CHAPTER V.
BARNBY HALL, BANKS HALL, &c.
BARNBY HALL.
The conspicuous and pleasantly-situate house on the Barnsley Road which is now Barnby Hall was built about sixty years ago on or very near to the site of a former residence of considerable importance, the seat of a "family which derived from it their hereditary name, and ranked with the principal gentry of these parts." In the Pedigree of Barnby of Barnby given by Hunter the family is traced up to a William de Denby, who married Sarra, daughter of Sir Alexander Venavre, Veneur, Le Hunt, or Le Hunter. From his mother, their son Robert is given as receiving eight bovates in Barnby. This Robert's son is called Robert de Barnby, who married Margaret daughter of John de Dronsfield: their son Edmund married Alice daughter and heiress of John de Midhope, which, says Hunter, "was a great advance to this family. They were further enriched by the marriage with the niece and co-heir of Sir Anthony Nutthil, one of the attainted Lancastrians. The Nutthil lands lay in Holderness. The attainder appears to have been reversed. The lands of Nutthil, Preston, and Stockholme, part of his inheritance, were at least in the hands of Robert Barnby, father of John, in 7 Henry VII., when he was a party to indentures with Sir Robert Hildiard, of Winestead, by which it appears that Sir Robert had those manors to farm of the lease of John son of Robert, paying to certain feoffees the annual sum of £10, &c"
The following is a deed of the above William de Denby who is not to be confounded, Hunter remarks, with another William de Denby, lord of Denby in Peniston, who was his contemporary:
"Sciant, &c. Will: de Denebi confirmavi Adæ fratri meo &c., homagio suo et servitio suo, totam terram illam in uno assarto quod vocatur Billecliffe in territorio de Calthorn, quam Sarra mater mea
