Cockersdale watercourses and mills

[The Parksider]

Jim and Tilly's efforts have been so impressive that I felt it was best to just continue the thread rather than start a "Troydale" one.In the steps of Jim and Tilly I started at the Union Bridge Mill, now a refurbished set of smart flats, with the mill sat close to the cascading beck ripe for water power whether from beck direct or timber launder coming on from above - only an expert could say?Tramping down Troydale first up is the aforepictured "upper Mill" that is now a scrap yard with the gable ends of the old mills still stood on the re-inforced stream banks. No evidence at all of a mill race or wheel in the beck power feed. led to several days confusion before it became abvious that this mill probably was a later mill that used steam power (why not - plenty of coal around) The possible presence of engine beds within the old buildings could confirm, but the mill is a scrap yard and as such is guarded by a rotweiler that would not make any discernible discrimination between a traveller or a secret leedser!!Below the upper mill is a fime "weir" whose purpose seems to be not to speed the beck, but to hold it up such that it can enter a race down to Farnley Mill. The old race can be traced as rather boggy land in which bluebells are keen to anchor themselves, but no distinct channel or mill pond is any longer in evidence.At the mill a couple of sections remain to sell granite worktops, with the real impressive structure being the mill owners (or is it managers) grand house. These exist upstream for Union Bridge and Upper Mills!!On down toward pudsey hough side and well before the Hough corn mill the beck takes a right angle turm whereupon a mill race can de clearly seen (again bluebell bulb ridden) going straight on with the curve of post hill hillside toward the mill site.These races no longer have any depth to them but are discernible as shallow ditches with different vegatation (possibly from being clay lined?? I dunno?? - were they stone walled even??) but you can see them...... As an aside checking with old maps the take off are after the mill race is marked as having the "site of a dutch dam" I felt confident that the world wide web would define what this was, but alas no. The modern oxford english does not even contain the word "goit"...which is what we are generally talking about here....Anyhowse I approached from the Hough end initially and on parking up and entering the pathway quickly came upon dressed stone and brick rubble grown over the mill (I dumbly presumed?)Some soul/map searching along the lines of how would Grumpytramp look at this I eventually concluded this debris belonged to the Park Spring Quarry infill which had spilled over the site of Hough Corn Mill and thus nothing remains of it to be seen....Don't get the idea the "corn mill" new build on the roundabout is anything to do with Hough Mill. This is in memorium to an eighth (??) mill along the once VERY productive Cockerstroy Dale!!

[tilly]

The Parksider wrote: Jim and Tilly's efforts have been so impressive that I felt it was best to just continue the thread rather than start a "Troydale" one.In the steps of Jim and Tilly I started at the Union Bridge Mill, now a refurbished set of smart flats, with the mill sat close to the cascading beck ripe for water power whether from beck direct or timber launder coming on from above - only an expert could say?Tramping down Troydale first up is the aforepictured "upper Mill" that is now a scrap yard with the gable ends of the old mills still stood on the re-inforced stream banks. No evidence at all of a mill race or wheel in the beck power feed. led to several days confusion before it became abvious that this mill probably was a later mill that used steam power (why not - plenty of coal around) The possible presence of engine beds within the old buildings could confirm, but the mill is a scrap yard and as such is guarded by a rotweiler that would not make any discernible discrimination between a traveller or a secret leedser!!Below the upper mill is a fime "weir" whose purpose seems to be not to speed the beck, but to hold it up such that it can enter a race down to Farnley Mill. The old race can be traced as rather boggy land in which bluebells are keen to anchor themselves, but no distinct channel or mill pond is any longer in evidence.At the mill a couple of sections remain to sell granite worktops, with the real impressive structure being the mill owners (or is it managers) grand house. These exist upstream for Union Bridge and Upper Mills!!On down toward pudsey hough side and well before the Hough corn mill the beck takes a right angle turm whereupon a mill race can de clearly seen (again bluebell bulb ridden) going straight on with the curve of post hill hillside toward the mill site.These races no longer have any depth to them but are discernible as shallow ditches with different vegatation (possibly from being clay lined?? I dunno?? - were they stone walled even??) but you can see them...... As an aside checking with old maps the take off are after the mill race is marked as having the "site of a dutch dam" I felt confident that the world wide web would define what this was, but alas no. The modern oxford english does not even contain the word "goit"...which is what we are generally talking about here....Anyhowse I approached from the Hough end initially and on parking up and entering the pathway quickly came upon dressed stone and brick rubble grown over the mill (I dumbly presumed?)Some soul/map searching along the lines of how would Grumpytramp look at this I eventually concluded this debris belonged to the Park Spring Quarry infill which had spilled over the site of Hough Corn Mill and thus nothing remains of it to be seen....Don't get the idea the "corn mill" new build on the roundabout is anything to do with Hough Mill. This is in memorium to an eighth (??) mill along the once VERY productive Cockerstroy Dale!! Great stuff Parksider how about comeing along with Jim and i on our next trip im sure Jim will be up for it.At the moment i am grandaughter sitting so it would have to be after the school hols but the offer is there.    

[tilly]

Sorry Parksider but my reply has joined the bottom of yours. (I've added a couple of breaks to seperate them for you. Chameleon)

[grumpytramp]

As soon as I get a few moments to catch up on outstanding posts elsewhere at SL I have a few interesting comments about this area but for moment I have just a few moments to hopefully help Parkie a wee bit with his www dilemma The Parksider wrote: ...... As an aside checking with old maps the take off are after the mill race is marked as having the "site of a dutch dam" I felt confident that the world wide web would define what this was, but alas no. In the first instance, I think (though am not 100% certain) that the word dam in the context of retaining water by a barrier originates from medival Dutch diallects. By way of example if you translate the short sentence "We will build a DAM to hold the water" to dutch it will read:"Wij zullen een DAM bouwen om het water te houden"and no I do not speak dutch! .......... just rely on the good services of Yahoo's babelfish service http://uk.babelfish.yahoo.com/I wonder if this is a phrase adopted to describe weirs created specifically to feed water through leats to mills; perhaps a product of early influence of flemmish river and water engineers worjing in late medival England (the paralell that immediately jumps to mind is the Dutch River which was constructed to divert the River Don from feeding into the River Aire, to feed directly in to the Humber at Goole by the Dutch engineer Vermuyden in the 17th Century)    

[grumpytramp]

I had a quick word with one of my colleagues this morning, who has a great deal of river and coastel engineering experience and he has informed me that in todays parlance a "Dutch Dam" is a demountable temporary barrier typically used for flood defence systems and pointed by way of example to http://www.dutchdam.nl/index.php?land=enHe is of the opinion, that traditionally the "Dutch Dam" was a temporary construction using timber, fabric and puddle clay.Not sure if that helps?

[tilly]

tilly wrote: Sorry Parksider but my reply has joined the bottom of yours. (I've added a couple of breaks to seperate them for you. Chameleon) Many thanks for that Chameleon im still getting my head around my wind up gramophone so no chance with this new fancy thing.lol

[Si]

tilly wrote: tilly wrote: Sorry Parksider but my reply has joined the bottom of yours. (I've added a couple of breaks to seperate them for you. Chameleon) Many thanks for that Chameleon im still getting my head around my wind up gramophone so no chance with this new fancy thing.lol There was a "t" missing from the last square-bracketed quote box. When I added it, the post resumed it's normal format. Hope you don't mind!Si.

[The Parksider]

grumpytramp wrote: I wonder if this is a phrase adopted to describe weirs created specifically to feed water through leats to mills; perhaps a product of early influence of flemmish river and water engineers worjing in late medival England (the paralell that immediately jumps to mind is the Dutch River which was constructed to divert the River Don from feeding into the River Aire, to feed directly in to the Humber at Goole by the Dutch engineer Vermuyden in the 17th Century)     I'll go for that!!! ceratainly at upper mill the weir is designed to hold back the water to a level where it primarily diverts down the mill race, goit. leat (or whatever it should be technically termed) to Farnley Mill.No sign of the same at the Hough Corn Mill today but could have been one early in the mills life of a "temporary" design such that the 1854 map deigned it to be the site of an antiquity!!

[jim]

Just got back from another walk up Cockersdale with Si and his brother.( Tilly was invited but wasn't able to make this one ) We managed to locate two more probable mill/leat sites, and lots of fresh knowledge and detail on the the sites previously looked at.I'm leaving it to Si to fill in the detail, a fresh approach after my previous meanderings won't come amiss but I must thank Si and his bro for the good company and transport.

[Si]

jim wrote: Just got back from another walk up Cockersdale with Si and his brother.( Tilly was invited but wasn't able to make this one ) We managed to locate two more probable mill/leat sites, and lots of fresh knowledge and detail on the the sites previously looked at.I'm leaving it to Si to fill in the detail, a fresh approach after my previous meanderings won't come amiss but I must thank Si and his bro for the good company and transport. Hi Jim!Full report and photos to come tomorrow!Watch this space...PS Had a lovely day out in the sun. Thanks Jim.