ECONOMIC HISTORY
Agriculture
In 1086
there were 10 servi and ancille and 4 ploughs on the
demesne of the manor of Bisley. (fn. 18) In 1309 Tibbald
de Verdun's portion of the manor included 50 a. of
arable, ½ a. of meadow, and 5 a. of wood, (fn. 19) and in
1337 the same portion had ½ plough-land and 20 a.
of wood. (fn. 20) The portion of the earl of March in 1382
had 80 a. of arable, 5½ a. of meadow, and various
pieces of pasture. (fn. 21) The original demesne lands were
presumably represented by the lands that were held
on lease with the two manor-houses in 1608; Over
Court then had 291 a. and Higons Court had 295 a.,
and almost all this land, 280 a. in each case, lay in the
open fields. Each estate also had pasture for 420
sheep. (fn. 22) In 1291 there were 3 plough-lands in
demesne on Througham manor, (fn. 23) and the manor of
Bidfield in 1370 had 1½ plough-land of open-field
land, 4 a. of wood, and 18 a. of meadow. (fn. 24) The
rectory estate in 1612 had 194½ a. of demesne
arable in the open fields, which was divided among 3
tenants, and only 5 a. of pasture and meadow. (fn. 25)
The tenants of Bisley manor in 1086 were 20
villani and 28 bordars, having 20 ploughs between
them, 8 radknights having 10 ploughs, and another
23 men owing a total rent of 44s. and two sesters of
honey; 11 burgages in Gloucester owned by the
earl of Chester were also listed with the manor. (fn. 26)
The successors of the radknights were presumably
the vavasours of the manor mentioned c. 1135 (fn. 27) and
their estates probably represented the various submanors in Bisley and Stroud. In 1309 there were 7
neifs, who each held ¼ yardland, and 20 free
tenants on Tibbald de Verdun's portion of Bisley
manor (fn. 28) and in 1382 the profits of the portion of the
earl of March included £24 rent of assize, labourservices valued at 22s. 3d., and rents in hens and
eggs. (fn. 29)
In 1608 Bisley manor included 31 free tenements,
57 copyhold tenements, and 11 tenements, including
the two manor-house estates, held on leases for lives
granted by the Crown since 1579; in addition there
were 12 customary tenements that were leased with the
Higons Court estate. Most of the tenements were
still designated as yardlands, half-yardlands, or fardels but their original proportions had become
blurred and they were of widely differing sizes. Few
were very large, although the free tenements
included one of 145 a. in Avenis and Nashend owned
by Ferdinand Snow, as well as the Frampton Place
estate, Sydenham's farm, the Rodborough feoffees'
Ansteads Farm estate, and Corpus Christi College's
estate at Chalford. Only four of the copyhold
estates were over 50 a.: Thomas Kyles held 51 a.
in Steanbridge tithing, James Keene held 52 a.,
Thomas Ward's Calfway farm estate had 58 a., and
Nicholas Egerley held an estate of 95 a. About half
of the other copyholders were little more than
cottagers. (fn. 30) The marquess of Buckingham is known
to have sold several copyholders their tenements
in the 1620s, reserving quit-rents, (fn. 31) and probably
all were enfranchised at that period; by the late 17th
century, at least, free tenancies were the only form
of tenure on the manor. (fn. 32)
In the mid 13th century the tenant of a yardland
at Tunley, part of the estate which Peter of Edgeworth granted to Cirencester Abbey, owed labourservice every other day between October and July
and every weekday except Saturday in August and
September, (fn. 33) and in 1291 the abbey's tenants at
Througham owed a rental of 27s. 11½d. (fn. 34) In 1540
there were 8 free tenements in the Cliveshale area of
Througham manor and 2 tenements at Througham;
the yardland at Tunley, and a close in Avenis were
held by copy from the manor; and the site of the
manor, the tenement of the Turner family, and the
Trillis estate at Oakridge were held on leases for
lives. (fn. 35) Bidfield manor had free and customary
tenants owing a rental of 36s. in 1370 (fn. 36) and on the
Bisley rectory estate there were 14 small copyholds
in 1612. (fn. 37)
The agricultural economy of Bisley was typical of
the Cotswold region, being essentially corn and
sheep husbandry based on the large open fields and
commons which occupied the high ground of the
parish. As the early-17th-century extents of the
demesnes of the manor-house and rectory estates
cited above testify, there were then comparatively
few closes of meadow or pasture and those that there
were lay mainly in the valleys and often belonged to
mill estates. In the centre of the parish were two
great open fields: Battlescombe field adjoined
Oakridge common on the south-east and extended
up by the east side of Bisley village to adjoin
Stancombe field; Stancombe field included the area
north of the village and extended down into
Steanbridge tithing, being bounded on the north by
the Custom Scrubs and Nottingham Scrubs
commons. A smaller field, West field, lay on the
south-west of the village adjoining Battlescombe
field on the east and Bisley (or Nashend) common
on the south. (fn. 38) About 1610 the tenants on the manor,
rectory, and vicarage estates had a total of 856 a. in
Battlescombe field, 841 a. in Stancombe field, and
120 a. in West field. (fn. 39) Most of the tenants had land
in both Battlescombe and Stancombe fields, often
in equal portions. (fn. 40) The three fields were inclosed by
a piecemeal process which was under way in the
earlier 18th century when many exchanges of land
in the two big fields took place. (fn. 41) By 1842 the
process was almost complete, many of the inclosures being recognizable by the name 'tyning',
used for land taken out of open fields. Battlescombe
had been completely inclosed by then, Stancombe
had been reduced to an area of 32 a. north of the
Stancombe cross-roads, and 2 a. of uninclosed land
near Nashend Farm, called Nashend common field,
was the only remnant of West field. (fn. 42)
Bidfield tithing had open fields in 1370 (fn. 43) but no
later reference to them has been found. Tunley
tithing had open fields on the plateau of high ground
above the woodland; an undated terrier, probably
of the 17th century, named the 3 fields there as
East field, Hillhouse field, and Upper field. (fn. 44) Their
inclosure was apparently completed in 1818 when
exchanges affecting 172 a. of open-field land were
made between the owners of the Daneway, Hillhouse, and Tunley Farm estates. (fn. 45) Througham
tithing had an east field and west field in the 13th
century, lying south of Througham hamlet and
possibly separated by the wall running from
Througham to Cliveshale that was mentioned in
1292. (fn. 46) Cirencester Abbey made a series of exchanges
to consolidate its land in the fields between 1288 and
1292, (fn. 47) but inclosure there was apparently a
gradual process extending over many centuries. Six
fragments of open field, totalling 36 a., survived in
1842, (fn. 48) and some of the land remained uninclosed
in 1891. (fn. 49)
The large commons, which covered c. 800 a. in
the early 19th century, (fn. 50) were chiefly valued as
sheep pasture. Sheep were presumably important
in the economy by the 1370s when Richard le
Shepherde was farming the demesne of the earl of
March's part of the manor, (fn. 51) and there were two
shepherds among the inhabitants of the parish in
1381. (fn. 52) Thomas Mill included a flock of 400 sheep in
a lease of his Chalford estate in 1455; (fn. 53) the Kingstons
had a flock on the Bidfield estate in the 1540s; (fn. 54)
and Thomas Turner of Througham was pasturing
300 in the parish in the 1560s. (fn. 55) A shepherd lived in
the parish in 1608. (fn. 56) In 1839 the two large commons
in the south of the parish were said to support
1,000 sheep and 200 cattle and horses, (fn. 57) and c. 1865
on all the commons there were 1,228 sheep and 347
other beasts. (fn. 58) Pasture in the two large commons and
the open fields on Bisley manor was stinted at 3
sheep to the acre in 1608 (fn. 59) and that stint was
confirmed for the fields by the manor court in
1676. (fn. 60) In the late 18th century the two large
commons were stocked during the spring in
alternate years. (fn. 61)
Schemes to inclose the commons were advanced
as early as the 1730s. (fn. 62) A scheme promoted at the
beginning of the 19th century by a group of local
landowners envisaged the application of the rents
from the inclosed land to alleviating the burden of
the poor-rates, (fn. 63) and a scheme for the division of part
of the commons into allotments for the poor was
advanced in 1839. The two smaller commons,
Customs Scrubs and Nottingham Scrubs, were poor
soil but the two large commons were good land (fn. 64) and
another advocate of inclosure in the 1860s maintained that it would treble the value of the land to
the parish. (fn. 65)
The common land of the parish, including the
four larger commons, 10 small greens and pieces of
waste, and the common rack-hills used by the
clothiers on the slopes of the Chalford valley, were
finally inclosed by Act of Parliament in 1869. A
considerable acreage was sold to meet the expenses
of the inclosure, much of it in small parcels on the
edge of the commons, which neighbouring cottagers
bought. The larger landholders were given allotments for their rights of common which were only
roughly proportionate to the size of their estates; for
example T. M. Goodlake received an allotment of
40 a. in respect of his 544-acre rectory estate,
Samuel Bidmead of Daneway had 12 a. in respect of
his 290 a., the Rodborough church feoffees had 15 a.
in respect of their 201-acre estate, and Anthony
Austin had 10 a. in respect of the 124 a. of his
Rookwood's Farm estate. J. E. Dorington had an
allotment of 36 a. for his manorial rights and one of
23 a. for his land in the parish. His son, the younger
J. E. Dorington, had an allotment of 5 a. for a 99acre estate he held in his own right and he added
30 a. to this by purchasing the allotments of several
small owners and some sale allotments; others who
took advantage of the inclosure to increase their
estates by purchase included William Baker and
Edmund Hopkinson. (fn. 66)
Under the inclosure about 350 cottagers living in
the villages on the fringes of the commons were
entitled to minute allotements of a few perches for
their rights of common; of those c. 100 elected to
take money payments of £1-£5 instead, c. 70
immediately sold their allotments to larger owners,
and the remainder took their allotments, evidently
securing parcels of land adjoining their cottages
which could be incorporated as gardens. Eight
parcels of land, totalling 30 a., were assigned to the
churchwardens and overseers as allotments for the
labouring poor; (fn. 67) in 1922 they were placed under the
administration of the Chalford parish council and
two of them designated as recreation grounds. (fn. 68)
There was considerable opposition to the inclosure
among the cottagers some of whom are said to have
pulled down the new walls by night. (fn. 69) The commons
were chiefly valued by the poor as pasture for their
donkeys which were used for carrying on the steep
slopes of the Chalford valley; (fn. 70) 57 were being pastured
in the early 1860s. (fn. 71) The younger J. E. Dorington, a
leading promoter of the inclosure, when later
campaigning for election to Parliament in the
Chalford area is said to have been assailed by cries
of 'Who stole the donkey's dinner?' (fn. 72)
The largest farms and those with the greatest
proportion of arable lay on the high ground in the
north of the parish. In 1842 Upper Througham farm
with over 400 a. was the largest, while Bidfield and
Lower Througham farms had over 300 a., and
Througham Slad, Nashend, and Copsegrove farms
had 150-200 a.; in Tunley tithing Hillhouse,
King's House, and Tunley farms had 100-200 a. but
in the south part of the parish only Frampton Place
had more than 100 a. There were also numerous
small pasture farms. (fn. 73) In 1856 there was a total of
c. 35 farms in the parish. (fn. 74) In 1972, when the number
had been considerably reduced by the conversion
of farm-houses to private residences, some large
arable farms remained in the north of the parish and
some small dairy farms in the south.
Mills and the cloth industry.
There were 5
mills on Bisley manor in 1086. (fn. 75) Some of them were
presumably on the Frome at Chalford, where 3 mills
belonging to Minchinhampton manor were recorded
c. 1170, (fn. 76) and some lower down the river in the later
Stroud parish. There were some fulling-mills in
Bisley and Stroud by 1360 when tithes from them
were specified as part of the endowment of Bisley
vicarage, (fn. 77) although only one fuller, listed under
Througham, was recorded among the inhabitants
of Bisley parish in 1381. (fn. 78) At least two of the
Chalford mills were fulling-mills by the mid 15th
century, and in the 1770s 8 were working there. (fn. 79)
Several of the smaller mills of the parish were
apparently never more than corn-mills but most
of the 24 sites whose individual histories are
traced below are known to have been used at some
time in cloth production.
By the beginning of the 17th century the cloth
industry was employing a large proportion of the
inhabitants of Bisley, although it was not so
dominant as in some of the smaller Stroud Valley
parishes, because of the considerable scale of arable
farming in the north of the parish. In 1608 a total of
62 people connected with the industry were listed,
including 41 weavers, 18 tuckers, a dyer, a clothier,
and a millwright, compared with 52 engaged in
agriculture and 21 in other trades. (fn. 80) The later
expansion of the industry was chiefly manifested in
the growth of the villages in the south of the parish.
In 1831 677 families in the parish were supported by
trade compared with 288 supported by agriculture. (fn. 81)
During the earlier 19th century the Chalford
region was severely hit by successive depressions in
the cloth industry. In 1826, when a local committee
was formed to distribute a grant from the London
committee for the relief of manufacturing districts,
it was said that 2,026 people were wholly unemployed
in the parish (fn. 82) out of a population of 5,500-6,000. (fn. 83)
In the late 1830s the Chalford area was once again
severely affected as a result of the loss of the trade in
'stripe', the type of cloth which most of the local
clothiers manufactured for the East India Company
for its China market until the cessation of the
company's trading activities in 1833. (fn. 84) In 1839 only
3 master clothiers out of 9 who had formerly
operated in Chalford were still in business and,
although some of the weavers at Oakridge found
work with a Cirencester clothier, most of the
inhabitants suffered severe poverty, much agravated
by the prevalence of payment in 'truck'. (fn. 85) The
situation was partly alleviated by emigration. In
1837 68 people, most of them members of weaving
families, left for New South Wales financed by the
parish, and in the same year 18 others left to work
in the Yorkshire cloth industry and 66 went to
Shrewsbury where they were taken on by a linen
manufacturer. (fn. 86) In 1842 a further grant from the
London relief committee was distributed in provisions and a programme of road improvements. (fn. 87)
Few of the Chalford cloth-mills survived the
depression but the manufacture of silk and walkingsticks to which most of them were adapted provided
employment for large numbers in the later 19th
century.
On the river Frome the highest mill adjoining
Bisley parish was Henwood Mill at Tunley. The
next three below belonged to Sapperton parish and
then from Twissell's Mill, south of Oakridge Lynch,
there was a succession of 13 or more sites, grouped
most thickly at the west end of Chalford village
where some were driven by the abundant springs
which rise beside the river. Some of the Chalford
mills were in Bisley parish and some in Minchinhampton but as they were all essentially part of the
settlement of Chalford they are all treated here.
St. Mary's Mill below Chalford is treated under
Minchinhampton. The smaller streams of Bisley
parish, in particular the Toadsmoor brook, where
tradition locates the first fulling-mill ever built in
the district, (fn. 88) also drove a few small mills.
Henwood Mill stood a short distance below the
ford where the old Cirencester-Bisley road crossed,
at a point where the water-supply was supplemented
by springs entering the river from each side. (fn. 89) The
mill belonged to the Daneway estate in 1707 (fn. 90) and
descended with it until 1867 when it was sold to
Earl Bathurst; (fn. 91) it was apparently always a cornmill. Abraham Hathaway, a baker of North Cerney,
took a lease of the mill in 1707. (fn. 92) Henwood Mill
was still a working corn-mill in 1901 (fn. 93) but it went
out of use in the early 20th century and became
ruinous. The buildings are said to have had
medieval features, including a chimney which was
removed to Sapperton church. (fn. 94) Fairly substantial
stone ruins and a high-banked pond survived in
1972.
Twissell's or Baker's Mill, named from successive
families who owned it, stood on the Frome at the
crossing-point of a lane from Frampton Mansell to
Oakridge Lynch. (fn. 95) It belonged to Over Lypiatt
manor in 1477 when, known as Frampton's Mill,
it was held by John Quarrion. (fn. 96) It was called
Blankett's Mill in 1581 when William Twissell held
it by copy, and in 1583 William Twissell the
younger, apparently his son, bought the freehold. (fn. 97)
William Twissell later acquired the adjoining
Frampton Place estate, with which the mill
descended until the later 19th century. (fn. 98) It was
equipped as a cloth-mill in 1821 (fn. 99) but was worked
as a corn-mill in 1856 (fn. 1) and remained a working
corn-mill in 1882. (fn. 2) The 17th-century mill-house
survived in 1972, having an extension of c. 1960 in
traditional style on the north-east. (fn. 3)
Ashmead's Mill, below, (fn. 4) has not been found
recorded before 1820 when Charles Innell was
making cloth there. (fn. 5) He gave up the business in
1825 when the mill was powered by a water-wheel
and a steam-engine. (fn. 6) In 1870 Nathaniel Teakle &
Sons, mattress-wool and shoddy manufacturers,
occupied it. (fn. 7) It is also said to have been at one time a
silk-mill, (fn. 8) possibly worked by Charles de Bary who
was described as of Ashmeads in 1896. (fn. 9) The
substantial 3-storey mill (fn. 10) had been demolished by
1972 leaving a small early-19th-century brick house
with some stone out-buildings.
Valley Mill, at Valley Corner where a small lane
crosses the river by a bridge, (fn. 11) belonged to William
Morton c. 1785, (fn. 12) and in 1820 was a cloth-mill
worked by Nathaniel Bennett. (fn. 13) In 1839 T. M.
Goodlake owned the mill. (fn. 14) It was a saw-mill in
1891, leased to Smith & Sons of the Brimscombe
brewery, (fn. 15) and it continued in occasional use as such
by a timber-merchant in the early 20th century. (fn. 16)
The mill had been demolished by 1972. The adjoining 17th-century inn, which was in the same ownership in the 19th century, (fn. 17) was presumably originally
the clothier's house; it had become the Clothier's
Arms inn by 1820 (fn. 18) and was renamed the Valley inn
before 1931. (fn. 19)
If the bridge at Valley Mill can be identified with
Stephen's bridge, Seville's Mill (fn. 20) was probably the
one below Stephen's bridge which Edward Smart
of Througham owned in 1608. (fn. 21) Edward sold the
property, comprising a messuage and 2 fulling-mills,
in 1609 to Richard Batt, who left it to his daughters,
Jane who married William Watkins and Mary who
married Walter Seville. Jane sold her share to
Walter Seville in 1649 and Walter settled the mill,
to which a gig-mill had been added, on the marriage
of his son John in 1663. Walter died c. 1705 and
John sold the mill in 1712 to Thomas Harmar,
clothier. (fn. 22) John Innell owned Seville's Mill c. 1785 (fn. 23)
and apparently until his death in 1800; his sons
William (d. 1795) and John (d. 1806) were also
clothiers but may not have been connected with
Seville's Mill, being described as of Chalford Hill. (fn. 24)
In 1821, however, the clothiers James and John
Innell were working Seville's Mill. (fn. 25) It was
evidently that called Innell's Mill occupied by a
Mr. Warman in 1827, and by 1845 it was owned and
occupied by Nathaniel Jones (fn. 26) (d. 1875), (fn. 27) who made
cloth there until 1871. By 1865 one part was used as
a silk-mill (fn. 28) and it was worked by John Sparling
some time before 1873 when Jones leased it to
another silk-throwster, William Chapman. (fn. 29) Both
parts of the mill were unoccupied in 1880 (fn. 30) but it
was described as a silk- and woollen-mill in 1882, (fn. 31)
and in 1901 and 1921 articles in bone and wood were
being manufactured there. (fn. 32) Later Seville's Mill was
used by Cook Bros. who made wooden tapestry
frames and embroidery hoops; in 1953 a new
company, Elbesee Products, was formed by the
Cook family to carry on the business and it remained
at the site in 1972. (fn. 33) The old mill, which comprised
two buildings, apparently dating from the 17th or
early 18th century, (fn. 34) was demolished in 1963 and
replaced by new buildings. (fn. 35) A 17th- or early-18thcentury house east of the site has a loft-doorway on to
the road and was probably connected with the mill,
but the owners usually occupied Green Court (fn. 36)
some way to the east, a 17th-century house enlarged
by the addition of a higher, west block in the early
19th century.
Stoneford or Halliday's Mill, situated just above
the Stroud-Cirencester road, (fn. 37) was presumably the
mill at Staford or Stoford that was held from
Minchinhampton manor by Godard c. 1170 and by
Richard of Stoford c. 1300. (fn. 38) John Halliday was
dealing with Stoneford Mill in 1546 and 1576, (fn. 39) and
Thomas Halliday held it with 3 rack-grounds in
1608. (fn. 40) In 1726 Samuel Halliday conveyed Stoneford Mill, comprising a fulling-mill and gig-mill,
to William Bawden. (fn. 41) It was described as Hopton's,
now Parker's or Bidmead's, c. 1785 (fn. 42) and Samuel
Bidmead and Thomas Parker occupied it before
1813 when it was worked by John Driver Bidmead, (fn. 43)
who was declared bankrupt in 1820. (fn. 44) William
Smart (d. 1860) (fn. 45) owned Stoneford Mill in 1839 (fn. 46)
and was recorded as a cloth-manufacturer at
Chalford in 1856; (fn. 47) in 1858 he sold the equity of
redemption of the mill to his mortagagee Obadiah
Smart. (fn. 48) It was a silk-mill by 1882. (fn. 49) Soon after the
First World War Peter Waals, who had been Ernest
Gimson's foreman at Daneway House, started a
workshop at the mill, taking on most of the workmen
formerly employed at Daneway; he made furniture
there until his death in 1938. (fn. 50) From 1956 the mill, a
19th-century brick building, was occupied by
Arnold Designs Ltd., which employed c. 25 people
in 1972 making household goods. (fn. 51) The millowner's house, a three-storey 18th-century stone
building with a classical front, also survives.
The next mill below Stoneford was originally
known as Wood or Randall's Mill but in the 19th
century the buildings on the site were called Spring
Mills; (fn. 52) they and Mugmoor Mill, below, received
their water-supply from a spring called the Black
Gutter on the south side, while the tail-races
drained into the main river on the north. (fn. 53) Wood
Mill with a messuage and dye-house belonged to the
Minchinhampton manor estate in 1711 when
Philip Sheppard granted a lease for 3 lives to Joan
Randall and her grandsons James and John Teal. (fn. 54)
In the 1780s Samuel Bidmead occupied the mill. (fn. 55)
In the 1830s Spring Mills were owned by Handy and
Jesse Davis and were presumably the mills containing
3 water-wheels, a steam-engine, 6 pairs of stocks,
and 4 gig-mills, which the assignees of the Davises'
bankruptcy offered for sale in 1838. (fn. 56) In 1843
Nathaniel Jones, acting for William Dutton and
John Ferrabee, conveyed the mills to the Great
Western Railway Co. In 1860 the company sold
them to Nathaniel Jones, the property then comprising a fulling-mill with a steam-engine on the site
of the old Wood Mill and a newly-erected building
closely adjoining it; in 1864 the two buildings were
known collectively as the Spring Mills (fn. 57) but later the
larger one, on the west, was distinguished as Spring
Mill and the smaller one, on the east, as Randall's
Mill. (fn. 58) In 1856 the silk-throwster Joseph Jones was
recorded at Spring Mills (fn. 59) and in 1860 both mills
were being used as silk-mills by Nathaniel Jones,
one having been formerly occupied by the silkthrowster Samuel Hook; (fn. 60) in 1863 Francis E. Jones
was making silk at Spring Mills. (fn. 61) In 1864 Nathaniel
Jones sold the two mills to James Apperly, machinemaker of Dudbridge, and Apperly sold them in 1867
to William Dangerfield (fn. 62) who incorporated them in
his stick factory. Both buildings had been demolished
by 1972.
The site immediately below was bought in 1803
by a clothier John David Webb who built on it a
cloth-mill, later called Mugmoor or New Mill. (fn. 63)
Webb was in partnership with Thomas Commeline
in 1808 when their debts forced them to sell Mugmoor Mill to William Toghill. Toghill sold it in 1820
to William Davis, machine-maker of Brimscombe,
and in 1837 Davis, who was then working as an
engineer in Leeds, made it over to his daughter
Anne Maria; the tenant was then Daniel Cox. Anne
married Charles Peaty in 1840 and in 1852 they sold
the mill to Nathaniel Jones; it then passed with the
two Spring Mills to become part of William
Dangerfield's factory. (fn. 64) The small square stone mill
survived in 1972. In 1875 the name New Mill,
formerly an alternative name for Mugmoor Mill,
was applied to a large mill of 17 bays and three
storeys which stands immediately below; (fn. 65) about
that mill no earlier information has been found and
it had perhaps only been recently erected by
Dangerfield.
The mill immediately below, standing on the east
side of the Chalford-Hyde road, was known as
Bliss's Mill from the late 18th century (fn. 66) and was one
of the most ancient sites at Chalford. It was evidently
the mill which Ralph Mortimer granted to William,
son of Hugh of Chalford, in the earlier 13th century
and it descended with William's Chalford estate,
passing to Corpus Christi College in 1523. (fn. 67) It was
probably a fulling-mill by 1455 when Thomas Mill
leased the estate to a tucker, John Field, (fn. 68) and the
site included 2 fulling-mills in 1462. (fn. 69) The mill was
leased to Edward More, tucker, in 1472, (fn. 70) and in
1516 to William Compton, his wife Elizabeth, and
son Walter. (fn. 71) William, described as a cloth-maker,
secured a new 70-year lease from Corpus Christi
College in 1524, under which he was required to act
as rent-collector for the college's property at
Chalford, Duntisbourne, and Longney. (fn. 72) He was
still answering for the rents in 1539 but he had by
then apparently assigned the mill to Walter who had
built a new mill there. (fn. 73) About 1562 Walter assigned
it for the remainder of the term to his son Francis,
who made cloth there for a short while, but later the
mill became a factor in disputes between father and
son over financial and business matters. Francis
assigned the lease to William Hopton (fn. 74) before
1583. (fn. 75) In the 1780s the mill was known as Bliss's or
Corpus Christi Mill. (fn. 76) In 1794 the college leased it
with their estate to William Hunt Prinn with
provision for a sub-lease to Charles Ballinger (fn. 77)
and the name Ridler's Mill applied to it in 1802
suggests that William's ancestors, the Ridlers of
Edgeworth, may have earlier been lessees. (fn. 78) In 1818
Thomas Packer Butt was rated for the mill (fn. 79) and the
rate books give his trustees as owners of the mill and
the near-by Company's Arms inn until the beginning
of the 1870s; (fn. 80) Butt, however, had evidently only a
long lease under Corpus Christi College which
retained the freehold until 1872 when it sold the
mill to the tenant, William Dangerfield. (fn. 81)
Daniel Cox, a cloth manufacturer and millwright,
occupied Bliss's Mill and the Company's Arms in
1820 and until at least 1840, (fn. 82) and in 1833 he was
manufacturing mainly for the East India Company. (fn. 83)
William Dangerfield occupied Bliss's Mill by 1856
and was making umbrella- and parasol-sticks, bone
mounts, buttons, and steel pen-handles. (fn. 84) In 1867
he bought the three mills above (fn. 85) and in 1875 he
leased his whole property, comprising Bliss's,
New, Mugmoor, Spring, and Randall's Mills, to his
own company, William Dangerfield & Co. (fn. 86) The
company became one of the largest and most
successful stick-manufacturers in the country and at
one time employed as many as 1,000 work-people,
but business was falling off and the firm in some
difficulties by Dangerfield's death in 1894, (fn. 87) and in
1903 it was taken over by A. C. Harrison and Co.
Sir Alfred Apperly acquired it in 1912 and a new
company, Chalford Woodworkers, formed later,
continued the production of sticks and tool-handles (fn. 88)
until c. 1930. (fn. 89) From 1938 the site was occupied by
Fibrecrete Ltd., makers of asbestos cement
products, (fn. 90) and at the beginning of the 1970s the
whole site was bought and broken up as the Chalford
Industrial Estate. (fn. 91) Bliss Mills, a 19th-century
building with a square tower, had been largely
demolished by 1972. On the north side of the site
there survives a house which dates partly from the
16th century and partly from the 18th but has
evidently been reduced in size.
Dangerfield's Stick Factory, Chalford 1875
Below the Chalford-Hyde road stood an ancient
mill which became known as Tayloe's Mill (fn. 92) from
its 18th-century occupants. In 1439 it was held from
Bisley manor by Alexander Robull, the property
comprising a messuage and fulling-mill with ½
yardland and a close called Woolrings. (fn. 93) Before 1558
it was leased by Princess Elizabeth to Robert Hone (fn. 94)
and in 1566 a new lease was granted to Robert,
Isabel his wife, and William his son. William
obtained a lease for the lives of himself, his wife
Sarah, and son Robert in 1583 (fn. 95) but his father
apparently continued to work the fulling-mill,
giving up to William a grist-mill on the site; in 1589,
after William's death, Robert was disputing the mill
with Sarah and her new husband William Elbridge. (fn. 96)
Robert Hone, William's son, was in possession in
1608, (fn. 97) and bought the freehold of the mill in the
1620s. (fn. 98) It later passed to Thomas Tayloe, clothier
(d. 1667), by his marriage to Margery Hone, and it
then passed in direct line to William Tayloe
(d. 1735), (fn. 99) William (fn. 1) (d. 1749), and William
(d. 1773). Hester Tayloe, mother of the last
William, (fn. 2) sold Tayloe's Mill in 1778 to Charles
Ballinger, clothier (d. 1798). It passed to his son
Charles (fn. 3) who in 1842, when the mill was apparently
used only as dye-houses, was leasing it to David
Farrar. (fn. 4) The younger Charles was dead by 1852
when the mill had been inherited by his nephew
Charles Ballinger of Skaiteshill House. (fn. 5) After the
middle of the century it was a corn-mill, worked in
the 1860s by the Gloucester firm of Reynolds &
Allen, and in 1875 and until the First World War by
Clark Bros.; by 1885 it was powered by both steam
and water. (fn. 6) In the late 1920s and early 1930s it
housed the Belvedere upholstery works owned by
Tylers Ltd. of Thrupp. (fn. 7) The late-18th- or early19th-century stone mill stood empty in 1972. Part
of the site was then occupied by a pumping station
of the North West Gloucestershire water board,
whose predecessors, the Stroud Water Co., were
using the springs which rise near the mill as their main
source of supply in 1930. (fn. 8) The house belonging to
Tayloe's Mill was that standing west of the site; (fn. 9) it
incorporates a small house of the earlier 18th
century, heightened and extended to the west in the
last quarter of the same century, possibly in 1789. (fn. 10)
Iles's Mill, the next below, (fn. 11) was probably the one
held by Thomas Butt in 1608, lying between
Robert Hone's mill and Henry Whiting's St. Mary's
Mill. Thomas, who also had four racks on Skaites
hill just above, (fn. 12) presumably came from the family
which held racks and a dye-house from Bisley manor
in 1536. (fn. 13) The mill, which apparently belonged to
John Iles (d. 1727) and John Iles (d. 1767), (fn. 14) was
described as Mr. Iles's Mill in 1785. (fn. 15) About 1806
another John Iles sold it to John Ballinger (fn. 16) (d. 1848)
who left it to a younger son Henry (d. 1855). (fn. 17) The
tenant in 1839 was Thomas Jones (fn. 18) and Iles's Mill
was perhaps that at Chalford which he was operating
in conjunction with a mill in Stroud parish in 1833
when he was employing between 200 and 300
people, including outdoor workers. (fn. 19) He was still
making cloth at Iles's Mill in 1856. (fn. 20) Later Richard
and Joshua Jones, brothers-in-law of William
Dangerfield, set up a rival stick factory at the mill,
but they went bankrupt in 1865 and were then
being sued by Dangerfield for infringing his patent
for the process of bending the sticks. (fn. 21) In 1879 and
until at least 1902 William Charles Grist worked the
mill as a flock and shoddy factory. In 1906 it was
occupied by a firm of bone turners, but in 1914 it
was once more a flock-mill, occupied by Richard
Grist Ltd. (fn. 22) The surviving part of the mill was
occupied as a pair of houses in 1972; a small threestorey stone building, it dates mainly from the
early 19th century but incorporates a 17th-century
gable end. Another block adjoining it on the southwest side was demolished after a fire in 1913. (fn. 23) The
building immediately west of Iles's Mill, occupied
as cottages in 1972, belonged to the mill estate in the
early 19th century (fn. 24) and appears to have been a
single house of traditional plan, perhaps dating from
the early 17th century.
Another mill was built in the early 19th century
just below Iles's Mill, adjoining the house which was
known as Brookside in 1972. (fn. 25) The house belonged
to Abraham Walbank, an attorney, who conveyed
it in 1782 to his daughter Sarah, who married
Robert Lees, a surgeon. In 1811 Sarah sold it to
Joseph Iles, clothier, who went into partnership
with Thomas Iles and built a cloth-mill and enginehouse on the site. Joseph and Thomas went
bankrupt in 1828 and the house and mill were
assigned to their chief creditors, Joseph Pitt and
his partners, bankers of Cirencester, (fn. 26) who were
leasing the mill to Handy and Jesse Davis in 1836. (fn. 27)
In 1840 Pitt and his partners sold the property to
Samuel Lawrence of Cirencester. (fn. 28) A long wing
which ran south from Brookside and evidently
housed the mill, (fn. 29) had been demolished by 1882. (fn. 30)
The surviving house has a symmetrical late-17thcentury range which was enlarged in the 18th
century by the addition of small balancing wings to
the east front and a larger range to the west front.
Immediately south of Tayloe's Mill stood a small
mill, which was apparently supplied with water by
the springs that rise there, rather than by a leat from
the Frome. (fn. 31) It was built as a cloth-mill by Timothy
Butt before 1784 and was perhaps worked for a time
by his son Samuel Butt, clothier of Chalford. In
1784 it belonged to Archer Blackwell who conveyed
it in that year to Thomas Packer Butt, clothier. (fn. 32)
In 1793 Thomas was in dispute with Charles
Ballinger of Tayloe's Mill over the water from the
springs, (fn. 33) which was apparently also used by the
latter to supplement his mill-pond. In 1836
Thomas's trustees held the mill and were leasing it
with Bliss's Mill to Daniel Cox who had two undertenants. (fn. 34) The site was largely obliterated a few years
later by the building of the railway.
A short way north-west of Iles's Mill stands
Clayfield's Mill on a site that came to be bounded
on the south by the canal and on the north by the
Stroud-Cirencester road; (fn. 35) its mill-pond was filled
by a spring which runs out of a culvert from
beneath the road. (fn. 36) It was apparently the grist-mill
owned by Mary Clayfield, a widow, in 1704, which
her son Andrew was working two years later. (fn. 37) In
1759 Clayfield's Mill was held by William Tayloe, (fn. 38)
and it is said to have been sold by him to Charles
Ballinger c. 1787. It then descended with Tayloe's
Mill until at least 1852. (fn. 39) It was a grist-mill in the
1780s (fn. 40) but in 1820 William Smart was making
cloth there, (fn. 41) as was Nathaniel Jones in 1842. (fn. 42)
Thomas Jones of Iles's Mill was the tenant by
1845 (fn. 43) and was working it as a cloth-mill in 1852,
although it was then known as the Grist Mill. (fn. 44) By
1860 it had been acquired by Richard Liddiatt, who
used it as a builder's yard and saw-mill until
c. 1885. (fn. 45) In 1972 the small four-storey stone
building, the lower part of which apparently dates
from the 17th century, was occupied as a house.
The small stream that flows down to the Frome
through Millswood drove a mill adjoining the
north-west side of the house called Sevillowes. (fn. 46) In
1826 there were fairly extensive buildings on the site
including an ancient cloth-mill and a newly erected
cloth-mill. The property was acquired in 1822 by
William Gardiner, who went bankrupt in 1827, and
in 1829 one of the mortgagees, Lt.-Col. Henry
Daubeny of Bath, bought the property from his
fellow creditors. (fn. 47) In 1841 the property, then also
including a cloth-mill called Seville's Upper Mill
which stood a short way north-east of Sevillowes on
a small tributary spring, was put up for sale following
a Chancery action brought by William Hunt against
Charlotte Ireland, her infant son William, and
Thomas Lediard. Seville's Upper Mill and the
newer mill of the two adjoining Sevillowes were then
offered for sale as building material (fn. 48) and no later
record of the mills has been found. Sevillowes,
evidently the house on the property described in
1826 as partly ancient and partly modern, was
occupied in the early 19th century by William
Seville (fn. 49) and by 1841 by a surgeon John Lowe (fn. 50)
(d. 1894); (fn. 51) the name is presumably an amalgam of
the two surnames. The house is a late-18th-century
building extended and partly remodelled internally
in the early 19th century when a semi-circular bay
was added.
Other mill buildings at Chalford, possibly not all
water-powered, were worked by the clothier William
Toghill in the early 19th century. In 1803 he bought
property from Archer Blackwell and by 1821 part of
it, apparently on Dark Lane near Skiveralls House,
contained a cloth-mill with a steam-engine, woollofts, and other buildings. (fn. 52) In 1807 Toghill bought
from Charles Innell another cloth-mill, recently
built near Dark Lane on the site of a house bought
by Innell in 1799. (fn. 53) Toghill was bankrupted in 1826,
and his creditors sold his property to one of the
mortgagees, John Abernethy (d. 1831). In 1834
Abernethy's trustees sold the two mills to Handy
Davis. (fn. 54)
A four-storey building called Warehouse Mill, on
the north side of the main road near the west end
of Chalford village, was built as a wool-store by
Handy and Jesse Davis before 1838. (fn. 55) Later adapted
as a silk-mill, it was being worked by Samuel Hook
between 1845 and 1855, (fn. 56) by the partnership of
William Dangerfield and Sidney Foot in 1863, (fn. 57)
and by William Chapman in 1870. (fn. 58) It apparently
remained a silk-mill until c. 1890 when it was
converted into 13 cottages (fn. 59) and in 1972 it was being
remodelled to form 7 houses.
There were several small mills on the Toadsmoor
brook at the western boundary of the parish. They
were usually regarded as part of Bisley rather than
Stroud, although some of them were undoubtedly
among the unnamed mills assigned to the Chamberlaynes and Windowes at the partition of the Stroud
manor of Nether Lypiatt in 1689. (fn. 60) The highest mill
on the brook, recorded in 1824 near the large pond
in Toadsmoor woods, (fn. 61) was apparently the mill built
on a piece of land called Wiselands, which was said
to be in decay in 1801. (fn. 62)
Further down the brook a group of three mills,
known collectively as Toadsmoor Mills, stood close
together below the point where a track crossed from
Bussage into Nether Lypiatt. (fn. 63) That crossing can
probably be identified with one anciently called
Row bridge, for a wood near by was named as
Rowbridge wood in 1842. (fn. 64) The highest Toadsmoor
mill (fn. 65) was presumably therefore the site of the house,
fulling-mill, and grist-mill at Row bridge which
William Snow held by copy from Bisley manor in
1608, (fn. 66) and the Snow's Mill at Toadsmoor which
passed to William Hayward in 1690. (fn. 67) William
Hayward was a clothier at Toadsmoor in 1715, (fn. 68) and
in 1729 Hayward's Upper and Lower Mills were
rated by Bisley parish. (fn. 69) The highest Toadsmoor
mill was owned or occupied by a Mr. Jones in
1813, (fn. 70) perhaps Amos Jones who was listed as a
woollen manufacturer at Bourne in 1820. (fn. 71) In 1842
it was owned and occupied by Aaron Evans. (fn. 72) It was
probably the property called Toadsmoor Mills
which William Dangerfield leased to Charles
Freeman and Richard Davis, shoddy and mill-puff
manufacturers of Bristol, in 1863; (fn. 73) Charles
Freeman, flock manufacturer, and Woollaston & Co.,
mill-puff and shoddy manufacturers, were recorded
at Toadsmoor in the 1870s. (fn. 74) By 1885 and until the
1930s William Selwyn was making flock and shoddy
at the highest Toadsmoor mill, (fn. 75) which then
comprised two mill buildings on the west side of the
Bussage-Bourne road and another building, called
Shortwood Mill, on the east side of the road. (fn. 76) Only
the lower of the two on the west side, a two-storey
range, survived in 1972 when it was occupied by a
firm making aniline and gravure inks.
The middle mill at Toadsmoor was held by
Obadiah Burge in 1813, (fn. 77) and in 1828 it belonged to
Aaron Evans who perhaps worked it in connection
with the mill above. By 1831 it belonged to Thomas
Creed (fn. 78) who was trading as a corn-dealer and seedsman there in 1856. (fn. 79) Shortly before 1865 it was
bought by the tenant William Davis who worked it
as a corn-mill (fn. 80) until his death in 1884. (fn. 81) By 1885 the
mill was powered by steam (fn. 82) but it went out of use
in the early 20th century (fn. 83) and had been demolished
by 1972.
The lowest Toadsmoor mill was held in 1813 by
John Lock (fn. 84) who was a corn-miller in 1820. (fn. 85) By
1840 it belonged to Richard Kilmister (fn. 86) who leased
it to a succession of millers. (fn. 87) By 1885, when it was
steam-powered, it had been acquired by George
Daniels (fn. 88) who worked it until c. 1920. (fn. 89) The small
stone building, which incorporates a house and dates
in part from the late 17th or early 18th century,
survived in 1972.
A small mill called Cricketty Mill, south-west of
Bisley village on the stream that flows down to
join the Toadsmoor brook, (fn. 90) was recorded from 1825
when it was owned by Robert Owen and contained
a pair of stones for grist-milling and one fullingstock. (fn. 91) In the following year it was being used by
William Mills and Thomas Partridge, wood typecutters and printers' joiners. (fn. 92) In 1828 Owen sold the
mill, which was described as newly erected, to his
mortgagee, Lt.-Col. Henry Daubeny of Bath. (fn. 93) In
1842 it was owned by Charles Newman and leased
to William Hazle, (fn. 94) who became the owner soon
afterwards; (fn. 95) Hazle's son William worked a brewery
and malt-house at the site until at least 1870. (fn. 96)
In the 19th century a silk-mill stood at Oakridge
Lynch at the head of a small stream which flows
down to the Frome. (fn. 97) It was evidently worked by the
succession of silk-throwsters recorded at Oakridge
Lynch, in 1856 John William Jones, (fn. 98) in 1863
Charles de Bary (who married Jones's widow), (fn. 99)
and in 1879 the firm of Tubbs & Lewis. (fn. 1) In the late
19th century it was owned by a Mr. Chapman, (fn. 2)
propably William Chapman who is recorded at
Seville's Mill. (fn. 3) The Oakridge mill, a substantial
three-storey range, was demolished c. 1900. (fn. 4)
On the Holy brook only one mill, Rookwood's
Mill east of Rookwood's Farm, (fn. 5) has been found
recorded. It was built shortly before 1818 by
William Tyler, the owner of Rookwood's. It was a
corn-mill in 1818 but in 1844 it was described as a
corn-mill formerly a cloth-mill and had presumably
been worked by Tyler in his trade as a clothier. (fn. 6) It
had been demolished by 1882. (fn. 7)
The lords of Througham manor had a mill at
Cliveshale in the 13th century, presumably a watermill on the Holy brook or its tributary there. (fn. 8) A
windmill stood in the high, western part of
Througham tithing in 1292. (fn. 9)
Other industry and trade.
Of the industries
which replaced cloth-making in the Chalford area
in the mid 19th century, stick-making and silkthrowing, both mentioned above, were the main
employers of labour; the stick industry exploited the
local beech woods (fn. 10) which also gave a livelihood to a
number of timber-merchants in the later 19th
century. (fn. 11) The manufacture of high-quality furniture was introduced into the parish by Gimson and
Peter Waals in the early 20th century, (fn. 12) and at the
same period furniture and other woodwork was
made at the steam joinery of C. W. Smith east of the
Bliss's Mill complex; the joinery was occupied by an
upholsterer before the Second World War, (fn. 13) and
from 1950 by Chalford Chairs Ltd. (fn. 14) A site near by,
occupied between the wars by a firm making tennis
racquets and later by a succession of businesses, (fn. 15)
was used in 1972 by Doulton Industrial Products.
The good quality oolite on which the parish lies
has been extensively quarried, providing the material
for almost all its buildings until the 20th century;
much was also exported from the parish in the form
of stone tiles. At Througham tile-quarrying had
begun by 1512 when a lease of the site of the manor
included the regulation that none should be dug on
the demesne closes, (fn. 16) a provision that presumably
led to the establishment of the largest tile-quarry in
the corner of an open field, at the cross-roads of two
tracks north of Calfway Farm. (fn. 17) Througham later
acquired the reputation for providing some of the
best tiles in the county (fn. 18) and in the 1770s they were
supplied in large quantities to the Severn Vale
region. (fn. 19) Tile-digging was also a common practice on
Bisley manor in 1593 when the manor court ruled
that all tenants quarrying on their land should
replace the topsoil. (fn. 20) There were numerous small
quarries on the commons, (fn. 21) particularly around
France Lynch and Chalford Hill where some were
worked by the Franklin family of masons during the
18th and early 19th centuries. (fn. 22) Quarries at Bussage
continued to be worked in the 1930s by a firm of
concrete-manufacturers. (fn. 23)
In 1831 the inhabitants of the parish included 7
tile-dressers and 23 stonemasons (fn. 24) and the local
tradition of stone working produced several masons
known beyond the parish. John Thomas of Chalford
(d. 1862) worked on many important public
buildings and in particular was the foreman of the
masons employed on the new Houses of Parliament, (fn. 25)
while the Wallis family, which included Solomon
Wallis who built Bussage church and his son
Samuel who did much work for G. E. Street, were
masons from Bussage. (fn. 26) George Drew, builder and
quarry-owner of Chalford, conducted a fairly
extensive local business in the mid 19th century, (fn. 27)
which included building to his own design the
Wesleyan chapels at Chalford and in Bisley
village. (fn. 28)
The parish was fairly well supplied with the usual
rural craftsmen, the earliest recorded being two
smiths of Bussage and a smith of Cliveshale in the
mid 13th century. (fn. 29) In 1608 the inhabitants of the
parish included 5 tailors, 5 masons, 3 shoemakers,
3 carpenters, and 2 smiths. (fn. 30) The industrialized
settlement of Chalford had the greatest number of
craftsmen in the 19th century: in 1856 it had 19,
including smiths, masons, shoemakers, tailors,
carpenters, and, more unusually, a basket-maker;
the village also had 18 shopkeepers and 3 coalmerchants, and the professional classes were
represented by a solicitor and 2 surgeons. (fn. 31) Bisley
village then had 12 craftsmen and four or five
shopkeepers, (fn. 32) and Bussage, Oakridge Lynch,
France Lynch, and Eastcombe also supported one
or two craftsmen and shopkeepers. (fn. 33) The craft
movement that was prominent in the locality in the
early 20th century was still represented in Bisley
village in 1972 by the smith Norman Bucknell,
son of one of the men trained by Ernest Gimson.
Markets and fairs.
Sir Robert Atkyns, the lord of
the manor, obtained a royal grant of a Thursday
market and fairs on 23 April and 1 November in
1687. He sold his rights in them, and the right to
use the streets of the village to hold them, to John
Eldridge, a Bisley innkeeper, in 1706, and in 1710
Eldridge sold the right for £150 to Thomas Parker
of Sapperton. (fn. 34) By the early 19th century, however,
the rights in the market and fairs had returned to the
lord of the manor. (fn. 35) The fairs (altered by the
calendar change to 4 May and 12 November) (fn. 36) were
doing a considerable trade in cattle in the 1770s but
the weekly market was then little frequented, a
circumstance attributed to the unfavourable position
of the village and the steepness of the roads leading
to it. (fn. 37) The market later ceased to be held and an
attempt to revive it was made in 1802 when a year's
toll-free trading was offered as an incentive. (fn. 38) The
attempt appears to have had little success, for the
market has not been found recorded later. The two
fairs continued to be held, mainly for the sale of
sheep and pigs, until the 1880s. (fn. 39) Bisley had a
market-house in 1740, (fn. 40) and in 1827 it was resolved
to shorten it by one bay; (fn. 41) it apparently stood on the
east side of High Street on the site later occupied by
the Court House. (fn. 42)