wayside crosses

Maiden Cross, Mereclough, Burnley, Lancashire

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Cross (replaced): OS Grid Reference – SD 8936 2883

Archaeology & History

Highlighted on the 1848 Ordnance Survey map, the original stone ‘cross’ has apparently been moved from its location up against the walling 30-40 yards away and placed by the roadside, just as you’re going into where the windmills are, right at the very crown of the hill, across from the car-park. I’m not so sure it’s the original one to be honest—but I may be wrong. Clifford Byrne (1974) certainly thought this is the original stone. He may be wright. Byrne told that “the Marquis of Colne had a photograph of the stump of the cross in situ,” which would be good to compare. It’s nowt special to look at, but at least the site has been remembered, so to speak.

The Maiden Cross was one in a series of wayside crosses along this ancient high road—known as the Long Causeway—not only marking it out when the snows covered it in the old Winters that we used to get, but also possessing religious importance to travellers. It was first moved sometime in the 19th century and “utilised as a gatepost into Maiden Cross colliery”—itself long gone.

Folklore

The name given to the ‘cross’ comes from a story that’s found at a number of other ‘maiden’ place-names. There may be an element of truth in it. It was told to the great historian and folklorist T.T. Wilkinson by his grandfather in 1766 and, according to him, his grandfather before that! J.A. Waddington (1884) subsequently wrote down the tale that Wilkinson told him:

“During the time of the great rebellion, this was the trysting-place of a young shepherd with his lady love. Often did they meet to pledge their simple vows at this lonely place, until one day a messenger came from Towneley to collect as many young men as he could get to swell the ranks of Rupert when he passed through this part to join the Royal forces at York, a march which ended with the disastrous fight at Marston Moor, on whose bloody sod lay stretched the chivalrous Towneley, and a many of his followers, including this young man, the victims of a tyrannical and ambitious king. For many a long year after this tragical event the poor demented maiden would repair to this hallowed spot, repeating with a sorrowful voice his promise to return.”

This was curiously described by Ormerod (1906) as “a pathetic tradition”! He much preferred the simple idea of this (and the other crosses along the road) as merely serving “the capacity of guideposts to the traveller (overtaken in a mist or by the swiftly lowering shades of light) who might be traversing these lonely roads”, as Waddington put it. Ormerod cited a conversation he had with “an old road mender” which for him confirmed the idea:

“Asked if he had heard what was the object of these crosses, he said, that “Joonas Lee said as they were put up 250 yer sin, for guideposts for’t pack horses, between Halifax and Brunshaw” (Burnley), adding, as if to give more weight to the authority he had quoted: “An he wur a far larned chap wur Joonas—he wur a preycher.”’

Walter Bennett (1941) meanwhile, thought its name derived from the Virgin Mary and this cross, at least, possessed religious importance.

References:

Bennett, W., The History of Burnley – volume 1, Burnley County Council 1946.
Byrne, Clifford, A Survey of the Ancient Wayside Crosses in North-East Lancashire, privately printed 1974.
Holden, Joshua, A History of Todmorden, Manchester University Press 1912.
Ormerod, T., Calderdale, Lupton Bros: Burnley 1906.
Waddington, J. Arthur, ‘The Crosses in and Around Burnley’, in Transactions Burnley Literary & Scientific Club, volume 1, 1884.

Acknowledgements: Huge thanks for use of the Ordnance Survey map in this site profile, reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.

Byrnand Hall Cross, Knaresborough, North Yorkshire

05/11/202002/05/2023 Paul Hornby

Wayside Cross (Destroyed): OS Grid Reference – SE 3519 5694

Also Known as:

Pastscape ID 53278

Archaeology & History

This long lost Cross could once be seen close to the Tudor era Byrnand Hall, which stood on the north side of the High Street. The Hall was demolished around 1780, and replaced by the present building, which is now a political club. The Cross was taken down around the same time, so we’re very fortunate to have a contemporary sketch.

Harry Speight (1906), the Great Yorkshire antiquarian, described the Cross when he was writing of the ‘big houses’ of Knaresborough, saying:

“Another notable old mansion was Byrnand Hall, which stood at the top of the High Street facing Gracious Street, and was rebuilt about a century ago. It was the property and seat for many generations of one of the leading families of Knaresborough, named Byrnand, one of its members being recorder of York in 1573. Opposite the house stood a very ancient stone cross, consisting of a plain upright column, without date or inscription, supported by several rudely-formed stones placed on three tiers or steps. It appears that one Richard Byrnand paid a fine and was permitted to enclose a cross standing on a piece of waste land then lately belonging to Robert Nessfield. The cross may be conjectured to have been either a memorial or boundary-stone. In those days ” it was not enough,” says the old antiquary, Hearne, ” to have the figure of the cross both on and in churches, chapels, and oratories, but it was put also in church-yards, and in every house, nay, many towns and villages were built in shape of it, and it was very common to fix it in the very streets and highways.

“This ancient relic, the site of which is now marked by a brass cross sunk in the causeway, was in after times called the Byrnand Hall Cross, from its proximity to the house of the same name. It stands on the road equidistant between York and Leeds, being eighteen miles from either place.”

At the end of the eighteenth century, E. Hargrove wrote:

“The (Byrnand) family mansion was situated at the end of the High-street, leading towards York. Near it formerly stood an ancient Cross, which being placed on the outside of the Rampart, and opposite to the entrance into the borough, seems to have been similar in situation, and probably may have been used for the same purpose, as that mentioned by Mr. Pennant, in his History of London, which stood without the city, opposite to Chester Inn; and here, according to the simplicity of the age, in the year 1294, and at other times, the magistrates sat to administer justice. Byrnand-Hall hath been lately rebuilt, by Mr. William Manby, who took down the remains of the old Cross, and left a cruciform stone in the pavement, which will mark the place to future times.”

Abbot J.I. Cummins, writing in the 1920s about the Catholic history of Knaresborough, told:

“Of the Byrnand Cross beyond the old town ditch the site is now marked in York Place by a brass cross let into the pavement for Christians to trample on.”

The Cross occupied an important position in the Knaresborough of old, at one of the highest points of the town by the junction of the modern High Street and Gracious Street, this latter being the road down the hill to the riverside and the troglodytic shrines of St Robert of Knaresborough and Our Lady.

Assuming the eighteenth century drawing is an accurate representation of the Cross, it does give the impression of considerable antiquity, and looks to have been 15-16 feet (4.75m.) high. From its appearance it looks like either a prehistoric monolith or an Anglo-Saxon ‘stapol‘ or column, and if it was the latter, it may have been erected to replace an earlier heathen wooden column or sacred tree following the replacement of the old beliefs by Christianity. If so, there may be no reason to deny Hargrove’s speculation that Byrnand Hall Cross once had a similar juridical function to the Chester Inn Cross in London.

References:

Bintley, Michael D.J., Trees in the Religions of Early Medieval England, Woodbridge, Suffolk, Boydell Press 2015.
Cummins, J.I., “Knaresborough,” in The Ampleforth Journal, Vol XXIV, No II, Spring 1929.
Hargrove, E., The History of the Castle, Town and Forest of Knaresborough, 5th Edition, Knaresborough 1790.
Speight, H., Nidderdale, from Nun Monkton to Whernside, London, Elliot Stock, 1906.

(Note – Knaresborough was at the time in the historic County of the West Riding of Yorkshire)

Bradshaw Cross, Long Lane, Nether Wyresdale, Lancashire.

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Wayside cross: OS Reference – SD 52474 51414

Also Known as :

Historic England Grade II Listed Building No. 1163927

Getting Here

Follow Long Lane northwards from Scorton, over the crossroads at Crosshill Four Lane Ends, and the cross base will be found at the road edge immediately to the right of the driveway of ‘Sandalwood’ on the left hand side of the road.

Archaeology & History

Described in the Historic Buildings listing citation as:

“Cross base, probably mediaeval. A sandstone boulder, roughly rectangular, with rectangular socket.”

‘A sandstone boulder, roughly rectangular’

The base of one of the numerous mediaeval wayside crosses that once adorned this part of Lancashire. So what happened to the cross? It’s possible that it was wilfully destroyed in the early nineteenth century as we have a likely culprit in the person of the Reverend Richard ‘Cross Smasher’ Wilkinson (c.1791 – 1823), Curate of Whitechapel, who took it upon himself to destroy the symbol of his religion wheresoever he could find it.

Immediately to the north west of the Cross is Cross Hill. The cross itself was probably a waymarker on the road over Harrisend Fell from Oakenclough, and Bradshaw may be the name of the locality, there being a Bradshaw Bridge just outside Street to the north west, while the 1846 6-inch OS map records a ‘Bradshaw Smithy’ on the same road.

Note: More has been recorded about Wilkinson in the profile of Stump Cross, near Goosnargh.

Reference:

Taylor, Henry, The Ancient Crosses and Holy Wells of Lancashire, Sherratt and Hughes, Manchester, 1906

Hill Chapel Cross, Goosnargh, Lancashire

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Wayside Cross : OS Grid Reference – SD 57273 38505

Also Known as:

Historic England Monument No. 42648

Getting Here

The Cross base is situated in a thick hedgerow on the east side of Horns Lane, opposite St Francis’ Hill Chapel, just to the north of and on the field side of the electricity transmission line that crosses the road at this point. It can be accessed from the field to the north by crossing the stream. In winter the Cross base is just visible from the road side through the hedge.

Archaeology & History

This cross is not described or noted by Henry Taylor in the 1906 edition of his Ancient Crosses and Holy Wells of Lancashire. All that survives is the substantial socketed base of what is likely to have been a mediaeval cross. It is almost completely hidden in the hedge, and is only accessible for ‘hands-on’ inspection from the field side of the road.

It was described by Historic England as:

‘The socket-stone of a probable wayside cross 1.0m square and 1.5m high…. Its present position in a pasture field suggests that it is not in situ.’

Despite this description, the substantial nature of the base leads me to query why anyone would wish to move it from elsewhere. It is more likely that past land-owners have encroached on to the ancient highway, and fenced it accordingly. Maybe the Hill Chapel congregation will at some consider exposing the base on its hill crest position and insert a replica cross?

There is no record of what happened to the original Cross. According to a pamphlet describing Hill Chapel, “this house appears to have always been in Catholic hands”, but no mention is made of the Cross. A likely culprit for its destruction is the early nineteenth century Protestant fundamentalist the Reverend Richard Wilkinson.

In view of the continuity of Catholic ownership and worship at the Hill Chapel site over the road since before the Reformation, and the sustained persecution suffered by local Catholics in the centuries following the Reformation, it is very unlikely that they would have drawn attention to themselves by erecting the Cross, making it almost certainly of pre-Reformation construction.

Reference:

Anonymous, Hill Chapel Goosnargh, privately published pamphlet available from Hill Chapel, n.d..

Boskenna Cross, St Buryan, Cornwall

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Wayside Cross: OS Grid Reference – SW 42579 24266

Also Known as:

Historic England Grade II Listed Building No. 1007955

Boskenna Cross on 1887 map

Getting Here

Travelling along the B3315 from Penzance to Lands End, the Cross is on the south side of the road at the junction with the minor road to St Buryan, past the Merry Maidens stone circle.

Archaeology & History

Arthur Langdon (1896), in his magnum opus on Cornish Crosses, describes this wheel-headed wayside cross:

Sketch from Langdon’s 1896 book

‘The only ancient part of the monument is the little cross at the top, which is mounted on a base made up of an extraordinary collection of apparently disused circular granite stones. Immediately beneath the cross is a cylindrical piece, the upper edge of which is roughly rounded off. Beneath this comes a short drum, about two inches wider than the piece above and nine inches deep. The next two stones are much wider but not so deep as the last, the bottom one consisting of the lower portion of an old cider-press, with its surrounding channel and lip !

Its roadside position.

There is a good deal to admire in the feeling which prompted this effort to once and for all preserve so ancient a relic, and the care bestowed in the erection of this curious substructure goes far to remove its incongruity.

Front — The figure of our Lord here sculptured is quite the best example in which He is represented wearing the tunic; the expanded sleeves are especially apparent, as well as the outline of the garment above the knees. The feet are very large, and turn outwards at right angles.

The Crucifixion face

Back — On the head is a cross with expanded limbs, flush with the surface of the stone. The four triangular sinkings, or recesses, which form the background are not of uniform size, the lower being considerably larger than those above, thus making the lower limb the longest. The inner portion of each sinking is raised, forming bosses in low relief.

Dimensions — Total height of the monument, 6 ft. 10 in; height of the cross, 2 ft. 4 in; width of head, 1 ft. 8 in; width of shaft, 12½ in.‘

The cross has had a chequered history. It is not known when it was demolished. Langdon, once more, takes up the story:

The opposite face.

‘Mr. J. H. Johns, landlord of the “King’s Arms”, St. Buryan, informed me of the circumstances connected with the discovery of this cross. It appears that formerly one of the angles at the intersection of these roads was so sharp and awkward for traffic that, in 1869, the local authorities decided to ease this corner by rounding off the hedge, which was then about ten feet thick. Mr. Johns’ father was one of the men employed on this work, and shortly after commencing he found the cross buried in the hedge. By the advice of His Honour Charles Dacres Bevan, County Court Judge of Cornwall, and then residing at Boskenna Mansion House, the cross was erected on the triangular piece of grass in the middle of the roads, a spot on which it is extremely likely it originally stood.‘

Side view from the east.

In 1941 and 1942, the Cross was demolished by road vehicles, whereupon the council removed it to its present roadside position. It was again hit by a vehicle in 1992. And in 2002 there was another incident, reported by Meyn Mamvro:

‘..In February the top of the cross was found lying by the roadside. It is not known whether this was the result of deliberate vandalism or a road traffic accident, but local village witch Cassandra Latham acted quickly in alerting Cornwall Archaeological Unit, who took it away for repair and restoration…‘

References:

Langdon, Arthur G., Old Cornish Crosses, Truro, Joseph Pollard, 1896.
Langdon, Andrew, Stone Crosses in West Penwith, The Federation of Old Cornwall Societies, 1997.
Meyn Mamvro, No 49, Autumn 2002, p. 4

Coombe Hill Cross, Wycoller, Lancashire

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Cross: OS Grid Reference – SD 95586 38608

Also Known as:

Combe Hill Cross

Getting Here

Coombe Hill Cross, Lancashire (photo credit, Ray Spencer) — Coombe Hill Cross (photo by Ray Spencer)

Along the high moorland road between Laneshaw Bridge up towards Oakworth, on the Lancashire side of the moors a half-mile before reaching the Watersheddles reservoir, past the derelict pub until you reach the isolated Coombe Cross farmhouse on the tops. Across the road from here is a boggy footpath leading onto the moors. Walk on here for 100 yards, where the path bends left and another footpath veers up higher onto the moors. Walk up here for 20 yards and you’ll see the small monolith 10 yards away in the grassy heaths on your left.

Archaeology & History

Taylor's 1906 drawing — Taylor’s 1906 drawing

Found on the old route between the counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire, this little-known wayside cross has seen better days. Found in relative isolation from other monuments by the ancient trackway (Herder’s Cross is a mile WNW, and the curious Water Sheddles Cross a mile east), its history is quiet and it was ignored in the general surveys of such monuments by Rimmer (1875), Tyack (1900) and Vallance. (1920) Thankfully the giant survey of Henry Taylor (1906) did not forget it—although he seemed to know little of its story, merely telling us,

“The base-stone and part of the upright shaft of this cross stand about one hundred yards in a south-easterly direction from (Far Combe Hill Cross)… Two hundred yards south of the Combe Hill Cross occur the words, ‘Cross Bent.'”

Coombe Hill Cross (photo by Ray Spencer)

The near-square stone base—about 3 feet by 3 feet—is commonly ascribed as medieval in origin and it’s thought that the remaining upright cross-stump—over 2 feet high—is probably not the original one. When fellow antiquarian Ray Spencer visited the site recently, he reported there to be “a faint inscription on the base saying COMBE HILL CROSS.”

The most detailed account of this monument was to be found in Clifford Byrne’s (1974) unpublished paper on the antiquities of the region, where he wrote:

“The pedestal of this cross with a piece of stone sitting in it which may or may not be part of the original monolith is situated on a wayside hillock… On passing the Herders Inn above Emmot, scrutiny of the left hand side of the road at the top of the next rise ahead opposite a white farmhouse will show what looks like a stumpy finger pointing to the sky. Close inspection will show that at the site sits the pedestal of a cross, apparently settled on two steps. Note that the pedestal and the supporting stones beneath have a remarkable resemblance to Carlton Cross which stands on Cross Green between Tom Cross Ainslack and Carleton village near Skipton. It may be that both monoliths were erected by the same hands. Whether the supporting blocks beneath the pedestal were for purposes of kneeling, or merely to stop the edifice sinking into the moor is…open to dispute. An ancient track passes the cross site where it splits into two: one going east towards Keighley and the other going south towards Haworth by Watersheddles Cross. A continuation of the track westwards travels along the foot of Boulsworth Hill past Iron Age burials,* along a fine set of pack horse setts, past standing stones, old lime kilns, and eventually leaving behind some remains of the Wycoller Vaccary stones near Antly Gate Farm. It tops the brow of a hill and drops down through Thursden by the Cold Well itself a a little green gate in the reservoir wall. Marquis of Colne suggested that the Combe Hill Cross dates from the time of King Stephen in the 12th century, but does not say on what he based his surmise…. If the origin of the stone is dated correctly, it has stood near Colne for over 800 years.”

References:

Byrne, Clifford, A Survey of the Ancient Wayside Crosses in North-East Lancashire, unpublished 1974.
Taylor, Henry, The Ancient Crosses and Holy Wells of Lancashire, Sherratt & Hughes: Manchester 1906.

* These Iron Age burials may be Bronze Age as we have found remains of several hut circles dating from that period in this area. PB.

Acknowledgements: Huge thanks to Ray Spencer for use of his photos and additional data for this site profile.