The History of Pott Shrigley

THE HISTORY OF POTT SHRIGLEY

Although Pott Shrigley is not mentioned in the Domesday Book, there is evidence of an early settlement, with a tumulus on Sponds Moor. The hamlet of Pott was probably named from a pot, meaning small pit (e.g. pot-hole) or pool.  Shrigley (spelt Shriggeleg in 1285) might be derived from Old English scric – a shrike + leah – a woodland clearing or lea. Evidence of ridge and furrow farming can still be seen in existing farms.

A great nephew of William the Conqueror called Horswin was granted a part of Macclesfield Forest, and the title: ‘Lord of Shrigley’. The two hamlets were possibly combined in 1354, after William – a descendant of Robert de Dunes, a forester of Taxal, bought some twenty acres in this area of the forest. His descendant, Geoffrey de Downes may have founded a Chapel of Ease in 1492, at the site of an earlier stone cross. In his will of that year, he insisted that his chaplain “…keep noe Horse, ne Hawke, ne Hound …” and should teach the boys of the parish. Thus education was also founded, leading to Pott Shrigley church school.

The Downes family, who were royalists in the Civil War, were fined, losing their land during the Commonwealth regime, but recovering it during the Restoration. In 1745, as Bonnie Prince Charlie’s army advanced south from Manchester, people on the main route to Macclesfield fled to the hills around Pott Shrigley until they had passed.

The Downes kept the Shrigley estate until Edward Downes died a bachelor in 1819 and the village was sold to William Turner, MP for Blackburn, who demolished the old hall and built a new one in Palladian style.

The Turner heiress, Ellen, is famous for being abducted from her school by Edward Gibbon Wakefield, (who later founded British rule in New Zealand).  The couple were chased, found and returned, with Ellen’s reputation saved.  This led to a special Act of Parliament to annul the marriage.  Ellen later married into the Legh family of Lyme Hall and her daughter, also Ellen, married the Reverend Brabazon Lowther, heading the last owners of the estate, which was finally sold at the death of Colonel W. G. Lowther in 1928.

The Hall was bought by the Roman Catholic Salesian Mission as a college, and a huge chapel was added, surviving as such until the college was closed and the hall eventually sold in the 1980s, when it was renovated as a hotel and country club.  An intriguing feature in the grounds was a castle, which was razed to the ground during the mission school days, because it was feared that the boys might be injured when playing there.  It used to be known as “the Edward III Castle”, but whether it was ancient, or an eighteenth century folly, is unknown.  There now remains only an old photograph of the ruin, and a bumpy dell in the golf course.

Pott too, had a hall, dating back to the 15th century.  After ceasing to be a single residence, it became a care home in the 1970s and in the early 2000s was converted into five separate houses. Remarkably, Pott was shown (in) on a map of Britain printed in 1595, possibly due to its industries of coal mining and stone quarrying, which continued well into the twentieth century.

The village is now almost entirely pastoral. It has a declining farming community, many of the residents being commuters and pensioners. The village’s only pub was closed by its owner, Mrs Lowther in the 1920s because she felt her workers were wasting too much time there. However, the Village Hall, which houses the school, has a newly refurbished bar, making the school one of very few primary schools on licensed premises.  At least two shops and tea rooms existed in the 20th century but now there only remains the corrugated iron ‘Coffee Tavern’, originally, a library for reading religious tracts, now a licensed restaurant in a listed building.

Only a few houses near the church and those at Unwin Pool have mains gas laid to them yet one of the iconic features of the village, situated outside The Croft, is the Victorian Gas Lamp, fed originally with gas from Bollington Gas Works. The lamp is fitted with an intriguing clockwork mechanism which turns the gas up and down during 24 hours but unfortunately it has seized up and no longer works.

With such history and in such beautiful surroundings, Pott Shrigley can look forward to remaining a truly desirable village.