ACCRINGTON

Accrington, in the parish of Whalley, comprised two townships – Old Accrington and New Accrington – which were united in 1878.

The agricultural land of the area is mainly pasture. By 1830 textile industries were developing in the town, notably calico weaving and printing and cotton spinning. Associated works producing textile machinery also grew up. From the fifteenth century there were collieries, quarries and mines in the area. The town was also famous for the manufacture of bricks.

There was a chapel at Accrington which was confiscated as a chantry in about 1547, but subsequently restored in 1553 on payment of a fee. The vicars of Whalley were responsible for maintaining worship there, and the chapel did not usually have its own minister. The chapel was demolished and rebuilt in 1826.

Sources:

‘Townships: Old and New Accrington’, in A History of the County of Lancaster: Volume 6, ed. William Farrer, J Brownbill( London, 1911), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/lancs/vol6/pp423-427

‘Abingdon – Ackton’, in A Topographical Dictionary of England, ed. Samuel Lewis( London, 1848), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/topographical-dict/england/pp5-9

MIDDLETON

The parish comprised Middleton, Pilsworth, Hopwood, Thornham, Great Lever, Ashworth, Ainsworth and Birtle-cum-Bamford, the last four being detached from the main parish.

The original parish church or chapel was built before 1066 and was dedicated to St Cuthbert, following the Norman Conquest a new church was built and dedicated to St Leonard. However, there is still a side chapel dedicated to St Cuthbert.

The church was entirely rebuilt in the early fifteenth century by Cardinal Thomas Langley, Lord Privy Seal and archdeacon of York, who was a native of Middleton. His building incorporated some remains of earlier building such as the arch between the tower and the nave (thought to be twelfth century).

The church building underwent further reconstruction a century later when Richard Assheton, lord of the manor of Middleton, enlarged it considerably and added the clerestory.

Subsequent rebuilding included the addition to the tower of its unusual wooden cap. The church retains many early features, however, including the rood screen and other early woodwork, together with some stained glass.

The advowson always belonged to the owner of the manor of Middleton which remained in the Assheton family for centuries. Many of the sixteenth-century rectors of the parish were family members.

Coal mines in Thornham and Hopwood helped to fuel the development of the textile industry which flourished with other industry in the parish from the late eighteenth century. Middleton is now part of the Manchester conurbation.

Cardinal Langley founded a church school which moved in 1586 to a new building which still stands on the bank of the River Irk.

Sources

Sir Stephen R. Glynne, Bart., Notes on the churches of Lancashire, ed. James Augustus Atkinson, (Chetham Society, new series, 27, 1893).

‘The parish of Middleton’, in A History of the County of Lancaster: Volume 5, ed. William Farrer, J Brownbill( London, 1911), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/lancs/vol5/pp151-161 [accessed 7 January 2025]

ASTBURY

The parish of Astbury was on the eastern boundary of Cheshire, bordering Staffordshire, and comprised eleven townships being Buglawton, Congleton, Davenport, Eaton, Great Moreton, Hulme-Walfield, Newbold Astbury, Odrode, Smallwood, Somerford Booths and Somerford cum Radnor.

The church was mentioned in the Domesday Book and following lengthy litigation it was accepted by the end of the fourteenth century that the rectory belonged to St Werburgh’s Abbey in Chester. Following the dissolution of the abbey the advowson passed to the dean and chapter of the new cathedral and from them to Sir Richard Cotton and then to the Egerton family. The rectors owned all the tithes of the parish but tended to be absentee pluralists, at least in the early part of the sixteenth century. Thus John Brereton, brother of the executed courtier, William, held the parish from 1535 until his death 1542. At the same time, he was a royal chaplain and held the parishes of St Mary in Chester, Christleton and both moieties of Malpas in Cheshire, as well as being a canon of St Paul’s. He was succeeded in the parish by Hugh Powell (or ap Howell/Apowell) who also held the parish of Eccleston in Cheshire and Llanvetherine in Monmouthshire.

The existing church was originally built in the twelfth century but substantially altered over the next three hundred years. The church building is unusual in that the tower, probably dating from the fourteenth century, is not integrated into the main building, but connected to it by a passage. Much of the woodwork of the interior, including the chancel screen and the parclose screen (separating the aisle from the nave), dates from about 1500, and it is thought that a surviving wall painting of St George dates from about the same time.

The fourteenth-century tomb of Ralph Davenport can be seen in the church, in the churchyard is a medieval canopied tomb, but the figures of a knight and his lady associated with it have been badly weathered.

Sources:

Rev. J. E. G. Cartlidge, Newbold Astbury and its History (Congleton, 1915: reprinted 2004)

J. P. Earwaker, The History of the Church and Parish of St Mary-on-the-Hill Chester (London, 1898), p. 80

Miriam Gill, ‘ “Now help, St George, oure lady knyght … to strengthe our Kyng and England ryght”. Rare scenes of Saint George in a wall painting at Astbury, Cheshire’, Transactions of the Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society, 91 (1997) pp. 91-102.

Douglas Jones, The Church in Chester 1300-1540 (Chetham Society 3rd series, 7, 1957), p. 176

George Ormerod, The History of the County Palatine and City of Chester (second edition, revised and enlarged by T. Helsby, London, 1882), vol. iii, pp. 21-72

The black and white images are reproduced from volumes 64, 68 and 69 of the Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire by kind permission of The Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire.