University of Derby was run by the NHS after 1948. The University of Derby purchased the then-derelict hospital from the NHS in 2001, and moved operations here from the Harpur Hill campus in 2005. The campus is also the location of Buxton & Leek College, created in August 2012 when the university merged with Leek College. Buxton & Leek College primarily offers further education courses, and has a second campus in Leek, Staffordshire. Film and video, fine art, photography, graphic design, fashion studies, and textile design were initially based at Kedleston Road before moving to the Britannia Mill site. They are now at
Duke of Devonshire William Cavendish (1552-1626), was a politician and a supporter of the colonization of Virginia. In 1605 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Cavendish, of Hardwicke in the County of Derby, and in 1618 he was further honoured when he was made Earl of Devonshire. Both titles are in the Peerage of England. He was succeeded by his eldest son, William Cavendish, 2nd Earl of Devonshire, who served as Lord-Lieutenant of Derbyshire and was a patron of the philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679). On his early death in 1628 the titles passed to his son, William Cavendish, 3rd Earl of