Miry Shay Estate, Barkerend  c.1860

2.38   BRA c1860 BAR   BHM 1774 B27

Oiled Paper   40 chains: 1inch   37*37 cm   Condition: good

Keywords: Barkerend, Miry Shay, Boldshay, Smyth, Outhwaite, Fitzgerald, Bunker, coal-mining

This map is annotated on back ‘give and take exchanges at Miry Shay estate’ which must refer to the lines GH, F & ED which are drawn on it. Clearly it is an estate plan showing the property of three men: Col. Smyth (the Miry Shay estate), Dr Outhwaite, and Major Fitzgerald (the Boldshay or Boldshaw estate). The buildings are roughly in the arrangement of the first OS map of the area, surveyed in the late 1840s.

Who was Major Fitzgerald? One possibility is Thomas George Fitzgerald, of Turlough, Ireland (1778-1850). He may once have been an army major but after 1839 he was a Lt-colonel but his dates are really too early for this map. Fitzgerald had a strong Bradford connection for in 1809 at St Peter’s Parish Church, he had married Delia (1780-1817), daughter of Joshua Field, of Heaton Hall, and sister of John Wilmer Field. Fitzgerald, in 1819, took Elizabeth Crowther as his second wife, at St George’s Hanover Square. Two daughters died young but they had one son Henry Thomas George Fitzgerald (1820-90) who took over their Irish estates, and he it was who was a major in the first Yorkshire Rifles. Henry Fitzgerald had been born and baptised in Bradford but probably didn’t live here; his address is usually given at Maperton House, Somerset, which the Fitzgeralds also owned. Baines directory of 1822 confirms that his father Colonel Fitzgerald was in residence at that date but by the time he died in 1850 the Leeds Mercury recorded that he was ‘formerly of Boldshay Hall’.

The map shows the position of Bunker’s Hill Coal Mine, Eastbrook House, Boldshay and Miry Shay House very well. Miry Shay has long been demolished but in the early nineteenth century had been the property of JH (John Henry) Smyth MP (1780-1822) whose family had owned it, and the Bradford Soke Mill, for generations. The ‘Col. Smyth’ in this map is John George Smyth (1815-1869) MP for York and Colonel of the 2nd West Yorkshire Militia who actually lived at Heath Hall, Wakefield. His land holdings north of Barkerend Road are now a substantial part of Bradford Moor Golf Club. Remarkably Boldshay House survives, now incorporated into much subsequent development. The the map must post-date 1850 but pre-date the death of physician Dr John Outhwaite in 1868. He is famous as being a friend of the Brontes. He was the son and grandson of local surgeons and treated the poor of the town. He left Bradford in 1847 and died in retirement at Harrogate.