Barrowford

Coordinates: 53°51′04″N 2°13′16″W / 53.851°N 2.221°W / 53.851; -2.221
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Barrowford
Shire county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townNELSON
Postcode districtBB9
Dialling code01282
PoliceLancashire
FireLancashire
AmbulanceNorth West
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Lancashire
53°51′04″N 2°13′16″W / 53.851°N 2.221°W / 53.851; -2.221

Barrowford (/ˌbærˈfɔːrd/) is a village and civil parish in the Pendle district of Lancashire, England, north of Nelson,[1] near the Forest of Bowland Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.[2][3]

Barrowford is on the

toll houses can still be seen at the junction with the road to Colne. The toll house was restored in the 1980s and is owned by the trust which operates nearby Pendle Heritage Centre. Barrowford is about half a mile from the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, and a set of seven locks leads to the highest section of the canal between Barrowford and Barnoldswick
.

About a mile on from the locks heading towards Leeds is Foulridge Tunnel known locally as the "Mile Tunnel". The packhorse bridge near Higherford Mill is the oldest in Barrowford, dating to the end of the 16th century. It formerly lay on the old main road to Gisburn, which was superseded by the Turnpike road built in 1804.

The modern Anglican church (St Thomas') was built to replace the original church of 1839, which burnt down in 1964.

The village has two rivers: Pendle Water, which flows through it, and Colne Water, which joins Pendle Water behind the site of the now demolished Samuel Holden cotton mill and flows down from the moors above Colne.

The first residential home for the deaf in Lancashire was established at Barrowford in 1929.[4]

History

Pasture House is a listed building

Barrowford has been a centre for textile production since at least the 16th century when a fulling mill is recorded as being in the village. Until the late 18th century, the manufacture of woollen cloth was the primary industry, but in 1780 the fulling mill was rebuilt by Abraham Hargreaves as a cotton mill.

The diarist Elizabeth Shackleton documented her life here. She died in 1781 at Pasture House.[5]

The cotton mill was powered by a

handloom weavers
' cottages which can still be seen along the village's main road.

As

power looms were introduced into the cotton industry in north east Lancashire in the 1820s, weaving gradually became a factory industry and production moved from the home to the massive weaving sheds which began to be constructed. At its peak, the industry boasted some 10,000 looms and "employed several thousand local people".[6]

One of the last examples of a working weaving shed could be seen at the East Lancashire Towel Company, but the firm, moved to premises in Nelson, and ceased production in the United Kingdom altogether. The site of the former mill was redeveloped by Booths supermarket, which opened in November 2014.

Another weaving shed at Higherford Mill has been converted to artists' workshops. By the 1860s, the village was heavily reliant on the cotton mills for employment, and, along with the rest of Lancashire, was badly affected by the Cotton Famine during the American Civil War. The wall alongside the river opposite Barrowford Park was built during this period to provide work for unemployed weavers: the milestone, which projects from the wall, is dated 1866.

Governance

Barrowford was once a

urban district up until 1974. The part of Blacko parish historically in Lancashire was created from the remainder, with the exception of a small area across Pendle Water, which became part of Nelson.[7]

The parish is split between the Barrowford and Blacko and Higherford wards of Pendle Borough Council.[8][9] It is in the Pendle parliamentary constituency, which is coterminous with the borough.

Demography

According to the

Burnley Built-up area defined in the 2011 census had a population of 149,422.[12]

The racial composition of the town in 2011 was 95.3% White (93.8% White British), 3.8% Asian, 0.1% Black, 0.6% Mixed and 0.2% Other. The largest religious groups were Christian (70.2%) and Muslim (3.2%). 72.7% of adults between the ages of 16 and 74 were classed as economically active and in work.[1]

Year 1901 1911 1921 1931 1939 1951 1961 2001 2011
Population 4,959 5,527 5,527 5,299 4,833 4,766 4,644 6,039 6,171
UD (pre-1974)[13] CP (2001 onwards)[10][1]

Media

The daily newspaper, Lancashire Telegraph, covers Barrowford in its Burnley, Pendle and Rossendale edition. The Nelson Leader, a weekly publication, also covers Barrowford.

See also

References

Citations

  1. ^
    Office for National Statistics
    . Retrieved 8 February 2018.
  2. ^ "Gateway towns, Barrowford". Forest of Bowland. Retrieved 26 July 2022.
  3. ^ "Gateway towns, Barrowford". Visit Pendle. Retrieved 26 July 2022.
  4. ^ "Gateway towns, Barrowford". Forest of Bowland. Retrieved 26 July 2022.
  5. , retrieved 24 January 2023
  6. ^ "Gateway towns, Barrowford". Forest of Bowland. Retrieved 26 July 2022.
  7. ^ "Barrowford CP/Tn through time". visionofbritain.org.uk. GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth. Retrieved 5 September 2015.
  8. ^ "Barrowford". Ordnance Survey Linked Data Platform. Ordnance Survey. Retrieved 5 September 2015.
  9. ^ "Higham with Pendleside". Ordnance Survey Linked Data Platform. Ordnance Survey. Retrieved 5 September 2015.
  10. ^ a b "Parish headcount" (PDF). Lancashire County Council. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 December 2006. Retrieved 25 July 2009.
  11. ^ Table KS01 Usual resident population, Office for National Statistics, archived from the original on 23 July 2004, retrieved 9 August 2014
  12. Office for National Statistics
    . Retrieved 6 March 2021.
  13. ^ "Barrowford UD through time". visionofbritain.org.uk. GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth. Retrieved 22 March 2021.

External links