+25th+May+2010.jpg)
Well as far as I'm aware, there was never a hall as such, it was just a name given to a row of four cottages that were just off the sharp bend, towards the top of Lammack Rd.
The top photo here, is the only one I know of, that shows the cottages. It dates from 1907.
To give you some perspective, the photographer would have been stood on the bottom slopes of the huge embankment that takes you up to the 'Tank'. The cottages fronted / faced the hill that the 'Tank' is at the top of (Revidge Hill is it?). If you could see through the trees above the rooftops in the old photo, you would probably be able to see the QEGS playing fields and Mellor / Ramsgreave beyond.
The lower photo is one I took back in May 2010 for a Facebook group (the 'name this place' group). When taking my photo, I was stood on the bend of Lammack Rd, looking into Cuckoo Hall (I would be to the far right, just out of view in the older photo). The cottages would be on the right hand side of my view. The gatepost you can see in my photo, would be one of the posts in the wall to the right of the cottages in the older image.
Robin Whalley and Peter Worden, in their postcards book, tell us that between the Jolly Dragoon at Four Lane Ends (opposite side to the Sportsman's) and the Hare & Hounds (facing Whinney Lane), these cottages were the only houses in 1848. Either side of them, in either direction, there would just have been fields. In fact, as you can see from the OS map, even as late as the 1930's, there was only the farmer's field between Cuckoo Hall and the cottage on the corner of Whinney Lane.
I used to deliver newspapers along both sides of Lammack Rd around 1970 - 71, when I was 12 or 13 years old and the site of the old cottages wasn't as overgrown, as they had only been demolished a couple of years earlier. Nowadays, there's virtually nothing left to see.
But sorry to disappoint you 'anonymous', as there wasn't a ''hall'' in that sense of the word (unless someone else knows differently).
This small section of an early 1930's map shows you exactly where the cottages were. The 'Res' (marked on the map) just over Revidge Rd from the tennis courts is the 'Tank' and as you can see, Cuckoo Hall was at the bottom of the same hill (just off Lammack Rd).
This small section of an early 1930's map shows you exactly where the cottages were. The 'Res' (marked on the map) just over Revidge Rd from the tennis courts is the 'Tank' and as you can see, Cuckoo Hall was at the bottom of the same hill (just off Lammack Rd).
LOWER PHOTO COURTESY OF CP.
MAP SECTION COURTESY OF THE ORDNANCE SURVEY.
MAP SECTION COURTESY OF THE ORDNANCE SURVEY.
That is really interesting. So there wasn't a hall just some houses. We lived on Rhodes Ave back in the 1980s and used to be around that area often, up by the tank and on the estate.
ReplyDeleteThanks. Peter
Hi Peter
ReplyDeleteAs far as I'm aware there was never a hall. I could be wrong. I've been wrong before :-)
Colin
In the book 'Blackburn Characters of a past generation' by Abram there is a Richard Edmundson who was born at 'Cuckoo hall' an old house on the further slope of Revidge'. He was a member of the first Free Library Committee and died in 1887.
ReplyDeleteHi
ReplyDeleteI do have that book, though I must admit, it's a while since I read any of it. Maybe there was a hall, or possibly Abram was just referring to the row of cottages, maybe Edmundson lived in one of those. Or perhaps the row of cottages were once a hall of some description, that were later converted into cottages? In the old photo above, the round window on the second or third cottage in, does suggest it it had been something else previously.
The map section above is only from a 1930's map, but I'm sure I looked at older maps when I was compiling this post and the only Cuckoo Hall / Cucken Hall marked on any of them, was the location above.
On the 1840's OS map and the 1910 OS map, all halls and significant properties are marked, so if there was a hall, in addition to those cottages, you would expect it to be marked.
Regards.
Colin
I've been studying the old maps again and on a couple of them, there looks to have been a slightly larger property on the extreme left of the cottages shown in the old photo, yet it still looks a part of the row (no gap between it and the cottages, just a dividing wall). Maybe that larger property (it's about the size of two of the cottages) could have been Cuckoo Hall.
ReplyDeleteRegards
Colin
Hi Robin, is it possible to get in contact with you? phildewhurst@hotmail.com
ReplyDeleteHad a relative who lived in one of the cottages in the 1950's. The cottages were not quaint English country cottages with roses growing around the doors, they were dark and damp sharing primitive toilets at the end of the row with the other tenants on the row.
ReplyDeleteThat small stretch of Lammack Rd. actually appears as 'Cuckoo Brow' on Google Maps. Possibly came from Cuckoo Hall?
ReplyDeleteMore than likely, I would think.
ReplyDeleteColin