That's right, I'm looking for a bit of help from my readers. By the way, if you want to give me a call do it before 10AM because after that I don't answer the phone, they are all cold calls!
As I am sure you all know by now, water resources are a big part of any understanding of how our mills started and what kept them going. The water-powered mills obviously needed good water supplies but so did the steam driven mills, not for the boilers so much as many people suppose, but more importantly as cooling water for the condensers that made the engines so much more efficient. There is plenty of evidence for this, mills complaining because another engine upstream from them was sending too much hot water down in summer and ruining their efficiency. This is why the ownership of water rights was so important and the mill owners didn't hesitate to bring down the law on anyone who interfered with their supplies. I've looked in the past at how William 'Billycock' Bracewell actively interfered with the water supplies to Old Coates Mill run by his cousins and this was one of the contributory factors that drove them out of business in the 1860s.
The thing I want help with is, funnily enough, connected with Billycock being short of water at Butts Mill. When he built the mill and started it in 1843 Calf Hall Beck was just about adequate to supply the mill but he could see that in future he was going to need more as he expanded. William Atkinson comments on this in his history of the town, 'Old Barlick'. (There's a copy in the library if you want to read it.) This is why, shortly after Butts opened he bought Ouzledale Mill, at that time a water-powered saw mill. I believe that he did this to get some claim on the water coming down Gillians Beck but unfortunately, Mitchell had sewn up the rights up on to the moor and when Slaters took over in the 1860s they inherited these rights and guarded them jealously. When James Nutter proposed building Bancroft before WW1 he had to get permission from the Slaters to use the water and I think the fact that he'd married into the Slater Family helped! Even so strict conditions were attached.
Right! Have a look at the map below. I know that sometime between 1850 and 1870 Billycock came to an agreement with the Slaters to draw water off the Clough dam and meter the amount with a Lea Recorder. The water was at a higher level than Butts and was piped down to a balance pond in the Parrock. What I don't know is the route the 6” cast iron pipe took. It could either have gone direct from point 'A' on the map to point 'B' but alternatively could have been laid through the culvert under Wapping. Has anyone ever seen evidence of this pipe? If so would you please let me know? Thank you....
A plan of the start and finish of the pipe. A to B.
