//Bramley ‘Tithe to 2009’ Boundary Trail

Type of Walk: Circular, including woodland paths Distance: 4 miles Starting Point: Leisure Complex carpark, Kirkstall Road (SE275 345) Suitable for: Walking only

Trail Summary: To the best of its modern capability, this trail follows the tithe boundary between the townships of Headingley-cum-Burley, Armley and Bramley, as they were laid out by the Tithe Commission in 1846. Beginning in the carpark of Kirkstall Leisure Complex, in the 19th-century township of Headingley-cum-Burley, the trail crosses the to skirt around partial boundaries of lands belonging to Armley House. Proceeding up Houghley Gill in Bramley, the trail follows the boundary of lands belonging to Wither Grange (demolished), before retuning across the river Aire to its point of origin in the carpark of Kirkstall Leisure Complex.

Bramley

Burley

Trail Water Railway Wooded area Built-up area Roads Armley © Crown copyright. All rights reserved. Wakefi eld MDC 100019574. 2009

17 Directions We begin by going left across the carpark of Kirkstall Leisure Centre, behind MacDonalds, to cross the footbridge over the river Aire and ascend the steps into Canal Road. We then turn right, passing in front of Armley Mills. In crossing the river, we have passed over the tithe boundary of 19th-century Headingley- cum-Burley and into the township of Armley. Armley Mills appears on the 1846 tithe map of the Armley area, as a complex belonging to John Gott, Esquire, eldest son of the late Benjamin. (1762–1840) was a prominent clothier, who Ladies’ Council of Education Diary, 1876 built his fi rst factory, Park Mill, (WYL5045/12) at Bean Ing in 1792 (on the site of the Yorkshire Post building to the west of city centre). Park Mill was the biggest woollen cloth factory in Yorkshire and a huge enterprise at a time when there were fewer than twenty mills of any sort in Leeds. By 1797, Benjamin Gott was master of 1200 workers, and had amassed a considerable fortune. He purchased Armley Mills in 1800, in order to further his business, which he then passed to his eldest son at his death.

Armley Mills however, has been around a lot longer than the Gott family. The earliest record of Armley Mills dates from the middle of the 16th century when local clothier Richard Booth leased ‘Armley Millnes’ from Henry Saville. A document of 1707 provides the fi rst description of the mill and fulling process carried out there. Fulling was the fi nal stage in cloth production and involved pounding the cloth in large pits fi lled with water, urine, and fuller’s earth to matt the fi bres together. Fulling was one of the fi rst industrial processes to have purpose-built premises.

The papers of the Gott family are held in Special Collections at the Leeds University Library (MS193 - business papers and MS194 - family papers). Archive Service also holds several collections with affi liation to the Gott family, such as the Yorkshire Ladies’ Council of Education Minutes (WYL5045) and the records of the Leeds Association for the Protection and Care of Young Girls (WYL416). 18 Take the next right into Road and follow the road to the entrance of Armley Park. Take the right-hand path and go down the steps, following the path ahead and keeping the Leeds-Liverpool Canal on your right. Both the railway you have just passed by and the Leeds-Liverpool Canal are listed in the Armley tithe apportionment of 1846 as simply belonging to the Leeds and Bradford Railway Company and to the Leeds-Liverpool Canal Company respectively. The railway was not yet built in 1846 and is marked on the Armley tithe map by an orange stripe, labelled ‘land taken for railway’. However, the canal pre-dates the tithe map. The Leeds Liverpool was the fi rst of the Trans-Pennine canals to be started, being proposed in 1765, and the last to be completed, in 1816. The length and complexity of the route meant the canal took 46 years to build at a cost of fi ve times the original budget. Continuing on the path, you soon pass on your left, a Victorian folly of 156 steps with an arch half way up, bearing the date 1893. These steps do not feature on the Armley tithe map, as they had not yet been constructed in 1846. Armley Park was not acquired by the Corporation for the people of Leeds until 1892, and in 1846, still belonged to John Gott Esq. The land here is listed in the tithe apportionment as being ‘parkland, woods, and pleasure ground’ associated with Armley House. Armley House was the family home of Benjamin Gott, his wife Elizabeth, and their children, three sons and a daughter. In 1846, Benjamin’s widow still lived here, despite the property belonging to her eldest Victorian folly 1893 son, John, who resided at Wither Grange. On Elizabeth’s death, the 24 acres of parkland at Armley House were sold to the Leeds Corporation, and these steps were built to create public access to the park up the steep slope from the canal side.

The records of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal Company (C299/16 and WYL7) and a list of subscribers to the Leeds and Bradford Railway (WYL13) are held by West Yorkshire Archive Service (WYAS). The Leeds-Liverpool Canal is a Site of Special Scientifi c Interest owing to its calcium-rich, clay lining, which encourages the growth of water plants. It is also a favourite haunt for local anglers and otters due to an abundance of fi sh, including bream, roach, carp, and pike. 19 Carrying straight on ahead, you reach Redcote Bridge. The name Redcote is evident on the Armley tithe map of 1846, which shows buildings here around both ends of the bridge. The buildings on the opposite side of the bridge to where we are standing now, belonged to Sir Sandford Graham Baronet, and were leased to John Tattersall as a house, cottages, mistals and a yard. These were the buildings known as Redcote. On this side of the bridge, in the woods to your right, were two cottages with gardens leased by John Gott, Esq. to Mary and John Walker. Facing Redcote Bridge, follow the footpath to your left into Ridge Wood, keeping the canal on your right. As you continue along this path, see if you can spot the Armley/Bramley boundary stones. There are two on your right on the slope beside the woodland path and one on the fairway of the Ridge Wood golf course to your left. This one can be seen through a clearing in the trees - it is not recommended that you walk on the fairway. The canal marks the Armley/Bramley boundary, Bramley being on the opposite side to where you are walking. Pass through a small clearing on the left and follow the path back into the woods for a short distance, until you are forced out onto the golf course. Turn right and go straight on to the corner of the golf green, then turn left up the edge of the course. Follow the line of trees and the remnants of a boundary wall of Armley House on your left, right up the side of the golf course, climbing a gentle hill Armley/Bramley boundary stone until you reach the road at the top. Go

Ridge Wood has a canopy of trees including sessile oak, elm, ash, silver birch, beech, sycamore and hornbeam. Beneath this is a shrub layer of elder, hawthorn, hazel, holly, dogwood, willow and guilder rose. In the spring, the ground has a carpet of wild garlic, which gives the wood its interesting smell, as well as bluebells, wood avens, enchanter’s nightshade, lesser celandine, and lady fern. 20 out onto the footpath in Armley Ridge Road. Turn immediately to your right and follow the footpath till you reach Raynville Crescent on the opposite side of the road. Cross here and just inside Raynville Crescent, to your left, is the site of the house and stable block of Wither Grange, the residence of John Gott Esq., eldest son of Benjamin Gott. The boundary wall separating the next plot from John Gott’s residence still stands to your right. Wither Grange appears on the 1846 tithe map of Armley as a large complex containing a grand house and outbuildings. During the 1880s and 1890s it was leased by Thomas Harrison, J.P. The house and grounds belonged to the Gott family until the First World War, during which they donated it to the war effort. The Wyther Home for Sick Babies opened in the building in 1914, and was described by the Leeds Babies Welcome Association Annual Report as having a ‘beautiful garden, large rooms and fresh air…[assisting recovery]’. By 1926, the medical offi cer for Wyther Infants’ Hospital was Miss Norah F. Smith M.B.S.S.D.P.H. She was also the assistant medical offi cer for maternity and child welfare in Leeds. In the 1930s, the home became the Infants’ Hospital. Houses were eventually built on the site of Wither Grange in 1990. The spelling of ‘Wither’ seems to have acquired a ‘y’ in place of the ‘i’ for unknown reasons during the 20th century. Perhaps it was thought to look more quaint and archaic!

Sister Palmer and nurses on the lawn of Wyther Home for Sick Babies, c. 1914, and opening of Armley Babies’ Welcome, 1928. (WYL705/20) Continue up Raynville Crescent, following the road round to the right and ignoring any turn-offs until you reach Raynville Gardens on your right. Here turn left and cross Raynville Crescent to enter Houghley Gill on the opposite side of the road, through the black gate. Walk up the path ahead and pass through a green gate into the wooded part of the Gill. Pass four sets of steps leading out of the Gill on your right. Shortly after the fourth set of steps, you cross over the invisible tithe boundary 21 of 1846 into the 19th-century township of Bramley. Follow the Gill until you reach the green gate at Bramley Hill Top. Go through the gate and turn back to face it. Standing at the entrance to Houghley Gill in Bramley look to the right over your shoulder. Set above you on a ridge behind trees you will note some rather ancient properties, dating from the medieval and Elizabethan periods. This area is known locally as Hill Top. According to the Bramley tithe apportionment of 1846, the Cottages were owned and occupied then by Julius Popplewell and Joseph Hargrave, who had a house, a homestead, and an orchard Houghley Gill - looking towards Hill Top there. The Hill Top area of Bramley is now a Conservation Area and has changed very little since the Victorian tithe map was drawn. The cottages here stand on the same footprints as the buildings appearing on the tithe map, and from their age, are certainly the same buildings, having been simply extended or adapted in areas. On the left, in front of where the wall now stands, the tithe map clearly shows a pond and a beck fl owing down into the wooded area of Houghley Gill. In 1846 this beck probably served the houses on Hill Top and the Tan Pits, owned by Richard Nichols, which stood high above the Gill, on the site of Hill Top Commercial Centre. The trees and beck in Houghley Gill would have been essential to any leather Entrance to Hill Top Commercial Centre, the road tanning taking place in the area as leading to the Tan Pits, and remnants of the wall both tree bark and water were used surrounding the house of Richard Nichols extensively in this process. The tan pits referenced by the tithe map would have been fi lled with crushed bark

At night, the trees in Houghley Gill are a perfect feeding ground for bats. There are records of Pipistrelle bats roosting in nearby houses and some bat boxes on an Italian Alder tree. Can you fi nd the bats carved on the gateposts of the Gill? On the ground, garlic mustard and stinging nettles are food plants for orange tip, peacock and small tortoiseshell butterfl ies. Foxes, grey squirrels, and roe deer have also been spotted here, early in the morning. 22 and water, or ‘tan liquor’, the solution getting progressively stronger in each pit. Animal skins were immersed in the pits to absorb this ‘liquor’ slowly and could take up to two years to tan. The entrance to Hill Top Commercial Centre where buildings associated with the tan pits stood, can be seen on your left. Richard Nichols lived in a house with stables, gardens and an orchard, just behind this road, on the spot where the new houses stand. The old wall here may be the same wall that surrounded Nichols’ house. Walk back between the gate posts of Houghley Gill now and continue straight ahead, following the footpath. In 1846 this footpath existed beside the beck shown on the tithe map and follows more or less the same course as the water, which is now piped underground. The beck would have been on your left as you walk down the footpath, Houghley Gill and if you listen carefully you can still hear it fl owing along its pipe. This stretch of Houghley Gill was known as Gill Wood and was owned by John Gott, Esq. as part of the Wyther Grange estate. According to the tithe boundary of 1846, we remain in Bramley township as we walk through the Gill with the boundary of Wither Grange, in Armley township, constantly visible at the top of the steep slope to our right. Where we reach the termination of the wall enclosing Hill Top Commercial Centre on our left- hand side, here imagine an invisible line across the footpath in front of you. This is the point at which we cross the tithe boundary and re-enter the 19th- century township of Armley. At this point, Houghley Gill, still owned by John Gott Esq., was known as Ofl ay Bank. The two names, Gill Wood and Ofl ay Bank, must eventually have merged to become Ofl ay (or Houghley) Gill. After passing two sets of steps rising out of Houghley Gill on your left, immediately before a third, there is a single set of rather dilapidated steps leading up the steep slope to your right. Turn right and go up these steps to the top of the slope, emerging through a modern stile into a ginnel. Follow this ginnel round to the left and into Coverdale Close. The boundary of Wither Grange in Armley township 23 Coverdale Close is built inside the boundary of the lands of Wither Grange, now demolished, and would have been in Armley township in 1846. Walk straight ahead to the end of the short road, turning right into Coverdale Crescent and follow the footpath onto the road side, as it curves to the right. Where the road forks, go left, and continue across the 19th-century lands of Wither Grange, by heading through the kissing gate at the end of the road. Follow the path to the right up the hill, ignoring minor turn-offs. When the main path splits, take the right fork and climb the hill until you reach another gate, opening onto Wyther Park Hill. Turn left out of this gate and head down Wyther Park Hill, keeping to the footpath on the left side of the road. (Note the views of to your left, and , left and slightly behind you). Wyther Park Hill follows, as closely as possible, the Victorian tithe boundary between Armley and Bramley townships, skirting the edge of the lands of Wither Grange, the 1846 residence of John Gott, Esq. Wyther House itself would have been visible in the 19th century from a position about View from Wyther Park Hill halfway down Wyther Park Hill. The house would have been some distance to your left and surrounded thickly by trees. With the house were stables, outbuildings and pleasure grounds. The footprint of the new estate of red-brick houses, low on your left-hand side, marks the boundary of the landscaped park around John Gott Esq.’s great house. Reaching the end of Wyther Park Hill and the junction with Cockshott Lane, cross Cockshott Lane and walk up the hill, turning left into Gotts Park Avenue. Continue along Gotts Park Avenue, crossing two minor roads. The name ‘Gotts Park Avenue’ may suggest these lands once belonged to Gotts Park or to Armley House, as the estate was known in the 19th century. According to the tithe map however, the lands here belonged to Armley Ridge, a group of seven houses and farm buildings which stood to your left-hand side as you reach what is now the junction between Gotts Park Avenue and Armley Ridge Road. We’ll stop here for a moment.

24 Most of the houses and farm buildings of Armley Ridge, which were rented to Christopher Acroyd and others by John Gott, Esq in 1846 are now gone. However two cottages, nos 181 and 183, remain, facing into Armley Ridge Road. There is also a 19th-century boundary wall still running across the fronts of these cottages. Cross Armley Ridge Road Nos 181 and 183 Armley Ridge Road from the corner of Gotts Park Avenue. Enter Gotts Park through the gateway immediately ahead. Just inside the gate and to your right is a building now known as The Lodge. This and a few buildings behind it are all that remains of the extensive outbuildings, stable yard and gardener’s house associated with Armley House, that the 1846 tithe map records standing here. However, in front of The Lodge, a large cross of Celtic design, recalls the erection of almshouses on the same spot, by Benjamin Gott, in 1823. These were endowed by Gott’s daughter, Harriet and the cross raised in their memory by W.H. Gott in 1902. It is not clear whether, by 1846, the Gott family had employed the poor of their almshouses as gardeners to the estate, or if the almshouses here had simply changed use. Either way, no reference to their use as almshouses is made in the tithe apportionment. (If you are stopping for lunch the walled garden still in existence to the left of The Lodge makes a lovely spot and can be accessed by walking around its left- hand edge.) Follow the path opposite the front of The Lodge towards Armley House noting the views of Leeds city centre to your left. Keeping left when the path splits, go around the left-hand side of the building. We have actually approached Armley House from the The Lodge back as its grand frontage faced towards the Leeds-Liverpool Canal and Armley Mills, the second factory purchased by its prospering owner Benjamin Gott, in 1800.

25 As you round the end of the house, you will notice the dilapidated remains of a semi- circular structure to your right. This structure appears on the tithe map of 1846 and marks the extent of the original building, a neo-classical villa with wings at either side. Armley House was fi rst built in 1718 by a local merchant, but Armley House - grand frontage after being purchased by Benjamin Gott in 1803, was redesigned in 1822 by Sir Robert Smirk architect to the British Museum. The wings of Armley House were demolished in the 1970s. The semi-circular structure to your right may once have been a conservatory or a small orangery facing out over the park and woodland. On reaching the front corner of the house ignore the path that turns sharp right to go across its grand frontage. Continue instead down the path ahead of you and follow its gentle curve around the edge of the lawn to your right keeping the woods on your left. At the corner of the lawn, ignore the path’s right turn and follow instead the path ahead and slightly to your left as it begins its steep descent into Ridge Wood. Shortly, you will come to a set of steps with a solid wooden handrail. Descend the steps and at the bottom take the rough path straight ahead of you. This path can be wet and muddy in places. Shortly, the rough path turns suddenly and sharply to the left down a very steep slope. Descend this slope and where the path splits at the bottom, we arrive back at Redcote Bridge. Cross over the bridge, and directly ahead of you is . Turn right and follow the access lane round under the railway bridge. Keeping right, you will soon emerge into Kirkstall Road. Turn right again, and after a short walk, Looking towards Redcote Bridge from arrive back at the carpark of Kirkstall Ridge Wood Leisure Complex.

There is a very large beech tree as you enter Ridge Wood. It is 140cm (56 inches) in diameter at breast height (DBH) and may be 300 years old. 26