" 'The Slack' not far from
Cressbrook ... is a small row of cottages, standing
on a bleak and wild looking moor-like prominence, as if the buildings had been lifted out of the
adjoining valley to look about them". Thomas Brushfield, 1865
Littonslack is a small hamlet lying roughly
halfway between the villages of Litton and Cressbrook and just North
of Litton Mill. Originally it comprised just 10 terraced cottages. The postcard
above, date unknown, shows the front (south facing view) of the 10 cottages. In
the
early 1900s a further house was built at the easterly end of the row and in the
1980s a farm was built nearby. "Littonslack" can also be written as two words
"Litton Slack" and is locally known as "The Slack".
Over the last few
years I have been researching the history of Littonslack ... when were the
cottages built? ... who were they built for? ... who built them? And
whereas there are no absolute answers to those questions the research has moved slowly closer to
some conclusions ... and at the same time thrown up many secondary, but
remarkable, facts.
If anyone can add anything to this research please
contact me via ...
Earliest Recorded
Date
All of the available censuses have been studied (1841 - 1901)
and these are attached below for display or download
(in Microsoft Excel). The censuses whilst providing a wealth of information only
gave an earliest date of 1829. Studying the Births marriages and Deaths at the
Derbyshire County Records Office (DCRO) gives some earlier dates as shown in the
table here...
This gives the
earliest reliable date of Littonslack of 22nd February 1796.
Note also the
changing place name of the hamlet. Up to the late 1790s the hamlet tends to be
called “Mill Slack”. Up to around 1838 the hamlet is referred to as “Litton Mill
Slack” with “Litton Slack” first appearing around 1834. There are also
occasional references to “Slack Houses”.
The origins
of "slack" are probably from Old Norse (see the Peakland
Heritage web-site) which tells us that ‘slakki’ (small shallow valley)
gives us Slack, Litton Slack and Raven Slack.
There is one earlier
reference to Littonslack and this is from Thomas Brushfield J.P. who died aged
78 in 1875. In April 1865 he published an article in "The Reliquary" No 20. Vol
V. Pages 187-192. The Reliquary was a "Quarterly Journal and Review; A
Depository for precious Relics - Legendary, Biographical and Historical.
Illustrative of the Habits, customs, and pursuits of our forefathers." (Price
Half-a-Crown).
Thomas Brushfield' article was "A brief Sketch of the
Life of John Howe, an Ashford Worthy". John Howe was know as the "Poet of
the Peak" and published a book poems.. Brushfield tells us ...
"In 1816 he
published the book above referred to - a small volume of poems - which he
entitled, "TRIFLES LIGHT AS AIR," and which he dedicated to His Grace the Duke
of Devonshire. The book of poems was purchased by the public very freely, and I
think, affords sufficient evidence that John Howe, under more favoured
circumstances, would have held no mean position among village minstrels. His
satirical strictures on hypocritical pretensions to sanctity, caused him to be
looked upon by some as enemy to religious truth, and the busy tongue of bigotry
poured out its accustomed venom upon him.
"
There is
much more on John Howe and his family at http://swww.wirklsworth.org.uk/RELIQ-6e5.htm A copy of this book is held in the British
Library, St Pancras and University of Leeds. Brushfield begins his article as
follows:
"I CANNOT conceive any thing more delightful to the
mind, than the making note and record of high and noble virtues in the life and
actions of a member of the human family-ennobling as well as delightful is the
task - cheering as the voice of welcome, as thoughts of a happy home, or the
smile of a friend: Charming! yes, truly
'Charming as Divine, Philosophy,
And musical as is Apollo's Lute!'
And such
is my task in this humble endeavour to preserve from oblivion the name of John
Howe, an inhabitant of Ashford-in-the-Water. His name stands high, in my
estimation, among the men of genius and worth who are connected with my little
favourite village. John Howe was born about the year 1777, at a place called "
The Slack," not far from Cressbrook; it is a small row of cottages, standing on
a bleak and wild looking moor-like prominence, as if the buildings had been
lifted out of the adjoining valley to look about them."
Brushfield tells us that John Howe was born at
the slack in 1777 (although further investigation shows that 1774 is the correct
year). But is this reliable? Brushfield is writing this in 1865... around 100
years after John Howe's birth and with no other evidence of the existence of
Littonslack between this date and 1796, then this looks unreliable. However,
John's parents (George and Mary) did live at Litton Mill Slack, as in February
1797 Mary's death is recorded there (shown in the first table
above).
Life and Death
From around
1820 more detail, including the age of the individual, was included in the
records of deaths. The attached list of deaths for Littonslack up to 1837
shows the stark realities of infant mortality Note
the entries for the year 1838. In this one year 6 children
died (from just the 10 cottages). At the end of July 3 children died
in one week.
But
LIFE on the Slack could not have
been dull. Each cottage had just one decent sized living room, a small
kitchen and 2 bedrooms. The 10 (dry) toilets were in a row at the
Westerley end of the cottages. In 1841 and 1851 the census shows 66 and 67
people respectively living in the 10 cottages. In 1851 one cottage is
shown with 13 occupants (although in these years, cottages on the Slack of
10 or 11 people were common). A copy of the census page and a transcript
for the cottage with 13 occupants are reproduced here. Most cottages
follow a similar make up ...husband and wife ... a good number of children
..a few relatives and usuallly one or 2
lodgers.
Ellen (above) gave birth to a Bastard
daughter in September 1841. She named her Mary Ann. Mary Ann died aged 10
weeks. Mill
Connections
There are many connections with Litton Mill and it is
possible that the cottages were built for mill workers. The censuses show the
majority of people at Littonslack in the 1800s are mill workers.
One fact that emerged is that in 1841 there are 16 Irish women living at
Littonslack all with recorded ages as 20 and all mill workers. One cottage had
husband, wife, 3 children and 5 of these women. The surrounding areas, of Litton
and Cressbrook take the total number of 20 year old Irish women to over 80. The
1841 census shows them as born in "foreign parts", yet the 1851 census shows the
same women as born in the Workhouse of St Giles, Bloomsbury, Middlesex. St Giles
contained a large community of Irish and was a very poor area of London. Census
takers were instructed to write the age of every person under "...15 years of
age as it is stated to you. For persons aged 15 years and upwards, write the
lowest of the term of 5 years within which the age is." See this link for all
1841 Census
Instructions
Whether these women are ex-apprentices or whether they
are adult migrants is unclear.The Workhouse website gives an indication on its
page, Pauper
Migration, on the movement of the unemployed from these poor areas to
where there was work in the Industrial North. Many apprentices at the mill had also come from
Workhouses, but burial records show that Litton Mill had not had apprentices
since 1818 with Needham's (second) apprentice house, built in 1794, being seized
by Needham's creditors in 1817 and pulled down shortly after that.
See note here. Cressbrook Mill however, had apprentices until 1837
and it is likely that these women in the 20 to 25 year old category are
ex-apprentices from there.
A
transcript from the 1841 census is shown here and a full list of all the 20 year
old Irish women in the immediate area (there were barely any males) is here.
Much has been written about the cruelty and
poor working conditions at Litton Mill in particular with reference to
apprentice deaths. Much of the evidence against Litton Mill stems from the book
"A Memoir of Robert Blincoe". The book contains great detail of the punishment
and suffering Blincoe, and others, experienced whilst at Litton Mill. For
example ...
"Palfrey, the Smith, had the task of riveting irons
upon any of the apprentices, whom the masters ordered, and those were much like
the irons usually put upon felons. Even young
women, if suspected of intending to run away, had irons riveted on their ankles,
and reaching by long links and rings up to the hips, and in these they were
compelled to walk to and from the mill to work and to sleep. Blincoe asserts, he
has known many girls served in this manner. A handsome-looking girl, about the
age of twenty years, who came from the neighbourhood of Cromford, whose name was
Phebe Rag, being driven to desperation by ill-treatment, took
the opportunity, one dinner-time, when she was alone, and when she sup-posed no
one saw her, to take off her shoes and throw herself into the dam, at the end of
the bridge, next the apprentice house. Someone passing along, and seeing: a pair
of shoes, stopped. The poor girl had sunk once, and just as she rose above the
water he seized her by the hair. Blincoe thinks it was Thomas Fox, the governor,
who succeeded Milner, who rescued her. She was nearly gone, and it was with some
difficulty her life was saved. When Mr. Needham heard of this, and being afraid
the example might be contagious, he ordered James Durant [Note Durant was shown
living Littonslack in 1811 and 1813], a journeyman-spinner who had been
apprenticed there, to take her away to her relations at Cromford, and thus she
escaped."
The book may be truthful, but it has also
received criticism as being written primarily for the campaign for factory
legislation.
Unsurprisingly Littonslack has connections with this
suffering. Robert Woodward (an overlooker at the mill) lived at Littonslack (he
has 2 children whilst living there in 1804 and 1807). Robert Woodward was one of
the villains cited many times in the Blincoe Memoir ...
"Robert Woodward
once kicked and beat Robert Blincoe, till his body was covered with wheals and
bruises. Being tired, or desirous of affording his young master the luxury of
amusing himself on the same subject, he took Blincoe to the counting-house, and
accused him of wilfully spoiling his work. Without waiting to hear what Blincoe,
might to have to urge in his defence, young Needham eagerly looked about for a
stick; not finding one at hand, he sent Woodward to an adjacent coppice called
the Twitchell, to cut a supply, and laughingly made Blincoe strip naked, and
prepare himself for a good flanking. "
Also William Mace, who lived at Littonslack, was
buried in 1811. Normally the register show basic information. However on this
occasion the registrar added a small comment . The entry read "William Mace of
Litton Mill Slack; killed yesterday at Litton Cotton Mill".
Who built the cottages?
In 1817 Ellis Needham’s Estate
(of Litton Mill) was being sold “to prevent any further Burdens being brought
upon the said township”.
A
document found in the DCRO (see here for
full version) and shown in part here contains the following....
“…the Assignees
have determined to sell the same no other ways then to gather with a Close or
parcel of inclosed land containing about 4 Acres with ten dwelling Houses
erected thereon a small Estate of the said Ellis Needham within the lyberty of
Litton in the said County which hee bought of Richard Arkwright Esq together
with all Buildings since and now erected thereon.”
The
paragraph above implies that these cottages are pre-existing and not “since …
erected”. That is that they were sold to Ellis Needham by Richard Arkwright. The
cottages are unlikey to be any other than Littonslack and at this time, apart
from the apprentice house, there was little accommodation at Litton Mill (the
1841 census shows just 3 dwellings)..
So could the cottages have been
built by Richard Arkwright - perhaps when he was speculating and investing in
land along the rivers Wye and Derwent? Arkwright was initially at least
interested in this area and built the original Cressbrook Mill in
1785.
The urgency by the local parishes of Litton and Tideswell to
resolve this matter is driven by the potential burden that the parish's gain. If
Needham's apprentices were turned out of the mill, then they did not return to
their original Workhouses but automatically became the responsibility of the
local parish. With Needham's apprentice house being built on the Taddington side
of the river, the concern of the Taddington parish is understandable. A second
document see here shows that the
apprentice house had by this time been pulled down and the stone
sold. So... that's it so far ... well the
interesting bits anyway ... there is much more to know ... so if you know
ANYTHING ... please drop me a note at
"A
Memoir of Robert Blincoe" ... usually available secondhand from ABE Books this was reprinted in 1977
by Caliban Books also ..."The Real Oliver Twist" (available new and
secondhand). This book reprints substantial parts of the older Blincoe book and
argues that the Blincoe memoir was the inspiration for Dickens' Oliver
Twist.
For an excellent work on the history
of Cressbrook and Litton Mils, see M. H. MacKenzie ‘Cressbrook and Litton Mills,
1779-1835. part 1’, Derbyshire Archaeological
Journal, 88 (1968): 8-14; M. H. MacKenzie,
‘Cressbrook Mill, 1810-1835’, Derbyshire
Archaeological Journal, 90 (1970):
Mill
Connections
Who built the cottages?