BLACKBURN HUNDRED 



BLACKBURN 



Bill for the construction of the Leeds and Liverpool 

 Canal in 1 770. 



He was succeeded in 1803 by his son Thomas 

 Clayton, who was nominated by George III to 

 succeed the Earl of Wilton as colonel of the Royal 

 Lancashire Volunteers, and served with his regiment 

 many years in Ireland before the Union. He was 

 fifty-eight years in the commission of the peace for 

 the county, was the father of the magistracy, a deputy 

 lieutenant of the county, and high sheriff in 1808. 

 He received the public thanks of the inhabitants of 

 the hundred in 1821, with a service of plate tendered 

 to him, in acknowledgement of his exertions for the 

 preservation of peace in the district during a period 

 of great insubordination.^' He married in 1788 

 Susan daughter of Robert Nuttall of Bury (died 

 1789), by whom he had no issue. Towards the 

 close of his life he dispersed the remainder of the 

 Little Harwood estate, having sold the hall with 

 the manor in 1 8 1 5 to John Hoyle of Haslingden. 

 Mr. Henry Hoyle of Little Harwood Hall suc- 

 ceeded to the property on his father's death in 1834. 

 It was sold by his executors in 1873, the year 

 after his death, to Mr. Henry Robinson of Black- 

 burn. 



LITTLE HJRIVOOD HALL is a two-story 

 17th-century house, built on the usual plan of central 

 hall and end projecting wings, facing south, with low 

 muUioned windows and stone-slated roofs. The 

 south front, which has rough stone walling, retains 

 most of its original features, but the north front was 

 rebuilt in brick in the i8th century," with square- 

 headed barred sash windows and central doorway. 

 The elevation is good of its kind — simple and digni- 

 fied, relieved with stone quoins, and emphasized in 

 the middle by a slight projection terminating in a 

 pediment above a plain brick parapet. At the east 

 end a later wing has been added, and the interior of 

 the house appears to have been first remodelled in 

 the 1 8th century and altered considerably at later 

 dates. The greater part of the building is now 

 used as a Conservative club, and the surroundings 

 have lost all their original rural characteristics. 



At the survey of the honor of Clitheroe made in 

 1662 a puture rent of 3/. zd. was charged upon this 

 township and contributed by : — 



John Clayton, gent., for the demesne . I zd. 



William Whalley, for Willworth . . 6d. 



Thomas Haworth, for Harston Lee . 6J. 



and for Bank Hey .... ^d. 



Edmund Cockshut, for Ediholes . . 3<a'. 



George Page . . . . . 'id. 



John Peele, for Bank Hey . . .4^. 



Harstonlegh was the property and residence of 

 Richard Rishton in 1 40 1, and continued in his 

 descendants for two and a-half centuries. 



Willworth was the property of Edward Braddyll 

 of Brockhall, esq., in 1 585, and soon afterwards 

 became part of the Claytons' estate, and was leased 



for several successive generations to members of the 

 Whalley family.'* 



Ediholes was given to the Hospitallers early in the 

 13th century. In 1330 Avice relict of Adam de 

 Hediholes claimed dower in a tenement from John 

 Page the elder and others. 



The Page family had lands here for four cen- 

 turies. John Page occurs in 1327, and John his 

 son was slain before 1347. In or about 1540 

 Richard Page held a messuage for a free rent of id., 

 and Thomas Thornley another messuage for 6d. free 

 rent, both in Ediholes, and formerly the possessions of 

 the Hospitallers.-" In 1 6 1 7 Richard Page sued his kins- 

 men George and John Page for a tenement in Little 

 Harwood which Henry Page gave to his son John 

 father of John father of Richard father of George 

 father of the plaintiff." George Page held a tene- 

 ment, probably Ediholes, in 1662, Edmund Cock- 

 shott holding another tenement there at the same 

 date. 



John Peel held a small tenement of the monastery 

 of Whalley at the Dissolution, of which his descen- 

 dant John Peel, died seised in 1640.^* The family 

 removed to Peel Fold in Oswaldtwistle in the i8th 

 century. 



The Boltons of Bank Hey were tenants of the 

 abbey in 1537, and continued here for two cen- 

 turies. George Bolton of Little Harwood, yeoman, 

 died in I 73 I, at the reputed age of 1 1 3 years.^' 



Tenements described as Bankhey were granted to 

 John Braddyll in 1545; another, granted to John 

 Dudley in 1575, was then in the tenure of Lawrence 

 Whalley.'" 



John Clayton's house, with six hearths liable to the 

 tax, was the largest in the township in 1666 ; one 

 other house had four hearths and two had three.'' 



St. Stephen's Church mission room, near Roe Lee, 

 was erected in 1886, and services are conducted in it 

 by the clergy of St. Michael and All Angels', Blackburn. 



A Wesleyan chapel was built in 1884 in the 

 Whalley road. 



In i68g licence was granted for a Presbyterian 

 meeting at the house of Richard Ingham.'* 



RAMSGREAVE 



Romesgreve, xiii-xvii cent. 



Ramsgreave occupies high ground, an eastern con- 

 tinuation of Mellor Moor, directly to the north of 

 the town of Blackburn. Save on the western side the 

 ground slopes in all directions from an elevation of 

 726 ft. above the ordnance datum at 'Top of Rams- 

 greave,' the lowest level being 300 ft. on the north- 

 west, where Zechariah Brook joins Showley Brook on 

 the borders of Salesbury. On the northern slope of 

 the hill the subsoil consists of the Yoredale rocks, on 

 the southern of the Millstone Grit. The soil is clayey 

 and the land consists of meadow and pasture, destitute 

 of woodland.' The area is 776 acres, and in 1901 

 the population numbered 179 persons.' The main 



*' Raines in Notitia Cestr. (Chet. Soc.) 

 ii, 279. 



2* Abram, Hist, of Blackburn, says circa 

 173 1; Baines, LflKCi.(i87i ed.), says 1791. 



25 Clayton D. 



26 De Banco R. 280, m. 310 ; Cat. Fat. 



i327-3°> p- "°; 1345-8, p. 552; 



Kueiden MSS. Coll. of Arms, ■/, 84*. 

 ^1 PaL of Lane. Plea R. 320, m. 10 d. 



28 Duchy of Lane. Inq. p.m. xxix, 62. 



29 Whalley Couch. 1224 ; Abram, Black- 

 hum, 562. 



™ Pat. 36 Hen. VIII, pt. xi ; 17 Eliz. 

 pt. V. John Foster of Little Harwood, 

 gent., held a messuage called ' le Bancke- 

 hey' at his death in 1638 of the king by 

 the three-hundredth part of a knight's 

 fee 5 Duchy of Lane. Inq. p.m. xxviii, 15. 



251 



3^ Lay Subs. Lanca. bdle. 250, no, 9 

 (hearth tax). 



3^ B'nU MSS. Com. Rep. xiv, App. iv, 

 230. 



^ The agricultural returns for 1905 give 

 arable land i acre, permanent grass JJO 

 acres. 



2 The new survey gives 778 acres j 

 Census Rep. 1901, 



