Эшби-де-ла-Зуш: История и современность английского города

Market town in Leicestershire, England

Ashby de la Zouch ('/æ//ʃ//b//i// //d//ə// //l//ə// /'/z//uː//ʃ/), also spelled Ashby de la Zouch, is a market town and civil parish in the North West Leicestershire district of Leicestershire, England, near to the Derbyshire and Staffordshire borders. Its population at the 2021 census was 16,491. Ashby de la Zouch Castle was an important fort in the 15th to 17th centuries. During the 19th century, the town's main industries were ribbon manufacturing, coal mining, and brickmaking. The civil parish includes the hamlets of Shellbrook to the west and Boundary to the north west. Swadlincote, Burton upon Trent, Melbourne and Coalville are within 10 mile (16 km), with Derby 12 mile (19 km) due north. It lies at the heart of the National Forest, 24 mile (39 km) south of the Peak District National Park, on the A42 between Tamworth and Nottingham.

The town was known as Ashby in 1086. This is a word of Anglo Danish origin, meaning "Ash tree farm" or "Ash tree settlement". The Norman French name extension dates from the years after the Norman conquest of England, when Ashby became a possession of the La Zouche family during the reign of Henry III. Ashby de la Zouch Castle was built in the 12th century. The town and castle came into the possession of the Hastings family in 1464 and William Hastings, 1st Baron Hastings enhanced its fortifications from 1473. In the English Civil War, the town was one of the Cavaliers' chief garrisons under the control of Colonel Henry Hastings, 1st Baron Loughborough and commander of the North Midlands Army. When the town fell after a long siege in March 1646, it was counted a great relief to the surrounding towns and villages. Many of the buildings in Market Street, the town's main thoroughfare, are timber framed. Most of this structure is hidden by later brick facades. The Bull's Head public house retains its original Elizabethan half timbering, although most of this was plastered over some years ago and can no longer be seen from the street. A short distance further down Market Street is a shop, currently occupied as a LOROS Charity Shop, which retains its original Elizabethan timbers in full street view. Regency buildings are also standing in this street. Bath Street has a row of Classical style houses called Rawdon Terrace, dating from the time of the 1820s, when the town was a spa destination.

St Helen's Church is Ashby's original Anglican parish church. It is a late 15th century Perpendicular Gothic building. The outer aisles were designed by J. P. St. Aubyn and added in 1878. St. Helen's contains notable memorials to various members of the Hastings family and other notables. It also holds a rare 300 year old finger pillory. Holy Trinity Church is a Gothic Revival building designed by H. I. Stevens in the Early English Gothic style and built in 1838–40. It has galleries supported by iron columns. The chancel was added in 1866 and the ironwork chancel screen in 1891. The Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of Lourdes was designed by F. A. Walters and built in 1908–15 at the expense of the 15th Duke of Norfolk. It is neo Norman, with three apses and a tower at the southeast corner. The Congregational Church was built in 1825 in a neoclassical style with Tuscan columns. There is also a Christadelphian meeting hall in the town.

The Ivanhoe Baths was an 1822 Neo Grecian building with a Doric façade 200 feet (61 m) long. Unused, it was derelict by 1960, and was demolished in 1962. Mineworkers discovered a copious saline spring when working coal at Moira Colliery, 3 mile (5 km) west of the town, in 1805. Here developers built the Moira Baths, with a large hotel nearby for travellers. After a few years, however, it was decided to convey the water to Ashby, where the Ivanhoe Baths were built. The Royal Hotel, originally called the Hastings Hotel, was built in 1826 to accommodate visitors to the growing spa. It has a Doric porte cochère and additional Doric columns in its hall inside. The hotel closed in February 2018.

The Grade II listed, 19th century water tower, located in the town's cemetery on Moira Road, has been converted into a dwelling. The conversion was controversial since it involved a number of modern additions to the building.

In 1879, Baron Donington, the widowed husband of Edith Rawdon Hastings, 10th Countess of Loudoun, had the Loudoun monument erected to her memory in Ashby. The octagonal monument by Sir George Gilbert Scott is based on the Eleanor crosses and is a Listed building. It is located at the junction of Bath and South Streets, opposite the Roman Catholic church.

Ashby de la Zouch Town Hall, which was built at the same time as the market hall to its rear, dates to 1857.

In the 19th century, Ashby's main industry was leather working. There was also a cotton textile factory and a glue factory. Ashby was surrounded by coalmines but was never a coalmining town itself. By far the largest employer in the town today is United Biscuits, providing about 2,000 jobs at its distribution centre, which stores its products and transports them nationwide, and its KP Snacks factory in Smisby Road. The firm formerly had a larger presence in Ashby. McVitie's biscuit factory on Smisby Road closed in 2004 with the loss of 900 jobs. Other employers in Ashby include Tesco, Ashfield Commercial & Medical Services, Timeline Communications, Eduteq Limited and TAC UK Ltd, a firm of energy consultants. Standard Soap Ltd, a significant industrial employer within Ashby de la Zouch since 1928, closed in early 2012, resulting in the loss of 155 jobs. The town has a concentration of high tech employers. The video game software house Ultimate Play the Game was based in Ashby. Now called Rare, it has moved to Manor Park near Twycross.

The town was to be served by Ashby Canal from 1804 but the canal never reached Ashby, as it was constructed only to the village of Moira. The town was served by the Leicester–Burton upon Trent line of the Midland Railway and had its own station. After the canal was abandoned in stages between 1944 and 1966, British Railways withdrew the passenger service and closed Ashby de la Zouch railway station in September 1964. The railway remains open for freight. There were also connections to both the Melbourne Line and Ashby and Nuneaton Joint Railway connecting the town with the towns of Melbourne, Market Bosworth, Hinckley and Nuneaton as well as the city of Derby, but these lines closed between the 1950s and 1980s. Both of the lines now form footpaths with some of the old stations still present but others demolished. In the 1990s, BR planned to restore passenger services between Leicester and Burton as the second phase of its Ivanhoe Line project. However, after the privatisation of British Rail in 1995, this phase of the project was shelved. In 2009 the Association of Train Operating Companies published a £49 million proposal to restore passenger services to the line, which would include reopening a station at Ashby. The nearest railway station is , 8 mile (13 km) away. The fastest train to London in the mornings and evenings is from Tamworth (12 miles from Ashby) to Euston at 1hr 2mins average non stop at peak hours. The A50 Leicester to Stoke on Trent road and the A453 Birmingham to Nottingham road used to pass through the town centre. The heavy traffic, which previously travelled through the town, has been greatly relieved by the A42 and A511 bypasses, which replace the A453 and A50, respectively. Bus routes provide an hourly direct service to Burton upon Trent, Coalville, East Midlands Airport, Leicester and Swadlincote (Diamond East Midlands 9 and 19, and Arriva Midlands 29, 29A and X29). The National Express coach network is available in Leicester, which has a daily direct service to London. East Midlands Airport is 9 mile (14 km) north east of Ashby. It provides flights to and from other parts of the UK and Europe. For International travellers, Birmingham Airport is 26 miles away (c. 30 mins) and provides international flights.

Television signals can only be received from the Sutton Coldfield TV transmitter which broadcast programmes from Birmingham. However, BBC East Midlands and ITV Central are also received through cable and satellite television such as Freesat and Sky. Local radio stations are BBC Radio Leicester, Smooth East Midlands, Capital Midlands, Gem, Greatest Hits Radio Midlands, and Hermitage FM, a community based station. Local newspapers are Ashby Nub News and Leicester Mercury.

Every May, Ashby holds an arts festival sponsored by the district council. This features local artists, musicians, songwriters, poets, performers, and story tellers. The multiple sites around the town host exhibitions, musical performances, workshops and talks, and the town centre is decorated with flags and an outdoor gallery. Ashby Statutes, a travelling funfair, is held every September. Instituted by Royal Statute, it was originally a hiring fair, where domestic servants and farmworkers would be hired for the year. During the fair in the 21st century, Market Street, the main road through the town (the former A50 trunk road), is closed for nearly a week. The traffic is diverted along narrower roads either side of Market Street. Locals call this event "The Statutes". A song "Ashby de la Zouch (Castle Abbey)", written by Al Hoffman, Milton Drake and Jerry Livingston, was recorded by the Merry Macs in 1946 on Decca No. 18811. It includes the lines "If you wanna smooch and be happy as a pooch, go to Ashby de la Zouch by the sea." (Ashby de la Zouch is close to the centre of England, almost as far from the sea as is possible.) In April 1946 the American jazz bassist and composer Charles Mingus recorded a tune called "Ashby de la Zouch" with his band. The title or choice of song could have been an acknowledgement of guitarist Irving Ashby, who took part in the recording. Ashby de la Zouch is twinned with Pithiviers in north central France. Ashby de la Zouch is mentioned in Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott as "the lists at Ashby", suggesting that jousting may once have taken place in the town (lists being the barriers through which the respective steeds charge during a joust). The same phrase is used in the original computer game Defender of the Crown, which apparently drew inspiration from Scott's novel.

Adrian Mole, a fictional diarist created by writer Sue Townsend, was from Leicester and moved to Ashby de la Zouch during his lifetime. Harry Flashman, Sir Harry Paget Flashman VC, KCB, KCIE is a fictional character created by Thomas Hughes (1822–1896) in the semi autobiographical Tom Brown's School Days (1857) and later developed by George MacDonald Fraser (1925–2008). Sir Harry, after his inglorious career, retired to his country home, Gandamack Lodge, in Ashby, there to write his memoirs, known to the public as The Flashman Papers. Ashby de la Zouch is often mentioned by Guz Khan in his show Man Like Mobeen, where some characters who "go on holiday to Ashby de la Zouch" mistakenly say it is in Spain rather than Leicestershire. The protagonist of the 1994 video game Universe is from Ashby de la Zouch.

Neighbouring communities include Lount, Normanton le Heath, Smisby, Packington, Donisthorpe, Oakthorpe, Moira, Measham and Coleorton.