Helmsley, called Helmsly-Blackmoor, about five miles south-west from Kirkby Moor-side, is situated in a valley called Rhidale, on the side of the river Rhye; the houses built of stone. A considerable trade is carried on by the inhabitants in cottons and linens. Here are the remains of a castle which appears to have been during the troubles of Charles I. in a defensible state: as the Parliamentary Chronicle, entitled, "The Burning Bush not consumed," informs us, that Helmsley Castle, being besieged by Lord Fairfax, a party of the royal horse advanced from Skipton and Knaresborough to its relief; but being repulsed, November 12, and a quantity of meal, salt, and other provisions for the castle, taken about the 20th November, 1644, it surrendered upon articles, with all the ordnance, arms, stores, and ammunition, except what the garrison marched out with, according to agreement. In it were about 200 men, nine pieces of ordnance, 300 musquets and pikes, six barrels of powder, with a great deal of money, plate, and other plunder.

Duncombe Park, the beautiful seat of Charles Slingsby Duncombe, esq. is situated one mile west from the town of Helmsley.

HELMSLEY (in Domesday “Elmeslac”), is a market and union town, parish, and head of a county court district, with a station on the Grilling and Pickering branch of the North Eastern railway, and is 12 miles west from Pickering, 23 north from York, 6 west from Kirby Moorside, 14 east from Thirsk and 218 from London; it is in the Whitby division of the Riding, wapentake and petty sessional division of Ryedale, rural deanery of Helmsley, archdeaconry of Cleveland and diocese of York. The parish consists of five townships and is 12 miles long from north to south. The town lies in a hollow, surrounded by hills, at the bottom of which flows the river Eye, crossed south-east of the town by a stone bridge of two unequal arches. Waterworks were erected by the late Earl of Feversham some years since, the supply being obtained direct from a spring in the rock 1 ¼ miles distant; a second spring half a mile still further up has recently been added, and the supply of water is now both ample and excellent; the town was partially drained in 1853, and improved drainage works were fully completed in 1897: the outfall being ¾ of a mile below the town, where the sewage is filtered through gravel beds; there are gas works belonging to a private firm. The church of All Saints, partially rebuilt in 1866—8, under the direction of Messrs. Banks and Barry, architects, is an interesting edifice of stone, consisting of chancel, nave, north aisle, transepts, south porch and a western tower, with plain parapet and octagonal spired pinnacles at the angles, and containing 8 bells and a clock with musical chimes striking the quarter-hours: the chancel arch and south doorway are portions of the original Norman fabric, and display some well executed chevron moulding: the arcade separating the nave and aisle consists of four lofty arches, apparently Transitional, on clustered piers, but the half columns east and west are round: the tower arch is also Transitional, and has plain caps: the east window and fourteen others are stained, and of these the following are memorials:-in the north aisle, to Sophia, wife of the Most Rev. Robert Gray D.D. late Bishop of Cape Town, who died 27 April, 1871; to the Rev. Ernest Alfred White, d. 1882; the Rev. Hastings Philip Elwin, d. 1874; the Very Rev. Augustus Duncombe, dean of York, d. 26 Jan. 1880; and in the south transept to the Rev. George Dixon M.A. 24 years vicar of Helmsley, d. 1 May, 1848; there are memorials to the Rev. G. Dixon, son of the former and also vicar of the parish and Margaret, his wife; to Charles (Duncombe), 1st baron Feversham, d. 16 July, 1841, and Lady Charlotte (Legge), his wife, d. 5 Nov. 1848; the Hon. Albert Duncombe, d. 14 sept. 1846; John Ness, d. 17 April, 1826, and Sarah, his wife; Jane, wife of the Rev. Richard Conyers LL.D, about 50 years vicar, d. 24 Feb. 1771; to the Sandwith family, 1808—71, and others: under the tower arch is a flat stone with the brass effigies of a man and his wife, a helmet with crest of the Manners family and mantling, and the matrices of five shields: there are also inscribed brasses to John Pierson, d. 12 Dec. 1770; William Moore, bur. 18 Feb. 1685, and Christopher Agar, d. 10 Nov. 1799: the chancel has a reredos of three arched compartments, filled with mosaics, and is fitted with seats under a continuous coved canopy: the north transept forms a chapel, arranged in 1881 by the present vicar in memory of his father, the Most Rev. Robert Gray D.D. Bishop of Cape Town 1847—74, and named in honour of St. Aelred, 3rd Abbot of Rievaulx: it has a separate altar and a canopied wood reredos, over which hangs a painting of a “Pieta”; the east window of the chapel represents “the Crucifixion”; the altar and reredos were designed by Mr. Temple Moore, architect, of Hampstead, London: a screen divides this transept from the aisle, and outside it are the remains of an ancient piscina and a brass: the south transept, called St. Columba’s chapel, is used for early Sunday morning services, and contains an altar and reredos with carved figures, the latter being given by friends in memory of the Rev. S. D. Hodgson, a former curate: the east wall of the chapel is decorated with frescoes: the ancient octagonal font basin is now in Pockley church: the font in use dates from 1867, and consists of a square basin supported on five shafts: in the church porch lies a large fragment of stone, carved with an interlaced pattern, and possibly part of a cross: in the north aisle are several stained windows depicting events in the ancient history of the parish and of the abbey of Rievaulx and its founder, Walter L’Espec, and on the jambs are descriptive inscriptions with painted shields of arms: on the interior walls of the tower hang three old halberts, a slave stick taken from the neck of one of a slave gang in the centre of Africa, a case containing impressions of old seals and documents &c. belonging to the parish, with various other curiosities, and another case containing relics brought from the Holy Land. The entire cost of the rebuilding, begun by William, 2nd baron Feversham, in 1866, and completed by William Ernest, 1st Earl of Feversham, in 1868, was £15,000: the church is seated with oak benches, and will hold 650 persons. The register dates from the year 1575. The living is a vicarage, net yearly value £280, including 32 acres of glebe and residence; it is in the gift of the Earl of Feversham, and held since 1870 by the Rev. Charles Norris Gray M.A. of University College, Oxford, and rural dean of Helmsley. The impropriate tithe amounts to £27. The Catholic church, in the High street, is a building of stone, erected in 1894 and dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Wesleyan Methodist chapel, at the east end of the town, erected in 1800, and enlarged in 1852, was rebuilt in 1902, at a cost of over £2,000, and will seat 500 persons: on the south side of the chapel are school-rooms, built in 1852 and 1878. There is also a Primitive Methodist chapel. The Union Club, which is non-political and non-sectarian, was opened in Byegate in 1910, and contains billiard and reading rooms. The Ryedale and Pickering Lythe Agricultural society hold their meetings here once in three years. The town has no manufactures, the district being purely agricultural. The fairs are held on the 1sth of May, 16th of July (for horses, cattle and sheep), October 1st (for sheep only) and 2nd (cattle and horses only) and November 5th (for sheep only) and 6th (cattle and horses only). Since the opening of the railway, the market day has been altered from Saturday to Friday. Members of the Territorial Force here belong to the G Company, 5th Batt. Alexandra, Princess of Wales’s Own (Yorkshire Regiment), whose head quarters are at Pickering. In the centre of the spacious market place is a fine canopied monument in the Gothic style, erected in 1869 at a cost of £800, raised by public subscription, to William, 2nd baron Feversham, who died 11 Feb. 1867; the monument, designed by the late Sir G. Gilbert Scott R.A. is similar in its general effect to the Scott memorial at Edinburgh, and includes a marble statue of the late Lord Feversham in his robes as a peer, executed by Noble, at a cost of £600, being defrayed by the Duncombe family: the statue was unveiled 10 Nov. 1875. The Town Hall, erected in 1901, on the west side of the Market place, was the gift of the present Earl of Feversham, and commemorates the bi-centenary of the possession of the estate of the Duncombe family, and also the coming of age of the present heir, Viscount Helmsley. The foundation stone was laid by His Majesty King George V. then Duke of York, during his visit to the Royal Agricultural show at York in July, 1900. The building is of freestone with stone dressings, and comprises a court house and market hall, reading room and coffee bar, and a residence for the caretaker. Adjoining the churchyard on the north is the Canons Garth, an ancient timbered house, and formerly a residence of the Canons of Kirkham, who served Helmsley church: the portion remaining comprises the centre with stone and timber porch, and the gabled west wing: an arched entrance leads from the street to the house, which in 1892 underwent a thorough restoration, including the rebuilding of the eastern wing on its original site to correspond with the existing west wing. It is now the residence of Church of England sisters from All Saints Convent, St. Albans, Herts, who work in the parish. Duncombe Park. Rievaulx and Byland Abbeys, the church and cave at Kirkdale, Hovingham spa, Gilling Castle, Pickering Castle, Kirby Moorside, Sinnington, with its maypole on the green, Lastinsrham, which has an extremely interesting church, and Coxwold, once the residence of Sterne, are places of interest in the neighbourhood.

Helmsley Castle, situated just within the limits of Duncombe park, at the south-east part of the town, was a fortress of probably very ancient origin, and though little now remains, yet its formidable earthworks and the fragments of the buildings which still exist, show that when perfect it must have been almost impregnable. Id plan it is rectangular, and consists of an inner ward, about 200 feet square, lying diagonally north and south, with the remains of the keep on the north-east side, and on the opposite side a portion of the later buildings and two ranges of earthworks, considerably widened on the north-west and south-east, almost completely surrounding the inner ward and forming double ditches, from 60 to 70 feet broad, and crossed where the ramparts are broadest, by bridges defended by barbicans, the whole covering an area of about 11 acres. The keep, of which the south-west front is almost all that now remains, was a huge tower about 53 feet square and 100 feet in height, with an embattled parapet and square battlemented turrets at the angles, rising about 10 feet above the curtain; the present height of the structure, owing to the accumulation of earth at the base, is not more than 96 feet. The original keep, a work of Late Transitional date, was probably built by Robert de Ros, surnamed “Fursan,” and completed before 1200; and it consisted only of a basement and first floor, together about 70 feet in height; his grandson, Robert de Roos, who died in 1285, made various alterations in the Early English style, and William de Boos, who held the lordship from 1317 to his death in 1343, may have added the upper stage, which, together with the turrets, is of the Late Decorated period. The buildings on the south side of the ward opposite to the keep consist of two unequal blocks; the larger is square with thick walls and a lofty elevation, and retains traces of Norman and Early English work, but underwent considerable alteration in the Decorated period and later; the other portion is of the 16th century and was probably erected by Edward (Manners), third Earl of Rutland, into whose family the lordship came by the marriage in the 15 th Century of Eleanor de Roos, eventual heiress of the house of Roos, with Sir Robert Manners, knt. of Etal, Northumberland; the rooms, now filled with lumber, contained some good oak panelling and plaster work, and the cornice of one of them is richly decorated with shields of arms of the earl, consisting of sixteen quarterings, impaling the coat of his wife Isabel, daughter of Sir Thomas Holcroft knt. and there are also figures of wyverns supporting fleurs de lis, mermaids and other ornaments; a portion of the area of the inner ward has been levelled and is now used as a tennis ground. The double ditches almost inclosing the stronghold necessitated four bridges, two on the north-west and two on the south-east, all the piers of which are still perfect, but of the gatehouse and barbican attached to the former no traces exist; on the south-east the rampart inclosing the first ditch is considerably widened to admit of the erection of the main barbican, a remarkable outwork about 250 feet long by 40 wide, with large circular towers at each end and a gatehouse towards the west end of the structure; the gatehouse, which is fairly complete on the ground floor, has a vaulted entrance, 32 feet wide, but the upper stage is ruinous; the outer gateway, about 10 feet in width, has a two-light Decorated window, and some other portions are also of this date, the Earlier parts being Norman or Early English. During the Civil war the Castle was held for the king by Col. Crosland, but after a brave defence, was surrendered Nov. 22, 1644, and immediately dismantled. By the marriage of Lady Katherine Manners with George (Villiers), first Duke of Buckingham, the castle became the property of the Villiers family, and George, the celebrated second duke, partially restored the structure and made it his residence; but after his death at Kirby Moorside, April 16, 1687, it was allowed to fall into decay, and in 1695 was sold to Sir Charles Duncombe kt. M.P. for Helmsley, for a sum of £90,000.

Duncombe park, which includes the seat of the Earl of Feversham D.L., J.P.lies to the west of the town; the mansion, a fine building in the Doric style, said to have been designed by Sir John Vanbrugh, with additions under the superintendence of the late Sir Charles Barry, was almost entirely destroyed by fire, Jan. 11, 1879; the hall, 40 feet long by 40 feet wide, is surrounded by Corinthian pillars; among the sculpture is the marble figure of a dog, purchased from Mr. H. C. Jennings by an ancestor of Lord Feversham for 1,000 guineas, and strongly resembling the famous “Dog of Alcibiades,” in the Uffizi gallery at Florence; it is said to be the work of Myron, a Grecian sculptor, and certainly has a wonderful air of animation; this fine work, as well as other statues and all the principal pictures, was fortunately saved from the flames: of the central part of the mansion nothing remained after the fire save the front elevation and part of the back walls, but since 1893 it has been rebuilt in accordance with the original design, under the superintendence of Mr. William Young, architect, of London; the low detached wings, erected by Sir Charles Barry, sweep round in a curve on either side, and are finished with squat towers at the angles, the innermost on either side having a cupola, one of these having a four-dialed clock and the other a bell turret, but on Feb. 7, 1894, the north wing was also totally destroyed by fire with the exception of the bell turret: tall iron railings strengthened by rusticated piers inclose the whole front, and the piers of the gateway are adorned with figures of a horse and a lion, supporting escutcheons of the Duncombe arms. The parks are extensive, and are well wooded and stocked with red and fallow deer; the terraces, pleasure grounds and gardens are laid out in excellent taste: the river Rye flows through the park; in that part of the park which skirts the valley of the Rye is the famous terrace constructed in 1758 by Thomas Duncombe esq.: it is a magnificent stretch of level greensward, half a mile in length, sheltered on the east by a thick belt of trees and opening on the west to the densely wooded slope of the ravine; at the north end is a square temple, raised on a ground storey, and now serving as a herdsman’s house; the principal front has a broad flight of steps leading up to a hexastyle pedimented portico, with columns of the Ionic order; the ceiling of the interior is ornamented with a copy of Guido’s Aurora in the Rospigliosi palace ait Rome and mythological subjects painted by Burnici, an Italian artist, and there is a richly carved marble mantel: at the south end of the terrace is a circular domed temple, surrounded by a colonnade and having a floor laid with tesselated pavement, found in 1821 among the ruins of Rievaulx Abbey, magnificent views of which and the splendid scenery around are obtained from various points; a steep path winding through the wood at the north end of the terrace leads down to the village of Rievaulx. The Earl of Feversham is lord of the manor and sole landowner. The area of the township is 8,788 acres of land and 35 of water; rateable value, £7,657; the population in 1911 was 1,393, including 3 officers and 24 inmates of the workhouse, and of the ecclesiastical parish, 1,662.

Petty sessions are held at the Tolbooth, Kirby Moorside, on Wednesday & at Helmsley on Friday, every alternate month at 11.30 a.m.

The following places are included in the Petty sessional Division:-AppIeton-le-Moors, Ampleforth, Beadlam, Bilsdale Midcable, Bilsdale Laskill, Bransdale West side, Brawby, Cawton, Coulton, Great Edstone, Little Edstone, Fadmoor, Farndale East side, Farndale West Side, Farndale Low Quarter, Gillamoor, Gilling, Grimstone, Harome, Helmsley, Hutton-le-Hole, Kirby Moorside, Lastingham, Muscoates, Nawton, Ness, Normanby, North Holme, Newton & Laysthorpe, Nunnington, Oswaldkirk, Pockley, Rievaulx, Rosedale West Side, Salton, Scawton, Skiplam, Spaunton, Sproxton, Stonegrave, Thornton Riseborough, Welburn, Wombleton.

HELMSLEY UNION

Board day, Friday, 2 p.m. fortnightly.

The Union comprises the following townships:-Ampleforth, Arden, Beadlam, Bilsdale West side, Byland with Wass, Caviton, Cold Kirby, Coulton, Dale Town, Gilling, Grimston, Harome, Hawnby, Helmsley, Laskill Pasture, Murton, Newton East & Laysthorp, Old Byland, Oldstead, Oswaldkirk, Pockley, Rievaulx, Scawton, Snilesworth, Sproxton, Stonegrave & Thorpe-le-Willows. The area of the union is 67,704 acres; the rateable value in 1912, £42,751; the population in 1911 was 5,154.

Workhouse, a building of stone, erected for 65 inmates, Ormond B. Warren, master; Joseph Francis Porter.

B.A., M.D. medical officer; Mrs. Warren, matron.

TERRITORIAL FORCE.

Yorkshire Hussars (Alexandra, Princess of Wales’s Own) Yeomanry (Detachment of B squadron), Major Viscount Helmsley M.P. commanding; squad.-Sergt.-Major George G. Potter, 27 North parade, York, drill instructor.

5th Battalion Alexandra, Princess of Wales’s Own (Yorkshire Regiment) (G Company).

PLACES OF WORSHIP, with times of services

All Saints’ Church, Rev. Charles Norris Gray M.A. vicar; Rev. Geoffrey Dutton Rimmer M.A. curate & Herbert slater & Thomas Teasdale, lay readers; holy communion, 7, 8 & 9.45; matins, 11 a.m. & evensong, 6.30 p.m.; children’s service, 2.30 p.m.; week days, holy communion 7 a.m. & evensong, 7.30 p.m.

St. Aidan, Carlton; 2.30 & 6.30 p.m. alternately with Sproxton.

St. Chad, Sproxton; 2.30 & 6.30 p.m. alternately with Carlton; holy communion, 2nd Sunday in the month at 8 am.

St. Mary the Virgin, Rievaulx; 3 & 6.30 p.m.; holy communion, 3rd Sunday in the month at 8 a.m.

Catholic Church, St. Mary, High street, served from St. Lawrence Abbey, Ampleforth; mass, 1st Sunday in the month at 8.30 a.m. & 3rd Sun. at 9.30 a.m.

Primitive Methodist, Rev. John Forster; 2 & 6.30 p.m.

Wesleyan Methodist, Rev. W. Britten Butters (supt.); 10.30 a.m. & 6.30 p.m.; Mon. 7.30 p.m.

PUBLIC ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS

John W. Allenby, Ryegate, attendance officer for Helmsley & Kirby Moorside Unions.

Church, High street (boys), erected for 200 children; average attendance, 63.

Church, Castlegate (girls & infants), for 180 children; average attendance, 114.

Wesleyan, Bondgate, erected in 1852, for 100 children; average attendance, 74.