Nurserymen to royalty at home and abroad – that was the proud boast of one remarkable Derbyshire dynasty, as Rosy Thacker reports in this two-part special.
TWO of Derbyshire’s most prestigious garden centres share a history which stretches back over two centuries and stems from one enterprising family of nurserymen. The family bible, now missing, contained information that their ancestors raised trees on Matlock Moor and in Ashover. Six generations ago the family lived in Slack, a hamlet halfway down what was then called Amber Hill. Now only a few pretty cottages remain, but once there was a public house called the Lord Nelson on the main road and several quarrymen’s houses…