Boggart Hole Clough is a large woodland and urban country park in Blackley, a suburb of Manchester, England. It occupies an area of approximately, part of an ancient woodland, with picturesque cloughs varying from steep ravines to sloping gullies. Clough is a local dialect word for a steep sided, wooded valley. Boggart Hole Clough was designated a Local Nature Reserve in 2008.[1] [2]
Historically, local activists used Boggart Hole Clough for open air meetings but in 1896, when Manchester City Council acquired the land they tried to stop these meetings by fining speakers.[3] The speakers rebelled by refusing to pay the fines and the publicity increased audiences from hundreds to tens of thousands.[4] National figures began to attend, including Keir Hardie. A women's suffrage demonstration of 15,000 was held at Boggart Hole Clough on 15 July 1906 where a group of men caused a disturbance that was reported in the Manchester Guardian.[5] Veteran suffragist campaigner Elizabeth Clarke Wolstenholme Elmy attended and wrote an account of being caught up in the scrum.
The park stages a number of cross-country events and mountain bike rides, along with summer fundays and an annual bonfire and firework display. It also provides facilities for a number of other activities, ranging from boating to athletics.Boggart Hole Clough featured in the childhood memories of ex-Manchester City footballer Fred Eyre in his autobiography "Kicked Into Touch", who lived in the adjacent Clough Top Road.
Local folklore holds that the clough is haunted by a boggart, a mischievous spirit found mainly in Lancashire and Yorkshire, perhaps in an attempt to explain the unusual name.[6] In 2008, Boggart Hole Clough attained the Green Flag Award for the eighth consecutive year.[7]
Boggart Hole Brook rises in the clough.