Community Assembly of Barnsley

Serving, supporting and protecting our local community

The Community Assembly of Barnsley is located in a market town and the fourth largest settlement in the County of South Yorkshire. Referred to as Berneslai in the 1086 Domesday Book, it is located in the River Dearne valley at the eastern foothills of the Pennines. During the 1150s the small village was given to Pontefract Priory, the monks started building at the meeting point of three roads, this became the town Old Barnsley. It was the monks who first established a market at Barnsley and in1249, a Royal Charter was granted permitting the town to hold a weekly market on Wednesdays and annual four-day fair at Michaelmas. By the 1290s they held three annual fairs.

With a strong manufacturing heritage of glass making, linen and textiles weaving, it was the coal mining industry that brought about brass bands being formed as social clubs by its mining communities. In 1960 there were 70 collieries within a 15 mile radius of Barnsley town centre, the last one closed in 1994. The first bottle bank for glass recycling collection in the British Isles opened in Barnsley 24th August 1977.