Hindley, Greater Manchester

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Hindley
Hindley Town Hall
Hindley shown within Greater Manchester
Population	23,457 (2001 census) [1]
OS grid reference	SD6204
Metropolitan borough	Wigan
Metropolitan county	Greater Manchester
Region	North West
Constituent country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	WIGAN
Postcode district	WN2
Dialling code	01942
Police	Greater Manchester
Fire	Greater Manchester
Ambulance	North West
European Parliament	North West England
UK Parliament	Leigh
List of places: UK • England • Greater Manchester

Coordinates: 53°32′08″N 2°33′57″W / 53.5355, -2.5658

Hindley is a town within the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan in Greater Manchester, England. Laying three miles east of Wigan it covers and area of 1044 hectares and is within the historic county boundaries of Lancashire. Hindley borders the towns of Ince-in-Makerfield, Leigh and Westhoughton, and, as of 2001, had a population of 23,457. ^[1]

[edit] Geography and administration

Hindley town centre is located on the historic route between Wigan and Bolton, approximately three miles to the east of Wigan centre and four miles to the north-west of Leigh centre. The town forms part of the greater south Lancashire conurbation set to the east of the M6 motorway between Wigan, St Helens, Bolton and Manchester. The town is set close to the north of an important junction of the A577 (Wigan-Atherton road) and the A58 (Westhoughton - Ashton-in-Makerfield road).

The Local Government Act of 1858 was adopted by the township in 1867 and under the Act of 1894 an Urban District council of fifteen members was constituted ^[2]. New council offices were opened in 1904 and Hindley Urban District Council ran until local government reorganisation in 1974 when Hindley became part of Wigan Metropolitan Borough.

[edit] History

[edit] Early History

The town is first recorded as Hindele in 1212 and again as Hindelegh in 1260. By 1292 it was commonly being referred to as Hindeley. It is believed that the name originally meant the Hind near the Lea - or the deer near the stream.

Hindley was one of the fifteen berewicks of the royal manor of Newton before the Norman Conquest in 1066. After the Conquest it continued to form part of the Barony of Makerfield. The area was held by various free tenants until 1330 when Robert Langton, Baron Makerfield, gave the lordship of the whole manor to his younger son. His descendants were lords of the manor until 1765 when it was sold to the Duke of Bridgewater.

[edit] Middle Ages

For much of the Middle Ages and into the 18th Century the land was a mixture of pastoral, farming and woodland with the local farmers being tenants of a variety of lords. Some of this ancient woodland still remains today in Borsdane Wood. This is a fine example of an ancient British woodland and consequently Borsdane Wood is protected as a local nature reserve; the richness of the wildlife, the age of the trees and the beautiful glades making an excellent setting for a visit.

[edit] 17th century

Parish registers from the end of the 17th century reveal that residents described themselves as Yeomen, independent farmers who supplemented their income by spinning and weaving. There are also many references to Blacksmiths, whitesmiths, nailers and wheelwrights demonstrating the essentially rural basis of the local economy.

[edit] Industry and commerce

Cotton manufacturing was carried on extensively from the 17th century until the middle part of the 20th century. By the end of the 18th century the majority of men described themselves as weavers in the parish registers.

The first cotton factory was erected in 1785 by Richard Battersby at Lowe Mill, formerly a water corn-mill. Later hand-loom weaving was one of the chief industries, each cottage having a weaving shop attached and as the Industrial Revolution grew, larger cotton mills were built. Nevertheless, Hindley retained a rural character throughout the century. In 1790 Market Street, known then as Mill Lane, remained unmetalled and predominantly undeveloped.

However, Hindley is built on the Lancashire coalfield and the two great business of the town for over three centuries were coal-mining and cotton manufacture. The first recorded coal mine was in 1528 and by the end of the 19th century there were over 20 pits in the area. At the start of the 20th century profitable coal seams were nearly exhausted and concerns were raised regarding the need to diversify and develop the cotton mills. Peak production of coal was achieved just prior to World War I. The period between the first and second world wars was marked by the closure of most of the collieries and mills including Hindley Field and Swan Lane collieries in 1927, Hindley Green Colliery in 1928; Lowe Hall Colliery in 1931; Lowe Mill closing in 1934 and Worthington Mill was demolished. During the post war period the Hindley workings became part of the large colliery complexes being developed at Bickershaw, Parsonage and Golborne.

The economic depression of the 1920s and 1930s hit Hindley hard and by the time of the Second World War the population had declined to 19,000.

[edit] Demographics

The population of Hindley increased during the 19th century from 2,300 in 1811 to 23,000 in 1911 reflecting the transformation of the town from a country village to small, dense industrial town whose wealth was based on cotton mills and coal mining. In 1822, John Pennington constructed his first power-driven mill. He was previously a significant employer of hand-loom weavers in the late 18th and early 19th century.

In 1835 John Leyland provided an insight into the growth of the town when he wrote, “Mr Pennington is extending his works, and a new mill is being built by Mr Walker. When these get completed a large increase in inhabitants must follow. In a small time it will doubtless rank as a small town.”

Like many other local towns, the coal mining and cotton spinning have all disappeared and most residents of Hindley work in neighbouring Wigan and Bolton or commute to Manchester or Liverpool.

[edit] Prominent People in Hindley's History

[edit] John Leyland (1832-1883)

Leyland was an important benefactor of the town. He was born in Mill Lane (Market Street) in 1832 to a well known family of cloth makers and eventually took over the family business.He became a governor of Hindley and Abram Grammar School and published a history of the town “Memorials of Hindley” in 1873. On his death, as a memory to him his estate paid for an extension of the Grammar School and built the Leyland Public Library in Market Street.

[edit] Nathaniel Eckersley

Colonel Nathaniel Eckersley, lived at Laurel House on Atherton Road.This can still be seen as the front building at Laurel Nurseries. He was the life long friend of John Leyland. Eckersley had a distinguished military career and served with Duke of Wellington. Eckersley was a philanthropist and during the second half of the nineteenth century was inextricably linked with local charitable and educational causes. He was particularly concerned by the living conditions of the mill and colliery workers. Eckersley unselfishly devoted funds bequeathed to him by Leyland for the improvement of the well-being of residents and the Park named after his friend remain a testament to their generosity.

[edit] The Pennington family

The Penningtons were a well known family of industrialists in Hindley throughout the later eighteenth and mid nineteenth centuries. Their industrial empire began with a single mill in 1822 which John Pennington’s expanded to six mills by the middle of the century. His son and grandson became powerful figures in the town, employing a high percentage of the population of the time. The Pennington family donated over half of the £9,000 required to build St Peter's Church in 1866.

[edit] Landmarks

Hindley Town Hall council offices situated on Cross Street

[edit] Hindley Churches

The first chapel in Hindley was All Saints Parish Church, built by public subscription in 1641 on land given by George Green. George Street in front of the current church being named after him. The church was built as a "chapel of ease" to Wigan Parish Church and was built with the blessing of the Rector of Wigan, Bishop Bridgeman.

The church was originally regarded as Puritan, and its first regular minister, Thomas Tonge preached an early version of the Presbyterian discipline established a few years later. He was succeeded by William Williamson, and then by James Bradshaw, ejected in 1662 for noncomformity.

The chapel seems to have remained unused for six years, and then a succession of curates followed. The chapel was finally consecrated in 1698 on All Saint’s Day. All Saints' Church was rebuilt in 1766 with modifications made in 1863 and remains to this day much the same as then. An attractive, bright church with an upper balcony and wide nave. All Saints' Church is not in the town centre but is the parish church of Hindley, and can be found on Chapel Fields Lane.

St Peter's, near the crossroads in the town centre, was built in 1866 and contained a rare example of an organ by Edmund Schulze until 1908 when two extra stops were added. It is now unused, having been replaced by an electronic organ by a local constructor. The war memorial, outside St Peter's Church at the town's main crossroad, was unveiled on 4th November, 1922; other memorials exist in individual churches.

Hindley has a strong tradition of Methodism and non-conformist churches in their various forms. The Wesleyan Methodists acquired land in 1846, and built a chapel in 1851. The United Methodist Free Church had two chapels at Hindley Green, Brunswick Chapel, built in 1855, and another in 1866. The Primitive Methodists had one at Castle Hill, built in 1856, and another at Platt Bridge, built in 1854. The Independent Methodists had a church at Lowe Green, built in 1867.

The Particular Baptists built Ebenezer Chapel in Mill Lane in 1854, converted to the Mahabarat Indian restaurant in recent years.

The Congregationalists made a first effort in 1794, but no church was formed until 1812; St. Paul’s Chapel was built in 1815, meetings for worship having been held some years earlier in cottages.

Presbyterians built a chapel in 1698 and this has been continuously used ever since, the present congregation being Unitarian in doctrine.

St John's Methodist Church at the top of Market Street and St Benedict's RC Church, in the middle of the main street, were both built in 1868.

Nothing is known of the permanence of Catholicism during the 17th century, but mass was probably said at Lowe Hall as Dom John Placid Acton, a Benedictine, was stationed at this place in 1699 and died there in 1727. Succeeding priests, who till 1758 resided chiefly at Park Hall in Charnock Richard, or at Standish Hall, moved the chapel to Strangeways and then to Hindley village. From 1758 there has been a resident Benedictine priest in charge of worship and the present church of St. Benedict in Market Street was built in 1869.

The cemetery on Castle Hill Road was opened in 1879 and is divided into denominational sections and of note is the amount of masonic gravestones to be found throughout. Hindley has a long and proud masonic tradition that still survives today.

[edit] Grammar School

Hindley and Abram Grammar School was established in 1632 and survived as a school until the 1980s when it was closed by Wigan Metropolitan Borough. The building still survives as a teachers' centre.

[edit] Hindley Junior and Infant School

Hindley J&I school was rebuilt on the existing site on Argyle Street. The new state of the art school, designed by NPS , is a fully inclusive mainstream school, with additional resource rooms, therapy rooms and a hydrotherapy pool. The school was opened by Tanni Grey-Thompson.

[edit] Borsdane Wood

The entrance to Borsdane Wood - an ancient broadleaved woodland now protected can be found by leaving the cemetery at its lower gate and turning right. Walking through the large tunnel under the railway allows you to enter a woodland little changed in centuries. Borsdane wood is designated as Ancient Semi Natural Woodland (ASNW.) believed to have been continuous woodland cover since before 1600 AD and is composed of native tree species that have not obviously been planted. Borsdane Wood is also a Local Nature Reserve (LNR).

The wood consists of approximately 2.55 Hectares of mixed broadleaf trees including species such as oak, ash, birch, cherry, hazel, hawthorn, blackthorn and dog rose, as well as 1.54 hectares of open ground. With trees, many hundreds of years old the wood has remained relatively unchanged for centuries and is home to a wide variety of wildlife including wild deer.

[edit] Today

Hindley's proximity to the modern motorway network and train lines to Manchester and Wigan (where connections to the West Coast Mainline can be made) and affordable housing mixed with modern small estates make it increasingly attractive for commuters.

The town has a modern supermarket which and has been the root cause of the slow demise of the independent traders on Market Street. The only type of trader seemingly to thrive is the 'hot and cold food' establishments, of which at the last count - 20th May 2008 - there were fourteen and the main street is slowly being regenerated by shopkeepers and local entrepreneurs.^[3]

[edit] Sport and leisure

The town has a recently refurbished swimming pool, two public parks and supports a growing amateur Rugby League team and a variety of amateur football teams. It also has thriving youth based groups including two scout troops, guides and brownies, Army Training Corps and a local gymnastics club.

Hindley St. Peter's cricket club, who participate in the Manchester and District Cricket Association and West Lancashire leagues, won the inaugural inaugural Manchester Association Twenty20 tournament^[4]. The club recently received funding to build a new pavilion and a revamped childrens' play area.

[edit] Notable residents

Among the noted past or current residents of Hindley are:

• George Formby, the writer and singer, who lived on Atherton Road as a boy
• John Crank, famous mathematician.^[5]
• Arthur Farrimond, 1924 Olympic runner
• Lily Brayton, Shakespearean actress ^[6]
• Tom Brown, who was the local MP from 1942 to 1964 and nicknamed "the Miners' Champion"; he sat on the Urban District Council for 25 years
• Numerous rugby league players, including Shaun Briscoe of Hull FC and Anthony Stewart of near neighbours Leigh Centurions
• International conductor, broadcaster and organist, Neil Shepherd who lived on Atherton Road. ^[7]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Hindley Hall Golf Club
• Hindley St Peter's Cricket Club
• Hindley Town Football Club
• Arthur Farrimond 1924 Olympics
• John Crank
• Lily Brayton