Disley

Disley

Disley village centre
Disley
 Disley shown within Cheshire
Population 4,301 [1]
OS grid referenceSJ972845
   – London  186 miles (299 km) 
Civil parishDisley
Unitary authorityCheshire East
Ceremonial countyCheshire
RegionNorth West
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post town STOCKPORT
Postcode district SK12
Dialling code 01663
Police Cheshire
Fire Cheshire
Ambulance North West
EU Parliament North West England
UK ParliamentMacclesfield
List of places
UK
England
Cheshire

Coordinates: 53°21′25″N 2°02′35″W / 53.357°N 2.043°W

Disley is a village and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East and the ceremonial county of Cheshire, England.[2][3] It is located on the very edge of the Peak District, in the Goyt Valley, very close to the county boundary with Derbyshire at New Mills, and south of Stockport, Greater Manchester. To the north of the village, the River Goyt and the Peak Forest Canal, which opened in 1800, passes along the edge of the village. Today it is a dormitory village retaining a semi-rural character.

Disley railway station is on the Manchester to Buxton line, with through trains to Preston and Blackpool.

The parish includes part of the neighbouring village of Newtown, the bulk of which is in Derbyshire.[4]

History

Its Anglo-Saxon name was Dystiglegh meaning "windy settlement" or possibly Wood or clearing by a mound.[5] In the 13th century, in the time of Edward I, there are references to confirmatory grants of land made to Jordan de Dystelegh of Disley Hall and Roger de Stanley-de-Dystelegh of Stanley Hall in the district, pointing to even older local settlements. It later had the name Dystelegh.[2]

Sir Piers Legh of Lyme founded St. Mary-the-Virgin Church in Disley (completed 1524) and consecrated as parish church in 1558. The earliest parish register is from 1591.

The village had at least one cotton mill by the mid-19th century. As the cotton industry declined, more varied employment became the norm. In 2005, there is a paper mill and some light engineering works, but most people travel out to work.

Governance

The Crescent, Disley in 2000

The parish of Disley was included in the 19th century as one of three parishes in Hayfield rural sanitary district, alongside Hayfield and Mellor in Derbyshire. In 1894, under the Local Government Act 1894, rural sanitary districts became rural districts, but were required to be entirely within one county or another - this led to Disley, the only Cheshire parish of the sanitary district, to form the Disley Rural District on its own - one of only a few single-parish rural districts to exist. This remained in existence until 1974, when it was merged into the new Borough of Macclesfield, whilst retaining a parish council.[2][3]

In April 2008 a referendum was announced for Disley residents due to the fact that the Borough of Macclesfield was to become part of the new Cheshire East unitary authority as a result of major local government changes in Cheshire in April 2009. Some residents believed that the village would be better served if it were part of the neighbouring boroughs of Stockport in Greater Manchester or High Peak in Derbyshire.[6]

On 8 May 2008 this referendum was held, with an overwhelming result in favour of staying within Cheshire, with less than 1/3 of the electors wanting to become part of the Metropolitan Borough of Stockport and an even lower proportion of the population wishing the village to become part of Derbyshire's High Peak Borough.[7]

Macclesfield Borough Council was succeeded on 1 April 2009 by the new unitary authority of Cheshire East.[8]

People

Past

Nearby Wyberslegh Hall (sometimes spelled Wybersley Hall), which stands between Disley and High Lane, was the birthplace of the Anglo-American novelist Christopher Isherwood.[9]

American historian A.J.P. Taylor bought a house in Higher Disley in 1935, for £525, so he could be close to University of Manchester when he was lecturing.[10] Dylan Thomas visited Taylor, first staying for a month and drinking "on a monumental scale", and later returning, in the autumn of 1946, homeless and with his wife Caitlin, with Margaret Taylor allowing them to stay in the summerhouse in the garden.[11]

Lord John Hunt who led the first successful Mount Everest expedition in 1953 also lived in Disley.

Present

Disley is also the home of

Points of interest

The "Rams Head" inn c.1650 at the centre of the village was formerly a lodge belonging to the Lyme Park estate. It became a main coaching stop on the Manchester to London route. The Rams head is now a restaurant and pub.

Lyme Park is not located in the civil parish of Disley, but in the civil parish of Lyme Handley. However, it is sufficiently close to be associated with Disley. The hall was used by the BBC as a setting in its adaptation of Pride and Prejudice.

Disley is home to Disley Cricket Club[14] a member of the TACS Cheshire Cricket League, playing their home games at Disley Amalgamated Sports Club (DASC). The 1st XI play in the Division 1 having won the Division 2 championship in 2014 and Division 3 in 2013.

Moorside Golf Club, Higher Disley (now defunct) first appeared in the 1930s. The club continued until the late 1950s.[15]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Census 2001
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Disley Parish Council; The Parish of Disley (Official Guide). (1994)
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 "Borough of Macclesfield: Parish Clerks". Borough of Macclesfield. Retrieved 2007-04-21.
  4. ↑ The Ordnance Survey (2006). "Sheet OL1: The Peak District, Dark Peak area". Ordnance Survey Explorer Map: 1:25000 series. Southampton: Ordnance Survey. ISBN 0-319-23777-X.
  5. ↑ "Disley". The Key To English Place Names. English Place Name Society. Retrieved 9 May 2012.
  6. ↑ "Manchester Evening News - News - Village Vote on Council Change". Manchester Evening News. 2008-04-12. Retrieved 2008-04-13.
  7. ↑ "Disley Parish Council - Declaration of Result of Poll" (.DOC). Disley Parish Council. 2008-05-08. Retrieved 2008-05-24.
  8. ↑ Cheshire (Structural Changes) Order 2008
  9. ↑ Jolly, Margaretta (2001), Encyclopedia of Life Writing: Autobiographical and Biographical Forms, Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, ISBN 1-57958-232-X (p. 475)
  10. ↑ Morley, P. (2013), The North: (And Almost Everything In It), Bloomsbury Publishing, ISBN 978-0747578161, p.289
  11. ↑ "Oxford affairs". The Guardian. Retrieved 17 November 2014.
  12. ↑ "Storeys add to GB cycling golds". BBC. 2008-09-10. Retrieved 2008-10-29.
  13. ↑ "Awesome GB sprint team take gold". BBC. 2008-08-15. Retrieved 2008-10-29.
  14. ↑ "Disley Cricket Club". www.disleycc.co.uk. Retrieved 2008-08-08.
  15. ↑ “Moorside Golf Club”, “Golf’s Missing Links”.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Disley.