Chapel-en-le-Frith

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Map sources for Chapel-en-le-Frith at grid reference SK055806

Chapel-en-le-Frith is a small Derbyshire town on the edge of the Peak District, part of the Pennine Range, near the border of Cheshire, in northern England. The controversially named "Capital of the Peak" (according to the town signs) was established by the Normans in the 12th century, originally as a hunting lodge in a densely forested area. This led to the French-derived name of Chapel-en-le-Frith ("Chapel in the forest clearing"). The population of 'Chapel', as the locals commonly refer to it, is approximately 6,000.

The first chapel in the town (now the Church of St. Thomas Becket) was originally built by the Normans but was replaced with a larger building a hundred years later, and is now almost entirely of 18th-century construction. It stands at the highest point in the town. Buried in the churchyard are soldiers of the Scottish army of the Duke of Hamilton who marched south in support of Charles I in 1648. After their defeat at Preston, they were marched to Chapel and imprisoned in the church for sixteen days in such squalid conditions that forty died; a further ten died when they were marched towards Cheshire.

A curfew bell has been rung in the town since 1070, and on Shrove Tuesday a Pudding Bell is rung at eleven in the morning to remind housewives to prepare their batter.

There is a regular market place, cobbled and raised above the High Street, which is still used every Thursday to host the local market. There is also a certain amount of industry — especially behind the church in the lowest part of the town, where the brake-lining manufacturer Ferodo (an anagram of Froode, the 19th-century founder's name) was a family concern for over a hundred years, but is now part of the international conglomerate Federal-Mogul.

Chapel is the location of the High Peak Borough Council offices, which have recently been moved from Buxton.

Chapel-en-le-Frith railway station is located a mile from the town centre, on the commuter line from Buxton to Manchester Piccadilly. The other train line passing through the town, which has a more centrally located station (Chapel-en-le-frith Central) built by the Midland Railway, was once one of the main lines from London to Manchester. While it no longer carries passenger traffic, it now carries a constant stream of roadstone from the quarries around Buxton. It terminates at its junction with the Manchester-Sheffield trans-Pennine line by way of two viaducts, diverging east and west, above the Black Brook valley at Chapel Milton.

To the north lies the Dark Peak highlands, which are made up of millstone grit and are heather-covered, rugged and bleak. Here we have Chinley Churn and South Head with, a little further off, Kinder Scout, which looms above the whole area. To the south and west is the gentler and more pastoral White Peak, consisting largely of limestone grasslands, nevertheless with spectacular bluffs and the occasional gorge. Combs Moss, a gritstone 'edge', dominates the valley in which Chapel lies from the south and Eccles Pike rises sharply above the town to its west.

[edit] External links

• Chapel-en-le-Frith Parish Council
• Chapel-en-le-Frith.com website
• The Church of St Thomas Becket
• Chapel Golf Club
• Chapel-en-le-Frith Cricket Club
• A map of Chapel-en-le-Frith
• An aerial photograph of Chapel-en-le-Frith

Coordinates: 53.32230° N 1.91889° W