The name Ashford derives from the Old Englishæsc and ford, and means a ford where ash trees grow. In 926, the village was known as Æscforda and in the Domesday Book of 1086 it was Aisseford. The addition of "in-the-Water" occurred in the late 17th century, and reflected the proximity of the village to meanders of the River Wye.[5]
In the Domesday Book, Ashford was described as one of the locations in the area where lead was refined.[6]
In 1786, Ashford had mills for carving and polishing the local black marble. By 1848, it had 950 inhabitants.[7]
The village passed to the Cavendish family in the 16th century (from the Nevilles) and was finally sold off in the 1950s to pay death duties.
Culture
The tradition of well-dressing continues in Ashford as in many other villages in the Peak District. Each year slabs of clay are decorated by village volunteers using petals, leaves and other plants to create a picture. The finished designs are then displayed at the six wells around the village and the event is marked by a church service and procession through the village to bless the wells. The event takes place around Trinity Sunday.
Within Ashford's civil parish are 62 structures that are listed by Historic England for their historic or architectural interest. None are listed as Grade I, but there are two structures (Ashford Hall and Sheepwash Bridge) that are Grade II*. All the others, including Thornbridge Hall and the parish church, are Grade II.[8]
Ashford Hall dates from 1785, though alterations were made in about 1840. It is a five-bay, three-storey building of gritstone and ashlar, with a balusteredparapet around its slate roof. It has an early-19th-century conservatory.[9]
Sheepwash Bridge
The Sheepwash Bridge, which dates from the 17th century, is a packhorse bridge with an attached stone sheepwash: lambs were placed in the pen on one side of the river and the ewes swam across the river to get to them, while being pushed underwater by the shepherds to clean the fleece before shearing. Large trout inhabit the waters of the Wye around the bridge. It is a Scheduled Monument as well as a listed building.[10][11][12]
Ashford's parish church of the Holy Trinity was mostly rebuilt in 1868–70 but has a partly 13th-century tower, a 14th-century north arcade and a recovered Norman tympanum above the south doorway.[2] In the churchyard lies the base and stump of a Grade-II-listed churchyard cross, variously dated to the 14th[13] or 15th century.[14] Behind the church are traces of a moat, all that remains of a fortified house which was the home of Edmund Plantagenet, brother of Edward II.[15]
Thornbridge Hall dates from the 18th century, but was enlarged in 1871 and radically altered in a neo-Tudor style in 1897.[16]
