SecretLeeds - History, culture and architecture in Leeds

After following a couple of threads and passing messages to Leeds Lass, a thought comes to mind. An area of Tinshill is named Silk Mill... whatever. Does this mean that some of the mills on Low Lane were in actual fact Silk Mills? Always wondered about that one.

Hi again Letty. I "think" there were silk mills there, but don't know for sure. Most of these places get their names from past industries, so it could well have been.

Hiya LeedslassHow are you?thought there might have been someone else who knew! I guess some who come on here seem to be either tunnellers, ghost hunters or trainspotters!I've noticed Leeds seem to have been quite good at naming areas after local industry.

An old neighbour of mine, whose family had lived in Horsforth since Victorian times, told me about a soap factory on Low Lane. She never mentioned a silk mill

There was a dyeworks and finishers down the works road from the soap works, and there was a bleachworks somewhere around there too. The area around the stream at the bottom had a particular smell to it from those works.I remember that the dyeworks was a large place and in the early 1960's it also had a water wheel.

Yes there was a silk mill and various other mills all the way down the valley of Moseley beck and low lane/woodside.......Some still there some gone.Drop in at the PO on station road and get the local history book on the valley's industries. Don't forget Horsforth museum.At the top of the valley was a bleachworks and it is still there - in poor condition. The track it is on runs over the Leeds/Harrogate line and passes moseley farm on it's way to cookridge.

Hopefully the above pic is of the Silk Mill. Parksider is right. The best source of info is local history books. The history of the Silk Mill is covered in Horsforth History Guides No. 3, Woodside and its Industries.Publisher Horsforth Village Publications, written byAlastair Lawrence, ISBN 0 947904 02 6.

I live on silk mill approch, and just short walk through the woods there are large pits which i think may have been used for dying silk. its now all over grown and the fence around it has droped to bits. i will do some investigating for information.. Wilko.

That picture is of the Springwell works, which was a dyers and finishers, at least in its later years. I have a postcard of that place somewhere.

I almost forgot, there did used to be a couple of mills on Troy Road, one just around the corner from Station Road, there was a fruit and veg wholesalers almost in the shadow of the railway brrdige and Troy Mill was the next place down, and there was another cloth mill about 200 yards further along the road.Both of them did worsteds, I remember the signs on the entrances.Somewhere in the low ground between the rwailway and Troy Road I think there was also a mill pond too.The Springwell mill is long gone, but the mill pond still appears to be there.