How Yeardsley Hall would have appeared originally.

 

Most of the large houses in the 1400s period were built on the capital H principle, the two uprights would have had a floor on the top. The cross piece would have been the main hall. , There were few chimneys prior to the 12th century, the fire in the larger houses being in the centre of the floor, the smoke escaping through doors and holes in the roof; hence "sluttish soote, a whole inch thick". The evolution of the manor house followed (13century onward). The most striking feature was the open-roofed hall. One notices the two wings each of two stories; solar near to the chapel or part of it; domestic offices, buttery, pantry, etc; hall with hearth in middle. Men servants, soldiers, slept on rushes in the hall. Other rooms gradually evolved leading from the hall and solar until the building became complex; it grew rather than designed. The hall was next devided, and became of less importance after the 11th century, except as a living room, until eventually the word hall was only used for the entrance lobby. The Solar became the drawing room.

The left hand side would have the Pantry, Larder, or Dairy, the right hand side would be the living quarters of the master and mistress of the hall. Just before the left hand wing in the hall is the porch entrance. Which in the case of Yeardsley Hall passing through the porch to enter by the heavy wooden 1400s door into a passage which has the large corbels supporting the massive chimney structure behind the large open fireplace on the other side of the wall. On the left of the corridor the first room was the dairy the next the stairs leading to the first floor. The next room was the kitchen and the end room, the Pantry. The other wing was at the opposite end of the hall and would have been the main living quarters (Solar) for the master and mistress of the hall with possibly a chapel. The women could withdraw (hence the later retiring, withdrawing, or drawing room). Yeardsley Hall follows this pattern to a tee although the chapel is built away from the wing and is of CRUCK structure. 

The solar was a room in many English and French medieval manor houses, great houses and castles, mostly on an upper storey, designed as the family's private living and sleeping quarters.

The above article comes from the archive of Furness Vale History Society. Its author is unknown. 

 

The following illustrations are by Marjorie Hobson from her 1960 Timeline Exhibition.

 

 

Miss Turner's Schooldays

 

 FURNESS VALE

Before Furness Vale school was opened in 1877, the owner of Furness Printworks - a Mr. Saxby - kept a school for the children of his employees in a building near Lodge Farm, adjoining the Printworks. There was a room above used as a church. This would be about 1875 or 1876 and the "Dame" who managed the school was a Miss Eyres. Mr. Goodwin took over this school and moved into the new Board school when it was ready.

Our summer holiday in 1940, the year after war broke out, was shortened to three weeks as children were considered safer at school! We had very wet weather during the holidays and on our return brilliant sun. We felt so cheated that each day we took our furniture out and did lessons in the yard. It was so very hot many children could not stand it and put on hats or used their individual hand towels, sometimes with weird results. Later, air-raid shelters were built in the yard and we had little or no play space.

I was always given a young men assistant when I was Head at Furness 1 had boys up to 14, and a man had always been Head before. The man I had as an assistant when we were a Cheshire school was always someone who had been through College but failed finals. He had to take his exam again and on passing was moved on as the Cheshire authority would not pay certificated salary for a man assistant. I never took P.T. with the boys, but did most of the garden of which we were very proud. The boys made the bird bath and flagged paths, and the garden was always self-supporting.

NEWTOWN

After the 1870 Act, Board schools were built at New Mills, Thornsett, Hague Bar, Hayfield, Furness Vale and Newtown. The two last were under a Board of their own, Disley Stanley School Board, which met in the room with a bay window at Newtown school. This room was very beautifully furnished. Newtown had a Weslyan school, where the Albion Road Chapel is now.

It was too expensive to run and was closed, the children going to Disley Church school, or to New Mills church school at least two miles from their homes. This was considered too far for the infants, and my mother and a local woman teacher were sent to the end house in Hibbert Street, Newtown, to teach infants. This house is a queer shape and is known as "The Smoothing Iron". The photo may be taken outside this house, or outside the Weslyan school of which my mother was in charge. Newtown school was opened in 1876 or 1878 with Mr. Turner (my father) as Head. 

Newtown School 1875

After my brother died in 1903, my mother came as Head to Newtown Infants Department, then separate from the upper school. She had taught there when the school opened. Her salary as Head was £70. 

Newtown School 1903.

(The log book for Newtown Infant Department from 1875, before the present school was built, is in the collection.) 


NEW MILLS

Mr. Nichols was head master of what is now Spring Bank secondary modern school as an elementary school with an infant department under the same roof.

He started evening classes and specialised in chemistry which met the needs of many aspiting young men in calico printing, bleaching and dyeing works, in the valley, Later a technical school was started under the same roof with Mr. Nichols as Head; this was the beginning of what is now New Mills Grammar school.

Mr. Nichols spent all his time in the technical school, but was also paid as head of the elementary school — a unique position and an assistant took charge of the elementary school. Mr. Skelton was the assistant; he was afterwards Head at Hague Bar and Thornsett.

When the new Grammar school was ready, Mr. Nichols gave up the headship of the elementary school; his assistant at that time was Mr. Crawford who was appointed Head.

A difficult situation arose because Mr. Skelton applied for the headship; the local managers appointed him but the Education Committee appointed Mr. Crawford. The deadlock lasted, but Mr. Crawford became Head although local opinion in some quarters never forgot or forgave. 

New Mills School 1899

 HAGUE BAR

Children of Hague Bar school in 1888, with Mr. Lee as Head. He was the first head master my mother worked with after returning to school.

Hague Bar school in 1896. From the front, the school is practically unaltered. It was modernised in 1936 when the County took over the school. Mr. Widdowes was the county architect. The ladies in flowered hats are visitors; Mr. Gregory was Head. 

Children of the top class in 1896. Some of the children are well dressed. Mr. Gregory had a London music degree, and was very keen on music and cricket. He yearly produced very elaborate concerts at Christmas in New Mills town hall, always giving an operetta and the dances were marvellous. Strines Printworks supplied wonderful prints in abundance, often sloe from their overseas stuff. Each year the Hallelujah chorus was included in the programme and well rendered, not without great effort and slogging. My mother (on the left) used to say that often Mr.Gregory sat down at the piano at 9 a.m. and the practise ended at noon! Cricket for the boys - who played very well - often took a good part of an afternoon;

Most of the children attending the school at this time were children of employees of Strines Print-works (before Calico Printers Association days) employees, and a few farmers. There were a number of large families. The fathers were either labourers - wage 18/- weekly, or 27/- if overtime was worked - or office workers, cashiers and secretaries in the Printworks; the well-to-do section  were calico printers, Many were very bonny children and all were well cared for. 

1899. With the exception of my mother who was fully qualified, and the head master, Hague Bar was always staffed with pupil teachers. My mother went there after my father died (he was the first head master of Newtown school) leaving her with myself one year old and ray brother aged five weeks. My brother, who appears on the New Mills photograph, third boy from the left on the row next to the back, was killed at work when sixteen years old. My mothar's salary was never more than £60 p.a. She had to be at Hague Bar school by 8 a.m., when the head master took the pupil teachers for lessons, a regulation made by the Board. I notice a variety of window plants in the photograph, but no aspidistras. I remember Dr. Stead when Director of Chesterfield giving at a refresher course an address entitled "Aspidistras". His theme was that you could judge the progress to be expected in a school by the presence or absence of that plant, which grows with little care, and with which it is easy to make a show without effort; so often work in such schools was similar! 

1904. These children do not look, as well cared for as some of Hague Bar children; as many lived in Strines as in Hague Bar. Mr. Wallwork, the Head at this time, later became head of New Mills St. Georges.

I went to Hague Bar with my mother for a short time about 1892. There was no drinking water laid on at the school then; the farmers nearby did not always supply water willingly if asked and there were no houses nearer than over the railway bridge. My mother could not afford to pay for hot water for tea, and she sent me to New Mills as she thought the day too long for me.

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 The above account is transcribed from a document written by Miss Turner, former Headteacher at Furness Vale School.  Miss Turner is seen in the following school photographs from 1950 

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