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- "The flood came on so sudden at Retford on Tuesday night, that great numbers of the inhabitants had no time to remove their effects, and several of them have received very considerable losses by it. It was three feet high in the Market-place, and the torrent ran so strong as to tear up the pavement in different parts of the town, which was nearly all under water. At West Retford a grocer's shop, and part of Miss Hurst's house were washed down, and four other houses were nearly destroyed, and their inhabitants preserved with the greatest difficulty." (en)
- Immediately in front of the Town Hall, in the Market Square, is the historic Broad Stone. It formerly occupied a slight eminence known by the name of Est-croc-sic, now called Dominie Cross. It is believed to have been the base of a cross, and to have formed one of four: a second is still preserved in the West Retford churchyard, a third was in the churchyard at Ordsall, the fourth is lost... these crosses probably marked the boundary beyond which inhabitants smitten with the plague were prohibited to pass. Certain it is that at times the plague devastated Retford ...From Dominie Cross the Broad Stone was removed into the Market-place. It became the hustings where candidates for the two parliamentary seats allotted to this borough addressed their constituents, the freemen. Here, at various times, they were heckled, threatened, even assaulted. Woe betide the candidate who was not "all right". When 40 guineas were at stake it was serious to a freeman to "lose his election". Apprentices assembled here at the close of their "servitude" after a night's carousal and sang a ditty which is still preserved. (en)
- "In the days of the Roman occupation of Britain, a great Roman Road, or "Strada"— Street— ran from Southampton to Derby, Little Chester, Chesterfield, Castleford, Pontefract, to Eboracum, or York: and from it, at Chesterfield, branched out a "Street" to the Roman Station of Lindum, or Lincoln, which crossed the River Trent at Agelocum, now Littleborough, and the River Idle by a Ford, still used as a watering place for horses, near West Retford Bridge; hence the place would be known as the Street-Ford, or Streteford." (en)
- They thought that East Retford ought to be partially sacrificed, in order to prevent the whole system of corruption from being overturned. Just as in a bullfight a cloak is dropped to turn aside the rage of the mad animal, while his assailant prepares more securely to destroy him. If the public were ignorant of the undue means by which a large majority of the Members of that House obtained their seats in it, they might declaim against the venality of the voters of East Retford; but, notorious as these circumstances were, he thought it better to pass over the present case in silence till they were prepared to deal with others equally flagitious. (en)
- "From whichever direction it is approached this building dominates the skyline". (en)
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