History of Lincolnshire
Later, Lindsey was applied to only the northern core, around Lincoln; it was defined as one of the three 'Parts of Lincolnshire', along with Holland in the south-east and Kesteven in the south west.
These survived until 1974, when Holland, Kesteven, and most of Lindsey were merged into Lincolnshire, and the northern part, with Scunthorpe and Grimsby, going to the newly formed non-metropolitan county of Humberside, along with most of the East Riding of Yorkshire.
[1] Lincolnshire was covered by ice in the Anglian and Wolstonian glacial stages and the eastern parts of the county were glaciated during the Devensian.
[2] Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers migrated to Britain at least 800,000 years ago, but evidence of early settlement in the Midlands is sparse, probably due to the ice disrupting remains.
[3][nb 1] Flint flakes at Kirmington in Lincolnshire have been traced to the Hoxnian interglacial, which fell between the Anglian and Wolstonian stages.
[6][7] During the Ipswichian warm period after the Wolstonian, humans began fashioning Mousterian flint-axes, a specimen of which has been found at Risby Warren, near Scunthorpe in northern Lincolnshire.
[16] Surface artefacts, mostly late Neolithic flint or other stone tools, are found scattered across the county and especially in the lower Trent Valley and the Lincoln Vale.
[18] Excavations at Risby Warren have revealed a large amount of Bronze Age beaker pottery from the early 2nd millennium BC, while similar material has been identified around Scunthorpe, the southern Wolds and Ancaster.
[19] Although Lincolnshire was once noted for its prehistoric burial mounds, modern farming has destroyed many of them; surviving beaker barrows include the Bronze Age sites at Tallington, Thoresway, Broughton, Cleethorpes, Willoughby and Stroxton, along with scattered tumuli in the Wolds.
[21] Changes in vegetation occurred across Britain between roughly 1300 and 600 BC; in Lincolnshire, drier conditions caused pine trees to grow around the Fen edge, while oak forests were largely replaced with peat bogs or moorland.
[35] Despite the comparatively small number and size of forts in Lincolnshire, the archaeologist Jeffrey May suggests that the landscape's suitability for farming and its prominent salt industry may have led to prosperity during the Iron Age.
[38] There was an "extensive" Iron Age settlement at Old Sleaford, where over 3,500 fragments of coin moulds have been discovered, the largest such find in Europe; it may have been a tribal centre, but never became a walled town under Roman rule.
[39] The Ancaster-Sleaford region has a high concentration of settlement, which may be due to geographical factors and the presence of two north–south communication lines, Mareham Lane and Jurassic Way.
Similarly, the northern Wolds were more densely inhabited; settlements at Kirmington and Dragonby have been excavated, while North Ferriby was a crossing on the Humber connected to the south by High Street.
The tyrannical rule of the Roman sub-prætor Ostorius Scapula so inflamed the Corieltauvi and their neighbours in Yorkshire, the Brigantes, that the two peoples conducted a simmering, low-key rebellion lasting well into AD 70.
This was used as part of the defence system set up to protect the Saxon Shore and re-used by William the Conqueror in conjunction with Lincoln Castle.
[44][45] However, indications of a continuing presence of Britons in the region (such as place names) are stronger than in nearby East Anglia, and the transition from British to Anglo-Saxon control may have been peaceful.
[47] In 865 a formidable Danish raiding army, led by Ivar (spelled "Hinguar" or "Igwar" in English sources), one of the sons of Ragnar Lothbrok, landed in East Anglia and established winter quarters there.
But there were conflicts, such as accusations against the Jews and the Lincolnshire rebellion, in which lower classes struggled with constraints, show that life was not all a sybaritic idyll.
Numerous churches were established in Lincolnshire that are dedicated to women saints; their names have been given to daughters of county families and passed down in a tradition continuing long after the Protestant Reformation.
During the Protestant reformation, Lincolnshire had strong pro-Catholic sentiments, and on 2 October 1536 an anti Anglican peasant rebellion broke out.
King Henry VIII responded by dispatching an army of 3,000 soldiers under the command of Sir John Russell and the duke of Suffolk to quell the rebellion.
Lincolnshire was important to the Parliamentarians as it provided access between the great arsenal of Hull and the south and the Eastern Association's heartland in the east of England.
[51] In June 1888, Mr G Randall visited 'some 30 villages' across Lincolnshire, recruiting people who were prepared to move to Queensland, including Bicker, Heckington Fen, Ropsley, Dunston, Minting, Donington-on-Bain, East Barkwith, Binbrook, Claxby, Waddingham, Normanby-by-Spital, Welton, Scampton, Eagle, Caythorpe.
He claimed 7000 had already left, recruiting a further 200 who sailed on the SS Waroonga, which landed passengers at Cooktown, Townsville, Cairns, Mackay, Rockhampton, and Brisbane.
[52] Source:[53] In the late 1930s, despite its coastal holiday industry, distant and near water fishing industries, iron mining and smelting, heavy machinery manufacturing, the country's main road and railway lines and growing number of airfields, Lincolnshire was large enough to give an impression of being a largely unvisited, peaceful agricultural backwater until the Second World War, when its extent, gentle topography and relative proximity to the enemy led to a further expansion in the number of Royal Air Force stations in the county.
This had begun as The Royal Naval Air Service Central Training Establishment, Cranwell; commonly known as HMS Daedalus, commissioned 1 April 1916.
