Denaby Main is unusual amongst communities in the Doncaster area in being entirely the creation of nineteenth-century industry. The industry, as usual in the Doncaster area, was coal. Other places in the area have developed from a small pre-existing village, and in some cases, such as Adwick le Street, Armthorpe, Edlington and Rossington, (all mining villages) developed so far as to almost overwhelm the ancient settlement they have been grafted onto. Denaby, although taking the name of the ancient settlement nearby (now known as Old Denaby), was created from open countryside by the road between Conisbrough and Mexborough where it crossed the River Don and alongside the South Yorkshire, Doncaster and Goole Railway Company’s line (later part of the Great Central Railway), which gave the new colliery vital access to the railway system.

Shaft-sinking began in September 1863, coal was reached four years later, and mining finally began in 1869. At that time, Denaby Main was the easternmost colliery in Yorkshire and, before coal was struck a quarter of a mile below the surface, there had been scepticism that the Barnsley seam extended so far east. In 1889, the company began to sink a second shaft a mile away, at what became Cadeby Main colliery, which went into production in 1893. The eastward movement of mining in the coalfield, with progressively deeper mines sunk at Brodsworth, Edlington, Armthorpe, Hatfield and Thorne in the early twentieth century, had a major impact on the whole area. The colliery company not only sunk the mine, but also built the village, which developed haphazardly in fits and starts over thirty years. By the turn of the century, the company had built over a thousand houses for its workforce, producing a village which lacked any real focus. It straggled along the main road, the layout of its streets reflecting the boundaries of the fields which had been purchased piecemeal (from John Fullerton of Thrybergh Hall, who owned the mining royalties, and Andrew Montagu of High Melton Hall) as the need for more pit- workers and hence new houses arose.

For twenty years, Denaby remained part of the parish of Conisbrough. In 1883, the colliery company opened a new school in Rosington Street, which was also equipped to serve as a mission church for the Church of England. However, in 1900 a new parish of Denaby was created and a new church, dedicated to All Saints, was built.

Doncaster Archives has the following registers of Denaby Main, All Saints:

• Baptisms 1891-1988
• Marriages 1900-1974
• Burials 1900-1956
• Banns 1900-1996
• Indexes : none
• Bishop’s transcripts : none