WEST DERBY HUNDRED 



CHILDWALL 



Liverpool salt works to this place. He willed this 

 estate to his only child Alice Anne, wife of Thomas 

 Hawkes of Himley, in Staffordshire, and about 1823 

 she disposed of them, the manor being sold to the 

 Garston Land Company. The duchy of Lancaster 

 afterwards made a claim to the manorial rights, 1 

 which are now said to be divided among the Light- 

 body* family and several companies. 3 



The neighbouring families of Ireland of Hale and 

 Grelley of Allerton also had lands in Garston. In 

 1 306 Thomas Grelley demanded against Adam de 

 Ireland and Avina his wife two messuages and an 

 oxgang of land in Garston. 4 One of the fields was 

 known as Gredley's Acre. 



The lands of Whalley Abbey were at the confisca- 

 tion found to be leased to Lawrence Ireland for a 

 rent of 4..* Some of the lands were by Queen 

 Mary appropriated to the endowment of the Savoy 

 Hospital in London ; 6 and on this being dissolved 

 they were sold. 7 They were held by Topham Beau- 

 clerk, the heir of the Norris family, about 1775. 



Garston Hall was originally the grange house of 

 the monks of Upholland, who, as appropriators of the 

 rectory of Childwall, held the land of the church in 

 Garston and the tithes. 8 



In 1350 John, prior of Holland, appeared against 

 Nicholas de Bold and others on various charges, in- 

 cluding one of carrying away his goods and chattels 

 (valued at I oos.) at Woolton and Garston, and breaking 

 into his fold at the latter place. 9 After the dissolution 

 the hall became the property of the new see of 

 Chester, as part of the rectory of Childwall, and was 

 farmed out with the tithes to the Andertons and Gerards. 

 It was a half-timbered building, standing on a rock 

 overhanging the lower mill-dam. There is a tradi- 

 tion that a room in it was used for Roman Catholic 

 worship during the time of proscription, which is not 

 unlikely, considering who were the lessees. 10 



The hamlet of Brooks, in which the early Norris 

 holding seems to have chiefly lain, gave a name to 



one or more families dwelling there." The principal 

 of these had its origin in a certain Gilbert living 

 early in the thirteenth century. Richard, son ol 

 Gilbert de Brooks, gave to Roger his brother land 

 called Carran, stretching from the river dividing the 

 Carran of Speke from the Carran of Brooks, to the 

 chief ridge of Roger's heir, and from the river of 

 Garston to the boundary of Allerton ; Roger son of 

 Robert de Brooks gave to Hugh son of Lette of 

 Garston, land near the river of Slodekan, and near the 

 river of Quitefelf ; and John son of Roger Punchard 

 granted to Alan le Norreys of land between the 

 Hollow brook and the highway, one head extending 

 to the house of Robert de Blackburn on the west and 

 the other towards Carran in the east." The Tran- 

 mole or Tranmore family had a small holding at 

 Brooks which ultimately passed to Norris of Speke, 

 the rental of 1454 stating that Wilkyn Plombe and 

 John Jenkynson paid <)s. \d. rent ' for Tranmoor's 

 lands.' l3 



Grassendale " had risen to the dignity of a hamlet 

 by the time of Elizabeth. 



4IGBURTH seems at first to have been the 

 descriptive name of a district at the north-west end 

 of Garston and the west of Allerton. It was very 

 largely in the hands of religious foundations Stanlaw 

 (Whalley), 16 Cockersand, and to a small extent the 

 hospital of St. John at Chester. Under these houses 

 probably the local families held. Henry son of Hugh 

 de Aigburth is mentioned as holding land in the Brooks 

 about 1270, in a charter to which Adam de Aigburth 

 was a witness ; and Alice daughter of Hugh de 

 Aigburth was in 1274 the wife of John de Garston, 

 son of Robert called the Mouner." Adam de Aig- 

 burth about this time made an exchange with the 

 monks of Stanlaw of land in the moor at Aigburth. 18 

 He is described as ' forester of Toxteth,' and may 

 therefore be the Adam de Toxteth who was the 

 ancestor of a family holding land in Aigburth down 

 to the sixteenth century. 19 Adam de Toxteth in 



