows east and passes under the A61 and the B6057 Jordanthorpe Parkway, where it is joined by a third source, rising south of Jordanthorpe and flowing south-west. After the junction, the combined flow heads south-west, to join the first stream at Holmley Common. The river shares the valley with the B6057 and the railway for much of its length, and there are numerous crossings as the river weaves along the valley floor.[3]
After a crossing by the B6057, the channel follows a straight course beside the railway, then passes under an industrial estate and the railway in a culvert. Before it was culverted, it looped to the east around Dronfield Forge, which made spades and shovels.[4] It soon passes back under the railway end enters another culvert,[3] from which it emerges at Lea Road Bridge. This is at the northern end of Dronfield railway station and was designed by J. S. Crossley, the Engineer-in-Chief for the Midland Railway, when they built their new line from Chesterfield to Sheffield via Dronfield in 1870. The bridge is grade II listed, as it was one of the most complex structures on the route between Derby and Sheffield. It consists of two segmental arches, which cross the railway in its cutting, followed by a right-angled bend and three more arches, one of which crosses the river.[5] The river passes under the station, to be joined by a small tributary flowing eastwards from Gosforth Valley, and immediately crosses back under the station again.[3]
After another crossing by the B6057 and the railway, the river loops south-west.[3] Dronfield Works, which made shovels, and the gas works were on the right bank, while the river widened to form the mill pond for Dronfield Corn Mill. The tail race rejoined the river after both had passed under the railway.[4] As it approaches Dronfield Sewage Works, the river passes through Dronfield Nature Park, and is joined by another tributary, which rises near Bentley Farm, heads west to Bentley Hall Farm, and then runs along the eastern edge of Dronfield through Frith Wood and through an industrial park to join the Drone. The river continues in a south-easterly direction, passing under Half Acre Land and Crow Lane, Unstone, and then turns south-west to reach the site of Unstone Mill. Continuing on,[3] it passes through one of the seven arches of Unstone Viaduct, built in 1870 as part of the Chesterfield to Sheffield line of the Midland Railway. It was designed by J. S. Crossley and is grade II listed.[6]
The river passes east of Unstone Green, where it is crossed by Whittington Lane and then the B6057 road at Brierley Bridge. Further south, is passes back under that road, and then through a long culvert under the A61 road and its sliproads. It is joined by Barlow Brook on its right bank, and becomes the River Whitting. Almost immediately it is crossed again by the A61, and then the B6057 and the railway. It runs along the south-west border of Old Whittington, where it is crossed by the B6052 road, and the final bridge carries another railway, the line to Sheffield via Barrow Hill. Just beyond the bridge it joins the River Rother on its left bank.[3]
History
In the late 1990s the river burst its banks and flooded Dronfield 'bottom' shopping area, and as a result a flood storage reservoir was built at Bowshaw to hold back (attenuate) the storm water runoff from the Batemoor and Jordanthorpe housing estates in the south of Sheffield, which form part of the catchment area. Some work was also done to build up the bank level with bunds or retaining walls in some sections of the valley.[citation needed]
The river used to feed several water wheels at early factories in the Dronfield valley in the 18th and 19th centuries. Part of the mill race is visible off Mill Lane in Dronfield, the remains of the mill being demolished in the 1970s.[citation needed]
The flow of the river has been measured using a weir just below the confluence with the Barlow Brook at Sheepbridge since 1976. This long-term record shows that the drainage basin of 50 square kilometres (19sqmi) to the gauging station yielded an average flow of 0.8 cubic metres per second (28cuft/s).[7]
Water power
The river provided power to some mills along its course. There was a water-powered corn mill at Dronfield, known as the Nether Mill or Lower Mill. It was recorded on a map compiled in 1710. A steam-powered flour mill was constructed a few years before 1813, and is thought to have supplemented the main corn mill. In 1845, the site included a kiln, a brewhouse, an engine house and machinery, a brazier's shop and a manufactory, in addition to the corn mill and its mill goit or tail race.[8]
The locations of other sites that used water power in Dronfield are marked by at least four dams, built in the 18th century to supply mills and workshops, as the river banks became industrialised to support the iron and coal industries. The uppermost of these was the iron foundry opened by Edward Lucas and Son in 1790. However, the industries were in decline by the time the railway arrived in 1870, and many houses became vacant when the steelworks relocated to Workington in 1881, taking large numbers of workers with them.[9]
There was a mill at Unstone, north of Unstone railway station. The 1882 map clearly shows the mill pond, with buildings at its south-eastern end, but does not give any indication as to its use. By 1898 it was labelled Unstone Mills and was producing edge tools. It reverted to having no description in 1919, and by 1958 part of it was a "works" and other parts were in ruins.[10]
Further downstream, a mill at Unstone was recorded in 1538, when the miller was R. Seveyson. A later miller, Joseph Haslehurst, became bankrupt in 1826. The mill was called Unstone Mill on the 1840 Ordnance Survey map, but another map by Burdett called it Highwood Mill. In 1880 the mill was rebuilt, but did not last long as it was destroyed by a fire in November 1887. The site can be identified by the river channels, but there are few structural remains of the buildings, although small sections of wall were still visible in 1980.[11] Ordnance Survey maps showed it as a corn mill in 1882 and 1898, but it was no longer in use by 1919.[12]
Another site was Coal Aston corn mill, close to the Chesterfield Road on the River Drone. The industrialist Christopher Rotherham moved there in 1820, and the site included his house, a grinding mill, a dam and a workshop. It was on the Hallowes Farm estate, and he developed it significantly, for by 1851 it was a sickle works employing 20 men, several of whom were related to him. There was industrial unrest at the works in 1856, when Mark Barker was caught after stealing 12 hammers and 20 pairs of tongs. At the trial, Rotherham maintained that Barker had stolen them because of his own anti-Union sentiment, and the stealing of tools was a common tactic at the time. This was never proved, but Barker served 18 months in prison with hard labour as a result. Subsequently, bellows were damaged, straps cut, and anvils thrown into the mill pool. Before 1860, his workers had refused to pay subscriptions to the Sickle Grinder's Union, and threats were made against him that the works would be blown up. There were several incidents involving explosives between then and 1863, when in June an attempt to blow up his warehouse, which was attached to the house where five members of his family lived, failed to detonate. He had had enough, and reluctantly persuaded his workers to join the Sickle Grinder's Union, after which the incidents ceased. After his death on 4 December 1870, the manufacturing of sickles was handled by two of his grandsons, who opened new premises at Unstone Mill in 1873, but the business failed less than a year later. It was sold to John Henry Harrison, Rotherham's son-in-law, and continued to produce sickles until it failed in 1953.[13]
On the River Whitting section, Whittington Mill was inferred in a deed dating from 1599, and near the weir a broken millstone carrying the date 1679 was found. The mill and kiln buildings were dismantled in 1735 and had been rebuilt by 1736. The work, for which detailed records are held in Chesterfield Borough Library, was commissioned by the Duke of Devonshire and cost £195-12s-8d. Two waterwheels were fitted, but the accounts do not mention any new millstones, although there were five sets. It was marked as a flour mill in 1876 and a corn mill in 1898.[14] In 1886 the Elliot family, who were running the mill, took legal action against the Chesterfield Rural Sanitary Authority, alleging that they were in breach of their authorising Act of Parliament. They were extracting water from the Barlow Brook, but had a duty to maintain some flow on the brook, to power Whittington Mill. The judge found in their favour, and ruled that water could only be extracted when the flow of the brook exceeded 150 cubic feet (4.2m3) per minute. The production of flour is thought to have stopped around 1900, and the milling of animal feed in the early 1920s. The Elliots then used the building as a joinery workshop.[15] In 1962, it was noted that the building had four storeys, but only one wheel, and although it had been unused for some time, all the equipment and the miller's tools were still there. In 2000 the building only had three storeys, with a slate roof, and the long thin mill pond alongside the railway had been filled in. A garden centre and car park have since been built over the site of the mill pond, although the mill building still stands in the grounds.[14]
Water quality
The Environment Agency measure the water quality of the river systems in England. Each is given an overall ecological status, which may be one of five levels: high, good, moderate, poor and bad. Several components are used to determine this, including biological status, which looks at the quantity and varieties of invertebrates, angiosperms and fish. Chemical status, which compares the concentrations of various chemicals against known safe concentrations, is rated good or fail.[16]
The water quality of the River Drone, which appears to include the branch that originates near Bentley Hall Farm but not those that originate near Dore and Totley, Mickley or Jordanthorpe, was as follows in 2019.
The river has not been classed as good quality because of physical modification of the channel, and because it is affected by discharges from sewage treatment works. Like many rivers in the UK, the chemical status changed from good to fail in 2019 because of the presence of cypermethrin, polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE), perfluorooctane sulphonate (PFOS), and mercury compounds, none of which had previously been included in the assessment.
The River Sheaf in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, flows northwards, past Dore, through Abbeydale and north of Heeley. It then passes into a culvert, through which it flows under the centre of Sheffield before joining the River Don. This lower section of the River Sheaf, together with the Don between the Blonk Street and Lady's Bridges, formed two sides of the boundary of Sheffield Castle.
The A61 is a major trunk road in England connecting Derby and Thirsk in North Yorkshire by way of Alfreton, Clay Cross, Chesterfield, Sheffield, Barnsley, Wakefield, Leeds, Harrogate and Ripon. The road is closely paralleled by the M1 motorway between Derby and Leeds.
Dronfield is a town in North East Derbyshire, England, which includes Dronfield Woodhouse and Coal Aston. It lies in the valley of the River Drone between Chesterfield and Sheffield. The Peak District National Park is three miles (4.8 km) to the west. The name comes from the Old English Dranfleld, probably meaning an open land infested with drone bees.
The River Rother, a waterway in the northern midlands of England, gives its name to the town of Rotherham and to the Rother Valley parliamentary constituency. It rises in Pilsley in Derbyshire and flows in a generally northwards direction through the centre of Chesterfield, where it feeds the Chesterfield Canal, and on through the Rother Valley Country Park and several districts of Sheffield before joining the River Don at Rotherham in Yorkshire. Historically, it powered mills, mainly corn or flour mills, but most had ceased to operate by the early 20th century, and few of the mill buildings survive.
The Moss is a brook in North East Derbyshire, England.
Beauchief and Greenhill ward—which includes the districts of Batemoor, Beauchief, Chancet Wood, Greenhill, Jordanthorpe, Lowedges and Meadowhead—is one of the 28 electoral wards in the City of Sheffield, England. It is in the southern part of the city and covers an area of 2.4 square miles (6.2 km2). The population of the ward in 2016 was estimated to be 19,669 people in 9,209 houses.
North East Derbyshire is a constituency created in 1885 represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2024 by Louise Jones of the Labour Party.
Killamarsh is a village and civil parish in North East Derbyshire, England, bordering Rotherham to the north and Sheffield to the north-west. It lies close to Derbyshire’s border with South Yorkshire.
Dronfield railway station serves the town of Dronfield in Derbyshire, England, south of Sheffield, on the Midland Main Line between Chesterfield and Sheffield.
Unstone is a village and civil parish in the English county of Derbyshire, in the North East Derbyshire administrative district approximately 1 mile (1.6 km) south east of Dronfield. It is also close to the town of Chesterfield. The River Drone and the Midland Main Line railway run through the village, which has a population of over 1,000, increasing to 1,876 and including Apperknowle at the time of the 2011 Census.
The Blackburn Brook is a stream in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England which flows through the Blackburn Valley along the M1 and Ecclesfield Road and joins the River Don near the Meadowhall shopping centre. Downstream from the A61 road at Chapeltown the Blackburn Brook is defined as a main river by the Environment Agency, which requires new building development to be at least 26 feet (8 m) from the bank side as a flood defence measure and to allow access to the watercourse for maintenance.
Treeton railway station is a former railway station in the centre of Treeton, Rotherham, England.
Apperknowle is a village in Derbyshire, England. The village is located on the Southwestern slopes of a flat-topped ridge at about 200 m above sea level. The village overlooks the town of Dronfield and the villages of Unstone and Unstone Green in the valley bottom, where the River Drone and the Midland Railway are located. Above the village is a small grass airstrip that used to belong to British Steel, and is now used for private planes with a couple of new hangars built in the 1980s.
Old Whittington is a village in the Borough of Chesterfield in Derbyshire, England. Old Whittington is 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Chesterfield and 10 miles (16 km) south-east of Sheffield. The population of the Old Whittington ward at the 2011 Census was 4,181. The village lies on the River Rother.
The River Hipper is a tributary of the River Rother in Derbyshire, England. Its source is a large expanse of wetlands, fed by the surrounding moors between Chatsworth and Chesterfield, known as the Hipper Sick on Beeley Moor, which is part of the Chatsworth Estate. It then passes through Holymoorside and down into Chesterfield, just south of the town centre, before flowing into the River Rother. In July 2007, parts of Chesterfield flooded when the River Hipper burst its banks during a substantial storm that caused extensive flooding in North Derbyshire and South Yorkshire. The river burst its banks again after torrential rain in October 2023. The surrounding landscape is known as the Hipper Valley.
Sheepbridge railway station was a station in Chesterfield, Derbyshire, England.
Whittington railway station is a former railway station on the southern edge of New Whittington, Derbyshire, England.
Shire Brook is a small stream in the south eastern part of the City of Sheffield in South Yorkshire, England. It rises in the suburb of Gleadless Townend and flows in a general easterly direction for 4 miles (6.5 km) to its confluence with the River Rother between Beighton and Woodhouse Mill. In the past the brook has been both the border of Yorkshire and Derbyshire and between the sees of Canterbury and York. The course of the stream has been influenced by human intervention in the 20th century with the brook being diverted underground and flowing through culverts on three occasions as it traverses locations which were formerly landfill sites and extensive railway sidings.
Beighton is a village 6 miles south-east of Sheffield's city centre, now classed as a historic township of the city. Due to much expansion, the village became a part of Sheffield city in 1967, and was transferred from Derbyshire to the newly created South Yorkshire, England. During much of the late 17th to 19th centuries the village was noted for its edge tool manufacturing, with Thomas Staniforth & Co Sickle works being based at nearby Hackenthorpe.
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