| Country: | England |
| Coordinates: | 53.396°N -2.028°W |
| Official Name: | Mellor |
| Population: | 2,394 |
| Population Density: | 2771/sqmi |
| Metropolitan Borough: | Stockport |
| Metropolitan County: | Greater Manchester |
| Region: | North West England |
| Constituency Westminster: | Hazel Grove |
| Post Town: | STOCKPORT |
| Postcode District: | SK6 |
| Postcode Area: | SK |
| Dial Code: | 0161 |
| Os Grid Reference: | SJ990880 |
| Static Image Name: | View of Mellor 2008.jpg |
| Static Image Caption: | View of Mellor from Mellor Churchyard |
Mellor is a village in the Stockport district, in Greater Manchester, England, lying between Marple Bridge and New Mills, Derbyshire.[1]
Buildings in the village include St. Thomas' Church, a primary school, golf course, sports club, a riding school, three pubs (the Royal Oak,[2] The Devonshire Arms[3] and The Oddfellows Arms[4]) and the late-17th-century Mellor Hall.
It was a civil parish in the county of Derbyshire until 1936, when it was transferred to Cheshire. In 1974, it became part of the metropolitan borough of Stockport in Greater Manchester.
The name Mellor is first attested in the thirteenth century, in the forms Melver and Meluer. Its origin lies in the Common Brittonic words which survive in modern Welsh as Welsh: moel ("bare") and Welsh: bre ("hill"). Thus the name once meant "the bare hill".[5] [6]
See also: Mellor hill fort. The name Mellor does not appear in the Norman-era Domesday Book, although the neighbouring settlement of Ludworth (recorded as Lodeuorde) is listed.[7] It is possible that Ludworth originally included Mellor and that they split into two distinct areas at a later date.
The Saxons built a church at the southernmost end of the Iron Age settlement at some point in the 7th or 8th centuries. The church was subsequently destroyed and rebuilt, possibly several times. St. Thomas' Church has the oldest known wooden pulpit in Britain, possibly the world.[8] Dating from the reign of Edward II (1307–1327), it is octagonal and carved from a single piece of wood.[9] The church also has a 12th-century font.
According to local legend, Mellor Hall is built on the foundations of the house of a Norman nobleman. During excavations of the Iron Age hill fort, a 13th-century hall was discovered.[10] By the time of the English Civil War, Marple had become important in the region, so much so that John Bradshawe, Lord President of the High Court of Justice and Lord of Marple Hall, was the first to sign the death warrant of King Charles I.[11]
Samuel Oldknow[12] was a significant businessman[13] and mill owner[14] in Mellor during the Industrial Revolution. Just across the River Goyt are the "Roman Lakes".[15] [16] [17] These are not Roman, but were water reservoirs for Samuel Oldknow's Mellor Mill,[18] a cotton mill that was a major employer in the area during the Industrial Revolution. The mill was destroyed by fire in November 1892.
Another major figure in Mellor at this time was William Radcliffe, a mill owner who invented many devices[19] for improving the textile industry.
At the height of the Industrial Revolution, coal-power supplanted water-power as the driving force and minable coal seams were found in Mellor. Relatively recently, British Coal strip-mined the seams that still contained commercially viable coal.
Before it expanded in the Victorian era, Mellor was a small village of a few houses, including the hamlet of Moorend, now considered part of Mellor.
Mellor lies in the foothills of the Pennines, just outside the area of Derbyshire known as the High Peak. Nearby villages include Rowarth, Marple Bridge, Ludworth and Mill Brow. The town of Marple lies across the River Goyt. A little further away are the towns of Romiley and New Mills, and the villages of Hayfield and Strines. Mellor Church and Mellor Hall are on a ridge, separated from the bulk of the village by a gully and stream.
The oldest part of inhabited Mellor runs alongside the River Goyt, stretching from the oldest parts of Marple Bridge up the hill and spreading out where the slope becomes gentler. Newer parts of the village run down Longhurst Lane, the old turnpike road, and into former farmland released for building by Townscliffe Farm. At the very top of Mellor is the junction of Five Ways; one of these roads runs to Mellor, a second to Rowarth, a third to Strines and New Mills, the fourth to a water treatment plant and a fifth to many farms on the edge of Mellor. Spoil heaps indicate mining operations here; coal was mined in the general area during the Industrial Revolution.
Due to its topology, Mellor lies on one of the easier points for entering the Pennines from the Mersey Basin by road or foot. It is also on the flight path for air traffic into Manchester Airport.
Mellor is within a gritstone area in a part of the Peak District referred to as the Dark Peak; in contrast, the limestone region of the Peak District is referred to as the White Peak. The underlying geology of the area belongs to the Carboniferous Millstone Grit series, which outcrop as the Middle Grit. Below this are shales, mudstones and older Gritstones, such as the Kinder Scout Grit which forms the Kinder Plateau to the east. Boulder clay, left from the Ice Age, can usually be found just below the surface-level soil. At one point, all of the Peak District – Mellor included – was submerged beneath relatively warm waters; evidence for this is the limestone region, with the limestone containing fossils of coral and other shallow-depth warm-water creatures.
The gritstone comes from deposits laid down about 300 million years ago over the limestone. Shallow coal deposits lie on top of the gritstone, although most of these have long since been mined. Very deep coal deposits occur further into the Pennines but, again, many of these have been worked out.
The soil in Mellor is fairly rich in peat and can bog easily, but there are no permanent peat bogs within Mellor itself. The only other noteworthy detail on Mellor's geology is the almost complete absence of iodine, particularly in the water of the River Goyt. If no other source of iodine is in the diet, the consequent iodine deficiency can lead to an enlarged thyroid gland, a condition known as "Derbyshire Neck" or goitre.
Mellor was formerly a township and chapelry in the parish of Glossop,[20] in 1866 Mellor became a separate civil parish, 1 April 1936 the parish was abolished and merged with Marple[21] and became part of Marple Urban District in Cheshire. In 1931 the parish had a population of 1712.[22] In 1974 it became part of the Stockport district in Greater Manchester.
| Mellor compared | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 UK census | Mellor[23] | Stockport (borough) | England | |
| Total population | 2,394 | 284,528 | 49,138,831 | |
| White | 98.2% | 95.7% | 90.9% | |
| Asian | 1.4% | 2.1% | 4.6% | |
| Black | 0% | 0.4% | 2.3% | |
At the 2001 UK census, 88.4% of Mellor's residents reported themselves as Christian, 1.0% Muslim and 0.2% Hindu. The census recorded 5.8% as having no religion, 0.2% had an alternative religion and 4.4% did not state their religion.[28]
| Population growth in Mellor from 1861 to 1931 | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | 1861 | 1871 | 1881 | 1891 | 1901 | 1911 | 1921 | 1931 | |
| Population | 1,733 | 1,447 | 1,242 | 1,096 | 1,218 | 1,711 | 1,876 | 1,712 | |
| Source: A Vision of Britain through Time | |||||||||
| Mellor compared | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 UK Census | Mellor[29] | Stockport (borough) | England | |
| Population of working age | 1,789 | 151,445 | 35,532,091 | |
| Full-time employment | 38.8% | 43.3% | 40.8% | |
| Part-time employment | 12.0% | 12.5% | 11.8% | |
| Self employed | 12.4% | 8.4% | 8.3% | |
| Unemployed | 1.6% | 2.5% | 3.3% | |
| Retired | 21.7% | 14.8% | 13.5% | |
A few small businesses work out of the old mills that scatter the countryside, and there is a limited amount of farming, principally grazing livestock: sheep and beef cattle. Horses are also common, and horse-riding is a popular pursuit in the area, which benefits from many ancient bridleways.
According to the 2001 UK census, the industry of employment of residents of Mellor aged 16–74 was 18.3% manufacturing, 16.3% retail and wholesale, 12.2% health and social work, 12.0% education, 11.7% property and business services, 6.6% public administration, 4.6% construction, 4.5% transport and communications, 4.2% hotels and restaurants, 2.7% finance, 2.0% agriculture, 0.7% energy and water supply, and 4.2% other.[30] Compared with national figures, the town had a relatively high proportion of people working in education, agriculture, and public administration, and low levels of people working in finance and transport and communications. The census recorded the economic activity of residents aged 16–74, 1.8% students were with jobs, 3.4% students without jobs, 3.1% looking after home or family, 4.1% permanently sick or disabled, and 1.1% economically inactive for other reasons.[29]
There are a number of societies within Mellor, ranging from church activities to painting and rambling.
Some of these societies run charitable events in the area. For example, every four years, the local residents open a number of private gardens during an event known as the Mellor Open Gardens day. The purpose of the event is to raise funds for Cancer Research UK and the support of the local Parish Centre.[39] Another event is the Mellor March, in which ramblers carry out a sponsored walk to traverse the boundary of Mellor.[40]
Mellor is served by three bus routes. The 375, operated by Little Gem, runs to Stockport via Marple and Hazel Grove; the service is hourly on weekdays. The 802 and 819 school services also run to Mellor from Rose Hill and Harrytown respectively.
The village does not have its own railway station; the closest is Marple station.
Notes
Bibliography
General information
Geography
Historical information for Mellor