Monument record MDR14246 - Foremark Park (site of), Foremark

There are few clues as to whether there was a medieval park at Foremark. The first mention of a park comes in 1620, from the Burdett Collection in Derbyshire Record Office. The Burdetts had acquired Foremark through marriage to one of the Franceys in 1602. As early as 1565 a 'Scadosse yeate' was documented. The Scaddows and Scaddows Wood are adjacent to the parish boundary by Foremark Park Farm and may have given their name to an entrance to Foremark Park called Scaddows Gate. If this were so, it strengthens the idea that a park was there in the time of the Franceys family or possibly earlier. The second mention appears in 1737, when the proposed design for the gardens of Foremark Hall was submitted for a later member of the Burdett family. The map of 1737 shows in detail the proposed layout of the gardens and park. One of the roadways is labelled 'Avenue to the old park', indicating that the old park was on a different site to the newly designed one surrounding the hall [see SMR 20007]. The present OS map shows the parish of Foremark to be long and thin, stretching from the River Trent almost to the southern end of Foremark reservoir. It is in this bottom third, now partly submerged below water, that it is considered the old park was situated. (1)