Halliwell

HALLIWELL, a village, a township, two chapelries, and a sub-district, in Deane parish, and Bolton district, Lancashire. The village stands 2 miles WNW of Bolton town and r. station; is a pleasant place; and has a postoffice under Bolton. The township comprises 2,320 acres. Real property, £23, 939; of which £320 are in mines, and £84 in quarries. Pop. in 1851, 1,959; in 1861, 1,953. Houses, 1,132. The increase of pop. arose from the erection of cotton mills. The property is much subdivided. The manor belonged formerly to the Radcliffes, the Bartons, the Fauconbergs, and the Byroms; and belongs now to the Ainsworths. Smithill's hall is the seat of Peter Ainsworth, Esq.; stands beside a lovely glen; and has, near the dining room, a natural discoloration resembling a human footprint, fabled to have been impressed, in 1555, by George Marsh, the martyr. The township is named from an ancient holy well; it has fine views; and it contains great bleach works and fourteen large cotton mills. The two chapelries are St. Paul and St. Peter; the former constituted in 1848, the latter in 1840, and both made ecclesiastically parochial in 1860. Pop. in 1861, 2,712 and 3,241. Houses, 527 and 605. Pop. of St. Peter in 1865, , 350. The livings are vicarages in the diocese of Manchester. Value, £180 and £200. Patron of St. Paul, R. H. Ainsworth, Esq.; of St. Peter, Trustees. The church of St. Paul was built in 1848; and that of St. Peter was built in 1838, rebuilt in 1844, is in the early English style, and has a tower. There are a donative chapel connected with Smithill's hall, three Wesleyan chapels, three working men's institutes, national schools, and a structure called the DeaneMill school, built at a cost of upwards of £1,000, and including free school, lecture room, and library. The subdistrict includes also the township of Heaton. Acres, 3,950. Pop., 6,908. Houses, 1,312.

John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72)