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Home , History of Manchester, Mamucium

ChapterChapter One: One:

LoomLoom of of Fate:Fate: The of The HisHistorytory of Manchester

The Pit

Manchester lies in the grasp of the . The flat plain of the city is walled 15 miles to the east by the hills of millstone grit. The city is bisected by the , which joins the and the Manchester Ship . “If you see The lack of dissolved lime in the rocks of the hills has ensured that the water was soft, making it good for the someone in bleaching of linen during Manchester Industrial heyday. “ About Manchester the plains of and ManchesterIf you see with lie on a bed rock of while the city of someone in Manchester stands upon sandstone, making early building of the city a pinkish red. a tan. Don't Manchestera tan. Don't with The skies of Manchester are seldom free of dreary a tan. Don't clouds. The Skies above are often in a state of flux, of a tan.believe Don't it. growing towers and spires of cloud. believe it. It is for those reasons above that the dawn and They've just dusk of Manchester allow for spectacular displays of light. They've just However, compared to other cities in the United gone rusty. ” Kingdom, Manchester has an undeserving reputation for gone rusty.” rain. Considering it has less annual rainfall than Glasgow Elderly resident the city will always be a city where it does rain all the time. explainingElderly resident the To the east rise the hills of the Pennines, the backbone of England. explainingweather to the The Pennines are made up of lime stone and foreign visitors. gritstone bedrock, and contain a warren of cave systems and watercourses. weather to The upland moors are sparsely populated, a haven for sheep farming, quarries and tourism based upon a foreign visitors. variety of outdoor pursuits and nature reserves.

Mamucium The earliest known mention of the location of Manchester comes from the Roman Julius Agricola, who in 79 AD brought a garrison of men to construct a fort to over

Loom of Fate The Pit 1 look the region and the river crossing. It was held by the king of , and was at the location of Mamucium, or the then in 870 AD the town was razed by the “ shaped hill”. vicious attacks of the , their The fort lay within the territory of longboats unopposed upon the River the area previously held by the Celtic tribe Mersey. known as the Brigante. This tribe of By the year 923 AD the town was was defeated at the Battle of Scotch held by the West Saxons kings of , Corner, with the tribe fleeing north to the known in these times as the town of Lake District. Mamecaestre or Manceastre. Agricola soon set about A notable relic of this time that establishing himself in the region, with a still survives today in the Cathedral wooden fortress being constructed, and (which at the time would have been the some 3 centuries later a stone fortress was church of St Mary) is the effigy of the local erected in the area that is now known as patron saint, the Archangel Michael. . This artefact was uncovered in 1871 and now stands within the walls of

the Cathedral, known more commonly as The Gate of the Castle in the “Angel Stone”. the Field

The gate way to the north has The Angel Stone been a centre for magical energies ever since the reconstruction of it Rumours amongst the more during the 1970 excavations. occult inclined have noted that such The presence of this rebuilt an icon of importance to the town body has had a strange effect in the would not have been buried except Shadow and has had a noticeable for good reason. effect on the area. This has led many a scholar Rumours abound of people amongst those in the know to ponder seeing the ghosts of Roman soldiers, the true nature of the effigy. Such a while others claim to have seen patron saint would not be treated in strange beasts crossing through the such a manner. But if it wasn’t an gate. angel then the possibility is that it is What is known is that the of another being. gate stands on a powerful ley line. Whether or not this means the gate is in some way tapping into ages past in unknown. Dragon’s Fire Of more interest is how the The conquest of Britain by gate itself ties into the relics about William the Conqueror brought much that bear the emblem of Mithras, the change to the region. William’s methods god of labyrinths. overshadowed the acts of the Norse in previous centuries. In particular he treated The Roman occupation persisted Cheshire with utter brutality as towns until the withdrawal of forces in Britain in were raised and crops were burnt. the year of 411 AD. In the Domesday survey of 1086 The end of the Roman occupation the lands about Manchester were simply soon left the region open to be plundered referred to as ‘wasta’, wasteland. by the Norsemen and Saxons. The cities around Manchester felt In 429 AD the area was plundered the brunt of the as by the fierce Northmen. was sacked and was The region was under a state of demolished. The devastation left the constant flux as various groups claimed people of the region deprived and starved possession of the region over the course of for years to come. the following centuries. At first the town

2 Dragon ’s fire Manchester of these times was noted for simply having a small parish church. Many lands were handed over to French lords, and Manchester was given to a Rodger de Poitou. Subsequently the region exchanged hands a number of times until it was held by Albert Grelley and his family for the next two hundred years. It was the Grelley family who were to leave an impression upon the town by allowing it to become a free with a , the future Cathedral of St Mary. Manchester acted as the administrative centre for the collection of manors given to the Grelly family; however it was by accident that the town itself was separated from as two separate were issued. Manchester remained a for some time, though with the growth of such a town it was given the right to hold and annual fair and was given a in 1301. Manchester, like many settlements of the time suffered from outbreaks of the Plague, though the town grew. Flemish weavers settled in the region and the started of the local wool trade began, and a sign of this prosperity was the construction of the Other signs of the continual growth of the town was the construction of a grammar school in 1515 by Hugh Oldham, the bishop of Exeter. It was also around this time that the church has been completed. The growth and trade of the town attracted many settlers from Europe who came to share in the prosperity or to flee religious persecution, and a court was trusted with ensuring that products of the town maintained a consistent quality, with aulnagers stamping woollen cloth when it was ready to be sold. A variety of products came out of the mills of Manchester, such as , flax and raw , with these products being exported as far as markets in . It was after the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VII and the Reformation that the collegiate church was in the care of wardens and one of

Dragon ’s fire 3 Particular note, the mystic of Elizabeth I, The 18 th century brought much . change to the town and was to shape the John Dee held the position until city to come, as the population of was to 1603, and during his ward over the town sky rocket. he is said to have translated into English a Manchester remained a famous copy of the Necronomicon . centre for the trade and manufacture of line and wool, and the ever need to trade, import and export goods, was the drive to John Dee widen the rivers to Manchester, in effect The following is not meant to creating and inland port connect to many be extensive by any means; however of its resource centres about the region. we should note some important Social improvements were also historical facts about John Dee. made as the population grew. The Royal It was after his first degree Infirmary was built, as was the first that he travelled to Holland and workhouse in 1745. returned with his first astronomer’s In 1761 the act staff and brass gloves. was past, allowing for the construction of At times he was often a water way from in the North expelled from England for his practices or imprisoned for them. West which would allow for the transport Dee acted as Elizabeth I of coal to the ever hungry furnaces of the astrologer, and he has many town. scientific achievements to his name. The Bridgewater canal was to be He dabbled with one of many that would criss-cross the crystallomancy, divination, and with region transport raw material to the great Edward Kelly used the fabricated cotton town, with the last being of Enochian to invoke constructed in 1894, the Manchester Ship spirits and angels. Canal, allowing for ocean going vessels to Apparently the Necronomicon pass 36 miles inland to Manchester. isn’t the only legacy left by the Workers poured into the town wizard, as rumours persist of tunnels from all around, and the population had centred on the church, the design of almost risen to 50,000. Improvements to the Corn Exchange being that of a the sanitation were a must, and the streets Roman temple to Ceres, and the were lined with gas lamps, and at night potential remains of his house under watchmen patrolled the town. the Corn Exchange. Manchester was a centre for such innovations, with steam trains also bringing coal in from the mines, and in 1789 steam engines were used for powering looms to enable the town to Dark Water, Black Steam produce mass quantities of fabrics. Following outbreaks of plague Manchester was truly at the heart of the and the recovery of the city from the loss industrial age. of life the town drew in new workers from Manchester acted as a hub for the poor in the countryside around. The many other industries, ranging from fabric industry continued and soon the brewing, food processing and the bottling city was producing finer materials such as of mineral water. However silk. discontentment was ever present amongst In 1642 came the Civil war and the work force. No matter how many acts Manchester sided with the Parliament, were passed the factories were dangerous, with the town besieged by the the streets were unsanitary, and their forces. The community fought back and homes were death traps. erected earthworks and ramparts to repel Many homes, if they can indeed the Cavaliers. However, with the town be called that, worked on shifts, with the firmly held by the Parliament the trade to workers sharing beds, and damp seeping and from the city suffered greatly.

4 Dark water Black Steam in from the outside. Some dwellings are stood at a population of 142,000. Water even described as mushrooming. was soon piped in to those who could The dead rotted next to the living, afford it. and the living drank from a river into Toward the end of the century which all manner of waste was dumped. many changes had come to pass, the Cholera was rampant and in many cases Manchester Mechanics’ Institute (the the only method to stop the spread of future Institute disease was to simply brick over the cellar for and Technology; UMIST) was chambers. founded in 1824. the railway to However with the epidemic past was opened in 1830, and the Owens and the cellars reopened, it was found that College was opened in 1851 (this went on in fact some of the dwellings were already to be the Victoria University of back in use. Every day the cellars would Manchester, and then in 2004 merged with be drained of the river water that had UMIST to form the University of flowed in during the evening, and the Manchester), plus other institutions for the cycle continued. arts and were built over the following decades. In 1838 Manchester was made a Blood Red Coats borough for the first time, and then in 1847 The social unrest amongst the the Church of St Mary was conferred the work forces of Manchester came to a head title of Cathedral. Finally in 1853 in 1819 as a mob descended upon St Manchester was declared a city, with a Peter’s Field. town hall built in 1877. The mass of people was around 60,000, and were brought together by the A Century of Bombs need to see a parliamentary reform, , the improvement of work The city of Manchester at the start conditions, and the end of the price of the century was one of the major inflating Corn Laws. powerhouses of the country; its factories The situation was a disaster as the producing vast amounts of products, and town authorities ordered the crowd the city acting as a centre for revolutionary dispersed, and mounted troops charged new ideas in both industry, the sciences head long into the mob. Their target was and social order. the ring leader of the mob, . The city continued to grow, Officially only eleven people died pushing in all directions but west, where from the attacks of the volunteers, while a the stood. , further 400 or more were injured. Bradford and other small towns and regions were drawn into the city limits. The event shocked the country, th and was dubbed the , Manchester at the end of the 19 after the Battle of Waterloo, by one of century was a hub of political activity, those in the crowd who had been present what with the city being the centre of the at the conflict. Women Suffrage and the Labour party, both acting improve the rights of their Reforms followed, with the respective groups. founding of the Anti-Corn Law League, and the Free Trade movement, otherwise In addition Manchester’s known as “The Manchester School” or industries grew and branched out, “Manchesterism”. enticing companies such as Ford to the city. However the glory days of It is events like this and those to Manchester’s economic might were soon come that show how Manchester is truly a to end. location where ideas and innovations move at a frightening pace. The outbreak of war cut off trade to India and the east, with Manchester In between 1801 to 1831 feeling the pinch as the economy in the Manchester gained an influx of north failed, and soon previous markets immigrants from , and the town began to turn from their British suppliers.

Blood Red Coats A century of Bombs 5 The Second World War however during this time gained a new face, was to have an even greater impact on the . city. Before the turn of the millennium Many of the factories were the city was to face one more hardship as diverted to the war effort, producing the city was struck by an IRA bomb. On munitions and machines of war. Being the 15 th of June one of the largest IRA such a centre for supplies for the armed bomb was denoted in the city centre, forces the city was one of the many cities damaging the Arndale centre and the targeted during . Much of the city Marks and Spencer building. Fortunately centre was levelled, only to rise again as no one was hurt as a warning was given concrete towers, which now only 50 years an hour earlier, though over 200 were hurt on are being torn down again to make by falling glass shattered by the explosion. way for steel and glass. As a result the city has taken the chance to After the strained of the war the redevelop the city centre and the area city saw a decline in its economy, with around, allowing for Manchester to take many companies closing and the textile on a more modern climate. industry being outdated by rivals in the US and the east. However despite all these The IRA Bomb problems Manchester maintain its position as a city of innovation. This section stands as a disclaimer to this book on this event. A shining example of the scientific The reason for this is that this book achievements of the city, which continues does not go out to present any form to this day, was the work by of actual truth on the matter, but and the creation of the Small-Scale merely take a subject that is very Experimental Machine, otherwise known real today and look back on the as Baby; a machine that was the first to use event through a certain lens for the a stored program. Following in its use of stories set within the setting footsteps was the and present in this book. led to the start of the computer age. This is in no way meant to be As motor cars became more malicious or disrespectful to either readily available the inner city soon saw those who committed the act or the its population moving to the outer victims, and for those wishing to , with only the poor and the seek information on this event I immigrants staying. The city witnessed would suggest consulting actual much re-development during the 60’s as evidence and documentation rather over crowded houses made way for high than this fan made book. rise blocks of flats, and the winding alleys of the city centre were demolished, only to be rebuilt upon by the shopping centre. The City of Man With time the inner city was devoted purely to trade, with the city Modern Manchester is a melting emerging as a more cosmopolitan centre, pot of architecture, people and cultures. with media studios allowing for The city is home to many religions, Manchester to allow its cultural colours and creeds. The area of Rusholme innovation to be spread across the country boasts its “Curry Mile” and a large and globe. proportion of the Asian community, while the city centre is home to the large Chinese The 80’s saw the city suffer at the hands of the restructuring enforced be and Far Eastern community. , however such strife always leads Manchester boasts a population of to revolutions, and the city saw new grow around 2.6 million within the central again toward the end of the 80’s as its music boundaries, and a further 7 million in the industry boomed, the youth rebelling through surrounding areas. he sounds and clubs of Manchester. The city Manchester is still a haven for the media, what with the city and hosting the

6 The city of Man studios to soaps and the clubs that Two main train stations serve the celebrities of these shows frequent. city centre, those being and Almost every street has a local Victoria, with the Metro Link trams pub/club/bar/restaurant, making the city system cutting through the city centre a constantly breathing entity at all time of between the two, and then out toward the day, especially with the 24 hour Bury, Eccles, and Altrincham in the south, licenses that can be applied for. stopping at what used to be old train The city also boasts three stations. In effect the tram route is one big universities and one of the largest student T shape, with the top running from Bury populations in Europe, 50,000 in total, and to Altrincham. tied to that fact the city claims one of the Manchester doesn’t have an busiest routes in Europe as well. underground network as rumours Much of the city to the south is circulate with regard to underground made up of the university district that tunnel beneath Manchester, possibly takes up a proportion of on referring to nuclear bomb Medlock, the terraced houses of Moss shelter, or underground train tunnels from Side, the Victorian middle class residential Manchester to Liverpool. areas of Rusholme, and On an average day the Metro Link Disbury. In addition a vast amount of the sees around 52,000 passengers a day, student population live in the rented apparently accounting for 2 million car accommodation in this direction, with journeys a year. being a community devoted to An extensive network of bus student life. routes serve the city almost at all times, Also to the south lie the airport with the main station being located in the and many major hospitals, with the world heart of the city at . famous cancer research centre of Christies However the Metro Link and the are being situated there. certainly not for the faint of heart at night, To the east are the townships of as they attract gangs of youths and , Bradford, and Clayton. boisterous students coming home from All these areas saw development during clubs. the , though in the The tram lines pass through a early 20 th century the regions suffered a variety of suburban areas, each with its decline in their populations as the various own character and social climate, such as mills and factories closed down in the the well off town of Altrincham, or the regions. Now today only certain light council estates of . Many of the industries remain and regeneration stations are run down, and only at certain projects are in action to revitalise the areas times does any form of security patrol the and draw people back into the districts. trams and the stations. It is for this reason To the north lie , Newton that the stations seem to act as a gathering Heath, Cheetham and , townships point for gangs and other criminals and which bore the brunt of the growth of the beggars. suburbs, with being the Between the stations the tracks origin of Manchester United football club. run through fields, towns, and over iron Economically speaking the city is bridges and under motorways. Of course still a major industrial city, though in with the tram running above ground at addition more modern businesses in street level through the city centre there is finance and scientific research are the ever present danger of people being pursued. run over, or children. At times along the 41, 42, and 142 routes along Oxford road, catching a bus Madchester can be a struggle. At times in the morning The city centre of Manchester lies and evening they are packed with just 20 meters over the River Irwell from commuters and students, and often 3 or 4 the centre of the city of Salford. will turn up at once, all managed by

Madchester 7 different companies with a varying degree The Trafford Centre, completed in of care and disrepair. 1998 is renowned as a “temple to The centre of Manchester is made commerce”, costing £600 million pounds up of a number of squares and shopping to build. districts. Most notable are the Arndale The centre houses many stores centre in the centre of the city, the and flagship shops, but also it contains a Triangle, located in the Corn Exchange large Megaplex cinema and a number of near the rebuilt M&S building, and the leisure activity centres. Trafford centre with stands to the west of The centre is a massive entity, Manchester near the MUFC grounds. being able to accommodate 350 coaches, The Arndale centre now stands as 10,000 cars, occupying the space of 30 a shining achievement for the regeneration football pitches. It generates 400 tons of of Manchester. The previous shell of the waste packaging every week and uses building, the dirty yellow tiles; have now enough power for a small town. In given way to sheet steel, glass and modern addition the building is decorated with design, with much of the interior restyled £40,000 worth of gold leaf and 3 massive or overhauled, in particular the north domes. wing which houses many upper market With regard to the media stores that look out onto the popular Manchester is still an exciting city. In Millennium Quarter. previous years it has hosted the Common The Millennium is also home to a Wealth games, calling for the construction number of local favourites. The first are of the Sport City in the east of the city, and the twin pubs The Wellington and the ever is home to Granada Studios and soon the popular (and cheap) Sinclair’s Oyster Bar. UK media centre for the BBC. Manchester Both of these bars were originally located still also acts as host for numerous bands near the M&S building, being part of a set and arts in its host of venues, in theatre of buildings known as the Shambles, constructed in Victorian times, and also in surviving the original construction of the the renowned clubs that dominate the city Arndale centre. Both pubs are fine centre. examples of Tudor buildings, both luckily One of the most recent and surviving the bomb of ’96 by being impressive developments of the city has shielded by the M&S building. Both pubs been the construction of one of the tallest were then move brick by brick and then residential towers outside of Manchester, raised 15 feet to their new location facing the Beeton tower, a massive spire of glass out onto the Millennium Quarter. and steel that towers over the The Triangle, another smaller locks. However this tower is the first of shopping centre, though no less many as the city continues to develop. The prominent, is also located at the question is how far can this development Millennium Quarter, along with other go, and if the city will loose its drive and prestigious department stores such as instead begin to stagnate? If that were to Selfridges (which shares the same building occur then Manchester would truly loose as M&S) and Harvey Nicholas. However its character. However the future looks the Triangle has a long and strange history bright as the redevelopment of Salford of commerce for this building was the into the UK media centre is about to Corn Exchange, the building designed by commence. It seems Manchester never John Dee, and stands mere meters from really stands still. If anything it gets the cathedral and the URBIS building. The brighter and consumes itself. Triangle is interesting as it was used for the better part of the 90’s as a centre for curio shops, selling items ranging from second hand clothes, to occult books and tarot readers. Now after the bomb the centre is now home to many expensive stores.

8 Madchester