Hanley in 1872

HANLEY, a town, a township, three chapelries, and a sub-district, in Stoke-upon-Trent district, Stafford. The town stands on the North Stafford railway, and on the Grand Trunk canal, 1 mile NE of Stoke-upon-Trent. It is a prominent one of the pottery towns; it includes all Hanley township and most of Shelton township; it was made a municipal borough in 1857, under a mayor, five aldermen, and twenty-four councillors; it acquired further rights of market trust, in 1863, under lease from the lord of the manor; and it forms part of the parliamentary borough of Stoke-upon-Trent. It has recently undergone very great increase; it has wide streets, paved with brick; it contains shops almost equal to many in the best parts of London; it makes a good display of public buildings; it possesses everything requisite for the current wants of its own inhabitants and of a very populous neighbourhood; and yet it partakes fully in the smoke and stir and general unpleasantness of the pottery region.

The town-hall is a stone edifice, built at a cost of £4,500; and contains assembly and news rooms. The markets have covered areas for meat, fish, and vegetables. The mechanics' institute was built in 1861, at a cost of £3,000. The North Staffordshire museum, in Frederick-street, has a good library and reading-room. The North Staffordshire infirmary, in Shelton, is a large edifice, maintained by subscription, for the use of all the pottery region. The government school of design, in Pall-Mall, was instituted in 1847. There are five national schools; and that for Wellington is a Gothic building of 1862. There are also a theatre, an inland revenue office, and other public buildings. 

One of the churches is a brick structure of 1788, with a tower; and another is a handsome edifice of 1834, at a cost of £11,000, with a tower 120 feet high. There are chapels for Independents, Baptists, Presbyterians, Wesleyans. Primitive Methodists, U. Free Methodists, and New Connexion Methodists; and several of these are spacious edifices; while one of them, called Bethesda chapel, in Albion-street, is so large as to accommodate 3,000 persons, and was repaired and decorated in 1862. A new cemetery was opened in 1860. The town has a post-office under Stoke-upon-Trent, two railway stations, two banking-offices, and several good inns; is a seat of county courts and petty sessions, and a polling-place; publishes a weekly newspaper; and is well supplied with water. Markets are held on Wednesdays and Saturdays; cattle markets on the second Tuesday of every month; and a hiring fair on 11 Nov.

A great trade is earned on in the manufacture of china and earthenware; a very great trade also, and an increasing one, in iron-smelting; and the general industry is both employed and stimulated by great abundance, all around, of coal and ironstone. Pop., of the town, in 1861, 31,953. Houses, 6,322. The township, though all included in the town, is partly rural. Real property, £43,222; of which £2,000 are in mines. Pop., in 1851, 10,573; in 1861, 14,678. Houses, 2,900.

The three chapelries are Hanley-proper, Northwood, and Wellington, or Hanley-St. Luke. The first is of old date; and the other two were constituted in 1845. The living of all are perpetual curacies in the diocese of Lichfield. Value of Hanley, £289; of Northwood, £150; of Wellington, £180. Patrons of the first, Trustees; of the other two, alternately the Crown and the Bishop. There are also three benefices in Shelton, Shelton-proper, Etruria, and Hope. The sub-district excludes Shelton, and consists of Hanley township and Bucknall-cum-Bagnall chapelry. Pop., 16,848. Houses, 3,308. 

An 1872 Gazetteer description of the following places in Hanley is to be found on a supplementary page.

• Hope
• Etruria
• Shelton

[Description(s) from The Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72) - Transcribed by Mike Harbach ©2020]