Colne Valley Folk (1936)
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COLNE VALLEY FOLK THE ROMANCE AND ENTERPRISE OF A TEXTILE STRONGHOLD BY ERNEST LOCKWOOD WITH A FOREWORD BY THE RT. HON. THE VISCOUNT SNOWDEN HEATH CRANTON LIMITED 6 FLEET LANE LONDON, E.C.4 19~6 First published in 1936 Printed in Great Britain for Heath Cranton Limited l,y Northumberland Press Limited, Newcastle on Tyne FOREWORD BY THE RT. HoN. THE V1scouNT SNOWDEN THE Colne Valley Folk are typically Yorkshire. I know no part of the West Riding where the sterling qualities of a moorland race have been better preserved. The old dialect still survives in spite of the efforts of a State school ing to give speech an alien twist. The population maintain a spirit of sturdy independence of thought and action characteristic of all peoples who breathe the air which has swept over wide regions of moor and heather. I represented the constituency in Parliament for nine years. When I was invited to become a candidate for the Division I accepted the invitation because I knew I should be going among my own folk. I had a very happy time among them. Yorkshiremen are proverbially clannish. They have good reasons to regard themselves as the back bone of England in more senses than one. The hills and valleys of the Pennine range have always been a centre of political activity. Colne Valley has a proud history of association with all the political movements of the last century. It sent its contingent to Peterloo. It led the Luddite rising. It was a hot-bed of Chartist agitation. 5 6 FOREWORD It formed its political Labour Union before the Independent Labour Party came into existence. The rise and development of the Colne Valley to the position of perhaps the largest woollen ·manufacturing centre in the world, is in a large measure due to the grit of its people. The Manufacturers and Spinners are a race of " self-made men," but they have not become a class apart from the rest of the population. It is most important, for historical reasons, that the records of such a district should be preserved, and the writer of this volume has rendered a valuable service in producing this story of its past which is within his own recollection. He has special qualifications for writing such a book. His life has been spent in roaming about the Valley picking up unconsidered trifles which make the social life of the people. The volume will be of interest to readers far beyond the stone cottages on the bleak and rugged hill sides of the Valley. AUTHOR'S PREFACE IN 1928, I ventured to place on record in the Huddersfield Examiner (on which paper I have been pleased to serve for twenty-three years) some impressions of my (then) twenty five years' service in journalism in the Colne Valley. I had no idea that these impressions would create the amount of interest that I was assured they did, and many influential people urged me to publish more fully my reminiscences in some more permanent form. For various reasons the task was not embarked upon until quite recently, when a valued friend and former colleague, Mr. William Linton Andrews (" W.L.A."), Editor of the Leeds Mercury, who is well known to radio listeners for his fortnightly broadcast of "~ews of the North," urged me to undertake the work. My employers readily fell in with the suggestion and gave me full liberty to use anything which had appeared in the Examiner, a concession that I greatly appreciate. Much of the matter has had to be revised and brought down to date, and a great deal of new information has been included. The photograph of the mill scene at Milnsbridge, which appears on the wrapper, I have been able to use by the kind permission of the Leeds }.,fercury. Many friends have assisted me in various ways, and to them I tender my sincere thanks. E.L. 1 CONTENTS Pase FOREWORD BY VISCOUNT SNOWDEN • • • 5 AUTHOR'S PREFACE • • • • • 7 Chapter I. INTRODUCTORY • • • • • II II. INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT • • • • 16 (a) THE CROWTHER FAMILY • • • 18 (b) JOHN EDWARD CROWTHER'S GENEROSITY • 23 (c) STORY OF THE FIRTHS • • • 26 (d) A LONG RECORD • • • • 31 (e) BACK TO 1793 • • • • 33 (I) THE FIRM OF MALLINSON • • • 37 (g) TITUS CALVERLEY AND SONS LTD. • • 40 (h) JOB BEAUMONT AND SON LTD •• • • 41 (,) LOCKWOODS OF LINTHWAITE • • • 44 (i) PEARSON BROS. LTD. • • • • 48 (k) SHIRES' S YARN • • • • 49 (l) HOYLES' RAPID GROWTH • • • 52 (m) LOCKWOODS OF GOLCAR AND MILNSBRIDGE • 55 (n) HIRST AND MALLINSON LTD. • • • 57 (o) TWO PROSPEROUS FIRMS • • • 59 (p) SLAITHWAITE SPINNING CO. LTD. • • 60 (q) GLOBE WORSTED CO. LTD. • • • 63 (r) POGSON AND CO. • • • • 64 (s) BEN HALL AND SON LTD. • • • 65 (t) JOHN W. LEITCH AND CO. LTD •• • • 66 (u) A CONCLUDING WORD • • • • 67 (v) A BIG CUSTOMER • • • 70 9 10 CONTENTS Chapter Page III. POLITICAL CHANGES • • • • 72 (a) A MEMORABLE BY-ELECTION • • • 76 (h) A LIBERAL REVIVAL • • • • 78 (c) COMING OF MR. SNOWDEN • • • 82 (ti) VISITS OF SUFFRAGETTES • • • 90 (e) RECORD OF ELECTIONS • • • 92 IV. LocAL GovERNMENT • • • • 95 (a) PROMINENT PEOPLE • • • • 105 ( b) SEVERE LOSSES • • • • 109 (c) EDUCATIONAL MATTERS • • • III v. WIDESPREAD CHANGES • • • • 116 (a) MARSDEN • • • • • 116 (b) SLAITHW AITE • • • • • 119 (c) GOLCAR • • • • • 121 (a) LINTHWAITE • • • • • 124 (e) MILNSBRIDG E • • • • 127 (/) CROSLAND MOOR • • • • 130 (g) LONGWOOD • • • • • 131 VI. RoYAL V 1s1Ts • • • • • 134 VII. NoRTH REGIONAL TRANSMITTER • • • 139 VIII. AMONG THE CHURCHES • • • • 142 IX. WAR-TIME MEMORIES • • • • 146 x. SoME INTERESTING CHARACTERS • • • 149 XI. EMBARRASSING EXPERIENCES • • • • 153 XII. Music AND THE DRAMA • • • • 156 XIII. A MooRLAND MYSTERY . • • • 162 XIV. GREAT STORM OF 1904 • • • • 167 xv. SPORTING REMINISCENCES • • • • 170 INDEX • • • • • • 181 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTORY WHEN writing about the Colne Valley we ought to be clear on what exactly the term means. As generally understood Colne Valley is that part of the district which lies on each side of the River Colne, and stretches from the top of Standedge on the Pennine Chain above Marsden, to Huddersfield, and includes the townships of Marsden, Slaithwaite, Linthwaite, Golcar, Scammonden, and the district of Milnsbridge, which is partly in Linthwaite, partly in Golcar, and partly in the borough of Hudders field. Bordering Milnsbridge are the districts of Paddock, Longwood, and Crosland Moor, which are within the borough of Huddersfield. The population of the com bined district at the 1931 census was 30,799, made up as follows: Marsden, 5,723, Slaithwaite, 5,181, Linthwaite, 9,689, Golcar, 9,812, Scammonden, 394. For political purposes, however, the Colne Valley takes on a much wider meaning. The Parliamentary constitu ency includes the area mentioned and also all the townships in the Holme Valley, the Meltham Valley, and the Tame Valley, known as Saddleworth. It is one of the largest and most widely scattered divisions in the country. The electorate at the General Election of November 1935, numbered 55,739, of which 25,560 were men, and 30,179 were women voters. The population of the adjoining town of Huddersfield in 1931 was 113,475. II 12 COLNE VALLEY FOLK The district is noted for its production of vast quantities of medium tweeds for the multiple shops, and is rightly regarded as one of the most important woollen manufactur ing areas in the world. Other writers have dealt with the subject from a purely historical point of view, and I have no wish to trespass on their preserves. I hope to show, however, how the woollen textile industry has developed from small beginnings, the changes that have taken place in the political history of the di vision, and in local govern ment, together with other features of the life of the people of this important area. Almost without exception, as the following pages will tell, the great captains of industry began their operation!s in a small way, in many cases com bining manufacturing on the old hand-looms with farming on primitive lines. My own grandfather, William Brad bury, of Highhouse, Linthwaite, was one of these, and I can remember watching my mother winding bobbins in readiness for the weaver. It is in such a district that I work as a journalist, and in which I first saw the light of day. I have now been in journalism for thirty-three years, for I took up my first appointment on the C olne Valley Guardian, at Slaithwaite, in January 1903. I remained there for a little more than ten years, and on May 5th, 1913, I took over my present position of Colne Valley representative for the Hudders field Examiner. But I am getting ahead of my story. Before I was eleven I was working half-time in a textile factory, going to the mill in the 1!1orning and school in the after noon one week, and reversing the process in the following week. At the age of thirteen I went straight on as a full time worker. My earliest recollections of schooling were that I had a burning desire, not to attend the Linthwaite Wesleyan Day School, near to which I lived, but to go to the private academy then held at Flathouse by the late William Sykes, who lived to be ninety-five! But to the INTRODUCTORY Wesleyan School I had to go under the tutorship at various times of Mr. Bywater, Mr. Quintrell, and Mr. W. S. Reynolds. Other teachers who did their best for me, even if I did not appreciate it as I might have done, were the two Misses Eastwood, Miss Carter, and Miss Shaw. I have no idea whether any of these good people are still living, but if so, and these lines catch their eyes, I now wish to apologize for all the trouble I gave them, and to thank them for the manner in which they persevered with a not always too willing pupil.