Gomersal was attested in the Doomes Day Book (1086) with the name Gomershale. *Guthmers Halh, is a supposed place-name, not attested in any written document, hence marked with asterisk in The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-names.[1] The location was at a bend in the brook which passes through the valley bottom before joining with the River Calder. This land became an Anglo-Saxon burial ground and most likely was the location of a Celtic temple site before the Roman Conquest. It became the site of the Parish Church of St Peter and St Paul, now known as St Peters. The brook formed the ancient boundary between Gomersal and Birstall.
The Luddite riots, that occurred in the area in 1812 provided Charlotte Brontë with material for her novel Shirley. Gomersal was the hometown of her friend Mary Taylor who lived at the Red House which she renamed Briarmains in the novel.[2]
The Taylor Family also lived in Spen Hall, a residence in the Lower Spen area of Gomersal. Spen Hall has been divided into several houses but retains a 16th-century mullioned window, a tennis lawn and a water spring which, according to myth, is a tunnel (now flooded) leading to the Old Saw public house cellar nearby. The cellar was apparently used to hide priests fleeing persecution.
Clay pipes were found in the earlier Old Saw premises in the walls and chimneys but, once exhumed, disintegrated. A glazed drinking cup found in the foundations survives after being carefully reassembled and preserved by Harry King, the former owner of the cottage. The cup still requires dating. A hand-made brick-lined pit two feet (60cm) deep was also discovered on the site. Its uses are disputed, with suggestions that it was a cockfighting pit or meat storage vessel.
Gomersal also has many fine and historic houses which climb the hill of Spen Lane and along Oxford Road towards Birkenshaw. Houses such as Spen Hall, Spen House (now demolished and rebuilt, except the Coach House), High Rising (High Royd, another Taylor Household) now The Gomersal Hotel, Tanfield House, Firdene (currently on the market for £1.25million), Hilltop House (now split into two homes with apartment buildings in the grounds), Gomers Hall (apparently, originally Gothmers Hall, which was demolished to build an electricity sub-station), Pollard Hall (home of the mill owner Thomas Burnley), Red House (now Red House Museum), Broadyards, Croft House, Sigston House, Gomersal Hall, Peel House, West House (the last three still privately owned).
The Roundhill Mill site in the Cliffe lane area of Gomersal is known for the sighting of the scratje (pronounced Skrayty), a legendary Norse spirit supposedly observed by a son before the death of his father and characterised by a cold and apparently sourceless light which moves erratically. The old name for Cliffe Lane was Scrat Lane.
Gomersal was heavily wooded up to the late 19th century with Swinley Great Wood, Lanes Wood, Scotland (Fusden) Wood containing the Taylor family burial ground, and Church Wood between the Hill Top and Monk Ings.
During the Second World War, Gomersal had a number of public air raid shelters, with quite a few remaining in 2007 at Birkenshaw roundabout Park, Gomersal First School, Hill Top. This was likely due to the semi-underground control bunker for the anti-aircraft guns in the West Riding, protecting Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield and Halifax. The bunker was in the grounds of Oakroyd Hall, making this a target for the German Luftwaffe; Oakroyd Hall is now the headquarters of the West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service.
There was also a Royal Observer Corps "Orlit" type surface observation post on the Popeley Fields around 1⁄3 mile (500 metres) from the Gomersal Cricket ground. This was active throughout the war and manned day and night. In the 1960s on the same site a nuclear-blast-proof underground bunker was constructed as a monitoring post, one of over 1,500 constructed in the UK, for use in measuring direction, strength of blast and fallout in the event of the UK coming under nuclear attack. The ROC stood down during the late 1980s with the reduced threat of the Cold War and the bunkers were abandoned and sold or given back to the land owners.
Railway
The Lower Spen area of Gomersal had a railway station, Cleckheaton Spen on the LNWR railway line diversion loop linking Leeds and Manchester and improving the main line capacity between Huddersfield and Leeds. The line was constructed between 1894 and 1902 and opened fully to passengers in 1904. It had some spectacular civil engineering for the time, including rail viaducts at Mirfield and Heckmondwike, a 90-foot-high (27m) pedestrian road viaduct linking Cleckheaton town centre with the station and goods yard. The Gomersal Tunnel is 890 yards (810m) long and around 30 feet (9m) deep, directly under the Shoulder of Mutton pub in Oxford Road at Great Gomersal (the LNWR bought the pub in 1897 in case it fell into the tunnel workings) and then the line opened into Gomersal Station in Moor Lane, a four-minute train ride from Cleckheaton Spen.
The railway closed to passengers in 1964 and goods in 1966, having had all the buildings and structures repainted and new track in 1963. In 1952, Sir Winston Churchill, then Prime Minister, slept at Cleckheaton Spen sidings overnight in a special train with a heavy security cordon during election campaigning.
Places of worship
Gomersal has a number of places of worship given the size of population, including Gomersal St Mary C of E Church (1851), the Methodist Wesleyan Chapel, Latham Lane 1827, Grove Congregational Chapel in Oxford Road, the Methodist Free United Chapel (off Reform Street), the Primitive Methodist Chapel in Moor Lane, the Moravian Chapel in Little Gomersal and Little Gomersal Methodist Chapel on Town Hill. Most are still in use.
John Wesley preached in Gomersal. One of his closest lay assistants John Nelson was involved with lay preacher Edward Brooke who initiated the construction the Wesleyan Chapel in Latham Lane in 1827. Its unusual bow front led to it being known as the "pork pie chapel".
Street and locality names
Gomersal also has some interesting street and place names, for example Mazy Brook (Mazebrook), Drub, Birdacre, Bleak Street, Wood Nook, Throstle Nest, Egypt, Worlds End, Fusden Lane, Monk Ings, Nutter Lane, Muffit Lane, Garfit Hill, Nibshaw Lane to name a few.
Pubs include The Peacock (demolished for the M62 Motorway), The Scotland, The Bankfield, The West End, Shoulder of Mutton (now permanently closed), White Horse (Demolished for Sainsbury's building), The Wheatsheaf, Bulls Head, The Old Saw (The Saw), and The California. Clubs include Gomersal Cricket Club, Spen Victoria Cricket and Bowling Club, and Drub Working Men's Club.
Gomersal also has a football club, Gomersal & Cleckheaton F.C., ranging from ages 6 to 17 and their traditional colours are red and black stripes.
Gomersal was once home to Burnleys Textile Mill, which was a landmark in the Spenborough area. However, this has been demolished to make way for a new housing development of up to 300 homes. Gomersal has two primary schools; Gomersal Primary School and St Mary's First School.
Notable people
The composer Arnold Cooke was born in Gomersal in 1906.
Gomersal is the birthplace of novelist John Barlow, who has set several works of fiction in the village.
Appearances in media
Gomersal was the filming location for a number of scenes in the long-running period drama Heartbeat.[citation needed]
Batley is a market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees, in West Yorkshire, England. Batley lies south-west of Leeds, north-west of Wakefield and Dewsbury, south-east of Bradford and north-east of Huddersfield. Batley is part of the Heavy Woollen District. In 2011 the population of Batley including Hanging Heaton, Staincliffe, Carlinghow, Birstall, Birstall Smithies, Copley Hill and Howden Clough was 48,730.
Red House Museum was a historic house museum, built in 1660 and renovated in the Georgian era. It closed to the public at the end of 2016 but remains as a Grade II* listed building in Gomersal, Kirklees, West Yorkshire, England.
The River Spen or Spen Beck, in West Yorkshire, England is a tributary of the River Calder. It rises north of Cleckheaton, runs through Liversedge and flows into the Calder to the south of Dewsbury at Ravensthorpe. The average rainfall for the river valley of between 600–1000mm per annum when combined with the steep narrow river channel, makes the Spen susceptible to regular flooding. It is referred to in the name of the local parliamentary constituency, Batley and Spen, to account for the villages and suburbs of Batley in the Spen Valley, such as Liversedge and Gomersal.
Cleckheaton is a town in Kirklees, West Yorkshire, England. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is situated south of Bradford, east of Brighouse, west of Batley and south-west of Leeds. It is at the centre of the Spen Valley and was the major town in the former borough of Spenborough. Cleckheaton has a history as a mill town and forms part of the Heavy Woollen District.
Kirklees is a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, England. The borough comprises the eight towns of Batley, Birstall, Cleckheaton, Dewsbury, Heckmondwike, Holmfirth, Huddersfield and Mirfield. It is governed by Kirklees Council. Kirklees had a population of 422,500 in 2011; it is the third-largest metropolitan district in England by area size, behind Doncaster and Leeds.
Heckmondwike is a town in the metropolitan borough of Kirklees, West Yorkshire, England, 9 miles (14 km) south west of Leeds. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is close to Cleckheaton and Liversedge. It is mostly in the Batley and Spen parliamentary constituency, and had an estimated population of 16,986 at the 2011 Census increasing to 18,149 at the 2021 Census. Heckmondwike forms part of the Heavy Woollen District.
Oakenshaw is a village located in both the City of Bradford and Kirklees in West Yorkshire, England. It is located midway between the town of Cleckheaton in Kirklees and the suburb of Wyke in Bradford. The village is close to the M606 motorway. The village's main shopping centre is on Bradford Road and its main church, dedicated to St Andrew, is a grade II listed building.
Batley and Spen is a constituency in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament. The current MP is Kim Leadbeater, a Labour politician, elected in a 2021 by-election by a 323-vote margin. The seat has returned Labour MPs since the 1997 general election.
The Heavy Woollen District is a region of textile-focused industrial development in West Yorkshire, England. It acquired the name because of the heavyweight cloth manufactured there from the early 19th century.
Liversedge is a town and former parish of Birstall, in the metropolitan borough of Kirklees, West Yorkshire, England. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Liversedge lies between Cleckheaton and Heckmondwike. The Kirklees ward is now called Liversedge and Gomersal with a population at the 2011 Census of 19,420. Liversedge forms part of the Heavy Woollen District.
Birstall is a market and mill town in the metropolitan borough of Kirklees, West Yorkshire, England. It is part of the Birstall and Birkenshaw ward, which had a population of 16,298 at the 2011 census. Historically in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and part of the Heavy Woollen District, Birstall is approximately 6 miles (10 km) south-west of Leeds and situated close to the M62 motorway. The town is situated between Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield and Wakefield.
Spenborough was, from 1915 to 1974, a local government district in the administrative county of Yorkshire, West Riding, England.
The A638 is a major road in England. It runs between the A1 at Markham Moor, Nottinghamshire and Chain Bar Interchange – Junction 26 of the M62 motorway, south of Bradford in West Yorkshire.
Birkenshaw is a village in the borough of Kirklees in the county of West Yorkshire, England. It lies at the crossroads between the A58 Leeds to Halifax road and the A651 Bradford to Heckmondwike road. At the 2011 census, the village was located in the ward of Birstall and Birkenshaw, which had a population 16,298. The name of the village derives from Old English and means "Birch Wood". Birkenshaw forms part of the Heavy Woollen District.
Spen Valley was a parliamentary constituency in the valley of the River Spen in the West Riding of Yorkshire. It returned one Member of Parliament (MP) to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
The Heaton Lodge and Wortley Railway was constructed by the London and North Western Railway, to provide a duplicate route between Huddersfield and Leeds, leaving the existing line at Heaton Lodge junction, east of Huddersfield and rejoining it at Farnley junction, south west of Leeds. During construction it became known as the Leeds New Line and following nationalisation it was referred to as the Spen Line. Passenger services ceased in the 1950s with full closure in stages between 1960 and 1990.
Heckmondwike Spen was a railway station opened by the London & North Western Railway (LNWR) in Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire, England. The station was one of two in the town of Heckmondwike, the other being Heckmondwike railway station which was opened by the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway (L&Y). Both stations have been closed and the lines they served have closed too although the formations that they occupied have both been converted into greenways.
The Spen Valley Line was a railway that connected Mirfield with Low Moor through the Spen Valley in West Yorkshire, England. Opened up by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway in 1847, with full opening to Low Moor in 1848, the line served a busy industrial and textile area and allowed a connection for trains between Huddersfield and Bradford. The line was absorbed by the London & North Western Railway, the London Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) and British Railways on Nationalisation. A separate link between Heckmondwike Central and Thornhill that opened later and was known as the Ravensthorpe Branch, allowed through running to Wakefield and beyond. The line was closed down to passengers in 1965 with freight continuing sporadically until 1981. A Spur onto the former Leeds New Line from the Ravensthorpe Branch kept the very southern end open until the late 1980s. The majority of the route is now the Spen Valley Greenway cycle path.
References
↑ Ekwall, Eilert (1960). The concise Oxford dictionary of English place-names (4ed.). Oxford: Clarendon Press. p.200. ISBN0-19-869103-3.
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