Shortly before 1790 the good people of Salterforth would no doubt have noticed strangers wandering round the district measuring and taking notes. These were the surveyors from the Leeds and Liverpool Canal Company setting out the levels and determining the proposed line of the new canal. They must have approached the landowners very shortly after this to make offers for the land they wished to use. In addition to all this activity the newspapers of the day carried reports about the canal and there can be little doubt that it was the subject of conversation between the villagers. I doubt if anyone was unaware of what was happening but I'm not too sure if they realised exactly what the work entailed or the disruption it would cause.
Imagine something on the scale of modern motorway building seen from the frame of reference of people who would regard a pack horse train passing through as a notable event. The most people they would ever see together would be the weekly walk to church at Gill, earthworks on the scale necessary to make the canal were simply beyond their comprehension. It got worse, canal building was all done by muscle power, horses and men. We have no direct account of what happened in Salterforth and Barlick but have enough evidence for other places to know that an army of hard-drinking navvies from all over the country would descend on the village. The usual practice was to build temporary barracks close to where operations were and it's logical to suppose this must have been somewhere between Salterforth and Barlick. Think of the disruption when the road out of the village up Salterforth Lane was cut by the canal and the present steep rise up to the bridge constructed. This isn't a serious obstacle for a modern motor vehicle but was a different matter altogether for a horse pulling the standard two-wheeled farm cart.
It wouldn't surprise me if some of the gangers and senior men lodged at the local pubs or with villagers. I think that Lane Head pub was built by then because a notice I have offering it to let seems to refer to an established business. Here's the wording of the 1813 broadsheet: “To be let by ticket for a term of years, to commence at the usual time of entry in Spring 1814 and possession to be delivered immediately. (Letting) at the Moor Cock Inn on the 1st day of October at six in the evening subject to conditions. A public house and inn in Salterforth called Salterforth Lane Head on the road between Barrowford and Barnoldswick consisting of a house with brew-house, stable, shippon and a wheelwright's shop.” The earliest record I have of the Anchor Inn is in Baines' Directory for 1822 which records John Crawshaw as the licensed victualler. However I have at the back of my mind that I was once told that when the canal was built and the road level altered the pub had to be raised by adding another storey. If this is true then it was there in 1790. In 'A way of Life Gone By', page 107, Dorothy Carthy reports that there used to be a farm called Broadstones where the mill car park is now. She says that the building was, at various times, a church (a chapel of ease for Gill?), a chapel and a public house and a graveyard was revealed when excavating for Kelbrook New Road in the late 1920s. Who knows, when the site is redeveloped for housing there may be more surprises under the car park, I hope the county archaeologists are keeping an eye on things. I have seen an obscure reference to a pub called 'The Holy Lamb' in Salterforth and wonder whether it was this one. One thing seems certain, the publicans would have a good trade for perhaps two years!
The Canal Company tended to be self-sufficient with their own blacksmiths and carpenters but I am sure that the barracks would be buying supplies from the local farmers, hay and corn for the horses and plenty of fresh meat for the men. According to Warner ('A History of Barnoldswick. Page 53) David Greenough was the incumbent at Gill from 1785 to 1791 and Edward Capstack from then until 1820. I can well imagine some quite serious sermons being preached against the consequences of having the navvies in the district, don't forget that they tended to attract itinerant hawkers selling strong drink, ladies of ill repute and in some cases, higher levels of disease owing to the temporary nature of the barracks leading to insanitary conditions. I have no doubt that these subjects would be discussed at the Quaker meetings as well. Incidentally I came across a reference in Warner (Page 52) which reads “In 1707 a record of Mary Ellis of the Parish of Broughton being buried at the Quaker's Sepulchre in Salterforth. May 16th and a similar entry in 1708 of the burial of Margaret Hartley in the same place. In 1704 William Houlte and Ann Hartley married at the Quaker Meeting House on June 15th.” The act of Toleration of 1689 which saw the founding of the Baptists in Barnoldswick may also have allowed Quakers to come out into the open in Salterforth much earlier than my previous research showed. Mr Lewis in his 'History of the Baptists in Barnoldswick' (page 86.) tells us that the Barnoldswick Baptists were the parent church of the Earby Baptists in 1819 and Salterforth in 1861. This bears out what I always tell you, don't take anything that I write as the final word, it's just my best shot at the moment and research always alters the 'facts'.
Baines Directory for 1822 gives us an interesting snapshot of Salterforth ten years after the opening of the canal. R Blezzard, carpenter and wheelwright. John Crawshaw at the Anchor. William Edmondson, commission agent (I think at this time this denoted a dealer in stocks and shares). Armistead Hartley, machine maker (textile machinery?). Rev. Henry Holgate, minister (Was this at the possible chapel of ease at Broadstones?). Francis Peel, lime merchant. Michael Pickles landlord of the Bay Horse (could this be the one at Broadstones? Remember this was before the mill was built in 1888). John Whitaker, grocer and John Widdup, timber merchant. The nearest I can get to the population around 1822 is 686. This looks like a thriving village with a good spread of trades, many of them based on the fact that the canal had started operating. Next week we'll have a closer look at how this stimulated trade and made the village even more prosperous.
SCG/11/06/12
The imposing bridge over Rainhall Rock quarry which preserved the right of way from Salterforth to Gill church.