NOTES ON THE PARISH CHURCH OF ST. WILFRED, STANDISH By William Frederick Price WRAPT Read 17th November 1904 INTRODUCTION. RAPT in the mist of unwritten history there is some tradition that long before the coming of the Normans, Standish was a fortified station or camp of some importance. Lying, as it does, on an elevated plateau 370 feet above sealevel, on the direct route of the Roman road between Wigan and Walton-le-Dale, there may be some truth in the tradition. The fact that the Romans were acquainted with the use of coal is now fully established, and so great an authority on mining as Professor Hull considers there is good evidence that they discovered and worked the Arley seam which crops out along the banks of the river Douglas between Standish and Wigan. Years ago, while driving a tunnel to divert the course of the river, this coal seam of 6 feet in thickness was found to have been mined in a manner hitherto altogether unknown. "It was excavated into a series of polygonal chambers, with vertical walls opening into each other by short passages, and, on the whole, presenting on a ground plan something of the appearance of a honeycomb. The chambers were regular in size and form, and were altogether different from anything within the experience of the miners of the district; there is some thing in the symmetrical arrangement and regularity of the works peculiarly Roman, reminding one of their tesselated pavements."-The Coalfields of Great Britain, pp. 12–13, Edward Hull, B.A., 1861. Other traces of Roman occupation were found at Standish in the seventeenth century in the shape of a Roman hoard of about 200 denarii (Domitian to Gordianus) and two gold rings. Although the Romans mined coal and other minerals in this Island during their occupation, it was not until the beginning of the fourteenth century that we find documentary evidence of the leasing of land for the purpose of coal mining in various parts of England and Wales. In the series of "Charters and Deeds relative to the Standish family of Standish and Duxbury" there is a lease dealing with land in Shevington in the parish of Standish, in which mention is made of "Fyrston (fire stone) and "Secole" (sea-coal): the date of this deed is 1350. Possibly the early discovery of that valuable mineral, here called "fire stone," may have some connection with the etymology of the word Standish, for in charters of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the spelling most frequently found is Stanedis or Stanesdis, and at a later date it becomes Stanesdich and Standyshe. Before the development and working of the Standish coal seams the inhabitants of the parish were employed in the weaving of cotton and silk by hand loom; several of these old hand looms were at work in Standish so late as 1860-5. While rummaging among old documents at the Diocesan Registry at Chester for material for these notes, a list of recusants of the parish of Standish was found for the year 1706; and out of about eighty male inhabitants, only one is mentioned as following the occupation of collier; the remainder are chiefly described as yeomen, weavers, and labourers. The Parish of Standish comprises ten townships -Standish-cum-Langtree, Shevington, Coppull, Worthington, Adlington, Anderton, Charnock Richard, Heath Charnock, Duxbury, and Welsh Whittle. These ten townships are identical in name with the ten ancient manors into which the district was divided in fourteenth of King John, 1212; and the ten manors were, with the exception of Coppull, held at that date by the family of Bussell, Barons of Penwortham.-Lancashire Pipe Rolls, W. Farrer. Dealing now only with the township of Standishcum-Langtree, in which the church and village of Standish are situated, it is recorded in the Testa de Nevill (vol. ii. f. 816) that Richard Bussell [11351160] gave two carucates of land in Standish and Langtree to Robert Spileman in marriage with his sister. By a fine levied at Westminster on the Octave of Holy Trinity, 5th June 1206, these two carucates of land were partitioned between Siward de Langtree and Ralph de Standish, Siward taking the carucate of land in Langtree, one moiety of the advowson of the Church of Standish, a moiety of the commonable wood in Standish, and sixteen acres of assarted1 land lying near the said wood; Ralph taking the carucate of land in Standish, the other moiety of the advowson and of the wood, and sixteen acres of assarted land. There is ample evidence in early deeds relating to lands in Standish showing that the township was at one time chiefly wood and waste, for we meet with grants of "house bote" and "fire bote" (wood for repairs and fuel), and common of turbary, with pannage for hogs in the woods of Standish and Langtree. Many disputes took place between the houses of = 1 "Assarted land" woodland which has been cleared and brought into cultivation. |