Header Picture

The header picture is one of a collection I will be showing of the train on route to Garforth in the early twentieth century. Although a PhotoShopped Image, I believe it gives a good idea of how the train would have looked if you were in the vicinity. The train is shown at the Light Arch, not the Dark Arch!

Recent Snippets of Information

Barnbow, the residence of the Gascoigne Family before Parlington.

An article from the Leeds Mercury dated February 4th 1888 sets out the fact that houses in the county of Yorkshire were recorded in the Ordnanace Survey where a date of establishment was indicated.

A "W.P.B." of London wrote:- I believe it is not generally known that the surveyors for the Ordnance survey maps (6in. scale) made notes of dated houses. This does not appear to have been done systematically, more's the pity, but according to the taste of the officer in charge of the surveying party. some officers seem to have kept a look out for dates; others have evidently taken no notice of them. However, there are a good many recorded altogether, and we must be thaknful for small mercies. I send a list of those houses in the West Riding noted in the maps as having dates. The survey was made in 1845-50, and time and the modern "improver" (so-called) have already between them removed some of those dates to my own knowledge, and I fear many others also must be lost.

I think it would be very desirable to place on record at once all dates on houses earlier than the present century. Yorkshire is especially rich in such. In almost every town and village you may see houses with dates on them, many of them seventeenth century. I feel sure that there are very few readers of the Weekly Supplement who could not contribute to such a list, and I sincerely hope it will be taken up.

A list of some forty-eight houses were scheduled by the writer as having been recorded by a Captain Tucker, he continued ...to whom great praise is due for thus rescuing these interesting facts from the chance of oblivion.

Map No. 204 Barnbow Hall Date 1677

No mention is made of Parlngton Hall, despite the fact that it had been acquired by the Gascoignes in 1545, the earliest in the list was Hazelwood Hall (Castle) dated 1286 also map 204. Another old property listed is Kiddall Hall 1400 again on map 204.

Benchmarks

The previous paragraphs draw a similarity to a more recent practice of the Ordnanace Survey; that is the disbandonment of the benchmark system sited on prominent structures all across the UK, in favour of a satellite based system. There is one such benchmark on the eastern end of the Dark Arch, on the facing archway on the northern side, about eighteen inches above the ground level. If we run out of power we may come to regret this practice!

Duel 1807

(From The Hull Packet (Yorkshire, England),Tuesday, June 9, 1807) A duel took place on Monday morning last, a few miles from York, between Mr. Mellish and the Hon. Martin Hawke, in which Mr Mellish was wounded, but it is understood not dangerously. They are both in the interest of Lord Milton. - Sir Thomas Gascoigne's son [Tom, later killed in a riding accident see here] was second to Mr Hawke; and Mr. Lee to Mr. Mellish.

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