page_title: Retford
section_title: Trinity Hospital
hierarchical_section_title: Retford / Landmarks and built environment / Trinity Hospital
caption_attribution_description: English: Trinity Hospital Retford. This was originally an almshouse
context_page_description: Retford, also known as East Retford, is a market town in Nottinghamshire, England, 31 miles from Nottingham, and 23 miles west of Lincoln. The population at the 2011 census was 22,013. The town is in the valley of the River Idle and the Chesterfield Canal passes through the centre. The village of Ordsall, west of the River Idle and the East Coast Main Line railway, and the former hamlet of Thrumpton are suburbs. Retford is administered by Bassetlaw District Council, which itself is now a non-constituent partner member of the Sheffield City Region Combined Authority. Retford is twinned with Pfungstadt, Germany.
context_section_description: Trinity Hospital is a Grade II listed building, set in gardens off Hospital Road. It was established over 340 years ago, and has been a prominent Alms House in Retford since the 17th Century. It was set up from the Will of John Darrel in 1671, to provide ‘hospitality’ to 15 ‘Poor Bachelors or Widowers of good Character, who are not less than 50 years of age’. He endowed the charity with a significant portfolio of property and land, and a Bailiff was to be appointed to manage this estate. The rental income from the properties was intended to cover any repairs of the buildings, including the Hospital itself, and be sufficient to sustain the Charity in providing benefits to the residents (known as the "Brethren").
  The building on Hospital Road was designed by Edward Blore with the chapel and the two projecting L-shaped wings of cottages dating from 1833, and the central section, dominated by the tower, added in 1872. The clock in the Clock Tower was made by William Thomas, Lincoln, and is dated 1858. The clock is of bird-cage wrought iron construction, having two trains, a recoil escapement and shows the time externally on a single adjacent dial. It strikes the hours only on a single bell above. 
  It is thought Blore's link to Retford was because his wife was from Mattersey. His creation cost £4,000 to build.
  A painting of Queen Anne belonging to the hospital was cleaned and restored in 1999. An appraisal of the painting was made by an art expert from Phillips, who attributed it to Sir Godfrey Kneller, a well-known royal portrait painter during Queen Anne's reign.
  The Audit Room features a striking stained glass window made by Edwin Wilmshurst. In his scrapbook he notes how in 1860 he happened to be in York and enquired if he could obtain historic stained glass. He was shown a box of waste glass and bought it. When he retired in 1908, he finally cleaned and sorted it, discovering some came from church windows, some from noble town houses in medieval York and some from secular public buildings. It ranged in date from early Gothic to Nineteenth Century. He assembled from this collection a window which became known as the 'Trinity window'. It was installed by William Spurr, Plumber and Glazier of Churchgate, Retford at a cost of £20 – 6s – 7½d. When the window was restored in 2000, it was discovered that it contained rare medieval glass, which necessitated recording the window in the European and British Register.
  Another stained glass window on the south-east side dates from 1876 and was added at the expense of brother Edward Beckett, who had been a gardener who laid out the grounds of the King Edward VI Grammar School and the Girls' High School. He is said to have saved his beer money for three years to pay for the window and have challenged his Brethren: "Now then you, there's t'other winder, and there be 15 o'yah; I dares ye to put him in." His Brethren took up the challenge and within a year had saved enough for the Four Evangelists window.
  The Hospital features an outstanding pair of gates, commissioned in January 1995 by the Master Governor from Chris Topp, Blacksmith, of Carlton Husthwaite, Thirsk, North Yorkshire. The gates were finished and hung on the Epiphany Feast 1996.
caption: Trinity Hospital Retford
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