Illustrated History of Mill Bank

Mill Bank is a hill-top village between Sowerby Bridge and Ripponden, above Triangle. It is around 500 feet above sea level. The village has a colourful and dramatic history associated with the textile industry. It is situated on an ancient highway which was a main thoroughfare between Lancashire and Yorkshire for many centuries.

From a flourishing community in 1900, the unexpected closure of the local mill at Kebroyd threatened the very existence of the community and many homes fell into such disrepair that most of the village was scheduled for demolition in the 1960s. Saved by local residents, it was eventually awarded the status of a Conservation Area in the 1970s. Following this, the village entered another period of growing prosperity.

Severhills Beck joins the Lum Beck through a culvert twenty metres from the Bridge. These streams have played an important part in the development of the village, supplying water to power the mills. Before the Industrial Revolution there was a fording place where the bridge is now, for people crossing between the Sowerby and Soyland uplands.

This map by W. Crump (1928) shows Roman roads in the area and a road between Sowerby Bridge and Lancashire, following the ancient highway through Mill Bank. Foxen Lane gets its name from the Latin of the time (Fosse = Ditch).

This is Lower Mill Bank Road which leads down to the beck, taken in the 1970s.

Mill Bank’s cobbled snickets and Nathan Lane join the upper and lower roads. Foxen Lane can be seen in the background of this photo taken in 1989.

The Feudal system was harsh under the ruling Lords, who used the area as hunting grounds, but by the 14th century the cottage-based woollen industry was flourishing and the forested uplands were mainly cleared.

People were obliged by law to use the Lord’s mill but other people were building mills to undertake fulling (felting) of cloth.

The left hand part of Sauterhouse Farm, at the Triangle end of the village was built in the 16th century.

Michael Foxcroft, who had Manorial Rights in 1621, took local farmer/clothiers to court for not using his mill but significantly the crofters won.

Following this judgement, many new mills were built and people were free to develop their textile businesses. Michael Foxcroft built Lane End at Soyland and owned many local mills and properties.

For centuries pack-horses would have been a common sight trudging up and down the hills through Mill Bank, carrying woollen cloth. Samuel Hill kept 40 pack horses at Making Place and built Clapgate Lane, an Occupational Road, to link Foxen Lane with Kebroyd Mills. He operated his successful ‘internal market’ transporting his fabrics between Kebroyd Mills and other operational centres that he owned. He exported his cloth as far away as Denmark, Austria and Russia.
This image is a close-up from Hazel Whiteley’s hand-drawn map of the 1970s.

Here is a list of properties that Samuel Hill owned, in his own handwriting, along with his valuation at the time, including many properties in Mill Bank.

Samuel employed hundreds of people and built many properties for his workers including cottages at Damside, Aufhole, Sawhill , Severhills, Spoutfield, Rawson, Knowsley, Lower Oak and The Dene.

Samuel built Kebroyd Hall for his son Richard and appointed him manager at Kebroyd Mills. Unfortunately, Richard did not follow in his father’s footsteps. He fell in love with Ann Wilde, a servant at Making Place, and was not very attentive to his work. Samuel opposed this relationship and fired Ann, so Richard employed her as his housekeeper. Samuel claimed that John Collier had more sense in his little finger than his son had in his head. Samuel disinherited Richard and left his vast fortune to Richard and Ann’s daughter Betty. She died young and eventually the trustees of the estate sold off the estate as parcels of land.
Thanks to Ann Kirker for this part of the story.

The first half of the Industrial Revolution from 1750 to 1850 forced the farmer/clothiers out of their homes and into the mills. There were 26 mills in the Ryburn valley, seven of them within walking distance of Mill Bank. The pollution in the valley was very unhealthy so Mill Bank, up on the hillside, was a relatively pleasant place to live. In Ripponden the average life expectancy in 1850 was 40 for men and 43 for women.
Thanks to Julian Carr for this photograph.

During the second half of the Industrial Revolution from 1850 to 1950 Acts of Parliament were passed to improve the conditions for mill workers. The 1847 Factory Acts restricted working hours for women and children to no more than 58 hours per week or 10 hours a day. This was a time of expansion in Mill Bank and many cottages and the Victorian terraces were built at this time.

This photo was taken in 1957, bottom right shows the end wall of the Aufhole cottages demolished in the 1960s.

Until well into the 20th century people had large families and many children died from disease. Tuberculosis killed one quarter of the population every year. Mill Bank cottages were small and often three generations of a family would live in a one bedroom cottage.
Drawing by Elspeth Walker.

Because living space was so limited men would spend much of their leisure time in the seven pubs or beer houses in the village. The New Delight can be seen in this photo beside the school. Today it is a car park.

The Alma Inn at Cottonstones is the only pub in the Mill Bank area today (2023).

After it ceased fabric production, Lower Lum Mill became a factory for rendering bones to make baking powder and gelatine. The smell was appalling.

Lilywhite’s Postcard factory then took it over and thanks to them we have good photographic records of the area for the first two decades of the 20th century.

A massive fire demolished the building in 1932.

The ruins of Severhills Mill can still be seen through the woods on the Calderdale Way going from the stream towards Wood End.

This photograph was taken in the 1970s.

On the top road there was a travelling packman, a joiner, an ironmonger, a herbalist, a blacksmith, and a wool merchant. This was the first Post Office/shop in Mill Bank, opposite the Chapel with Mr and Mrs Garside at the door.

At Bank View there was a Working Men’s Club on the first floor where a doctor and dentist held surgeries. There was also a fabric outlet in this terrace.

The end cottages were demolished in the 1960s and the village stone was erected on the this site in 2007.

In this corner cottage, half way down Nathan Lane, was a grocer called Nathan Whiteley who gave his name to the Lane. Along Beggartons Row in this photo there was a cobbler, a clogger and a chemist.

Mains services such as water and electricity were late coming to Mill Bank and Cottonstones. This photo shows Margaret’s mother and her Aunt reading by lamp light in the 1950s.

Lum House at Cottonstones behind the trees had the first inside toilet and the first television in the area. Mr Ellis, who was a baker, lived here with his family. This is a Lilywhite’s postcard from the 1920s. Lower Lum Mill can be seen in the background.

Also at Cottonstones there was a monumental mason and a wheelwright. Later in the 1960s/70s Mr Ellis renovated bubble cars at Lum House.

Mr Smith, seen here with his wife, was the village ‘knocker-upper’. He would go round with a long pole and knock on people’s windows to wake them in the morning. He was also the village lamp-lighter.

In 1947 there was a cloudburst on the tops and the flood coming down Lum Beck severely damaged the road and the cottages at Cottonstones. Mrs Phoebe Brown was swept away and drowned by the flood and her body was found in the River Calder in Wakefield a month later.

This was Annie Cartwright, who was Hazel Whiteley’s Grandmother. She came to Mill Bank in 1910 with seven of her seventeen children and her second husband Harry Marklew, who worked at Stansfield Mill, Triangle.

In this photo Annie and Harry Cartwright are in a charabanc, off to Sowerby Bridge to celebrate the end of World War I in 1918.

The Hadwens built a fourth mill at Kebroyd and employed 500 people, most of whom lived in Mill Bank. There were over twice the number of people living in the village in 1850, compared to about 250 in 2022.

The Hadwens were regarded as good employers. Ellen and Eliza Hadwen funded a Dame School for workers’ children at Aufhole Farm, and left money in their wills to build St. Mary’s Church at Cottonstones and St. Mary’s School in Mill Bank.

Here is a photograph of St. Mary’s pupils in the street about 1910.

The Wesleyan Chapel was first situated in the corner of the Wesleyan graveyard, before the present building was constructed along with a Sunday school. The chapel closed in the 1960s and both buildings are now private dwellings.

In 1900 the chapel and church were well attended. The photograph shows Mr Alderson at the door. He was the chapel organist. Handel’s Messiah was performed every year and the village had a brass band as well.

Frederick Hadwen, John’s grandson, built a stage at Kebroyd Mill. Here he put on plays and dances for the rich people of the area. On entertainment evenings carriages stretched from Kebroyd to Triangle on the main road.

Mrs Hadwen and her daughters also held coffee mornings for ladies of the village and Whitsun was a festive time for the mill workers. There would be a parade with village children all dressed up, from St. Mary’s Church to The Dene, where the Hadwens would hold a tea party.

In 1900 Frederick Hadwen had a medal struck to celebrate 100 years of Hadwen ownership of Kebroyd Mills. These were distributed to all mill workers.

In December 1902 there was a huge fire at Kebroyd Mills which demolished the main buildings. Miraculously, a Bible was found unharmed by the flames in a cupboard. The Bishop of Wakefield came to see it, and it is now in a display cabinet in St. Mary’s Church along with an order book and keys to the old mill.

Many families moved away to find work. Some found employment at other local mills but over the next 60 years the village slid into a state of decay through neglect.

By 1950 there were squatters in some properties and there was still no electricity, mains water or drainage. Rents were low and bad debtors were sent from Halifax to Mill Bank. Residents complained to the Rural Council and without consultation the Council started demolishing the most dilapidated cottages.

This photo shows cottages on Lower Mill Bank Road in the 1960s just before they were demolished. This space is now a car park.

The Action Group fought on under the leadership of the Halls until Mill Bank was recognised as a Conservation Area in 1976.

The Anchor Inn became a well known restaurant in the 1990s but is now a private residence. In the 1970s Brian Highley, the landlord, brought a shipwrecked anchor from Hull as his Inn sign. It was the heaviest pub sign in the UK until it fell in a gale. Brian was bankrupted after he ran a music festival at Norland, which was ‘washed out’ by the weather.

In 1960 the M62 opened, linking Manchester and Leeds. This made Mill Bank accessible to city commuters. As new money arrived in the village there was steady modernisation to dwellings and many cottages were knocked through to create larger living spaces.

Mill Bank entered the Yorkshire in Bloom competition and by 2016 Mill Bank was declared ‘Best Small Village in Yorkshire’. This photograph is of St. Mary’s pupils, staff and volunteers who helped plant over 2000 bulbs as part of the Yorkshire in Bloom competition.

As a result of the Tour de France, better internet communication became available in Mill Bank and when Covid struck in 2020 villagers benefitted from more on line communications including a WhatsApp group which has had a significant impact on bringing people together and recreating a vibrant community.

Other events have become regular features of life in Mill Bank such as Christmas Carols and a Christmas street market. St. Mary’s School also holds an Owl Hunt event in the summer.

A Book Group holds regular monthly meetings and film nights and a History Group undertakes ongoing research into village life.