ROTHERHAM  , a

market-town and municipal borough in the Rotherham parliamentary division of the West Riding of Yorkshire, England, 5 M . N.E. of Sheffield, on the Midland, North-Eastern and Great Central railways . Pop . (1891) 42,061; (1901) 54,349 . It lies in the valley of the Don, where that river is joined by the Rother, and has communication by water with the Humber . The Don is crossed by a bridge on which is a small ancient building, formerly a chapel . The parish church of All Saints, occupying the site of a building dating from Anglo-Saxon times, was erected in the reign of Edward IV., and is among the best specimens of Perpendicular in the north of England . The town possesses iron, steel and brass works, railway wagon works, potteries, glass-works, breweries, saw-mills and rope-yards . At the township of Masborough, opposite Rotherham across the Don, works were established in 1746 by Samuel Walker, a successful ironmaster . The municipal borough, incorporated in 1871, is under a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors . Area, 6or2 acres . The town was of some importance in Anglo-Saxon times, and at Templeborough, on the S.E. side of Rotherham, there was a Roman fort, but its traces are effaced .

In the

time of Edward the Confessor, Rotherham possessed a market and a church . During the Civil War it sided with the Parliament . It was taken by the Royalists in 1643, but after the victory of Marston Moor was yielded to a detachment of the Parliamentary forces .