A Hidden Landscape: Heaton industry in the eighteenth century

Derek Barker

For centuries Heaton had consisted of a pattern of cottages, small farms and fields, some of which pre-dated the late eighteenth century’s Enclosure Act. Around the time of this Act local landowners began to exploit land, previously used solely for agriculture, by promoting extraction industries like quarrying, coal mining, limestone burning, and brick making. The financial rewards of such activities were aided by an improved infrastructure of turnpike roads and canals. After a century or so the profitability of these industrial activities declined in their turn. The expansion of , with the development of a rail link from in 1875, made sales of land for villa development more desirable. Mine shafts and quarries were filled in and waste tips removed. Heaton today is a quiet residential suburb in north Bradford whose ‘post- industrial landscape’ is so extremely post-industrial as to be virtually hidden. Predictably, much Heaton history was recorded, a century or more ago, by William Cudworth.1 In 2001 the late Stanley King published the only modern study of the township.2 Nobody will ever surpass the pride, love, and knowledge which this author possessed for the place of his birth. He studied very widely, and is reliable in his recording, but the lack of an index and detailed referencing can make the confirmation of individual facts from his necessary account quite difficult. Nonetheless readers may reasonably ask if I can now contribute anything new to these authors’ contributions. The first essay I wrote on local history, ‘Coal Mining in Heaton Woods’, was the result of interest stimulated by a woodland walk with an historian, the late Kath Alred. The current work was in turn generated by discussions I had with my long-standing friend and collaborator, the late Tony Woods. Tony believed that there was indeed more to say in one area at least: the industries which once exploited Heaton’s natural resources. He followed Stanley King in making the pilgrimage to Birr Castle, Co. Offaly, Eire where the Earls of Rosse have long preserved an archive of Heaton related material. Tony made a photographic record of a great many documents which subsequently transformed my understanding of Heaton in the early modern period. I have certainly drawn heavily on King when providing an historical background to my study, but I believe I have added new material in three significant areas. I always knew that stone was quarried in Heaton but not how very extensive this undertaking had been. I have now learned that limestone was brought to the village a generation before the opening of the Leeds- Liverpool Canal, and that later Heaton exported coal to Kildwick and elsewhere using the newly opened canal. Finally, and most surprisingly, I discovered that there had been an extensive brick-making industry at Heaton in the late eighteenth century, of which almost no trace survives, and which King does not mention. Tony Wood’s premature death was a huge loss to Heaton and Shipley historical studies but, with the permission of his partner Jane, I shall try to use the material he gathered, and our conversations, to tell at least a part of the story on which I hoped we might work together.

The Evidence Heaton ceased to be a combination of two hamlets, Heaton cum Clayton, at the beginning of the eighteenth century.3 Documents from the Birr Archives, such as Joshua Field’s account books and journals, are the best primary source for its subsequent history. Cudworth and King are the best secondary sources, although industry formed a relatively small part of the narratives that they both wrote. The Field family will feature prominently in my essay. They possessed several landed estates, but I shall take care to use only material that can be definitely ascribed 1 to Heaton. In italicised direct quotations from the archive material I will normally expand contractions and modernize spelling. My own comments on such quotations are enclosed within square brackets. The word Field, with an uppercase initial letter, will always refer to the family, never the land division. The names of fields, and trackways, are good guides to early industrial locations. King produced a most useful map of Heaton field names although I am not always sure on what evidence it was based, and fields may in any case change their designations. He also published a valuable glossary of local place names and their meanings, although it is no criticism to say that certainty over such derivations can seldom be assured.4

Stanley King’s map of Heaton field names in 1839.

There is so little archaeological material now visible that reflects former industry that I feel able to describe eighteenth century Heaton as ‘a hidden landscape’, but small amounts do survive. The local woodland contains evidence of coal mining and fireclay extraction. The products of stone quarrying: flags, setts, roof-stone, wall-stone and so forth remain all around us. Twentieth century aerial photographs of Heaton exist which can be employed for archaeological purposes,

2 but sadly the Environment Agency’s LiDAR survey scarcely touches this area.

A LiDAR image of Northcliffe Woods combined, with very great skill, with an aerial photo, by Tony Woods. The top right of the image across the Northcliffe Dike was, Tony discovered, considered to be part of Heaton. You can see extensive mining shaft remains there, also modern golf course greens.

The Field & Rosse families The Field family had provided the Lords of the Manor of Heaton since the seventeenth century. 5 During the eighteenth century the lordship was principally held by two men, John Field (1701-1772), and his son and successor 'Squire' Joshua Field (1742-1819). Both men lived at Heaton Hall where their house and parkland roughly corresponded in extent to the St Bede’s & St Joseph’s Catholic College playing field perimeter. To the best of my knowledge Heaton Hall was built in the reign of Queen Anne and was reconstructed in 1765-1774.6 At the end of its life the hall was purchased by the Roman Catholic diocese (in 1920) and was demolished in 1938-39, at least partly to enable road-widening to take place in Highgate.7 3

Joshua Field married Mary Wilmer, the daughter and heir of Randal Wilmer of Helmsley, and Joshua and Mary were the parents of several children. Most significant was John Wilmer Field (1775-1839) who inherited the lordship of Heaton and acquired that of Shipley by purchase in 1819. His daughters Mary (1813-1885) and Delia (1814-1873) had no brother and so after their father’s death all his property was divided between them, with Mary receiving the Heaton and Shipley estates. Mary had married Lord Oxmantown who later succeeded to the Earldom of Rosse. He was a noted astronomer and at Birr Castle, his family home in Ireland, rents from Heaton must have contributed to the construction of what was then the world’s largest telescope. In 1911 his successor, William Edward 5th Earl of Rosse, sold his estates near Bradford but his descendants have continued to live at Birr until the present day.

Heaton Hall in late eighteenth – early nineteenth centuries (image from Cudworth).

In the eighteenth century, as Lords of the Manor, John and Joshua Field would have possessed rights over the common land of Heaton Moor, some of which would have been devolved to twenty or so freeholders. Mineral rights were valuable: Heaton had economically useful seams of coal, fireclay, and sandstone which geologically formed part of the rock series known as the Lower Coal Measures. Deposits under Field estate land would have been owned outright: these could be leased or ‘farmed’ by others for a consideration. Coal was being mined around Heaton by the eighteenth century and evidence of mining can still 4 be seen in Heaton Woods. By this time, if not earlier, 'delvers' had started to remove lovely honey-coloured sandstone from the township's many 'delphs' or quarries. Local ‘Elland Flags’ sandstone splits easily and so provided flagstones, roofing slabs and wall-stone for field boundaries, many of which are still visible today. The Lord of the Manor had other rights over common land which could be shared with freeholders after payment. These shared rights varied between manors but may have included: digging wall-stone, cattle grazing, cutting bracken, collecting dung or cutting and drying turf (turbary).8 Turbary is important since evidence of the widespread use of turf as fuel would indicate that coal was not available, or at least not available at an affordable price.

A portion of the Heaton Enclosure Map. The roadway shown is modern Highgate (previously Town Gate) which becomes Shay Lane and passes through Heaton Woods. All the woods were awarded to Joshua Field, some as his manorial right.

Joshua Field provided spring-fed water ‘wells’ for his community. Three remain: at Heaton Syke, the Heaton Royds trough and at the bottom of the hill in Highgate.9 The ‘town well’ was in Leylands Lane. In 1775 Field was receiving money for 'sough water' which I assume means that he had arranged to bring a convenient supply into Heaton. A sough (suff) was a stone lined conduit used for mine drainage or other water movements. 5

The water trough at Heaton Syke.

Although local cottagers would have enjoyed some access to the waste or common land, both Fields were litigious men when they saw any threat to, or infringement of, their rights. Joshua took civil action against Jonas Greenwood for ‘trespass & replevin’ in 1773, after Greenwood ran cattle on Heaton Common which were not his own property. Seemingly sixteen ‘Scotch’ oxen were de- pasturing the common near Field's own mansion.10 An account of this action lists the steps that Field had taken in the past to prove his rights there: 'having dug for and got coals and stone on the waste, and cut the brackens'. Another document provides significant help in identifying the extent of Field’s property.11 It gives particulars of lands sold by, and in possession of, the late Mr Joshua Field in Newsholme, Damems, Wheatley, Shipley, Bolton, Idle, Pudsey and . It also lists those who purchased these properties. Some of the land in Pudsey, for example, was subsequently purchased in 1792 by the trustees of the Moravian Society.

What was Heaton like in the Eighteenth Century? By the early part of this century the township centre consisted of Heaton Hall with a few farmhouses and cottages wholly surrounded by woods and agricultural land. It was approached from Bradford up a muddy track later known as Heaton 6

Road.12 Most ordinary residents of Heaton would have been farmworkers, quarrymen (delvers), coal miners, or wool-combers. The built environment was quite different from today, although a flavour of the eighteenth century can still be detected at Hammond Square (Low Fold), and the hamlet of Heaton Royds.

Hammond Square and Farm: give a flavour of the eighteenth century.

In Heaton Syke older houses here were demolished to create the former Fountain Inn car-park but a white building (23/25 Syke Road) remains; it is of a type called a 'mirror image' cottage. The datestone (TRM 1743) suggests it was 7 originally built by Richard & Mary Thompson in the mid-eighteenth century. St Barnabas Church did not exist then of course, being built as late as 1864, and all the housing surrounding it is also of much later date. A trackway called Heaton Lane led from the King’s Highway (later Low Lane or Manningham Lane) up-hill from Frizinghall to Cross Hill (where now Heaton Road meets Emm Lane).13 The upper part of Heaton Lane has long been called Elm or Emm Lane which once gave access to Heaton Hall and Garth House, both long demolished. There was no Heaton Baptist cemetery until the early nineteenth century, although its oldest graves contain Heatonians born in the eighteenth. There were no Heaton allotments (which were a twentieth century creation) at least at their present site. Rossefield Road and its houses were a late nineteenth century replacement for the earlier Back Lane, a stump of which survives and gives access onto the curiously named Nog Lane.

A stump of Back Lane remains, leading to Heaton Hill and Nog Lane. The original lane passed the Ebenezer Wesleyan Chapel (now a private home) and continued on to meet Ashwell Road.

Paradise, the higher terrace of the Highgate (Town Lane) cottages, may have just been in existence.14 At various times the activities on Cold Hill (Heaton or Quarry Hill) included agriculture, brick-making and stone quarrying. It did not become even an unofficial public space until the quarrying was concluded in the mid- nineteenth century, after which Heaton residents could take exercise there and

8 enjoy fresh air ‘straight from Morecambe’.

I know of no surviving eighteenth century map of Heaton. This is a detail of the Heaton Tithe map reflecting the situation in the 1840s. Some inhabitants would have been born in the previous century, and the extent of village centre quarrying is made clear.

The Field family did not possess the whole of Heaton. Samuel Crabtree (1754- 1831) owned the fields and delphs later to become Quarry Street. A section of the Heaton Woods was part of the Jowett or Clockhouse estate. ‘Six Days Only’ at Heaton Royds and some adjacent fields had been in the possession of the Dixon family since the seventeenth century, and is still owned by them today.

Communications In the years 1755-57 the & Bluebell Turnpike Trust created a new road to Colne via Haworth Road, Chellow Heights, and . The development of Haworth Road later became important for nearby stone exploitation and transport.15 In 1760 the & Bradford Turnpike Trust created a more successful route out of Bradford towards Skipton via Lane and the future Road over Cottingley Moor. The Act creating the Keighley Road turnpike via Shipley was passed by parliament outside our period, in 1815.16 The tracks that became Emm Lane, Heaton Road and Shay Lane were then small roads of poor quality, ‘sloughs of mud’ in Cudworth’s view.17 In the last quarter of the eighteenth century canal development was also very much in the air. An explanation of its value to Heaton is contained in the Birr Archive.18

On its lately appearing that the coals and stone on Heaton Common were likely to 9 turn out ….advantageous and shall be made more valuable by their owners…to the navigable Canal from Leeds to Liverpool - the freeholders in Heaton, many of them at least, have of late shown a strong justification for sharing them with the defendant [Field] and have been very active lately in pushing matters so far as plainly shows a design to divide the common into shares, that everyone may have a part if possible.

Agriculture and Woodland Heaton originally possessed three ‘great fields’ taken from the common: Northsides, Emm Field and Cold Field. Others were later created like West Field beyond Toller Lane.19 In the medieval period tenants were allotted stints (pasture) and doles (ploughland) by the manor’s Court Baron but by the early seventeenth century freeholders wished to have their allotments consolidated into ‘closes’.20 King covers eighteenth century agriculture in considerable detail.21 An extensive range of crops were grown in Heaton: peas, potatoes, turnips, clover, oats, wheat, and barley. Heaton ‘peys’ were especially noted. Poor soil and an elevated situation would be no impediment to the growing of oats, but it is surprising that more fastidious grains like barley and wheat were apparently successful. Bradford brewers naturally required a supply of malting barley. We know that malt kilns were constructed at Heaton Royds since in 1814 Mr Dixon writes to Mr Field describing a malt kiln ‘which you have mentioned to me in the past’, but says that he has 'converted it into cottages'.22 King lists the names of some eighteenth century public houses in Heaton which would have sold the beer brewed from the malt. The Black Swan at Frizinghall is oldest and survives to the present day. Ned Brook’s (which was in the space now occupied by 6 Highgate) was demolished in 1789 and succeeded by the Punch Bowl at Garth House, also long gone.23

The harvesting of wheat for long storage would surely have required corn driers in our damp situation, but if so I don’t know their former locations. The grain harvested could have been milled at George ’s flour mill in Frizinghall.24 By this time it was appreciated that yields could be improved by crop rotation, lime spreading, and manuring. Manure was obtained from the stock: cows, sheep, pigs, and horses. Horse shoeing, and agricultural equipment repairs, probably account for the fact that blacksmith’s bills were such a regular feature in eighteenth century Field diaries. The forge was at Heaton Syke: Joseph Woodhead was the blacksmith in the early eighteenth century and was followed in this position by James Mortimer.

Farmland needed to be drained and this activity must have been stimulated by the enclosure of Heaton Common in 1780-81. The development of the new enclosed fields would also have produced an enhanced demand for wall-stone. The operation of the 1780 Act was described in detail by Cudworth and King.25 Some 560 acres were enclosed, many of which were located on both sides of Haworth Road and adjacent to Heaton Royds Lane. As Lord of the Manor Joshua Field would have received some land, a sixteenth I believe, as his manorial right. 10

After that the remainder was allocated to freeholders in proportion to their share of common right. This process ensured that Joshua Field was by far the largest beneficiary. After all the large landowners were accommodated cottagers would have received their very tiny plots. Once the assignment had been completed there was a secondary process of sales and transfers between those initially allotted land.

Article of purchase. Memorandum of agreement of 1790 between Richard Fox Lister and Joshua Field to convey land on the late Heaton Common bounded to the south by Haworth Road turnpike [other boundaries described]. £665.26

After enclosures several new farms were created, the nearest to the township centre being Shay Grange on Long Lane, now a golf driving-range.

The Fields owned quite extensive areas of woodland. Their exploitation seems to have consisted of managed coppicing, with some standard trees being left for timber. In nearby Northcliffe, Shipley there is an ‘Old Spring Wood’. This name does not reflect water courses: springs were coppiced trees. There were also regular charcoal and timber sales.27 Even bark was a valuable product and could be sold to leather tanners. Deposits of burned ashes can reflect charcoal burning but in some places wood was heated in a temporary oven to drive the water off and produce ‘white coal’ or chop wood, an alternative fuel. Ashes themselves could be deliberately produced for lye-making or glass manufacture. There is no positive evidence for any such activities, except charcoal burning, in Heaton Woods.

Textiles Bradford was an important wool-textile centre and it is no surprise to find that there is evidence for nineteenth century wool-combing and hand-loom weaving in Heaton.28 Obtaining evidence for this industry in the eighteenth century has proved more difficult. An Ambrose Padget is recorded as a weaver at Heaton Royds in 1772.29 There are also occasional mentions of wool sales:

4 July 1806 I sold my wool to Geo. Beaumont for 19s a stone: believe it was cheap 30

This works out at about 36d per kg, not very different from today’s average 32p per kg, although the change in the purchasing power of the penny greatly favours Joshua Field.

Coal Mining Under Heaton, and much of north Bradford, lie the two deepest commercially exploitable coal seams in the whole Lower Coal Measures series: the Hard and the Soft Beds. In the eighteenth century these seams were accessed by shafts dug from the surface which would have been 20-60m deep. The unit used to measure shaft depths was the yard (0.9m). ‘Mines and quarries’ are mentioned as early as 11

1635.31 A reference to a colliery in the Heaton area mentions 'Harrie Rhods coalpitts' and is dated 1665.32 Harry Rhodes’s pits were in Frizinghall. During one part of the eighteenth century Abraham Rhodes of Heaton Royds, who might have been a relative of his, ‘farmed’ the Field’s coal seemingly paying £6 10s yearly for every pickman employed.33 34 Later Joshua Field clearly managed the whole process himself through agents, and in the later eighteenth century the necessary shaft digging is associated with the name of Abraham Normington.

An early nineteenth century map showing the turnpike (Manningham Lane – Keighley Road). Note Harry Royds and Coalpit Close. The building is the old Turf Inn.

I understood that there would always be a local demand for fuel but I was surprised to learn that after the opening of the Leeds-Liverpool Canal in the eighteenth century coal was taken by water to supply Kildwick and Gargrave.35 We even know the name of two of the boats involved: Eclipse & Skipton.36 I assume that the mines of Heaton were at that time the closest to the canal and that this fact minimised transport costs. I am certain of the names of two of the Field eighteenth century collieries: Shay Pit and Millstone Hill Pit.37 Inspection of the first Ordnance Survey map (surveyed in the late 1840s), and local field names, suggests that Shay Pit was where the golf driving-range is now situated. 12

In his field map King named Millstone Hill as the field immediately west of Shay. There is evidence for this location, which makes perfect geological sense, although there is no very obvious hill at this position.38 Other pits are named in the Birr Archives but they have unhelpful designations like ‘the New Pit’ or ‘Mr Field’s Old Pit’: locating such collieries is difficult, as is providing names for collieries whose anonymous remains are still apparent. Where was this shaft for example?

1786 Agree with Abraham Normington to sink me a coal pit in Ambrose Padget’s allotment.. 8 shillings per yard if it requires boring.39

In the late eighteenth century customers for coal included Mr Field himself but also a local lime kiln, brick works, blacksmith, and the Bingley and Shipley coal staithes where supplies were presumably accommodated prior to transport along the canal.

District boundaries were a source of contention in former times, if they were not unambiguously defined. Since the coal seams were invisible from the surface there was considerable potential for disagreement over the extent of underground workings. There were, apparently, confrontations between John Field and Richard and William Hodgson in 1765.40 Hodgson had the mineral rights to the manor of Chellow and the question arose whether over Field’s pit, probably in the area of Noon Nick, was exploiting coal to which he had no right. I am not sure what the final decision was. Again in 1767 John Field and Dr Cyril Jackson clashed over subterranean boundaries when Jackson was the Lord of the Manor of Shipley.41 Field was not the exclusive owner of Heaton coal. There is a lease from 1748 in which, for a consideration of £2-2s, Robert Stansfield gave Jeremiah Marshall of Rawdon permission to create a sough on Stansfield land to drain water from Marshall's coal mine. The sough was to be dug 'from the bottom edge of the hill near the brook in a parcel of woody ground in Heaton' then in the possession of Peter Atkinson and Jasper Pickard.42 I assume this land was in Heaton Woods. Many years later, in 1806, the 'heirs and assignees' of both these men were involved in a lawsuit to determine whether this lease effectively lasted forever. The involvement of the Marshalls is in this question complicated. Here is a note by John Field concerning one James Garth:

[18 C Notebook – John Field.] Garth, Mr James, of Heaton, his will entered into the court or office at York on 26 August 1767…. [His nephew is involved as is John Marshall of Yeadon] …..there is nothing said as to the disposal of any share or shares in any mines of stone or coal nor any such thing in the second will....43

It would take a good deal of additional research before I could claim to understand what is going on here. I am sometimes asked if the Fields were definitely involved in coal mining in Heaton Woods, where the evidence remaining for this activity is certainly the most apparent. There is this:

13

9 July 1806 Mr Priestley junr took the levels from the last boring in J Bierley Field to two small oaks near the footway and rivulet in Rhodes Cliff and found it to be 52 yards and one foot.44

Possibly Mr Priestly is trying to calculate how high above a coal seam a recent exploratory boring is situated: whatever the exact meaning surely the expression ‘footway and rivulet in Rhodes Cliff’ identifies Heaton Woods. Whoever mined coal the activity left a very damaged landscape. The Fields did attempt some restoration, in 1806 for example:

Reclamation: 27 June 1806 I agreed to give [name space left blank] of Heaton Rhodes £1.11.6 for filling up the pit in field at same place.45

Someone in 1774 (probably James Mitchell and Wm. Pickard) was paid for removing a 'hill at Syke’ which might well be mining debris too.46 This material seems to have been used for road repairs.

Brickmaking Late nineteenth century frogged, machine-pressed, bricks were made from ground-up shale (deposits of which were often associated with coal-mining). These are common in Bradford and a visit to any allotment garden will normally reveal hundreds, many of which will be stamped with the makers’ names or initials. The various works of George Heaton, the Beanland family, and JR Fyfe were all adjacent to the Shipley end of Heaton Woods. What was the situation a century earlier? Unmarked, plain, hand-made bricks would be produced using deposits of superficial boulder-clay as the raw material. This glacial drift material could be up to 30 feet deep in the Heaton area.47 Tony Woods told me that Dr Cyril Jackson, then Lord of the Manor of Shipley, had an eighteenth century brick works on Shipley common which was recorded as making 40,000 bricks, although I don’t have a reference for this, but certainly in the same century hand-made, unstamped, plain bricks were being produced in and around Heaton, probably at four different locations. The West House Farm, near the Bay of Biscay has both a Delph Field and a Brick Field among its field names.

In Frizinghall there is also map evidence for a field name: Brick Kiln Close, not far from the place at which Frizinghall Road now crosses the railway. Almost opposite the brick works location is a building which was known at various times as the Poplars or Carr Syke Farm. This has a partial external skin of hand-made bricks.

The earliest bricks made in the village itself were produced virtually at its centre. There is a vacant site alongside Heaton Baptist Cemetery off the Paradise Road footpath to Heaton Hill. In 2019-20 the new owner had been undertaking ground works which have dug through a thick layer of red burnt shale fragments which were easily visible. Similar material is scattered elsewhere over the site. I assume this red material is the mineral component remaining when poor quality coal or shale is burned in a kiln as fuel. Heaton Hill was previously called Quarry Hill, 14

Delph Hill or Cold Hill. This site near it was the location of a Sunday School in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, but it was empty at the time of the survey for the first OS map of the area (c.1847). I cannot guarantee that the burnt rock wasn’t imported for ground levelling purposes but there is a more interesting possibility.

If it is permissible to identify old industrial activity from field names there should have been brick making and forge work in this part of Frizinghall.

Burnt shale in the currently empty site adjacent to Heaton Hill and Heaton Baptist Cemetery. I believe that this indicates old brick-making.

In the documents Tony brought back from the Birr Archive there is this item: 15

‘On 12th July 1765 bricks (the 3rd oven full) and ...upon the hill 9750 burnt and 12 we had led into Back Lane and 550 were sold’.48

Well, we know where Back Lane is (as I have said it was originally much longer) and the phrase ‘on the hill’ could easily apply to the Paradise site. Landowners might be inclined to clamp-fire bricks in a single 'campaign' in advance of the construction of single brick-buildings. Alternatively, if they had easy access to suitable brick-making clay, they might lease it to itinerant brickmakers who dug it, and made, dried, and clamp-fired the hand-made bricks in the cheapest way possible. The Fields would have had capital and access to a means of exporting bricks. Probably they had the means to buy-in good advice to build a kiln for making, and firing, a superior product.

A detail of the 1780 Enclosure Map for Heaton. It shows that Bingley Grammar School owned land roughly where Leylands Avenue is today.

The most detailed description of brick-making in the Birr Archive concerns an enterprise that Tony Woods and I believed were at the bottom of Highgate, near the Woods entrance. A kiln is described and it is evidently reconstructed every couple of years.49 On 29 June 1772 large purchases of bricks are recorded: men prepare ground and an ‘oven’ is built. In February 1774 a new oven is built with two men taking down the old oven. In November 1776 once more a new oven

16 replaces the old, and then this happens for a final time in August 1778. All these developments seem to have required large purchases of bricks, possibly better- quality bricks suitable for kiln construction. From the numbers provided several hundred thousand bricks must have been fired in all, but what is the evidence that the kiln was at the bottom of Highgate?

Long after the brick-making had finished, in 1864, Timothy Stocks the Rosse agent made a declaration, and provided associated maps of Heaton and Shipley. In his second schedule, for Heaton, is an entry concerning a field: '448 Brick Kiln Field'. Initially I wondered if this was Brick Kiln Close in Frizinghall but this seems most unlikely since the relevant field number in Frizinghall is 881a. Fields numbered 446 and 447 are at the bottom of modern Highgate and 448 Brick Kiln Field is also marked as purchased (like 447) from the trustees of Bingley Grammar School who clearly have land in this position as evidenced by the enclosure map. Unfortunately, I cannot find field number 448 on any available map. There are mistakes on the map I do have, for example the field opposite Heaton Royds was originally number 442 but is hand corrected to 422. Could 448 have been incorporated into 458 or simply omitted I wonder?50

We know something of the uses to which the bricks were put. A document seems to record the quantity surveying for a house and garden wall (with a sough under it). The wall is between S Farrer and J Field and technical language is used for the house parts. There are measurements for two cottages in Back Lane, Heaton on 12 July 1779. Even at this early stage a brick wall is included.51 Bricks were almost always cheaper that quarried stone. They were used for an inner leaf of a house wall, and also for the internal chimneys.

Limestone Lime manufacture was a significant industry in the eighteenth century. Slaked lime was a vital constituent of mortar, and both quick and slaked lime could be spread on Heaton’s fields to ‘sweeten’ the acid soils and thereby improve productivity. King described lime coming from Skipton on the newly constructed canal and being burned in the township at Lime Kiln Close adjacent to Royds Cliff Woods.52 Lime Kiln Close can be seen within modern Heaton Woods in the field map used as the first illustration in this essay. Haw Bank Quarry at Skipton, the source of much of the limestone, was part of an even more dramatic industrialisation than occurred in Heaton itself.53

We can be certain however that Heaton coal was used to burn lime even before the canal reached Shipley, since supplies of this valuable commodity were earlier obtained from Bingley. In Bingley an industry based on glacial erratic boulder extraction had existed since the seventeenth century, if not earlier. 54 There may well have been other sources for limestone boulders. There are many references in the 1750s where Otley is evidently also a source for this commodity derived in the same way.55 It was wholly the Birr Archive which confirmed that lime obtained from Bingley and Otley was used locally in the pre-canal period: 17

October 15th1756 Began loading lime from Bingley 2pm yesterday. Ditto. 5 horse loads being all they had since 7 loads in the cart. December 11th 1756 paid for above.56

Once the canal between Shipley and Skipton was opened in 1774 there was a canal-based limestone source by means of the Skipton quarries.

1775 Paid Mr Hardcastle, Treasurer for the Skipton Lime Bank(?)….. partly for the expense of working the vein'.57

Joshua Field had a financial interest in the canal lime trade as well as being a customer, for example:

November 1796 Bradford Navigation Co. shares 25 Shares in the Lime Kilns: share dealings.58

Moving limestone from the canal to the village centre was evidently a considerable undertaking. On 18 June, 1794 a boat load of lime for Heaton arrived. It appears that four carts with three horses each went to the staithe three times each, and had two ‘drinkings’ each. Further visits were still needed on the 19 June.59 Again, slightly after our period, we read:

August 1818 Thos. Brooks team of 3 horses carted lime for me 2 days and the driver had 2 drinkings each day. He went to Shipley three times each day. Clark of Lillams [Leylands] man carted 2 loads of lime and the last of the lime was carted with my teams.60

‘Drinkings’ are not explained. I suppose the horse would have needed breaks for water and horse troughs could be found at Heaton Syke, Leylands Lane, Highgate and Heaton Royds. ‘Drinkings’ would perhaps be the carters’ equivalent of tea- breaks, but spent in local inns. I am sure Mr Field paid for at least some of these rejoicings and the word appears in his journals quite frequently.

Stone and quarrying Many quarries in this area are known as delphs. I am not sure if there was originally any distinction between them but it seems useful to retain both words. I think of ‘quarry’ as describing a large area of stone exploitation such as those at Spinkwell or Bolton Woods. Many of Heaton’s were far smaller and appear to have been only two or three house-plots in size: these are delphs.

It will be helpful to look at the geology of this area first. The Hard Bed coal seam runs just above the level of the Red Beck in Heaton Woods with the Soft Bed 20m below. There is no commercially exploited stone between the two seams, but immediately above the Hard Bed are 10-30m of sandstone and flaggy siltstones, called Stanningley rock, which finishes just under the 36 Yard Coal seam. This 18 wasn’t a famous building stone but delphs in Northcliffe seem to have accessed it. After the 36 Yard Coal there are another 30m of sandstone represented by the 48 Yard Rock and 80 Yard Rock (Gaisby Rock), which elsewhere form the surface of Stoney Ridge plantation and Baildon Moor. The Gaisby Rock was worked at the large Bolton Woods and Spinkwell quarries. Immediately above it are some 35- 70m of Elland Flags sandstone which were quarried on Heaton Hill, Idle, Eccleshill, and many other sites in north Bradford. All the bedrock in Heaton Woods, the quarry behind Shipley Fireclay Works, and the Taffy Mires quarry face where George Heaton had his coal mine, should be Stanningley Rock. The Paradise Quarry at the Highgate end of Heaton Woods should have been quarrying Gaisby Rock. Much of Weatheroyds Quarry, where Salem RUFC now has its pitches might have been exploiting Gaisby Rock or the Elland Flags or both: geology reports say Elland Flags.

The Birr Archive provides definitive lists of mid-nineteenth century Rosse-owned quarries. There were no less than 36 on the estate at that time. King describes this industry in detail.61 Rosse quarries were situated in Gaisby, , Shipley, Hirst Wood, and Heaton. As you would expect from the geology, the stone seams exploited were Elland Flags, Gaisby rock and Staningley rock but Elland Flags were the dominant stone in the village centre.62 The delph products, many of which are still around us, were: flags, roof stone, setts, wall-stones, and dimension stone (ashlar). A great deal of stone must have been needed, post- enclosures, for stone ‘fences’ or drystone walls. A document provides the earliest written evidence that I know of for stone quarrying in the Heaton area, in the seventeenth century.

John & Richard Gawkrodger 1689. Reign of William & Mary. John Gaukrodger (Keighley) is executor of Timothy Gawkrodger. Relates to William Smith once of Heaton. Delph Close [and other closes of land whose names are less certain] lying in Heaton [Frizinghall is also mentioned. Delph Close was off Toller Lane just before the Bingley Road, Haworth Road junction].63

The field name ‘Millstone Hill’, where a coal mine was known to be situated, is a puzzle since local sandstone would not be suitable for millstones. Could such an industry have been based on gritstone glacial erratic boulders? Early records frequently mention earth-fast stones used as boundary markers but boulders within newly enclosed fields would normally be removed to enable ploughing to take place. Gritstone boulders are still to be found on the surface in nearby Northcliffe Wood and would have been expected in Heaton. Against this theory King records that in 1694 Edward Bolling dug for coal and quarried millstones in Heaton.64 Possibly digging large boulders out of glacial moraine deposits was regarded as quarrying. The Birr Archive provides some information about the price of stone in the eighteenth century:

Indenture 1775: Joshua Field & George Anderson (Guiseley) and Joseph Anderson (Yeadon) [who were both masons]. Delph Close upon Toller Lane (in occupation 19 of Henry Atkinson) to get and sell unlimited quantities of stone for 2/6 per yard of stone. [Other prices included].65

Records survive of a surveyor's notebook belonging to Joseph Atkinson.66

1778 July 20th. Stone getting in Coldhills Delph [Heaton Hill?] for Wm Pickard July 20th Weatheroyd Delph for J Anderson Apr 5th 1779 Masonry for Mr Field done by Jos? Sawden.

Stanley King formed the view that stone was first quarried for local building purposes in the early seventeenth century, but that only after 1770 was commercial stone production undertaken in Heaton.67 I am reasonably certain that at this early period there were five or six stone quarries operating: Delph Close, Towler (Toller) Lane, Cold Hill Delph (Heaton Hill), Weatheroyd Delph (now Salem Rugby Club) and Lillams or Leylands Lane. There was also a Tewitt Well Quarry which King places on Bingley Road.68 The industry expanded greatly in the nineteenth century. Once the delphs were exhausted there were clearly attempts made to returning previously quarried land to agricultural use. Quarry waste (hills) were removed. Consequently, no Heaton quarries are now visible and most are totally forgotten. For example, it is hard to credit that the land at the former Frankland Fold, the lock-up shops adjacent to the old Kings Arms, was a quarry until the early twentieth century.69

Conclusion By the end of the eighteenth century, Heaton had an estimated population of 951.70 The township and its industries were about to change substantially. John Wilmer Field purchased the Lordship of Shipley in 1819, so there were no further boundary demarcation disputes. On Field’s death in 1839 the Lordships of Heaton and Shipley, and his property in those townships, passed to the Earls of Rosse by marriage. After the death of the 3rd Earl of Rosse in 1867 his widow, Mary Countess of Rosse, resumed a great personal interest in the place of her birth, but I imagine that agents took an enhanced role in managing the estate. There was a slow agricultural decline and far less estate income was obtained from woodland products. Local malting and corn-milling had long ceased. Coal mining continued but successful collieries were larger, and by the mid-century fireclay seams also began to be exploited. There was a gap in the brick-making industry but after 1846 this was filled by George Heaton near Taffy Mires, and other local manufacturers in nearby Shipley and Wrose. A purely canal-based lime industry was established and there was no further Heaton lime-burning. In 1838 Manningham Mills was built nearby and census reports suggest that it gave employment to many local people. Stone quarrying in many small delphs continued and house construction stimulated the demand for more building stone, paving slabs and kerbstones. The construction of Manningham Lane and Keighley Road had greatly improved access to Heaton. The opening of Frizinghall railway station made lower Heaton and Frizinghall desirable places to live. As a result of this substantial villa building took place and the Rosse estate sold much land 20 during the late nineteenth century. All that remained of the Rosse estates in Heaton and Shipley were sold in the early twentieth century (1911). At this time a substantial part of Heaton Woods was purchased by Bradford Council.

This essay scarcely scratches the surface of the information available in the Birr Archives although I hope will serve as a general introduction, and will interest the present residents of Heaton. The next step might be to re-examine individual industries in more detail, and to survey and date the township’s older buildings. I am sure that there is plenty left to discover for I am the first to admit that I still have a great deal to learn concerning the long and fascinating history of Heaton.

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Glossary Old English (OE): Old Norse (ON)

Acre – a plot of arable land often irrespective of size Busk - wood Carr – marsh (ON) Close – enclosure or field (OF clos) Croft – small enclosure: definitely a medieval term Delph or Delf – a small quarry: delvers worked in them Dole – a section of meadow in a great field Garth – enclosure (ON) Heaton – High farm (OE) Hollin – relating to the Holly tree Holt – wood or copse (ON) eg = ash wood Ing – meadow, pasture Leah – wood or glade eg Bingley Kiln – in the eighteenth century a lime kiln, malt kiln or brick kiln are possible Ley Land – fallow land Lillams – an early spelling of Leylands Mires – from mere a pool, or mers a boundary (OE) Paradise – used of highly productive land, or said ironically of poor soil? Pickman – a getter or miner who won coal from the seam: a hurrier moved it Royd – a clearing Shay and shaw – copse or small wood Staithe or staith – a riverbank landing stage, or coal storage area Stocking or Stock Ing – field for animals, or stoccen OE = logs, cleared of stumps Sough (suff) – a stone lined water drainage channel Syke – boggy ground (OE) Taffy – sticky Toft – land associated with a croft, or clump of trees (ON)

Acknowledgements I must thank the staff of Bradford Local Studies Library and the West Archives (Bradford) without whom little local history research could ever be undertaken. The Earls of Rosse have long guarded the material which enables the history of Heaton to be written: it is a pleasure to acknowledge their diligence in this respect. Phil Barker proofread the text. Gillian Wright is Secretary of the Heaton History Group. She has always promoted knowledge of the past to the interested public and her website will host the current work. Deb Ball and Jane Robinson curate the papers of the two local historians on whose work this essay is mainly based. I must be held entirely responsible if it transpires that I have imperfectly understood their views.

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References Material from the Birr Archive does not seem to have a series of unique index numbers. When referencing it I shall give a description of the book or date of origin if I can. After these I will provide the reference number used by Tony Woods to identify the photograph which contains that portion of the document. An example of such a reference might be: Birr Archive, Shay & Millstone Mining Records, P.1080 903-905. On this basis I could provide individual page photographs to interested readers.

1 William Cudworth: Histories of Manningham, Heaton, and Allerton, W. Cudworth, 1896.

2 John Stanley King, Heaton: the best place of all, Bradford Arts, Museums & Libraries, 2001.

3 Cudworth, p.185.

4 King, pps.185-189.

5 King, pps.36 & 37. Joseph Field of Shipley became sole Lord of the Manor of Heaton in 1635.

6 King, pps.47 & 68.

7 King, p.154.

8 King, p.35.

9 King, p.70. The Highgate well or trough is still obvious, but is not in its original position.

10 Birr Archive, P1060 937-958. The cattle belonged to a Mr Cunliffe of and Mr Margerison of .

11 Birr Archive, 1C- P1060 930-936 [extract] Extent of Field property.

12 King, p.55. Seemingly it took six horses to get the Field’s coach to Bradford.

13 King, p.28.

14 King, p.73. The terrace was built by farmer John Wood of Gethsemene Farm, Toller Lane. Joshua Field built the lower terrace a few years later.

15 Cudworth, p.174: King, p.55.

16 Cudworth, p.6.

17 Cudworth, p.173. Squire Field’s coach required two extra horses when travelling from Bradford to Heaton.

18 Birr Archive, P1060 937-958.

19 King, p.20.

20 King, pps.34-35.

21 King, pps.68-70. There are plenty of references to field crops in the Birr Archives: for example, peas are mentioned in P.1080 929-930 (the year 1765). 23

22 Birr Archive, P1070 533-534.

23 King, p.109: 6 Highgate is the first of three Victorian cottages in a short terrace immediately downhill of Dyson Street.

24 King, pps.57-58.

25 Cudworth, pps.183-185: King, p.64.

26 Birr Archive, P.1060 883-886. Bradford lawyer and luminary, Samuel Hailstone, has his signature appended to this document.

27 Birr Archive, P.1080 898-899: records eighteenth century charcoal sales. The references to wood sales are nineteenth century, although some are as early as 1822.

28 King, p.67.

29 Birr Archive, P1060 820-826. An 11 years lease: Joshua Field to Ambrose Padget of Heaton Royds (weaver).

30 Birr Archive, P.1080 135: also P.1080 108-109.

31 King, p.36.

32 King, p.42.

33 King, p.59.

34 Wilfred Robertshaw, The Manor of Chellow, Bradford Antiquary Vol. IX (New Series Vol. VII) 1952, p.25.

35 Birr Archives, P.1070 676: is one of several references. The name of William Sugden of Kildwick is mentioned in connection with this trade.

36 Birr Archives, Joshua Field's Dated Notebook, 1774-86 P.1070 663.

37 King, p.63: also scores of references in Birr Archives documents.

38 King, p.63: A later Survey & Valuation of Heaton (Lister & Ingle) 1839-40, Birr Archives, P.1080 825 refers to Shay Farm which includes a group of fields called: Shay, Millstone Hill, Upper & Lower Spring. There is no mention of any mining continuing at these locations.

39 King, p.63: Birr Archives, P.1080 045.

40 Wilfred Robertshaw, The Manor of Chellow, Bradford Antiquary Vol. IX (New Series Vol. VII) 1952, p.25.

41 Cudworth p.202: King, p.59: Birr Archive, 1767, P.1080 929-930.

42 Archives 10D76/3/190 Jowett family of Clockhouse: Boxes 1 & 2.

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43 Birr Archives, P.1080 903-905.

44 Birr Archive, P.1080 135.

45 Birr Archive, P.1080 135-136.

46 Birr Archive, Joshua Field's Dated Notebook, 1774, P.1070 648.

47 JV Stephens & GH Mitchell, Geology of the country between Bradford and Skipton, HMSO, 1953, p.86.

48 Birr Archive, 18 C Notebook – John Field P.1080 932-935.

49 Birr Archive, 1776, P.1070 631.

50 Birr Archive, P1070 393-457.

51 Birr Archive, P1070 268, 1779. Construction of two cottages in Back Lane. I think these are probably now demolished.

52 King, p.66.

53 Kenneth C Jackson, The Earls of Thanet and the Industrialistion of the Valley of Eller Beck at Skipton, North Yorkshire. Industrial Archaeology, 41, 2, 2019, 132-144.

54 Bingley Wills, Bradford Historical & Antiquarian Society, local record series vol 1, 1929.

55 Stephens & Mitchell, 1953, p.131 suggest that working of glacial moraine for limestone boulders also occurred at Hirst Wood, Shipley.

56 Birr Archive, P.1080 910-912.

57 Birr Archives, Joshua Field's Dated Notebook, P1070 650. ‘Vein’ is really more appropriate to lead mining.

58 Birr Archives, P.1070 974-75: is one example, dated 1790-1811 it contains a very neatly written account of dividends issued, and works performed, by the Bradford Navigation Company.

59 Birr Archives, Heaton demesne and farm a/c book 1792-1814 P.1080 071-072.

60 Birr Archives, Heaton demesne and farm a/c book 1792-1814, P.1080 215.

61 King, p.33, pps.110-111.

62 Stephens & Mitchell, 1953, p.86.

63 Birr Archives, P1060 839-842.

64 King, p.58.

65 Birr Archives, P1060 811-819.

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66 Birr Archives. P1070 265-272 (1) Stone surveyor’s notebook.

67 King, p.33.

68 King, p.188.

69 King, p.121 & 151. King explains that Heaton’s refuse was dumped disused quarries and sealed by the products of ashpits. He doesn’t provide a reference for this practice.

70 King, p.72.

Heaton, v.1.0 July 2020

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