Worsley
Worsley is a village in the City of Salford, Greater Manchester, England, which in 2014 had a population of 10,090. It lies along Worsley Brook, west of Manchester.
Within the boundaries of the historic county of Lancashire, there is evidence of Roman and Anglo-Saxon activity, including two Roman roads. The completion in 1761 of the Bridgewater Canal allowed Worsley to expand from a small village of cottage industries to an important town based upon cotton manufacture, iron-working, brick-making and extensive coal mining. Later expansion came after the First and Second World Wars, when large urban estates were built.
Worsley Delph is a scheduled monument and a significant part of the town's historic centre is now a conservation area.
History
Toponymy
Worsley is first mentioned in a Pipe roll of 1195–96 as Werkesleia, in the claim of a Hugh Putrell to a part of the fee of two knights in nearby Barton-upon-Irwell and Worsley. The spelling Worsley itself first appears in 1444. Scholars agree that the last element of the name comes from the Old English word lēah. As to the first part, however, there are many variations on the name, which the place-name scholar Victor Watts divided into three varieties:| 1 Werkes-type | 2 Werkede-type | 3 Werkedes-type |
| Werkesleia, 1195 | Wyrkedele, 1212 | Wurkythesle, 1246 |
| Wrkesley, 1292 | Whurkedeleye, c. 1220 | Workedesle, Workdeslegh, 1259, 1278 |
| Wyrkeslegh, Workesley, 1301 | Worketley, 1254 | Worcotesley, Workedesle, 1276 |
| Workesley, Worseley, 1581 | Wrkedeley, Workedeley, 1292 | Workdisley, 1581 |
Type 1 looks like it comes from an Old English personal name Weorc, in which case the place-name meant "Weorc's clearing". Types 2 and 3 could come from an otherwise unattested feminines personal name Weorcgyth, in which case the name meant "Weorcgyth's clearing". But Watts also suggested that types 2 and 3 might really point to an initial element of uncertain origin followed by the Common Brittonic word found today as Welsh coed, in which case the name originated as the name of a forest along the likes of Wer-ked, which later gave its name to the settlement in cleared land.
Early history
Two Roman roads run through the area. Connecting Mamucium with Coccium, one passes through Worsley near Drywood, and over Mosley Common. The present-day A6 road follows part of the course of another Roman road, which passes through the northern part of the area near Walkden and Little Hulton. In 1947 a hoard of 550 Roman coins was found near a quarry in Boothstown, dated to between AD 250 and 275, and in 1958 the head of a man was found on Worsley Moss. Named "Worsley man", and originally thought to be no more than 20 years old, upon the discovery of Lindow Man it was re-examined and dated to approximately the 2nd century AD, in the Romano-British period.File:Line engraving of Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater.jpg|thumb|upright|Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater, built the Bridgewater Canal and was directly responsible for much of the economic growth of Worsley through the latter part of the 18th century.
Worsley later fell under the control of the Anglo-Saxons, who controlled much of the area around Manchester and who also defeated the British at the Battle of Chester in AD 615. Edward the Elder rebuilt the fortifications at Manchester, and in AD 924 captured all the land between the rivers Mersey and Irwell, making it demesne in the Kingdom of Wessex. During the Middle Ages the area was covered with forests and marshlands. Thinly populated by craftsmen and serfs, Worsley grew as a settlement adjoining an ancient corn mill, close to the location of the present-day Worsley Road Bridge. Most farms throughout Lancashire were small with their tenants dependent upon secondary employment, however in 1719 a John Kay of Worsley had five stirks, two bulls, 17 cows, "young cattle upon the moors", and a "cow at hire", all valued at £97 5s. Marl was commonly used as a fertiliser, and is recorded in use in 1719. Wheeler's Manchester: Its Political, Social and Commercial History, Ancient and Modern states that about one-fifth of the land around Worsley, Astley and Tyldesley was in tillage, lower on average than the surrounding areas.
Bridgewater estates
Worsley was, originally, the largest manor of the seven ancient manors of the Bridgewater Estates. It was created by William I and held for him by the Barton family in thegnage, and for them by a Norman knight named Elias, who fought in the crusades. On his death in Rhodes, the manor remained with Elias' son, whose family had by that time adopted the name of the village as its family name. On 23 June 1311 a substantial part of the Manor of Hulton was granted to the Worsleys. The family held both manors until the late 14th century, whereon they passed to the Massey family of Tatton, and then in the 16th century to the Brereton family of Malpas, Cheshire. The Brereton family added the Manor of Bedford to the estate. Richard Brereton later married Dorothy Egerton, and upon his death the estates passed into the Egerton family.In 1617 John Egerton, son of Sir Thomas Egerton, became Earl of Bridgewater. The Egerton family was descended from Sir Richard Egerton of Ridley, Cheshire. His illegitimate son, Thomas Egerton, was a prominent lawyer who served as Master of the Rolls from 1594 to 1603, and Lord Keeper of the Great Seal from 1596 to 1617 and also as Lord High Chancellor of England. John Egerton succeeded to Worsley in 1639, and died in 1649. He was succeeded by the second and third Earls of Bridgewater. The title of Duke of Bridgewater was first given to Scroop Egerton in 1720. He devised a navigation system for Worsley which was not carried out. His son, the third Duke of Bridgewater Francis Egerton, was to build the Bridgewater Canal.
The Duke purchased the Manor of Pemberton in 1758, the Manor of Hindley in 1765, and the Manor of Cadishead in 1776. Upon his death in 1803 he was succeeded by George Leveson-Gower, 1st Duke of Sutherland. In 1833 the estate was inherited by Gower's son, Francis Leveson-Gower who changed his surname to Egerton, and in 1846 became the Earl of Ellesmere. In 1836 he purchased the Manor of Tyldesley. He is recorded as saying that he found Worsley to be "a God-forsaken place, full of drunken, rude people with deplorable morals".
Worsley New Hall, designed by Edward Blore, was built in 1846 for Francis Egerton the First Earl of Ellesmere. The plans are held at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Queen Victoria visited the hall in 1851 and 1857; Edward VII and Queen Alexandra visited in 1869, and on 6 July 1909. The hall was used as a hospital in World War I and in World War II housed Dunkirk evacuees, American soldiers preparing for D-Day and the Lancashire Fusiliers. In 1943 the hall was badly damaged by fire and demolished in 1949.
Industrial Revolution
Coal has been mined around Worsley from as long ago as 1376, originally in bell pits. The coal seams in the area tend to be fairly thin, slanting downwards from north to south, and so deeper mining became necessary during the 17th century.With the onset of the Industrial Revolution and the growing use of steam power, there was a rapid increase in the demand for coal. The Duke's mines were among those supplying the surrounding districts but transport was both inefficient and expensive, and the mines also suffered from persistent flooding. His solution to these problems was to build a canal from Worsley to Salford, and an underground canal into the mines from Worsley Delph. The canal boats would carry at a time, – more than ten times the amount of cargo per horse that was possible with a cart. The Duke and his estate manager obtained an Act of Parliament empowering them to begin construction on a planned route directly to Salford, avoiding the River Irwell.
James Brindley was brought in for his technical expertise and suggested varying the route of the proposed canal away from Salford and across the Irwell into Manchester. A second Act was secured for this variance, which included an aqueduct to cross the Irwell. This was built relatively quickly for the time; work commenced in September 1760 and the first boat crossed on 17 July 1761. The canal opened in 1761 and along with the stone aqueduct at Barton-upon-Irwell, was considered a major engineering achievement. One writer said that when finished, it "will be the most extraordanary thing in the kingdom, if not in Europe. The boats in some places are to go underground, and in other places over a navigable river, without communicating with its waters ..."
Worsley Delph, now a scheduled monument, was the entrance to the Duke's underground mines. Two entrances, built years apart, allowed access to the Starvationer boats, the largest of which could carry of coal. The entrances allow access to of underground canal on four levels, linked by inclined planes.
The burgeoning village became a hub of commercial activity. The Duke employed craftsmen to service a wide range of industries including boat-making, plastering, blacksmithing and mining. A local quarry supplied limestone, for which a kiln was constructed at the junction of Barton Road and Stableford Road. A quarry at the Delph supplied building materials for the region, including the stone used to construct Brindley's aqueduct. To accommodate the workers needed for these industries the Duke built extra housing and cottages. In a diary entry of 1773, Josiah Wedgwood wrote of the area "We next visited Worsley which has the appearance of a considerable Seaport Town. His Grace has built some hundreds of houses, & is every year adding considerably to their number." Worsley Green became a thriving centre of industry.
With the death of the Duke in 1803, his estates were inherited by his nephew, George Leveson-Gower, who later became the Duke of Sutherland. The canal and coal estates were placed under the control of the Bridgewater Trust, and in 1833 the rest of the estates were inherited by the Duke of Sutherland's son, Francis Leveson-Gower who changed his surname to Egerton, and in 1846 became the Earl of Ellesmere. The mines ceased production in 1887, and with the expiration of the Bridgewater Trust in 1903 the village began to change; the Duke's warehouse and the works on what is now Worsley Green were demolished. Worsley Brook was culverted, and a memorial fountain to the Duke was built from the bricks of the works' chimney.
Although much of the industry that dominated Worsley was in decline, in 1937 Sir Montague Maurice Burton opened the Burtonville Clothing Works along the East Lancashire Road. Built in the Art Deco style, in 1938 the factory employed 3,000 people.