Freehold estates auction: Wilsden, Allerton & Rawden

Joseph Smith, Land Agent, Bradford.

Material: paper, remounted on paper

Scale: 10 chains per 1.5 inches   Size: 58*45 cm  Condition: good

This plan is a duplicate of one permanently available to the public in the Local Studies Library collection. It is also on-line at the West Yorkshire Archive Service but is published here without any exegesis as far as I can see. Joseph Smith was a Bradford Land Agent who evidently drew up the plan for a land auction in 1829. It is the estates in Wilsden and Allerton which interest me most. I suppose the most likely cause of such a land auction is the death of an owner with the consequent sale by executors. An alternative situation would be the sale of a small portion of a much larger estate, like that owned by the Ferrands of Bingley, at that time Lords of the Manor of Wilsden. The West Yorkshire Archives have a plan (WYB346 1222 B16) of nearby Old Allen Common in Wilsden including its collieries. This shows the areas where Edward Ferrand Esq, as Lord of the Manor, had mineral rights over common land. This plan was made ‘for the purpose of ascertaining the best method of leasing the coal’ by Joseph Fox, surveyor, also in 1829. Are the identical dates a simple coincidence? A more extensive land auction, but which evidently included Birkshead and Crosley Hall, had been advertised in the Leeds Mercury in 1814.

Unfortunately, but as usual, the vendor of the land and property in 1829 is not named although there are useful details like field names and surrounding property owners’ names. Confirmation of the auction is easy to find in contemporary copies of the Leeds Mercury. Although such notifications of the prospective auction also do not name the vendor a list of the contemporary occupiers is provided. The sale was handled by the well-known firm of attorneys, Hailstone & Thompson, of Bowling Lane (now Manchester Road): it was held by Mr GT Lister at the Sun Inn, Bradford on 14 December, 1829. In Wilsden sale Lot 1 involved Birkshead Mill, house and barn together with several closes of land: lot 5 were a terrace of eight cottages fronting the Bradford – Haworth turnpike road (Shaygate cottages). Other lots consisted of closes of land with attached farm buildings.

Birkshead Mill was eventually the last of Wilsden’s 8-9 textile mills to remain working. It was originally built in 1820, along with these Shaygate cottages, by Richard Fawcett. I assume that this was Richard Fawcett, wool-stapler, of Shipley Low Hall. Fawcett was involved with several Bradford mills (notably Holme Mill) but I don’t know if he was the actual owner of the property being auctioned in 1829. He lived into 1840s and as ‘Mr Fawcett’, he seems to be identified as a neighbouring landowner.  It is possible he was selling off a fragment of his estate. Lot 7 on the plan is Norr Field. This shows no evidence of coal mining but it was certainly mined later in the nineteenth century, and the Reserve Map Collection has the plan of a drift mine at this site.

South of Wilsden in Allerton we can see that Crosley Hall and some attached land is for sale, which was currently in the occupation of John Balme. Balme occupied several other closes of land which were also being auctioned. This is useful information since William Cudworth, in his history of Allerton, gives a good deal of information about Crosley Hall which was originally the property of the Priory of St. John of Jerusalem. It was for long associated with the Hollings family but latterly the estate had belonged to John Hill MB, apothecary of Bradford. Hill is mentioned in Astrid Hansen’s invaluable book (Wilsden, 2001) but it would appear that although he owned property in Allerton and Wilsden, which may well have been this, he flourished 50 years too early.

At the time of Cudworth’s writing (well after 1829) land in the area belonged to John Fairbank and John Dalby, who owned the hall itself. There are coal reserves under Allerton as well as Wilsden: Lot 19 is a field with the name of Coal Pit Close.

The question I am naturally asking is whether anyone with a greater knowledge of Wilsden and Allerton history can tell me who owned these estates prior to the sale this map documents.