A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



Cotham,' from whom it has descended to Mr. Alfred 

 Angelo Walmesley-Cotham.' Certain manorial rights 

 are still connected with it. Old Hardshaw Hall 

 was pulled down about 1 840 ; the new hall is used 

 by the Providence Hospital. Another house, called 

 the Manor House, was pulled down about 1870. No 

 courts are now held. 



A grant of land in Hardshaw was made by 

 Bartholomew Ford to Sir Richard Bold in 1483 ; ' 

 the inquisitions show that his descendants held it 

 a century later. A family named Roughley resided 

 here in the seventeenth century ; one of them was 

 founder of the school.' 



ST. HELENS being situated at a 

 BOROUGH point at which various roads inter- 

 sected, as from Widnes or Warrington 

 to Lathom and Ormsidric, and from Prescot to Wigan 

 and Xewton, it is probable that there has for centuries 

 been something of a village here, clustered round the 

 chapel.' The King's Head Inn, formerly on the site 

 of the post office, was built in 1629.' A school was 

 founded about the same time, and before the end of 

 the century a monthly meeting of the Society of Friends 

 was established, followed by an Independent chapel 

 in 1710.' 



The progress of coal-mining in the neighbourhood, 

 which led to the formation of the Sankey Canal in 

 1755, also promoted the growth of St. Helens, as the 

 most convenient centre of trade and residence. By 

 1 800 it had become a small town, comparable with 

 Ormskirk.' A Saturday market was established ' by 

 custom,' and two annual fairs, on Easter Monday and 

 Tuesday and the first Friday and Saturday after 

 8 September.' 



The Liverpool and Manchester Railway, opened in 

 1830, passed about a mile and a half south of the 

 town, and two years later the St. Helens and Runcorn 

 Gap line was constructed. Both are now parts of the 



London and North Western system, and the latter 

 was extended through the town to Ormskirk in 1849 

 and 1858.'° A new railway, known as the Liverpool, 

 St. Helens, and South Lancashire, was begun in 1888 ; 

 the eastern portion is worked by the Great Central 

 Company, having been opened in 1895." There is 

 also communication with neighbouring places by the 

 electric tramways. 



Other conveniences for the growing town were 

 supplied from time to time. A gas company was in- 

 corporated by Act of Parliament in 1832 ; a water 

 company was also established, and in 1 844 water pipes 

 were laid in the town ; these works have been taken over 

 by the public authorities. Market sheds were opened 

 in 1843, and a market hall in 1850; a covered 

 market was built in 1889. 



The government was populariEcd in 1845 by the 

 creation of an urban sanitary 

 authority, with a board of 

 Improvement Commissioners." 

 A county court was granted 

 about the same time. A town- 

 hall, built by an association of 

 'proprietors' in 1839, being 

 burnt down in 1 87 1, the pre- 

 sent public town hall was built 

 and opened in 1876. A charter 

 of incorporation was granted in 

 1868 ;" the town became a 

 parliamentary borough in 1885, 

 and a county borough in 1889. 

 A borough police force was 

 established in 1887. The area 

 comprises Hardshaw, the ori- 

 ginal seat of the town, parts of 

 Windle and Eccleston, and the whole ot Parr and 

 Sutton — in all 7,284 acres." The population in 

 1901 was 84,410. 



St. Helens Bo- 

 rough. Argent^ rwo 

 bars azure f over all a 

 cross sable f in the jirst 

 and fourth quarters a 

 saltlrey and in the second 

 and third a gri^n k- 

 greant gules. 



Cotham, subject to a rent charge of ^lo 

 in trust * for the Popish secular clergy for 

 ever.' In 1716 Thomas Goulden was 

 the owner, in right of his wife \ he had 

 an estate in Fcarnhcad, the annual value 

 of all being /128. See Payne, Rec, 

 fyf Engl, Cato. 123 ; Engl. Cath. Non- 

 jurors, 119. It will be noticed that a 

 Thomas Goulden took part in the above 

 fine. The Thomas Goulden of 17 16 was 

 son of John ; ibid, 155, 



^ Baincs, Lanes, (ed. 1836), iif, 710. 



Mary, wife of Thomas Goulden, by her 

 will of 175:', left Hardshaw Hall to her 

 nephew, William Penketh Cotham, of 

 Bannister Hey in Clyton j Piccope MSS. 

 iii, 288, quoting R. 3 1 of Geo. II at 

 Preston. 



The will of William Cotham of Hard- 

 shaw Hall was proved in 1797. Lawrence 

 Cotham seems to have succeeded ; he 

 married Winifred, daughter of Thomas 

 West of St. Helens, and had a son 

 William Penketh Cotham (under age 

 1828) ; Charity Rep. He married, July, 

 1 8+0, at Macclesfield, Anna, daughter of 

 William Taylor. See Gillow, op. cit, iii, 

 +2. 



^ He is a son of Thomas Walmesley (a 

 younger son of Charles Walmesley of 

 Westwood, Ince) by his wife Anna Maria, 

 daughter of William Cotham of Spring- 

 field, Eccleston, and heiress of Lawrence 

 Cotham. 



* Dods. MSS. cxlii, fol. 208, n. 105. 



* In 1601 Thomas Gerard complained 

 that Robert Roughley was withholding 

 suit to Windle manor : Ducatus Lane. 



(Rec. Com.), iii, 439, 459. In 1614 

 Thomas Roughley of Sutton left j^loo for 

 the school j Robert, his brother and heir, 

 was thirty years of age and more ; Lanes. 

 Inj. f.m. (Rec. Soc. Lanes, and Ches.), i, 

 280. Janet the wife of Robert was a re- 

 cusant in 1641 ; Tram. Hnt. Soe. (New 

 Ser.), xiv, 241. 



' It may be noticed that the three 

 ancient chapels of the parish are situated 

 on the road from Lathom and Ormskirk 

 to Widnes — Rainford, St. Helens, and 

 Farnworth ; the name, Chester Lane, still 

 applied to a part of this road, is of ancient 

 origin. 



• Adam Martindale (Chet. Soc), 17 ; 

 he specially mentions its situation on ' the 

 great road ' between Warrington and 

 Ormskirk. 



' The hearth-taji list of 1 666 shows 

 twenty-seven houses of three hearths and 

 more in the township of Windle ; Lay 

 Subs. 250-9. They would be mostly at 

 St. Helens. The numbers of such houses 

 were in Prescot thirty-two, and in Widnes 

 twenty-six. 



* Lady Kenyon, writing in 1797, says : 

 ' St. Helens was a poor little place when I 

 passed through it thirty years ago ; and 

 now is a very neat, pretty country town ; 

 the roads all as good broad pavements as 

 can be' ; Kenyon MSS. 548. 



' Baines, Lanes. Direct. 1825 ; p. ii, 

 ?47~5'' Letter bags came in from Liver- 

 pool, Prescot, and Wigan once a day, with 

 corresponding despatches. Four coaches 

 beside the mail seem to have been run- 

 ning through the town, between Liver- 



374 



pool and Wigan, and Liverpool and 

 Bolton. 



1" In 1845 the St. Helens and Runcorn 

 Gap Railway and the Sankey Canal were 

 amalgamated, and the united concern 

 was purchased by the London and North- 

 western Company in 1864. 



'' These particulars, as well as most of 

 the modern story, are derived from James 

 Brockbank's Hist, of St. Helens, 1896. 



" Improvement Act, 18 & 19 Vice. 74. 



" The original area of the borough was 

 6,558 acres, being the same as that of the 

 present parliamentary borough. The town 

 was divided into six wards — Hardshaw, 

 Parr, East Sutton, West Sutton, Windle, 

 and Eccleston ; each with an alderman and 

 three councillors. In 1889 the borough 

 was divided into nine wards — Central, 

 Hardshaw, Parr, East and West Sutton, 

 North and South Windle, and North and 

 South Eccleston — the membership of the 

 council being thus increased to thirty-six. 

 The water undertaking and the markeU 

 were already public property. The gas 

 works were purchased in 1878. The 

 St. Helens Corporation Act, 1893, con- 

 solidated into one civil parish the various 

 civil parishes, or parts, within the county 

 borough, at the same time extending the 

 bounds to include parts of Windle and 

 Eccleston, amounting to 720 acres j in 

 1898 a further 6 acres of Eccleston was 

 included. Mr. W. H. Andrew, town clerk, 

 has afforded information on these points 

 to the editors. 



'^ 7)^8 ;, including 104 of inland water ; 

 Census Rep. of 1901. 



