A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



j^io ; Richard Ashton, £iS '> Aspull, Ralph Haugh- 

 ton, £6 13J. 4(/. ; Billinge, Edmund Bispham, £•} ; 

 Birchley, Roger Anderton, ^^21 12/. ^li. ; Dalton, 

 Thomas Bank, £2 ; John Reskow, £z ; Haigh, 

 William Bradshaw, ^^3 6s. %d. ; Hindley, Abraham 

 Langton of Lowe, £10 ; Ince, Thomas Gerard, £\o ; 

 Thomas Ince, £% ; Pemberton, Edmund Winstanley, 

 £z 10s} 



The Civil War found the district as a whole loyal 

 to the king ; but the Ashhursts and some other 

 families were Parliamentarians. There was fighting 

 at Wigan in 1644 and 1 651, and much confiscation 

 by the Commonwealth authorities. The Restoration 

 appears to have been generally welcomed. At the 

 Revolution there was much more division, but no 

 open opposition was made, and the Jacobite rising of 

 1 7 1 5 does not seem to have had any adherents in the 

 parish. The march of the Young Pretender through 

 Wigan, Ince, and Hindley in 1745 brought in no 

 recruits. The more recent history has, as in the north 

 of England generally, been that of the growth of 

 manufactures and commerce. 



The total area of the parish is 29,03 3 J acres. Of 

 this at present 12,938 acres are arable, 7,179 per- 

 manent grass, and 854 woods and plantations. The 

 populuion in 1901 numbered 157,915. The county 

 lay of 1624 was arranged so that the parish counted 

 as six townships and a half, Wigan itself answering for 

 two. The other groups were — Pemberton and Ince, 

 Hindley and Abram, Holland and Dalton, Orrcll, 

 Billinge and Winstanley ; H.iigh was the half town- 

 ship. Aspull, being in Salford Hundred, was grouped 

 with Blackrod. When the hundred paid X'°° 

 Wigan parish, excluding Aspull, paid £iz los. The 

 ancient fifteenth was more irregularly levied thus : 

 Wigan j^3, Haigh "js., Hindley 16/. ?>J., Ince ()s., 

 Dalton 19/., Abram lis. id., Upholland ^l js. id., 

 Billinge cum Winstanley ijs., Orrell 6/., Pemberton 

 lis. 4a'., or £() izs. ^d. when the hundred paid 

 j^Io6 9/. 6d. Aspull paid 7/. id. in Salford. 



The church of JLL SJINTS ' has a 

 CHURCH chancel of two bays with north and south 

 chapels, the Legh chapel on the north 

 and the Bradshagh or Bradshaw chapel on the 

 south, a nave of six bays with aisles, and a tower at 

 the north-east angle of the north aisle of the nave, 

 with the Gerard (now Walmesley) chapel adjoining 

 it on the west. East of the tower is a modern 

 vestry. 



Though the plan of the church is ancient, the 

 building has undergone even more than the general 

 amount of renewal which has been the lot of so many 

 of the neighbouring churches. The chancel is re- 

 corded to have been rebuilt in 1620 by Bishop 

 Bridgeman, and was again rebuilt in 1845. The 

 Bradshagh and Legh chapels, which had been re- 

 paired if not rebuilt in 1620, were also rebuilt in 

 1845, and the nave taken down and rebuilt from the 

 foundations in 1850, much of the old material being 

 however used. The Gerard chapel, rebuilt about 

 1620, escaped the general fate. The tower and the 

 lowest parts of the stair turrets at the west end of the 



chancel were not rebuilt, and contain the oldest work 

 now existing. With such a history, any definite idea 

 of the development of the plan is out of the question. 

 The tower is at least as old as the 13 th century, and 

 in the course of rebuilding some 12th-century stones 

 are said to have been found. 



The nave arcades, as noted by Sir Stephen Glynne,' 

 have somewhat the appearance of 1 4th-century work, 

 with moulded arches and piers of four engaged shafts 

 of good proportion. All the old stone has been re- 

 tooled at the rebuilding of 1850, and the capitals are 

 entirely of that date, so that it is impossible to deduce 

 the former details of the work. A clearstory runs for 

 the whole length of the nave and chancel, and the 

 nave roof retains a good deal of old work, being 

 divided into panels by moulded beams. The figures 

 of angels on the roof corbels are terra-cotta substitutes 

 for old oak figures. All the windows of the church 

 before 1850, except the east and west windows, were 

 like those still remaining in the Gerard chapel, with 

 uncusped tracery and four-centred heads. The tower 

 opens to the north aisle by a pointed arch, with half- 

 octagon responds, and its ground story is lighted by 

 a two-light window on the north, and a three-light 

 window on the west. The latter was built up, per- 

 haps when the Gerard chapel was added, and was 

 opened out again in 1850 ; it is of three lights, 

 app.irently of the second half of the 13 th century, 

 though much repaired. In the sill of the north 

 window is set an effigy of which only the face can be 

 seen, the rest being entirely plastered over. It is 

 said to be that of an ecclesiastic, wearing a mitre, and 

 was found under the tower. In the east jamb of the 

 same window is set a panelled stone with two scrolls 

 on the top, locally believed to be part of a Roman 

 altar. It is impossible to examine it satisfactorily in 

 its present condition. The tower has been heightened 

 to make room for a clock, and has pairs of windows on 

 each face of the belfry stage, and an embattled parapet 

 with angle pinnacles. In its upper stages no ancient 

 detail remains, but it seems probable that all above 

 the first stage was rebuilt in the 15th century. Of 

 the ancient fittings of the church nothing remains. 

 The turret stairs at the west end of the chancel 

 doubtless led to the rood-loft, and before 1850 a 

 gallery spanned the entrance to the chancel, carrying 

 an organ given to the church in 1 708, and afterwards 

 moved into the Legh chapel. At the west end of 

 the nave was a gallery with seats for the mayor and 

 corporation, and a ' three-decker ' pulpit and desk 

 stood against the fourth pillar of the nave arcade. 

 The altar-table is of the 17th century, of oak with a 

 black marble slab. A piece of tapestry with the story 

 of Ananias and Sapphira, formerly hung as a reredos 

 to the altar, is now above the south doorway of the 

 nave. A font dating from c. 1710, removed from the 

 church in 1850, is now in St. George's church, and 

 the present font is modern.* Two 14th-century 

 gravestones with floriated crosses are built into the 

 walls of the tower, and near them lies a slab with a 

 plain cross and the inscription, 'oL 1585.' In the 

 Bradshagh chapel is an altar-tomb with two effigies. 



^ From the list in Lucas's * Warton ' 



"^ By an inquisition in 1370 it was 

 found that Roger Hancockson of Hindley 

 had, without the king's licence, bequeathed 

 a rent of 40*/. to the church of Blessed 

 Mary of Wigan. Possibly the gift was 



to the Bradshagh chantry, which had this 

 dedication. See Q. R. Mem. R. 160 of 

 Mich. 6 Ric. 11. The All Saints' fair 

 dates from 1258. For burial places in 

 the church in 1691, see Genealogist (new 

 ser.), i, 282. Arms in the church ; 

 Trans, Hist, Soc. xxxiii, 248. 



8 Cbs. of Lams. (Chet, Soc. xxvii), 58. 



^ The octagonal bowl of a 14th-century 

 font, used successively as a water trough 

 and flower pot, lies in the garden of 

 Wigan Hall ; Trans, Hist. Soc, (new ser.), 

 xvii, 68. 



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