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Kibboth Crew – History

A Fulling Mill Site Dating Back To 1710

This is a 300 year old site …..

…dating back to c.1710 and is the oldest known industrial site in Ramsbottom. The excavation of this water-powered fulling mill (where felt was made) has uncovered a later mill with a large room, huge stone engine mountings, boiler house, and a flag floor with culverts beneath. Trenches through this floor have shown earlier stages of the mill buildings.

The mill has a fascinating history …..

…which has been revealed in contemporary newspaper articles, rates evaluations, censuses and maps. The Manchester Mercury advertised the sale of Kibboth Crew with its house and two mills in 1778, and the 1842 Tithe map and schedule show that it was later owned by William Grant.  Maps indicate that between 1850 and 1893 there were major developments on this site. The mill itself increased in size and in number of buildings, and the two small millponds were merged to form a single lodge with a dam, the remains of which are still visible today. It is possible that a steam engine was also installed at this time. It is likely that Fulling ceased before 1871 and that the building may have been empty after this time.

Destruction of the building …

...occurred on  Friday 16th March 1894 when the dam burst at 5.15 in the morning and the building collapsed. Dramatic eyewitness accounts appeared in the Ramsbottom Observer and the Bury Times describing the death of Mary Hill in the catastrophe.

1710                999 year lease created for Kibboth Crew

After 1850       The mill and reservoir were enlarged or rebuilt

A steam engine may have been installed at this time

Between 1861 and 1871

It is likely that fulling ceased and the mill closed

1894                Destruction of the building by the dam burst

Identifying the mill

This map has been adapted from the 1842 Tottington Lower End Tithe Map and shows the three mills in the valley where the dig took place. The valley runs downhill from the kidney shaped reservoir on the left to the roadway on the right. No 91 is the highest mill in the valley and was called Top Wood Mill.  No 93 is the site we have been excavating and no. 94, now with just a wall and a stream remaining, can be seen just above the roadway which leads from Ramsbottom to the mill site and Top Wood.

Since the mill at dig site was never given its own name, the numbers allocated in 1842 will be used and it will be referred to as the fulling mill (93) at Kibboth Crew.

Researching these mills has been difficult because they often changed their names and owners, and Kibboth Crew was sometimes not named in documents, but came within the general area of Top Wood.

Although Kibboth Crew now includes all three mill sites, this was not so until comparatively recently.  For many years only (93) the fulling mill and (94) originally a perching mill, belonged to Kibboth Crew. Topwood Mill (91) involved with various cotton processes was under separate ownership.

Kibboth Crew in the 18th Century

There are three known sources of information about Kibboth Crew from the 18th century.

The first, which has not yet been located, was the 999 year lease. This must have been dated around 1710 as this can be calculated from the length of the lease remaining when the property was sold in 1778.

The 1778 sale of Kibboth Crew or Kilboth Cren, which was reported in the Manchester Mercury, gives interesting details. The property consisted of a house and three closes of land, a fulling mill and a perching mill with tenters belonging to the above. It was stated that “the mill is well supplied with most excellent water and lies convenient to the highway”. It had “a yearly rent of 40s, free of all taxes, now out of lease and valued at £20 a year”. It was occupied at that time by Robert Wallwork.

In the 1794 Tottington Lower End Rates Valuation Survey the three mills are included under the name Walk Mill. It would appear that the dig site (93) was the fulling mill and below it, by the road, was the perching mill (94).

(19) Walk Mill fulling mill and perching mill was owned and occupied by Richard Wallwork.

Valuation –     Walk Mill – part £19
Reaps – part £5 £24
Tenter croft and water land £2 10s
Two small meadows £3 10s
Higher Mill £2 10s £19
Lower Mill £3
Dry House £4 10s
Extra house £3
Reapd Meadow £5

A more complete description of fulling and perching mills is in a separate section on this CD. But briefly, fulling was a process of thickening or felting the cloth, usually wool, to make it warmer and longer lasting. Fulling mills were often referred to colloquially as walk mills as, before mechanisation, the cloth was walked or trodden to make it into felt. Perching referred to inspecting the cloth over a ‘perch’ to find imperfections. Tenters or tenter fields were areas of land, often with south facing terraces, where cloth could be pegged out to dry and be bleached by the sun.

Confusion over names

Over the years the mills (93) & (94) were always described together under a single name, but the name changed from time to time. Other mills in Ramsbottom had colloquial names as well as those used in legal documents and this seems to have been true of Kibboth Crew. From 1794 to at least 1834, the Tottington Lower End rates valuation surveys (or Poor Rates Assessments) referred to mills (93) & (94) as Walk Mill or Mills. In the1842 Tithe Schedule the land was identified as Crib ‘oth Crew, and in a map of 1850 the mills are identified by a longstanding name of Holcombe Mill. Unfortunately, either by mistake or design, Top Wood Mill was also referred to as Walk Mill in 1842.

In Trade Directories and some censuses (1841,51,61 & 81) Kibboth Crew was not named individually but came under the general area of Top Wood

WHAT’S IN A NAME  - KIBBOTH CREW

Written by Rev hume Elliott in 1893

“This curious place name has been a puzzle to all who have thought about it. Can it have anything to do with the old name croo, which meant calf’s crib? Or must we look further back for the constituent elements? Cridden or Cribden – the finely terraced hill which looks down the Ramsbottom valley between Haslingden and Rawtenstall – according to Dr Whittaker, the historian of Whalley, is Keiruden the hill of stags. Now, knob like parts of a mountain are sometimes called Kipps, and kippie means a little hill; while in Celtic, kippen means promontory. Kibboth Crew is just at the extremity of a cape-like piece of land running out to a considerable distance from the base of a steep-wooded eminence on the hill side, and abruptly dropping down into the dell where now Springwood Mill stands, with the deeply embanked lodge behind. One or other of these old words Kip, kippie of kippen may  have been linked with keiru. And Kippie or Kipper Keiru might in the course of centuries be corrupted into Kibboth Crew meaning the hill or cape-like resort of the stags. Kip o’ th’ Keiru if permissible would phonetically come very near to Kibboth Crew. If Crew, as is possible, is a corruption of Keiru then the name goes back to the time of the ancient Britons and may have been applied here before the Romans appeared on the scene.”

Reference   Rev Hume Elliott (1893)  The Country and Church of the Cheeryble Brothers

This information from Hume Elliot’s book was reprinted in an article in the Bury Times in March 1894, just after the reservoir dam burst at Kibboth Crew.

This article is to be found in  Newspaper Articles, 1893-1910  Vol 1. which is a bound collection of newspaper articles, probably all from the Bury Times, held in Bury Library.

 

Re-development of the mill

The 1850 map shows fulling mill (93) looking as it had in the map above, and at this time it was probably a water-powered mill. The lodge or reservoir consisted of two small ponds connected by a short stream or channel and the mill building seems to have been made up of at least two rooms or attached buildings. It is not known when the mill was re-developed

or re-built, but maps show that between 1850 and 1891 both the lodge and the mill greatly increased in size and shape. The additional height of the dam would have produced more power from the mill wheel and the size of the lodge increased the amount of time for which it could be run. The new mill consisted of several buildings, the main one appearing to extend across the width of the site. Another quite large building appeared on the north side of the site and two smaller ones on the south. Apart from its increase in size the other major change came with the instalment of a steam engine. According to Dr. Mike Nevell of the University of Manchester Archaeology Unit, this would have happened either at the time of, or soon after the re-development of the mill. Evidence of the steam engine comes from the large stone engine bed lying parallel to the wheel pit and from one of the smaller buildings on the south of the site. The latter, whilst built of stone, was brick lined and so likely to have been a boiler house. The recent excavation uncovered this later mill and so much more is known about it than can be deduced from maps alone. This is documented in the section ’A layman’s report’

The lives of local people centred on the mills

A study of the censuses showing the occupations of the residents of Top Wood (including the two cottages at Kibboth crew) has revealed much about the people and the mills in this valley.

The 1851 and 1861 censuses listed the types of occupations that might be expected. Since Top Wood Mill was a cotton mill, residents had various jobs associated with the cotton industry and the two cottages at Kibboth Crew were occupied by fulling millers (or woollen fullers) and their families.

In 1871 work in Top Wood became more varied with cotton weavers, outdoor labourers, quarrymen, gardeners, a block printer, railway worker, farmer and a carter. Only one cottage at Kibboth Crew was listed and this was no longer occupied by fulling millers. James Spencer age 54 was a woollen sorter, as was his son James aged 15. His other son, John, aged 11 was a cotton doubler.

In the census of 1881, the residents of Kibboth Crew no longer worked in a mill. There were two households of shuttlemakers, one of whom had his own workshop. The Register of People Entitled to Vote, shows that the following were qualified because of their business connections with Kibboth Crew - John Fletcher, the shuttlemaker with a workshop, John Birch of 24 Crow Lane Ramsbottom who qualified because he had a ‘drying stove’ and William Henry Birtwistle of Carr Terrace, Ramsbottom who had land and buildings there.

In 1891 William Taylor aged 62, blacksmith and Mary Hill aged 45, housekeeper lived at one of the cottages at Kibboth Crew and John Taylor aged 44, labourer at a print works, and his family lived next door.  William Taylor and Mary Hill were the people caught up in the drama in 1894 when the dam burst above Fulling Mill (93). Mary Hill was carried to Topwood farm where she died and the local papers mentioned the names of Abraham Warburton 1841-91 and his brother-in-law, Samuel Belsham (Belshaw) who lived in the farmhouse.

In 1901, the last available census, Mary Belsham age 60 and her brother William were farmers at Top Wood.  John Belsham age 62 a widower and farm labourer lived next door alone. The first of the two cottages at Kibboth Crew was occupied by Walter Taylor age 42, a tap and die manufacturer, and his family, and the second by Elizabeth A. Wright age 33 a cotton weaver and Jane Palmer age 36 a boarder.

The fate of the fulling mill (93) at Kibboth Crew.

Very few buildings in the 19th century can have the exact time of their demise documented as accurately as this one. It was at 5.15 am on Friday 16th March, 1894 that the dam above (93) burst, the building fell and further down the valley Mary Hill was swept to her death. Eye-witness accounts of this incident from the Ramsbottom Observer and the Bury Times, can be found elsewhere on this disc in ‘A Victorian tragedy’.

Standing on the site of the mill today, with the dam looming above, the huge v-shaped breach is very obvious and the extent of the devastation of 1894 can be easily imagined. Certainly the first known map after the dam burst (surveyed in 1908) shows that all the buildings disappeared except the boiler house, which stood on slightly higher ground. Interestingly, maps indicate that this building retained its roof until some time between 1938 and 1962. The historic photograph of Kibboth Crew (on this CD) taken between 1938 and 1956, shows something like a small chimney between the stone arch and the lower lodge and the arch itself looks more extensive than it is now. The photograph also shows the tall chimney, which may have served both mills (93) and (94), still standing on the hillside above them.

Whilst we initially attributed the closure of the mill to the collapse of the dam, documentary evidence found subsequently suggests that fulling operations may have ceased long before. During the inquest into Mary Hill’s death John Stacey gave evidence that after the dam burst the “old building that had stood between the bottom lodge and the middle lodge had fallen”. Since this was the site of fulling mill (93) and Stacey did not report anything that would relate a working mill, it may be that the building was already empty.

Further evidence comes from the fact that there were no fulling millers in the censuses for the whole enumeration district, which included Kibboth Crew or in trade directories, after 1861. A few occupations relating to the woollen manufacture were documented in the 1871 census. It would therefore seem that fulling could well have stopped some twenty to thirty years before the destruction of the mill building.

The only evidence that the mill building may have been used after the dam burst, was suggested by Mike Nevell. Later maps show that the stream coming down the hillside was channelled when it arrived at the mill site and then disappeared underground. A brick culvert has always been visible on the surface and the large underground cast iron pipe through which the water then passes to the lodge below, was excavated during the dig. A channel had been dug into the stone floor of the mill to allow the pipe to be laid, although the top of the pipe was still visible above it. Maps indicate that the culvert and pipe were put in place until between 1908 and 1929. Mike Nevell suggested that the fact that the owner invested time and money in laying the pipe might possibly indicate that the building was still in some kind of use.

Many aspects of the history of fulling mill (93) are still to be researched and sources to be accessed. In the mean time I would like to thank Brenda Richards and Kath Haddock who have spent many hours researching the mill during the period of the dig, building on the previous research undertaken by Janet Smith and Andrew Todd.

In 1995 Andrew Todd commented on the fate of mills in this area in ‘Around Ramsbottom’, page 45.

“Like other early mills located in remote side valleys with good falls of water providing power, their locations left them obsolete when the economies of scale made large, steam-powered mills locate in towns, close to railways and workforces.  Many of these water-powered fossils later eked out a living in the cotton waste trade, and when finally abandoned their rural positions meant that the unwanted sites were left simply to fall down.

This small clough (referring to Kibboth Crew) is still a ‘graveyard’ of early textile mills and their lodges”

The research undertaken at the time of the dig has provided a more detailed understanding of what happened to the three mills now belonging to Kibboth Crew. And whilst Chris Aspin in ‘The Water Spinner’ informs us that Top Wood Mill, then a 3 storey building was in fact destroyed by fire in 1876, it is clear that these small mills would not have been able to survive longer in the rapidly developing and highly competitive world of textiles.

Fulling Mill

The site we have been excavating was that of a FULLING MILL which dated back to at least 1778 and possibly back to 1710.

Documents show that there were two such mills at Kibboth Crew, although in 1778 one was more specifically described as a PERCHING MILL

Fulling mills produced felt material, usually from wool.

Kath Haddock researched the following information :-

Extract from the book ‘Further Rossendale Rambles’ by Ian Goldthorpe

In 1750 there were several mills in the area which denoted the extent of the cloth trade. These mills were fairly small and were not the mills of the Industrial Revolution although the latter probably replaced them. They would be '‘walk'’or fulling mills, for the last process of thickening and preparing cloth for the market. Initially the process of thickening the cloth to make it warmer and longer lasting was done by ‘walkers’. Where people have the surname Walker today, it usually indicates that one of their ancestors trampled cloth.

Fulling mills existed in the middle ages. It was the first textile process to be mechanised and in the latter part of the 18th century, fulling started to be done by machines in mills.

Sourced from ‘anyanswers.com’

Fullers Earth – A highly absorbent claylike substance consisting of hydrated aluminium silicates used predominately in fulling woollen cloth, in talcum powders, as a filter and as a catalyst.

Fullers Earth – The term originated in England, where in ancient times raw wool was cleaned by kneading it in water with clay material that absorbed dirt and lanolin. The process was known as ‘fulling’ and the clay or earthy material was known as Fullers Earth.

The term ‘perching’ in relation to woven cloth. Perching is the first process of finishing whereby fabric is inspected over a ‘perch’ to find imperfections. This process is known to have taken place on the second storey of a woollen mill.

A Victorian Tragedy

The dam above the mill site burst at 5.15am on Friday 16th March, 1894 and the V-shaped breach can be clearly seen.

The dam burst led to the death of Mary Hill, aged 50, a widow and housekeeper. Despite the heroic efforts to save her, the flood swept her out of her cottage and into the mechanic’s shop next door. She was carried to Top Wood farm where she died later that morning.

Fascinating accounts of her death and the effect of the burst on the lodges and buildings on this site appeared in two local papers.

The accounts have been studied closely to identify where the incidents took place. There seems no doubt that the dam was the one standing above the dig site (93). When this dam broke water swept down the valley causing the mill building to fall, and because the lodge below it was too small to hold the excess water, it spilled over the next dam and into the buildings beneath it. The cottage where Mary Hill lived, and the mechanics shop next door, where she died were almost certainly here on the site of the perching mill (94), just above the road to Top Wood Farm.

Transcript from The Ramsbottom Observer, Friday March 23 1894

THE BURSTING OF A LODGE IN RAMSBOTTOM

INQUEST ON A DEAD WOMAN

On Saturday noon, at the Grant Arms Hotel, Ramsbottom, Mr.J.W.Barlow, deputy coroner, held an inquiry relative to the death of a widow, named Mary Hill, aged 50 years, housekeeper, of Kibboth Crew, Top Wood, Ramsbottom, whose death was caused by the bursting of a lodge at Top Wood, Ramsbottom, on Friday morning.

Mr J. Hitchen was foreman of the jury.

The first witness called was Wm. Taylor, master mechanic, who said deceased was a widow, and was his housekeeper.  She was a distant relative of his. She died on Friday morning about half past eight at the house of Mr Warburton, Top Wood Farm.

She was 50 years of age, and kept house for him about 18 years. She had been ailing three years this March from consumption and heart disease, and had been under medical treatment by Dr McLeod, of Bolton Street, who first attended her about three years ago.  About seven weeks ago, she had a stroke, and Dr Deans was called to her assistance. Since that time she had been in the Royal Infirmary, Manchester.  She came home three weeks ago.  She was weaker constitutionally, but better of her stroke than when she went. Witness thought her to be in her usual health when last he saw her about eleven o’clock on Thursday night.

He awoke about a quarter past five on Friday morning and all was right. Shortly afterwards as he was making a fire in the bedroom, he heard a loud noise as of the falling of a building, followed by the rushing of water.  He concluded the lodge had burst, and he told deceased, who was in the same room, to follow him.  They made their way downstairs, and found the house flooded with water.  They passed through the front door, when all of a sudden the back door gave way, and a large force of water rushing in slammed the front door to again, and caught his fingers between the cheek of the door, and held him fast.  He was standing in the water about a quarter of an hour before he got loose.  During that time he was holding witness (? deceased) with his other hand so that the water would not wash her away. When the water had subsided a little, he let her go so that he could try to get his fingers loose.  He had no sooner let loose of her than suddenly the panels of the door gave way, and she was washed away into a mechanic’s shop, which joined up to the front door of the house, the door of which had also burst open.  He got free shortly after with the assistance of John Stacey, and he went to look for her and found her in the mechanic’s shop, laid on the floor.  Her face was bleeding.  Her head rested on the face plate of a lathe. The water was about six inches deep at this spot. They carried deceased to the house of Mr. Warburton, Topwood Farm.  Here they enveloped her in warm blankets she being quite cold from lying in the water.  She then seemed to be quite conscious and spoke to them.  He sent for the first doctor they could get, and about a quarter to seven Dr Lawrell came.  She did not seem to mend any, and died about half-past eight, as the doctor said, from shock to the system.

John Stacey, labourer, of Kibboth Crew, Top Wood, was the next witness called, and said he was awakened on Friday morning about twenty minutes past five by Mr. Taylor shouting for help.  He went to the window and saw Taylor standing in a flood of water with his arm round Mary Hill, as if holding her up.  Witness told Taylor he would be with him in a minute and he was going downstairs to go to him when he found the kitchen flooded with water. It was four feet deep.  He went back upstairs and got out through the window, and when he reached the ground Taylor and Mary had gone.  They made a search and found her laid in the mechanic’s shop with her head under a lathe.  She was then conscious.  They carried her to Topwood Farm and folded her up in blankets. Mr Taylor asked witness to go to Mr. Grant’s agent, and on his return deceased was dead.

The bottom lodge, which is behind their houses, was not capable of holding the additional water which was caused by the bursting of the middle lodge.  The size of the lodge behind their house is about fifteen yards by twenty-five. The bank surface of this lodge stands about 13 feet above Mr Taylor’s doorstep.  Further up there is another lodge and a building stands between the two bottom lodges.  The middle lodge is called Topwood Lodge, and is 20 yards by 12.  He saw the place on Friday after the flood and found that the building, which stood between the two bottom lodges had fallen, and that the middle lodge bank had given way, and so released the water into the bottom lodge which overflowed and flooded the houses.  The owner of the lodge was Mr Grant. Witness had never expected anything of this kind, but he given the agent of Mr Grant notice of the water coming trough the wall in the back yards.

A verdict of ‘Death by misadventure’ was returned.

A juryman said he would like to call the attention of the Local Board to the danger of these lodges, and ask that authority to do their utmost to make them safe.

Another juryman said he would also like the attention of the landowner called to the condition of the lodges referred to.

It was afterwards unanimously agreed that the recommendations should be sent to the Local Board and Mr Grant, with a view to render impossible a second such catastrophe.

 

Transcript from The Bury Times March 21, 1894.

The Bursting of a Reservoir – Coroner’s Inquiry.

Mr J W Barlow Deputy Coroner held an inquiry at the Grants Arms on Saturday morning relative to the death of Mary Hill, age 50 widow who died on Friday morning after being washed away by a flood of water consequent on the bursting of a lodge at Topwood near Kibboth Crew.  Mr W Hitchon was foreman of the jury.

William Taylor master mechanic at Kibboth Crew said deceased was his housekeeper and had acted as such for eighteen years.   For three years she had suffered from consumption and heart disease and had been attended by Drs McLeod and ???.  For seven weeks she had been a patient in the Manchester Royal Infirmary and  returned three weeks ago weaker in condition but free from paralysis.   About 3.15am on Friday while getting up from bed he heard a noise as of a building falling and a rush of water.  He told deceased to follow him and made his way downstairs.  He found all free and got the front door open and deceased passed through but at the same moment water broke down the back door and rushed in a great volume into the house to the depth of (?) feet and carried the front door rapidly to again so that witnesses fingers were trapped and he could not get free for fifteen minutes or so.  He held deceased with his right arm and she stood by him in the water which was flowing with great force.   After a little while he let her go thinking that the water had subsided but the panels of the house door gave way and the water flooded out carrying her into the workshop.  Witness got free immediately afterwards and went to the deceased whom he found with her head on a face plate free from the water which was around her.   Witness called for John Stacey, his next door neighbour who came through the bedroom window.   Together they carried the deceased to Topwood Farm and into the house of Mr Belshaw.  She was conscious but cold.  Dr Deane and Dr Laurie were both called in and Dr Laurie attended her til her death which took place without her rallying.  Dr Laurie stated that death was due to shock upon a diseased heart.  There was no warning as to the probability of the lodge bursting.  He had always thought they were safe enough.

John Stacey, labourer, neighbour of the previous witness said that he was awoke by Taylor shouting for help.  On going downstairs he found his house four feet deep in water.  He saw Taylor fast in his own doorway with Mary Hill beside him.  Witness then slid down from the bedroom window and Taylor said ‘Marys gone’.  They found her in the workshop and carried her to Belshaw’s house.  Taylor asked him to go to Grant’s office.  He did so and on his return the woman was dead.  The lodge behind Taylor’s house was about 15 yards by 25 yards.  It was incapable of holding the water that burst from the middle lodge.  Its bank was about 13 feet above Taylor’s doorstep.  It was about 18 years since there was a previous flood.  Witness visited the lodge on the previous day and found that an old building that had stood between the bottom lodge and the middle lodge had fallen.  The bank of the middle lodge had given way and had released the water into the bottom lodge and so flooded the houses.  Grants were the owners of the lodge.  Witness had expected nothing of this sort.   He had given notice of the water coming through the walls.

Mr Frank Lomax (a juryman) said the attention of the local board ought to be called to the condition of the lodges behind the two cottages at Kibboth Crew.  He considered that these two cottages were unfit for habitation and ought to be closed.

Mr Howard (another juryman) said he considered the landowner to be to blame.

Mr Parkinson and Mr Hitchon expressed similar views and it was suggested that the latter should lay the matter before the Local Board.

The jury returned a verdict to the effect that death was due to mis-adventure consequent upon shock sustained by a diseased heart.

As a matter of interest 21st March, 1894 was the Wednesday edition of the Bury Times – it cost ½ penny.  The Saturday edition cost 1d.