Skellingthorpe, United Kingdom

By the 1360s the manor had passed to Gilbert de Umfraville, 3rd Earl of Angus and Kyme. By February 1399 the manor of Skellingthorpe was all but deserted, with much land left uncultivated through a lack of tenants. In the May the Rectory was appropriated to the Hospital of Spital in the Street (the Spital Charity) by Thomas de Aston (Canon of Lincoln), and they farmed out the rectorial tithes to laymen. The vicar was paid £5 a year by the charity.

On the attainder of Sir William Tailboys, his estates were escheated to the crown and a portion, including Skellingthorpe, were granted to Thomas Burgh and his male heirs by King Edward IV in 1460.

The medieval settlement was in the vicinity of Lower Church Road, to the north of the church and most of the present village. There were three sub-rectangular fishponds, orientated north–south, near Manor Farm. It is unknown at what point that settlement became fully deserted. (In 1981, it was reported that the remains of the fishponds, water channels, ridges and furrows were in excellent condition but by 1987 they had been largely obliterated. The site is now largely given over to livestock.)

The manor was inherited by Henry Stone. He died aged 62 on 26 June 1693, and the following year the governors of 'Christ Hospitall' in London arranged for a tomb to be erected in his memory, which is now in the grounds of the church. As his relatives had all predeceased him, he willed his estate to Christ's Hospital. His will also benefitted neighbours and tenants, local schools and the church.

Throughout the late 1600s and early 1700s the village economy stemmed from duck decoys, but began to decline with the drainage and enclosure of the land. The earthwork remains of an old decoy pond, which had been established in 1693, can be found on private land to the east of the village. In 2010 it was announced the surviving decoy pond was one of 79 historic sites to be protected under an environmental stewardship scheme, run by Natural England.

In 1710, surveys by Christ's indicated that Skellingthorpe estate consisted of 2,872 acres let to fourteen tenant farmers, 900 acres was newly planted ground, 600 was uncultivated and the rest was wooded.

An 1872 gazetteer of Skellingthorpe records it as "a scattered, but well-built and pleasant village" which consisted of "726 souls, and 6220 acres of land, extending to the Fossdyke... including 600 acres cleared of plantations, and some fertile and well-drained marshes".

In the 1850s a new National Society School, called St Lawrence's after the adjacent church, was established in 1855. Compulsory attendance was not enforced until 1870.

By the beginning of the 19th century large parts of the parish were still little more than a morass, and the risk of flood was a constant one. The Catchwater Drain was planned from 1805. By the middle of the 19th century, Skellingthorpe had been well-drained for some time and two small steam engines were erected near the Decoy Farm to pump out floodwater.

In 1905 an epidemic of typhoid swept Lincoln, killing at least 110 people and making over 1,000 ill. It was alleged that Skellingthorpe's Catchwater Drain, which flowed into the city, contributed to this.

In 1914 Christ's Hospital sold off all their properties in the parish, effectively ending a connection between Skellingthorpe and the capital that had existed for over 200 years. A small number of buildings. including St Lawrence's School, still bear Christ's coat of arms on their gables or wall.

During the 1915–1918 aerial bombardment of Britain by German Zeppelins 14 bombs damaged an engine shed and a railway track at Skellingthorpe on the night of 12/13 April 1918.

A war memorial in the church grounds shows that the village lost 19 men during the Great War, and a further five during the Second World War.

In 1948 there was a proposal to develop RAF Skellingthorpe into a civil airport, but it came to naught.

On 15 July 1949 an RAF bomber of 61 Squadron from Waddington crashed near Jerusalem Road, Skellingthorpe.

Electricity and running water came in the 1930s. Before this, houses shared pumps that tapped underground wells. The first street lights were erected in 1956–57. Main drainage came in 1964.

By 1971, Skellingthorpe's population had risen steadily to 2,593. This was more than three times what had been just forty years earlier, and thirteen times what it had been in 1801.

A village hall had been built in 1928. By the 1970s this was judged too small. In 1973 a larger Community Centre and Youth Hall were built on the site of the railway station.