Burnley's Historic Halls and Houses, Past and Present
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Burnley's Historic Halls and Houses, past and present. Here you will be able to read about Towneley Hall and other great halls of Burnley and district. Burnley possessed a number of fine houses, but sadly some of them are now lost, gone forever. However, we still have our 'Jewel' Towneley Hall, and we must not forget Gawthorpe Hall, now in the hands of the National Trust. Below are some of Burnley's finer houses along with their history, some are gone, but still remembered and so are included. Much of this information comes from Leslie Chapples 'Romantic Old Houses and Their Tales' one of the towns great late historians. THE HOLLINS Delightfully placed in farmland on Higher Brunshaw at the Burnley/Cliviger border, the Hollins has generally been associated with Lady O'Hagan, who moved to the house from Towneley Hall after the hall had been handed over to Burnley Corporation in 1902. After all, she did live there for almost 20 years, and died there in 1921. But there is another quite eminent personage who lived his formative years at this lovely old house, but so little seems to have been known about him by the general public. He was Philip Gilbert Hamerton, who was born at Laneside, between Oldham and Rochdale, in the year 1834. He was a member of a family of solicitors, his father and both his uncles being associated with the legal profession. Philip's mother died when he was only two weeks old, and her death, after only a year of marriage, had a profound effect on his father, who became morose, ill-tempered and appeared to have little affection for his son. It goes without saying that his father's business began to suffer, and Philip Gilbert was brought to live at The Hollins with his father's two unmarried sisters and their mother. In his autobiography, Philip refers most affectionately to his life at The Hollins and never lost his love for the place. Writing from his 1850 diary, he said: "Hollins is situated in the middle of a small but very pretty estate, almost entirely surrounded by a rocky and picturesque trout stream, and so pleasantly carried by hill and dale, wood, meadow and pasture that it appears much larger than it really is. In my boyhood it seemed an immensity these boyhood recollections and an early passion for landscape beauty made Hollins seem a kind of earthly Paradise to me...Philip Gilbert Hamerton achieved fame in the literary world, was an accomplished linguist, was a connoisseur of art and architecture, and could also claim a friendship with Robert Browning. He lived in France for much of his life and his wife was a native of that country, but throughout his autobiography Burnley and The Hollins figured prominently. "Hollins ... when in its perfection must have been rather a good specimen, with its mullioned windows, its numerous gables, and its formal front garden, with a straight avenue beyond. Unfortunately, my grandfather found it necessary to rebuild the front, and in doing so altered the character by introducing modern sash windows in the upper storey, and though he retained mullioned windows on the ground floor, they were not strictly of the old type. My uncle also carried out other alterations, external and internal, which ended by depriving the house of much of its old character, and still more recent changes have gone farther in the same direction." In about 1854 one of his uncles came to live at The Hollins with his wife and children, and to take extra accommodation the stables were converted into living quarters. Philip deplored this move and said: "I remember the regret I felt on seeing the workmen pull down the handsome oak stalls and remove the beautiful pavement, which was in blocks of smooth stone carefully bevelled at the angles." Mr. Hamerton referred in a rather peculiar incident which occurred at The Hollins and which was related to him by his aunt. "My grandfather had lived in apparently. excellent health till the age of 77, when one afternoon as he was seated in his dining room, nobody being present except his eldest daughter Mary, he asked her to open the window, and then added: 'Say a prayer'. She immediately began to repeat a short prayer, and before she had reached the end of it he was dead. There is a strange incident connected with his death, which may be worth something to those who take an interest in what is now called psychical research. At the same hour his married daughter was sitting in a room 40 miles away with her little boy, a child just 61d enough to talk, and the child stared with intense interest at an empty chair. His mother asked what attracted his attention, and the child said: 'Don't you see, mama, the old gentleman who is sitting in that chair?' 'I am careful not to add details, as my own imagination might unconsciously amplify them, but my impression is that the child was asked to describe the vision more minutely, and that his description exactly accorded with his grandfather's usual appearance. In October 1882, Mr. Hamerton visited Burnley with his wife and family, and was accorded a civic reception at which he received many flattering speeches. He was much moved by his reception and wrote in his diary: "One of the most delightful days of my life." Of course, he visited The Hollins, and his children insisted on seeing the room, which had been their father's study. In the mid 19th. century the approach to The Hollins was a long straight avenue from the front door to the main Burnley/Mereclough road. This avenue was lined with 'oak trees, which were removed in rather unusual circumstances. It appears that Mr. Hamerton left his estate manager in charge of affairs while he himself went abroad. On his return he discovered that the trees had been cut down, his estate manager explaining that they were diseased, so he had authorised their removal and sale. Mr. Hamerton was not pleased. There is no account of what happened to the estate manager. Although there is no record available of the date that The Hollins was built, it is an established fact that the estate was sequestrated from the Cunliffe family during the time of the Commonwealth. Consequently the family went to live at Wycoller, but with the return of the monarchy in the form of King Charles II, Nicholas Cunliffe, the head of the family, was able to sell the property. In 1730 Gilbert Holden occupied the house, and on the turn of the 18th century the Hamertons, a branch of the Holden family, were in possession. The Hollins eventually passed into the hands of the Thursbys, and it was from that family that Lady O'Hagan rented the house. On her death The Hollins lay empty for about 18 months, when it was sold to Mr. and Mrs. W. Kippax. They undertook much modernisation, which included the installation of a bathroom and inside toilet. They lived there for 40 years. Like several other older houses, mining subsidence caused trouble to the foundations of the house, and it seemed at one time that it would have to be demolished. However, this danger was averted, and some reconstruction was undertaken and the building has been restored. At an early period in its history Hollins Farm was part of the main building, but at the beginning of the 19th century a member of the Hamerton family separated the two. In November, 1918, Lady O'Hagan entertained Mrs. General Bramwell Booth, the daughter-in law of William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, at The Hollins. Mrs. General Booth had visited Burnley to speak at the Palace Theatre and Lady O'Hagan supported her on the platform. Leslie Chapple 'Romantic Old Houses and Their Tales' GAWTHORPE HALL GAWTHORPE HALL (pictured left) As with Towneley, one cannot omit mention of another of the greater houses of the district - Gawthorpe Hall. The hall itself has been described as "one of the most perfect old mansions in England." According to "Old Halls of Lancashire and Cheshire", Gawthorpe "stands near the banks of the Calder, in a fine park, about halfway between Burnley and Padiham. It is a stone house, chiefly built at the end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, in the stately fashion of the period. Gawthorpe was built 1600-1605 by the Rev. Lawrence Shuttleworth, and probably incorporated walls of an older structure. However, in 1850, Sir James Barry was commissioned to undertake structural alterations and some of the rooms were rearranged. The Shuttleworth family have been connected with the Gawthorpe estate since the 14th century, and their influence and wealth continued to increase during the next two centuries. Richard Shuttleworth was born in 1587, and after attending university became Sheriff of Lancashire in 1618, later entering Parliament as member for Preston in 1641. His eldest son, also named Richard, was elected to the same Parliament as member for Clitheroe. On the outbreak of the civil war they became association with the Parliamentary forces hostile to the King, and the elder Richard was made colonel in the forces of Oliver Cromwell. Five of his sons also served with the Parliamentary side, two of them dying before the struggle was over. In February 1842, Janet Shuttleworth married James Philips Kay, who assumed the name and arms of Shuttleworth in addition to his own. The family motto of the Shuttleworths was "Prudence and Justice", while the motto of the Kay family was "Kind relations once known keep.