Almost on the Yorkshire boundary, Barlborough is a charming village of old stone houses and colourful red roofs. Within a stone's throw it has the old cross with three sundials, two fine 18th century houses, a charming almshouse of 1752, and the church.
The Normans thought it important enough to mark its name with a red line in the Domesday Book, and of their church there still remain four round arches between the nave and the north aisle, resting on pillars of the late 12th century. As old as the pillars is the chancel arch on foliage corbels, and part of the base of the tower with a small window. The south arcade, with the south aisle, was rebuilt in 1899.
On a great stone in the north aisle is the battered sculptured figure of a woman wearing a long mantle over a close-fitting gown; she is Lady Joan Furnival, and her monument has come here from the chancel of Worksop Priory where they laid her about 1395. A brass tablet in the north chapel tells of Margaret and Mary Pole, two maiden sisters who died within two months in 1755, after restoring part of the church and giving the village its almshouse.
The old home of the Poles was Park Hall, still today a substantial house some two miles from the village. In the chancel is a small 14th century painting of the crucifixion, brought from Italy.
A mile from the church is the fine Barlborough Hall, with projecting bays and embattled turrets built in 1583, probably by Robert Smythson, the great Elizabethan architect of Hardwick Hall, for Francis Rodes, who was born a few miles away at Staveley Woodthorpe and was one of the judges who tried Mary, Queen of Scots.
One of its great possessions is a magnificent stone chimney-piece with the figures of the judge and his two wives. Barlborough Hall, too, has its ghost, known as the Grey Lady. Two hundred plus years ago, a daughter of Barlborough Hall left for her wedding, only to find her groom had been killed when his carriage overturned on its way to the church. The daughter returned home, committed suicide, and has wandered the Hall ever since, searching for him.
The house with its glorious approach along an avenue of limes planted at the end of the 17th century, became the home of the judge's son, Sir John Rodes, and of many generations of his descendants, but is now a Roman Catholic preparatory school. The Old Hall dated 1617, is also by Robert Smythson.
