High Up On The Moors

  At 463metres (1518 feet), Flash is the highest village in Great Britain. It is also home to the highest village pub, The New Inn.   Just outside the village, The Flash Bar Stores is the highest shop in England and alongside is the former "Traveller's Rest" once the third highest pub in the country but now converted to holiday accommodation. The Post Office was also highest in the land as was the village post box.

 Flash is in the parish of Quarnford which has a population of 242; much reduced from the 700 residents of the early 1800s.  The parish name was first recorded in 1227 and perhaps refers to the Old English name for a millstone : a ‘cweorn’. 

 Agriculture was of course an important source of employment but so too was mining. Coal was first produced in 1401 and there were a number of pits in the area, mostly to the north of the village. The mines continued to be worked through the 18th and 19th centuries with the last mine closing in the 1930s. 

A number of people were employed in the silk trade and in 1850 there were 34 people employed making buttons by hand. This trade continued into the 20th century. 

St.Paul's Church dates from 1901 and replaced an earlier building from 1744. Naturally it is the highest in the land. Only ocassional services are now held.

This was an early centre of Methodism and a chapel was built in 1784. Although no longer a place of worship, it does of course hold yet another altitude record. 

Flash once had its own school and at one time taught 50 children. It closed however in 2012 when its number fell to just four. There was no prospect of it surviving as only one child had been born in the village in a 10 year period.

The Post Office was just behind the New Inn and closed c1990.  There is still a Post Office in the village but only on one day each week at the village Hall.  

The Post Office and the sign from the gable end rescued by David Harrop

Despite its remote location, the village has its own brewery. Its products, usually only in bottles, can be found at the Flash Bar stores.

The Tea Pot Club was a mutual society set up in 1846 to provide sickness relief. The money was collected in a tea pot!  It was wound up in the 1990s but every May,  a marching band leads a parade whe a teapot is carried through the village.

The district had a reputation for criminal activity including cockfighting and prizefighting. Money is said to have been couterfeited giving rise to the term "Flash Money".

Cutting from the Ashton Reporter of 1938

A Derbyshire Miscellany

 We are grateful to Vivian Dubé for the following articles about Derbyshire history:

This Wife for Sale

Between 100 and 200 years ago, husbands all over the country were selling their wives at bargain prices. The going rate was anything from half a pint of beer to 25 guineas (£26.25).

On 5 December 1771 a Derbyshire farmer, Thomas Bott, sold his wife for 1s.6d (7.5p), delivering her up in Derby market place with a halter round her neck. This was an average price at the time.

It was probably a farmer who swapped his wife for a sheepdog and a bale of hay at Chesterfield market.

By comparison, William Bradley of Matlock got gold and silver for his wife of 18 years. In 1773 he sold her at Wirksworth market for two guineas (£2.20p) and a silver watch.

Fifteen years later, again at Wirksworth, a breeches-maker sold his wife to a shoemaker for 5s 3d (26p). About 500 people witnessed the sale, making a great deal of noise as they congratulated the newly-joined couple.

 

 Courtesy of Vivian Dubé; first posted on Facebook 11th July 2022

 

 

A New Mills Accident

Accident - The workpeople employed by Messrs, Hibbert and Alcock, Torr Mills, were thrown into a state of alarm on Wednesday morning last, by the sudden stoppage of the machinery, upon inquiring it was discovered that the boiler was fast emptying itself of its contents through the sludge pipe.  To avoid a serious accident, it was found necessary to let off the steam and rake out the fire.  In the consternation, the stoker who was endeavouring to do his utmost to prevent any damage, accidentally fell off a plank into the boiling water, and was seriously scalded on the back; one of the overlookers hearing his cries for help, went and in attempting to rescue him, accidentally fell in and scalded his legs and feet.

 

 From an undated newspaper cutting

 

Torr Mill, built in the 1790s stood alongside the River Goyt and just below the Union Road  Bridge. The mill was destroyed in a fire in 1912

 

How Hayfield Bridge Was Built

The handsome bridge over the river in the centre of Hayfield was built in the year 1837, of course, on the site of a more ancient and primitive structure. Cut in the central stone was the inscription:-

"Erected Anno Domini,  M.M.C.C.C.X.X.X.V.I.I.
Samuel Worth, Architect.
George Bamford, Builder"

It was a big day when this central stone was laid, in which there is a cavity containing several articles, one of which, it is said, is a bottle of wine.  The ancient bridge consisted of three arches, and a former bridge was washed away by a flood 110 years ago.  On the 16th June 1858, a great flood occurred caused by an unusual downpour of rain on the top of Kinder Scout, where the water rose to the keystone of the arch, and suddenly the weir, which had stood time out of memory, was torn up, and the back parts of four houses swept away.  It was at this flood that Mr Boardman, an old pensioner, who retired to bed early, had to be aroused, and was only got safely away from his bed chamber when the flood swept it away.  The bridge is one that the inhabitants may be justly proud of, for the more pressure there is put upon it the firmer it stands.  On the south side the arch rests upon solid rock, but great difficulty was experienced in getting a good foundation on the north side, owing to the quicksand which exists on that side of Hayfield. After sinking as deep as possible, bags of wool were pressed down for the foundation. A temporary bridge was made during its erection opposite the George Inn.  The new bridge is  considerably higher than the old structure, and consequently the road through the village was made much higher, which accounts for some of the houses being so much below the present road level.  After the bridge was erected, Mr. George Rowbottom, of Marple, built the Bridge End Buildings (in 1838).  Many can well remember the great festivities on the jubilee of the bridge, in 1887.

 

From an undated newspaper cutting

Hayfield Bridge c1900

 The Needhams of Thornsett

 

Thornsett came to the Needham family by the marriage of Maud, daughter of Roger Mellor, to Thomas de Nedeham, elder son of Thomas, sometime around 1350. She brought with her part of the manor, which at that time was about 1300 acres. Thornsett is a hamlet near Glossop, Derbyshire and is currently in the parish of New Mills, although at the time the Needham's were resident there it was in Glossop parish. Thomas made Thornsett Hall his family residence and subsequently it was the family home of the Needham's for nearly 300 years and 9 generations of the family

Parts of the hall are still visible at Thornsett Hey Farm, notably a stone buttress, visible from the road, just west of the 'Printer's Arms'. A second buttress was demolished some time after the '30s since it was a hazard to traffic. The Thornsett Needham's were Foresters in the Royal Forest of the High Peak , officials acting for the King, and this is reflected in the bucks' heads on the various Needham coats of arms. Needham's of Thornsett are listed among the gentry of Derbyshire from 1360. During the early sixteenth-century, they also acquired the manors of Snitterton and Cowley, and descendants married well into county families. By the time that armorial claims were verified during the Herald's Visitation to Derbyshire in 1611, the family was recognised as Needham of Needham, Thornsett, Snitterton and Cowley.
However, like many good things it didn't last. George Needham (born before 1557), who inherited Thornsett and Cowley from his father William after WIlliams brother Ottiwell died, made some unwise investments in local mines together with his son Henry (born before 1577). This resulted in them selling the family estates ( including Thornsett) in 1613 to Sir Francis Needham of Melbourne Derbyshire, who immediately sold the estates on. Many works indicate that the Seniors of nearby Bridgetown acquired the properties; as a consequence Thornsett left the Needham family. George died in around 1615 and Henry moved to Wales , so by the time of the next Visitation in 1662/3, Needham's were no longer recorded in Derbyshire.
Sources
1. Source : Alastair Lack http://www.lackfamily.net/genealogy/index_genealogy.html

THORNSETT OLD HALL DEMOLISHED -  In the interests of public safety this old building known as "Barn End" has been demolished and the road at Thornsett widened. Few people seem to be aware that this old building was once part of one of the historic homes of the old officials of the Ancient Forest of the Peak.  Yet this building was the homestead of the Needhams of Thornsett at a time when kings and nobles, knights and ladies, riding across unfenced country, over moorland and waste, through fen and ford, with hooded falcon and stooping hawks enjoyed what was for nearly a thousand years the national sport of England.

 

Cutting from the Ashton Reporter of 1938

Building the Midland Railway through Derbyshire

 In the early years of the 1860s, the Midland Railway commissioned a series of photographs recording the construction of its new line between Rowsley and New Mills in Derbyshire. Later in the decade, building of the extension to London was photographed including St.Pancras Station.

The Science Museum has now released around 100 photographs under a creative commons licence and these may be viewed or downloaded from its website: https://bit.ly/3RrXqBN

Below is a selection of pictures from locations in Derbyshire.

                                                New Mills Viaduct, about 1864

Building Bugsworth Viaduct in about 1862

Building the tunnel at Chapel en le Frith, about 1862

 

Dove Holes Tunnel, Pit Bank, Shaft No 5, about 1862 

 

Peep O' Day Bridge, Peak Forest Station, about 1862 

Monsal Dale Viaduct, about 1864 

Construction of a railway bridge, about 1862. Location unknown.

The River Wye, Derbyshire, about 1862

 

 

Brickbarn Pit - Shallcross Hall Colliery

Shallcross Hall Colliery, known locally as Brickbarn Pit was opened by the Buxton Lime Firms company in 1909. Coal was mined until February 1925 by which time the reserves had been exhausted. There was an additional mine entrance through an adit to the west of Buxton Road and this was known as Walker's Pit.  Much of the output was taken out of the Walker's Pit adit and over a narrow bridge crossing the River Goyt nd straight into Botany Bleach Works. Coal was also raised from the Brickbarn shaft and taken down an inclined plane which led to Shallcross Sidings and also to the nearby Mevril Bleach Works .  This shaft gave access to the Yard Seam which here was six feet thick. The workings extended over a large area although the coal beneath Shallcross Manor was not mined.  A steam engine with a Galloway boiler provided power for the pithead and Worthington pumps kept the workings dry, releasing the water into the Goyt at the Walker adit and into the Blackbrook near Wheel Farm. 

Mining in this area has a long history. The Shallcross Mines were among the oldest in North Derbyshire and had been worked by the Shallcross family since the mid seventeenth century providing much wealth.  By the early nineteenth century, Thomas Boothman was mining at Shallcross and in the latter years of that century, local coal owners, Levi and Elijah Hall were working the Shallcross New Pit which was located to the south of The Manor.

The photographs below are courtesy of Arthur Philips.

 

 

This 1919 map has been marked to indicate the approximate location of known shafts and adits. Most of the shafts were to ventilate the workings.