April 2015

Turbary stones

Holme Moss conjures up different images for people: for some it’s an iconic bike ride climb; for others a treacherous moorland road where to venture in the winter is to court danger. But for the residents of the Graveship of Holme the Moss (and ‘moss’ is a local term for a peat-bog) was their source of fuel, and peat was also used for other purposes, eg roofing.

The Graveship of Holme was (in fact still is) a collection of townships around Holmfirth in West Yorkshire. Its origins have nothing to do with burying the dead, but denoted an area governed by a grave or grieve, a mainly northern term for a sheriff. The common lands (in effect the moorlands or mosses) to these townships were divided between the townships, and a glance at older large-scale Ordnance Survey maps reveals a vast number of detached portions of townships all over the moors. These were the sources of peat or turbary (from ‘turf’) for the local population.

“Father Conmee reflected on the providence of the Creator who had made turf to be in bogs where men might dig it out and take it to town and hamlet to make fires in the houses of poor people”.  So wrote James Joyce in Ulysses, but turbary or peat-digging rights were jealously guarded. And, because of the featureless nature of the landscapes of these mosses – cf the fruitless searches for the Moors Murderers’ victims – disputes were common. Hence we sometimes find turbary boundary stones.

We have looked, so far without success, for turbary stones around Holme Moss; nor are there any yet located in peat-digging areas of Marsden Moor, just north of Holme Moss – again the proliferation of Moss names indicates the peaty areas. Which is why an unidentified stone on the first Austerlands turnpike above Marsden, which we wanted to be a turbary stone, almost certainly isn’t one.

Further north again, however, there are some stones asserting turbary rights (or ‘commons’) in the township of Langfield in the ancient parish of Halifax. This covers a wide, sparsely-populated area south of Todmorden on the West Riding county boundary. There is no standard pattern to the stones, but all have ‘L’ for Langfield, followed by a number. The one illustrated here says “This common doth belong to L…”, but much on the stones is illegible.

Another area where turbary stones are found is further north again, in the Dales, where turbary rights were often in dispute, especially in the 17th century. They have been recorded in the parishes of Austwick, Dent, Stainforth and Thornton-in-Lonsdale, with the largest number in Lawkland. Many, however, have no visible text. The Yorkshire Dales National Park website has further information, a database on a spreadsheet, and a picture gallery.

For more information on peat and peat cutting see a book of the same title by Ian Rotherham (Shire Publications, 2009).  This book is a celebration of a cultural history that extended from the Iron Age to the twentieth century when peat was the main fuel that warmed houses all over the British Isles, and the mark of the peat cutter is written deep in the landscape.  It tells the story of the use of peat for fuel in the British Isles, and the people who cut it. It also examines the methods of cutting, the tools that were used, and the organization of cutting. It chronicles the beginning of commercial extraction and the exhaustion of this precious resource.

Sources: Talk given to the Milestone Society Northern Spring Meeting, 2015, by David Garside; Yorkshire Dales National Park website article (archived); Langfield Common stone illustration © Copyright Humphrey Bolton and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

RWH / rev Sept 2020

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Milestones around Thirsk

On a number of roads in the vicinity of Thirsk in North Yorkshire are some series of milestones that are all very similar in design, although there is no indication on them of who made them.

One series begins in York on a road originally turnpiked in 1753, through Easingwold and Thirsk to Northallerton – this is now mainly the A19 and A 167 (ignoring modern by-passes). This series actually continues to Darlington (a separate turnpike). The stretch between York and Easingwold has the greatest number of surviving milestones. A road with similar milestones connected Thirsk with Boroughbridge to the south-west, and another with slightly different ones to Yarm (which was of course originally in the North Riding), turnpiked in 1803. Only two stones survive on the latter.

[There was another turnpike that started in Thirsk, to Masham (1755) – now mainly the B6267 – but the only milestone on this road, at Nosterfield, is a later one erected by the Hang East Highway District.]

The milestones all have a number of distinguishing features. They have a triangular cast-iron shape with a sloping top on which the number of miles to London is shown – although not all these mileages are consistent. The lettering is also in a fairly standard font: the local directions are cast in a semi-circular shape around the miles (except for the two surviving Thirsk/Yarm stones, which, perhaps because they are shorter names, are in a straight line).

The most interesting example is in Thirsk itself, opposite no 15, Ingramgate, near the Frankland Arms. This depicts, as part of the original casting, on the left (Easingwold) a lamb and its mother, and on the right (Thirsk) a character with a pint of ale. He has been interpreted variously as Tom the Drover or Tom the Tippler, a colourful local character. Under ‘Thirsk’, in lieu of a mileage figure, is an unidentified symbol, perhaps a bird (or, in the words of Hamlet, “Is it a whale?”).

As for who made the milestones, it would seem likely that they were made in Thirsk, which is fairly central to them all, and because a special one was made for the one in Thirsk itself.

The likeliest candidate would seem to be the ironfounders William and Thomas Chapman, recorded in the 1841 census living at 15 Kirkgate, Thirsk, sons of John Chapman, machine-maker. By 1851 they are still there, unmarried, the head of the household being the now widowed Isabella Chapman. Their foundry is shown on the OS map just north of the church and parsonage. William Chapman died in 1858 and Thomas gave up the business, so it would seem likely that the milestones were produced around the mid 1850s.

Source: based on a talk by Jeremy Howat to the Milestone Society Northern Spring Meeting, April 2015.

RWH/April 2015

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Northern Spring Meeting, April 2015

There seemed to be more cakes than ever to greet the goodly number of milestoners who assembled on a cold but generally sunny day at Hebden, our usual venue in the Yorkshire Dales.

First up was the double-act of Brian and Dorothy Burrows with another entertaining selection of slides from around the world: not just milestones, but waymakers of all kinds, as well as amusing signs (eg “Toilets. Maximum stay 2 hours”).

Next came Jeremy Howat to tell us about the milestones on the A19 (York-Easingwold-Thirsk-Northallerton), and reporting on his research into their possible ironfounders. Click here for full details.

Jeremy highlighted the milestone in Thirsk showing on one face a sheep and lamb, and on the other a figure thought to be a drover, which led nicely into the final session before the lunch break. Presented by Mike Lea, this featured extracts from a Border TV film of 1988, “The Drove”, in which their intrepid reporter, fellow masochists and a dog recreated a journey made regularly in the 18th century, driving a herd of cattle from Galloway via Malham (a hub of the trade, controlled by the local Birtwhistle family) and Norfolk (St Faith’s, near the airport, and for seven centuries host to one of the country’s largest cattle fairs) to London. Drove roads once covered the country (albeit without milestones), but the drovers’ lives were made increasingly difficult with the growth of turnpikes (with their attendant costs) and the enclosure movement, and the trade was dealt a final fatal blow by the railways.

After lunch David Garside introduced a completely new (to us) type of boundary marker, the turbary stone. These are found on moorland areas where peat was dug, turbary being land where turf or peat may be dug for fuel, or as a legal term the right to dig for it. Click here for all the details. He also revealed that Garside Hey, part of Marsden Moor, is named after his ancestors, who had such rights.

And finally Jan Scrine updated us on her ongoing Beyond Graffiti project, and entertained us with the triumph, trials and tribulations of the award-winning Crossing the Pennines scheme – grand opening on July 4th (barring acts of God or Kirklees). Watch this space.

RWH/April 2015

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Some hands on guide-stoops

The skills of those who carved guide-stoops varied enormously, as these pictures show.

I have just (Jan 2021) discovered that the technical term for a pointing hand is a manicule, although the word is not in most dictionaries, or even the OED online.  This is from a fascinating book on London street signs by Alistair Hall (Batsford, 2020).

Not a standard guide-stoop, this classical structure of 1805, recently restored, is at Ackworth: designed for the traveller on horse-back. A very elaborate sleeved hand on a stoop on Lindley Moor Road in Huddersfield (1735). A rather more primitive hand – at the junction of the B6118 and the road between Kirkheaton and Mirfield.
A nicely-carved hand at Sowerby Bridge. Looks like an afterthought, perhaps by an apprentice who didn’t know what a hand was: at Stone Chair near Shelf; erected 1737. Two different hand styles on the listed stoop at Farnley Moor End, near Thurstonland (1738).

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The Maythorn Way

W B Crump, in his Huddersfield highways down the ages (1949), describes the route of an ancient track leading from Marsden to Penistone, by way of Meltham, Holmfirth, Hepworth, Maythorn and Thurlstone. He also describes five guide-stoops found along the route. Four of these, now somewhat battered, and some no longer in their original locations, survive.

From Marsden the track took the route that later became the first Wakefield-Austerlands turnpike as far as Holthead where the present road turns off to Meltham. Just before Meltham was the first guide-stoop, described by Crump, but now lost.

The second (pictured, right) is just south-east of the centre of Meltham, where Mill Bank Road leads off the B6107 towards Honley (grid ref SE104102). It is sadly virtually illegible, but had distances to Honley, Marsden and Penistone.

The third is a couple hundred yards further on, at the crossroads at the top of the steep Netherthong Road (grid ref SE108099), where a road leads up to the Ford Inn and the A635. Crump records a now invisible hand pointing left to Penistone, with other directions (no hands: “go right” would be assumed) to Holmfirth and Marsden. These directions are a bit of an enigma, since according to Crump the route to Penistone lay through Holmfirth, and one would therefore expect the stoop to be pointing in the same direction to these two places. Also Penistone and Marsden, being in opposite directions, should be on opposite faces but aren’t. Perhaps the stoop was originally elsewhere.

The fourth stoop has had a chequered history, and is now in the middle of Netherthong (grid ref SE138096), a good mile and a half away from its presumed original position. An old Ordnance Survey 2½” map records a milestone at about SE121093, and this is presumably our stoop, being used as a gatepost, and this is how Crump describes it. But obviously it had been moved there at some time as it was some distance from any road or track junctions. Howard Smith, in his Guide stoops of the Dark Peak (1999), suggests that this was at SE119092, where Bradshaw Road crosses Wilshaw Mill Road/Wolfstones Road, but he reports it as missing. It has directions to Marsden, Penistone and Huddersfield.

Crump then describes a route through Holmfirth, Hepworth, Maythorn and Thurlstone to Penistone, though some parts of it are possibly a bit speculative. The only other guide-stoop is on Thurlstone Moor, on the un-made-up High Bank Lane (grid ref approx SE219038), directing to Holmfirth, Huddersfield and Penistone – again in a very poor condition (pictured, right).

There is a stone just inside the grounds of Holmfirth High School (Heys Road, grid ref SE151097) which looks like a guide-stoop, but whatever markings it may have had have been erased. Though not on Crump’s route it is not far from the old crossing of the River Holme at Thongsbridge and could possibly be connected.

And finally, this being about the Maythorn Way, mention should be made of the Maythorne Cross, which has been the subject of legal disputes in recent years. Thought to have originally been a Saxon boundary marker, there are now two Maythorne Crosses, neither particularly original: one in Holmfirth by the river, near the main car-park (grid ref SE144084); the other in a field near its original location near the hamlets of Victoria and Maythorn.

RWH/April 2015

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