BLACKBURN HUNDRED 



BLACKBURN 



About 1720 Bishop Gastrell found that divine 

 service was performed in the forenoon of one 

 Sunday and afternoon of the next in summer time ; 

 on alternate Sundays in winter, the curate also 

 serving Samlesbury Chapel. Sir Henry Hoghton, 

 bart., elected one warden, the minister and principal 

 inhabitants the other."' In 1834 the value was 

 ^^156 ; it is now given as j^-jio."' The vicar of 

 Blackburn is patron. The chapelry was constituted 

 an ecclesiastical parish in 1837, but has since been 

 divided. 



The following have been curates of Low Chapel : — 

 to 1228 Richard son of Geoffrey Dean of 

 Whalley 

 1250 William, clerk of the Lawe "° 

 1280 Adam, chaplain, and William, clerk of 



the Lawe '" 

 1322— JO John del Lawe, chaplain '" 

 1332 William, clerk '" 

 I 341— 5 Hugh de Pocklington '" 

 1359 Robert de Kirkham (r) '" 

 DC 1439-45 Edward Farington '^' 

 oc. 1541-65 Thomas French'"' 

 William Wall 

 Lawrence Waddington 

 Peter Makinson ''* 

 — Inskip 



Robert Osbaldeston 

 Richard Redman "' 

 oc. 165 1-3 William Heald'" 

 1676 Thomas Abbot, M. A. 

 William Colton '" 

 John Hull '" 

 William Vaudrcy, B.A.'" 

 John Shorrock, B.A. 

 Edmund Stringfellow Radcliffe, 



B.C.L.'" (Brasenose Coll., Oxf.) 

 John Clay 



Randal Henry Feilden 

 Henry Walter McGrath, M.A. 



(T.C.D.) ''' 

 Robert Hornby, M.A.'" (Downing 



Coll., Camb.) 

 John Brookes 



James Clegg Kershaw, M.A.'" (Em- 

 manuel Coll., Camb.) 

 Seymour Frederick Harris, B.C.L.'^' 



(Worcester Coll., Oxf.) 

 Edward John Middlecott Davies 



c. 



oc. 



oc. 



oc. 



c. 



oc. 



oc. 1592 

 oc. I 60 1 

 oc. 1609 

 oc. 1622 

 oc. 1629 

 1646 



1688 

 1703 



I72I 



1763 

 1803 



1826 



1827 

 1832 



1838 



1853 



1857 



1889 

 1908 



There was anciently a small chapel or oratory at 

 the bridge over the Ribble. In 1365 John, called 

 the hermit of Singleton, had licence to have divine 

 service in the chapel at the foot of Ribble Bridge, 

 on the Walton side, for three years. '"^ In 1383 

 the abbot and convent demised to Ralph de Langton 

 and Thomas de Clayton, chaplain, for a term of 

 thirty years the chapel standing on Ribble Bridge with 

 all oblations and the books, vestments of the altar, 

 a chalice, images, wax and other belongings, render- 

 ing 3^. 4a'. yearly and prayers for the abbot and 

 convent, for Ralph and Joan his wife, their ancestors, 

 heirs, and children, and all benefactors of the chapel 

 living and dead. Clayton received licence in 1387 

 to celebrate in the chapel at the end of Ribble Bridge 

 ' beyond the bank of Ribble,' and in his oratory 

 within his mansion house at ' Clecton,' probably 

 Clayton-le-Dale, at the bishop's pleasure. 



A story has been preserved how Edward Kelley 

 (1555-95) the alchemist, a friend of Dr. John 

 Dee, held converse with the corpse of a poor man 

 which he and Paul Waring, his companion In such 

 deeds of darkness, had disinterred a few hours after 

 burial in Low churchyard, and from whom by 

 incantations they elicited information as to passages 

 in the life and the manner and time of death of a 

 young nobleman, then in ward of the relater of the 

 story.""" 



In 1689 Walton Hall was licensed as a meeting- 

 place for Presbyterians under the ministration of 

 Thomas Key."' A Presbyterian chapel existed here 

 at the close of the 1 7th century ; in I 7 1 9 Sir Henry 

 Hoghton erected a new chapel, described in a return 

 of Dissenting chapels made in 1772 as then Congre- 

 gationalist, where the congregations of Preston and 

 Walton met alternately. Soon afterwards the society 

 became Unitarian, and early in the 19th century 

 ceased to use the chapel, which was turned into 

 cottages and attached to the endowment of the 

 Unitarian chapel, Preston. The building stands 

 in the rear of the main street of Walton village ; 

 the burial-ground attached has long been oblite- 

 rated.'" 



In 1784, and again in 1790, during his last 

 journey in this part of England, Wesley paid brief 

 visits to Walton in connexion with members of the 

 society who worshipped at the chapel in Little 

 Walton, afterwards called Bamber Bridge. A Wesleyan 

 school-chapel was opened in Walton-le-Dale in 1868 



bishop's lands in Thornley, £5 61. 8</.; 

 augmentation given by the archbishop out 

 of the rectory of Blackburn, 461. id. ; 

 one-tenth of the clear rent of Mr. Crook's 

 estate at Whittingham, 221. ; interest of 

 Mr. Hoghton's benefaction, 551.; total, 

 ,^15 lOJ. id, 



"8 Notitia Cestr. (Chet. Soc), ii, 290. 



"' Manch. Dioc. Dir. 



'«> WhalUy Couch, i, 127. 



"ilbid. 105. 



"' V.C.H. Lanes, ii, +56 ' Forestry ' ; 

 Kuerden MSS. Cuerdale D. no. 68. 



'25 Assize R. 428, m. 3. He was pre- 

 sented at Preston assizes for wounding 

 Richard son of William Brown at 

 Ciiorley, 



12* Hoghton D. 541 ; FF 249. 



"s Ibid. FF 1 10. 



"» Sir Edward of Farington, parish 

 priest of Low, and thirteen other parish- 

 ioners * senden hele in our Lord God 



everlasting ' and testify that ' Jankin of 

 Walton swere on the mass bokc at the 

 pulpit in the Law Kirk ' on Sunday next 

 before ' St. Nicholas' Day the bishop ' (in 

 1436) that he had made no feoffment to 

 son William, and only a jointure of 401. 

 yearly to his wife Johan, and that Harry 

 his son was his heir; Walton D. 91 ; 

 Harl. MS. n2, fol. 114- 



H' Visitation Bks. at Chester. 



128 He was then sick and decrepit. In- 

 Tentory filed at Chester the same year. 



129 He was a member of the Presby- 

 terian classis in 1646 ; afterwards at 

 Overton near Lancaster. 



ISO Plmd. Mim. Accts. (Rec. Soc. Lanes. 

 and Ches.), i, 107, 249. 



13' He was also in charge of Samles- 

 bury, but seems to have resided at 

 Walton. 



13" Alexander Bagot was stipendiary 

 curate 171 7-21. 



299 



133 The church papers at Chester begin 

 with this incumbent. He retained the 

 curacy till his death, but had a second 

 nomination — to Walton and Samlesbury 

 ■ — in 1727. 



13* He had been assistant curate since 

 1798, and was incumbent of Burnley 

 1817-26. 



'35 Rector of St, Ann's, Manchester, 

 1837. 186 Vicar of Bayston Hill 1853. 



^^^ For an account of the church and 

 its minister about 1870 see A. Hewitson, 

 Our Country Churchesj 26-9. 



1'^ Author of a Digest of the Institutes 

 of Gaius, &c. 



138a Lich. Epis. Reg. Stretton, v, 13. 



138b Weever, Anct. Funeral Monuments^ 

 cited in Hardwick's Freston^ 149. 



139 Hist. MSS, Com. Rep. xiv, App. iv, 

 231. 



1^^ Abram, op. cit. 742 ; Nightingale, 

 Lanes, Nonconf, i, 9-21. 



