By 1835 William (Billycock) 1813 had married Ellen Metcalfe and moved into her family home at Horton House, Horton in Craven. They had nine children. On 22 April 1860 Ellen Bracewell died at Horton House her old family home. William married again to Mary Whitaker of Colne on 5th June 1861 and their only child, Ada was born in 1865. He had taken a shop at 24 Church Street, Barnoldswick and started a putting out business from there. He must have prospered because by 1846 he was building Butts Mill and in 1854 built New Mill, later Wellhouse. William was a voracious entrepreneur. Apart from his two large mills in Barnoldswick and his engineering works in Burnley in 1867 he was main promoter of the Barnoldswick Railway in 1871. In July 1874 he bought large interests in the Ingleton coalfield for £15,000. He bought Park Close quarry and brickworks, also the Corn Mill and started to build a gasworks to supply the town. His name constantly appears in land deals, notably for the Dam Head and Calf Hall Estates.
This is where the new research comes into play. Thanks to research by The Northern Mines Research Society published after I had done my Bracewell research we have more information. There was a cotton mill in Ingleton and in 1854 it burned down. The owner rebuilt it and reopened within 6 months but could not find a tenant until in 1862 Billycock and a man called Towler from Burton in Lonsdale took it over as partners. This was the time of the Cotton Famine and one senses that they got a bargain. They opened the mill again in 1867 and this was how Bracewell first took an interest in Ingleton.
Back in Barlick Billycock needed coal for his two mills but resented having to buy it from pits owned by Hargreaves in Burnley, he wanted control and direct access but couldn’t achieve it. Ingleton had access to the railway in 1849 and by 1867 so had Barlick. Bracewell put two and two together and realised that coal could be sent by rail direct from Ingleton to Barlick. In 1874 he achieved his aim when he bought the Wilson Wood colliery and later other interests.
Meanwhile, back in Barlick, Billycock’s cousins, William, Thomas and Christopher, were in trouble at Old Coates Mill which by that time had a steam engine and its own gasworks for lighting. Sometime after 1867 they failed and Old Coates stopped and never reopened. I know that a man called Nuttall bought the mill in 1870 but Billycock went to court and denied him the water for Old Coates lodge from the Bowker Drain which he was diverting to run his new mill, Wellhouse, built in 1853. Nuttall cut his losses and built a new Coates Mill using the canal for condenser water.
It gets complicated doesn’t it! I can’t rush this so I will come back next week and finish this part of Barlick history!
Nuttall’s New Coates Mill on the side of the canal.
