Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for SADDLEWORTH

SADDLEWORTH, a hamlet, a chapelry, a township, and a district, in Rochdale parish and W R. Yorkshire. The hamlet lies near the river Tame, the Huddersfieldcanal, and the N E branch of the Northwestern railway, 2¼ miles E of the boundary with Lancashire, and 5½ E N E of Oldham; is practically conjoint with the village of Upper Mill, about a mile to the S W; and, with that village, has many inhabitants, much manufacturing prosperity, petty sessions and county-courts, a post-office of the name of Upper Mill under Manchester, a railway-station of the name of Saddleworth, a banking office, a large public hall, a literary institution, a good churchwith 1, 147 sittings, Independent and Wesleyan chapels, a public cemetery, and fairs on Whit-Wednesday and thefirst Wednesday of Oct. The chapelry dates from oldtimes, and is now ecclesiastically parochial. Pop., 2, 954. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Manchester. Value, £300.* Patron, the Vicar of Rochdale. The township was formerly in Lancashire; extends about 7 milesby 5 from the present boundary of that county; bearsthe name of Saddleworth-with-Quick; is divided intofour meres or quarters, called Friar mere, Lord's mere, Quick mere, and Shaw mere; contains the villages of Upper Mill, Dobcross Delph, and Greenfield, a number ofhamlets, and parts of the villages of Lees, Mossley, and Waterhead; has three railway stations, besides that of Saddleworth; includes a canal-tunnel and a railway -tunnel, side by side, upwards of 3 miles long, emergingnear Marsden; belonged, in the 12th century, to the Stapletons; is a region of hill and mountain, vale and moor, with much picturesque scenery; contains somehouses with traces of the times of Elizabeth and Charles I.; abounds in antiquities of the ancient British times; shares extensively in both the cotton trade of Lancashire and the woollen trade of W. R. Yorkshire; and besidesthe chapelry of Saddleworth, contains the chapelries of Dobcross, Lydgate, and Friar-Mere, and parts of the chapelries of Friezland and Hay. Acres, 18, 280. Real property, £62, 651; of which £975 are in mines, £507 inquarries, and £276 in gas-works. Pop. in 1851, 17, 799; in 1861, 18, 631. Houses, 3, 818. The district is conterminate with the township, and is divided into the sub-districts of Upper-Mill and Delph. Poor-rates in 1863, £7, 517. Marriages in 1863, 99; births, 651, of which 35 were illegitimate; deaths, 461, of which 195were at ages under 5 years, and 2 at ages above 85. Marriages in the ten years 1851-60, 900; births, 6, 389; deaths, 4, 351. The places of worship, in 1851, were 5of the Church of England, with 3, 547 sittings; 3 of Independents, with 1, 625 s.; 1 of Baptists, with 200 s.; 4of Wesleyans, with 1, 722 s.; 1 of New Connexion Methodists, with 210 s.; 2 undefined, with 500 s.; and 1 of Roman Catholics, with 80 s. The schools were 12 public day schools, with 922 scholars; 28 private day schools, with 906 s.; 20 Sunday schools, with 3, 457 s.; and 12evening schools for adults, with 187 s.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a hamlet, a chapelry, a township, and a district"   (ADL Feature Type: "populated places")
Administrative units: Yorkshire AncC
Place: Saddleworth

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