Ancient history Early
Iron Age settlement existed in the Rugby area: The
River Avon formed a natural barrier between the
Dobunni and
Corieltauvi tribes, and it is likely that defended frontier settlements were set up on each side of the Avon valley. Rugby's position on a hill overlooking the Avon, made it an ideal location for a defended Dobunni watch settlement. During the
Roman period the Roman town of
Tripontium was established on the
Watling Street Roman road around north-east of what is now Rugby, this was later abandoned when the Romans left Britain. Another theory is that
Rocheberie was a phonetic translation of the
Old English name
Hrocaberg meaning 'Hroca's hill fortification';
Hroca being an Anglo-Saxon man's name pronounced with a silent 'H', and
berg being a name for a hill fortification, with the 'g' being pronounced as an 'ee' sound. The first part of the name may also be Old English
hrōc (> "rook"). By the 13th century the name of the town was commonly spelt as
Rokeby (or
Rookby) before gradually evolving into the modern form by the 18th century. In 1140, the first recorded mention was made of
St Andrew's Church, which was originally a
chapel of ease to the mother church at
Clifton-upon-Dunsmore, until Rugby was established as a
parish in its own right in 1221, at which point it was elevated to the status of
parish church. In 1255, the
lord of the manor Henry de Rokeby obtained a charter to hold a weekly
market in Rugby, which soon developed into a small country
market town. In the 12th century, Rugby was mentioned as having a castle at the location of what is now Regent Place. However, the nature of the 'castle' is unknown, and it was possibly little more than a fortified
manor house. In any event, the 'castle' may have been short lived: It has been speculated that it was constructed early in the reign of
King Stephen (1135–1154) during the period of civil war known as
The Anarchy, and then, as a so-called
adulterine castle, built without Royal approval, demolished in around 1157 on the orders of King
Henry II. The earthworks for the castle were still clearly visible as late as the 19th century, but have since been built over. According to one theory, the stones from the castle were later used to construct the west tower of St Andrew's Church, which bears strong resemblance to a castle, and was probably intended for use in a defensive as well as a religious role.
17th century The Rugby area has associations with the
Gunpowder Plot of 1605: On the eve of the plot, the plotters stayed at the 'Lion Inn' (now a private residence called 'Guy Fawkes House') in nearby
Dunchurch, convened by Sir
Everard Digby, awaiting news of
Guy Fawkes's attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament. If he had been successful they planned to kidnap the King's daughter
Princess Elizabeth from
Coombe Abbey in the countryside between Rugby and Coventry. During the
English Civil War, one of the earliest armed confrontations of the conflict took place at the nearby village of
Kilsby in August 1642. That same year, King
Charles I passed through Rugby on his way to
Nottingham, and 120
Cavalier Horse Troops reportedly stayed at the town, however the townsfolk were sympathetic to the
Parliamentarian cause, and they were disarmed by the Cavalier soldiers. Later, in 1645, Rugby was strongly Parliamentarian, and
Oliver Cromwell and two regiments of
Roundhead soldiers stayed at Rugby in April that year, two months before the decisive
Battle of Naseby, some to the east, in nearby
Northamptonshire. building steam engines to drive electrical generators, they were followed by
British Thomson-Houston (BTH) in 1902, who manufactured electrical motors and generators. Within a short time, their product range expanded, and a wide array of electrical equipment came to be produced by BTH at Rugby. Both firms started producing
turbines in 1904, and were in competition until both were united as part of
GEC in 1969. Another name associated with Rugby was
Lodge Plugs, manufacturer of
spark plugs, who set up a factory in the town in 1916. For most of the 20th century, the various engineering works dominated employment in Rugby; at their height in the 1960s, BTH alone employed around 22,000 people. Rugby expanded rapidly in the early decades of the 20th century as workers moved in. By the 1940s, the population of Rugby had grown to over 40,000, and then to over 50,000 by the 1960s. The local board's main responsibilities were to provide the town with infrastructure such as paved roads, street lighting, clean drinking water and sewerage. Such districts were converted into
urban districts in 1894. Rugby's status was upgraded to that of a
municipal borough in 1932, and its boundaries were expanded to incorporate the formerly separate villages of
Bilton (including
New Bilton),
Hillmorton,
Brownsover and
Newbold-on-Avon which have become suburbs of the town. In 1974 the municipal borough was merged with the
Rugby Rural District to form the present
Borough of Rugby.
Modern history In the postwar years, Rugby became a major junction of the motorway network, with the
M1 and
M6, and
M45 merging close to the town. The railways went into decline during the same period, with several of the railway lines into Rugby closed. Since the 1980s, the engineering industries have gone into steady decline, with many former industrial sites redeveloped for housing and retail. Due to its proximity to the motorway network, Rugby has become a major
centre for logistics, becoming, in some definitions, part of the area known as the
golden logistics triangle.
Pierre de Coubertin, a French educator and father of the modern
Olympic Games, visited Rugby School several times in the late 19th century. He cited the school as one of his major inspirations behind his decision to revive the Olympic Games.
Holography was invented in Rugby in 1947, by the Hungarian born inventor
Dennis Gabor, also while working at BTH. For this he later received the
Nobel Prize in Physics in 1971. In the 19th century, Rugby became famous for its once important railway junction which was the setting for
Charles Dickens's story
Mugby Junction. ==Rugby today==