The Hulton family of Hulton lived and owned land in Lancashire for more than eight hundred years from the late-12th to the late-20th centuries. The family took its name from the three townships surrounding their Hulton Park Estate, Over, Middle and Little Hulton.
The first family members to live in Lancashire were Iorwerth and Madoc the sons of Bleiddyn who left North Wales in about 1167 after Owain Gwynedd expelled Norman and English settlers. [1] Iorwerth, was granted by charter the town of Pendleton by King John in 1199. [2] The family expanded its influence and in 1304 Richard de Hulton held parts of Hulton, Ordsall, Flixton and Heaton. [3] He built the first Hulton Hall, establishing the family seat in Hulton Park which covered 325 acres of parkland approximately five kilometres south-west of Bolton. [4] Richard's grandson, also Richard squandered much of the family's estate and died in poverty without an heir.
The Hultons regained and expanded their estate spent during the 15th and 16th centuries often through marriage. In 1485 a marriage was arranged between the infants, Adam Hulton and Alice Hulton, daughter of John Hulton of Farnworth. In 1521, Henry VIII arbitrated a dispute that arose between the two branches of the family, ruling that lands in Westhoughton, Harpurhey, Denton, Openshaw and Gorton should be assigned to Adam and Alice's male heirs. From this time this branch of the Hultons became much prominent than their namesakes in Farnworth. [5]
The Hultons worshipped at Deane Church and some are buried in its Hulton Chapel. They were devout Catholics, and, in common with many Lancastrians, kept the old faith during the Reformation but remained allied to the sovereign. William Hulton joined the association of Lancashire magistrates committed to defending Elizabeth I in the Anglo-Spanish War in 1585. [6] His successor and grandson, Adam Hulton converted to Protestantism, and developed connections with Puritan families in the area. [7] The family was involved in the Civil War of 1642–51 when Adam summoned his tenants to Parliament's cause [1] and may have taken an active role in the conflict. A letter addressed to George Rigby of Peel, Clerk of the Peace for Lancashire in January 1643 relates that Rigby's brother-in-law, 'Captaine Hilton', was kept prisoner in Chester Castle after acting as a captain in the Parliamentary army. [8] 'Captaine Hilton' could be Adam or his brother Edward.
Adam's son, William, inherited the estate as the Hulton's wealth and influence was increasing. He represented Clitheroe in the Convention Parliament of 1660 that invited Charles II to return to the throne, and was the only family member to sit in the House of Commons. He built the second Hulton Hall. [9]
The Hultons occupied positions of political influence during the 18th and 19th centuries. From 1767–75, Henry Hulton of the Hampshire branch of the family was the First Commissioner of Customs in the American Colonies in Boston and responsible for collecting taxes levied on the American population which they denounced as 'taxation without representation'. Hulton was reviled and attacked and at the onset of the American Revolution returned to England in 1776. [10]
William Hulton was appointed High Sheriff of Lancashire in 1811. After a cotton mill in Westhoughton was torched by Luddites in 1812, Hulton ordered the execution of four of the suspects, one of them reported to be twelve years old. [11] Hulton was a magistrate who dealt harshly with the working-class crime and social unrest. On 16 August 1819. 60,000 pro-democracy reformers gathered in St Peter's Field in Manchester to listen to the radical orator, Henry Hunt. Hulton, chairman of the Lancashire and Cheshire magistrates, a body set up to deal with the growing problem of civil unrest was in Manchester to ensure order was maintained. Observing from a nearby house, Hulton issued an arrest warrant for Hunt and his associates, but was advised that military assistance was required. He called on the local yeomanry to arrest the radicals and disperse the meeting. The yeomanry attacked the crowd indiscriminately. [12] It is estimated that 18 were killed and 600 to 700 injured. The event became known as the 'Peterloo Massacre'. [13] Home Secretary Lord Sidmouth conveyed King George III's 'great satisfaction' at Hulton's 'prompt, decisive and efficient measures', [14] but among the working classes he was known as 'old Peterloo', his reputation was forever sullied. [14] In 1820 he turned down a Tory seat in Parliament, [15] while in 1841 Hulton and his family were attacked in Bolton during an election campaign [16] demonstrating how the massacre had influenced public opinion.
The Hultons accrued much wealth from the coal under their estate. It was mined from the 1550s, but its worth became clear as industrialisation took hold in the late-18th and early-19th centuries. [17] William Hulton, who inherited the family estate in 1800, was responsible for the major developments that exploited the coal reserves in Hulton Park. He was a principal supporter of the Bolton and Leigh Railway, which transported the Hulton's coal to markets in Bolton, Manchester and Liverpool. [18] The railway pioneer, George Stephenson, stayed at Hulton Hall for three months while overseeing the railway's construction. [19] The line was opened for traffic on 1 August 1828, with 40,000 people in attendance to witness what the Bolton Chronicle described as an 'interesting and novel spectacle'. [20] The Bolton and Leigh Railway was the first railway line to operate in Lancashire. In 1858, William Hulton founded the Hulton Colliery Company in partnership with Harwood Walcot Banner. Their partnership was dissolved ten years later and from 1868 onwards the company traded under the Hulton name. The Hultons gave up control of the coal mines in 1886 after the Hulton Colliery Company was founded. [21] In December 1910 a defective safety lamp caused an explosion in the Pretoria Pit killing 344 men and boys. It was the worst coal mining disaster in Lancashire, and the third worst in Britain. [22] By 1947, the Hulton coal empire could claim to be the largest in Lancashire, but it gradually diminished in the second half of the 20th century due to a nationwide fall in demand. [23]
In the late-19th and 20th centuries the Hulton family fortunes gradually declined. However, in 1902 William Wilbraham Blethyn Hulton was made a baronet for services to Lancashire. The second baronet, Sir William Rothwell Hulton, was the last patriarch to live in Hulton Hall before moving into an estate cottage towards the end of the First World War. Hulton Hall fell into a state of disrepair before being demolished in 1958.
The fourth and last baronet, Sir Geoffrey Alan Hulton served as an officer in the Royal Navy Marines on board HMS Repulse during the Second World War. He was held prisoner by the Japanese for three and a half years, during which he 'lived in the depths of squalor'. [24] Geoffrey Hulton's death without heir in 1993 signalled the end of the Hulton dynasty.
Descendants of the Hulton dynasty can be found throughout the world. Some remain in the United Kingdom while other, by way of migration have resettled throughout the commonwealth, most prominently in Australia and New Zealand.
Thomas Henry Hulton served the New Zealand Army Corps in the First World War, while his children; Henry Hulton, Fergus Hulton and Douglas William Hulton served in the Second World War. Fergus Hulton, serving the Royal New Zealand Air Force, died in a mid-air collision over the town of Wooler.
Thomas Henry Hulton's grave can be found in an above ground tomb outside St Faith's Church near Te Papaiouru Marae in Rotorua, New Zealand.
Westhoughton is a town and civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, Greater Manchester, England, 4 miles (6 km) southwest of Bolton, 5 miles (8 km) east of Wigan and 13 miles (21 km) northwest of Manchester.
Agecroft Colliery was a coal mine on the Manchester Coalfield that opened in 1844 in the Agecroft district of Pendlebury, Lancashire, England. It exploited the coal seams of the Middle Coal Measures of the Lancashire Coalfield. The colliery had two spells of use; the first between 1844 and 1932, when the most accessible coal seams were exploited, and a second lease of life after extensive development in the late 1950s to access the deepest seams.
Walkden is a town in the City of Salford in Greater Manchester, England, six miles northwest of Salford, and seven miles of Manchester.
Little Hulton is an area in the City of Salford, Greater Manchester, England, 3.4 miles (5.5 km) south of Bolton, 7 miles (11.3 km) northwest of Salford, and 9 miles (14.5 km) northwest of Manchester. Within the boundaries of the historic county of Lancashire, Little Hulton is bordered by Farnworth to the north, Walkden to the east and Tyldesley to the south.
Over Hulton is a suburb of Westhoughton within the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, in Greater Manchester, England. Historically part of Lancashire, it lies 3.5 miles (5.6 km) south west of Bolton.
Howe Bridge railway station, originally Chowbent station, is a former railway station in Atherton, Greater Manchester. It was situated within the historic county of Lancashire.
The Lancashire Coalfield in North West England was an important British coalfield. Its coal seams were formed from the vegetation of tropical swampy forests in the Carboniferous period over 300 million years ago.
Tyldesley Coal Company was a coal mining company formed in 1870 in Tyldesley, on the Manchester Coalfield in the historic county of Lancashire, England that had its origins in Yew Tree Colliery, the location for a mining disaster that killed 25 men and boys in 1858.
Ramsden's Shakerley Collieries was a coal mining company operating the Nelson and Wellington Pits from the mid 19th century in Shakerley, Tyldesley in the historic county of Lancashire, England.
Great Boys Colliery was a coal mine operating on the Manchester Coalfield in the second half of the 19th century in Tyldesley, then in the historic county of Lancashire, England. It was sunk on Great Boys farm, which in 1778 was described as a "messuage with eight Cheshire acres of land" on the north side of Sale Lane west of the Colliers Arms public house. It was owned by William Atkin and sold in 1855 to mineowners, John Fletcher of Bolton and Samuel Scowcroft. By 1869 their partnership was dissolved and the company became John Fletcher and Sons in 1877. Shafts were sunk for a colliery on Pear Tree Farm on the corner of Mort Lane and Sale Lane which appear in the 1867 Mines Lists and became part of Great Boys Colliery. Fletcher and Schofield were granted permission to construct a mineral railway to join the London and North Western Railway's Tyldesley Loopline in 1868 but there is no evidence that it was built. The colliery closed before 1885. The colliery accessed the Brassey mine at about 170 yards and the Six Foot mine at 182 yards. The deeper coal seams were accessed by New Lester Colliery.
Manchester Collieries was a coal mining company with headquarters in Walkden formed from a group of independent companies operating on the Manchester Coalfield in 1929. The Mining Industry Act of 1926 attempted to stem the post-war decline in coal mining and encourage independent companies to merge in order to modernise and better survive the economic conditions of the day. Robert Burrows of the Atherton company Fletcher Burrows proposed a merger of several independent companies operating to the west of Manchester. The merger was agreed and took place in March 1929.
Fletcher, Burrows and Company was a coal mining company that owned collieries and cotton mills in Atherton, Greater Manchester, England. Gibfield, Howe Bridge and Chanters collieries exploited the coal mines (seams) of the middle coal measures in the Manchester Coalfield. The Fletchers built company housing at Hindsford and a model village at Howe Bridge which included pithead baths and a social club for its workers. The company became part of Manchester Collieries in 1929. The collieries were nationalised in 1947 becoming part of the National Coal Board.
New Lester Colliery was a coal mine operating on the Manchester Coalfield from the second half of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century in Tyldesley, then in the historic county of Lancashire, England. It was owned by James Roscoe and two shafts were sunk in about 1865 on the east side of Mort Lane on the road to Little Hulton where Roscoe had sunk the Peel Hall and New Watergate pits.
Andrew Knowles and Sons was a coal mining company that operated on the Manchester Coalfield in and around Clifton near Pendlebury, in the historic county of Lancashire, England.
The Clifton and Kersley Coal Company or Clifton and Kearsley Coal Company was a coal mining company that operated in Clifton and Kearsley on the south side of the Irwell Valley, then in the historic county of Lancashire, England. Its collieries exploited the coal mines (seams) of the middle coal measures in the Manchester Coalfield. Pits had been sunk in the 1730s and in the 1740s John Heathcote who owned the pits employed Matthew Fletcher. The Fletchers had extensive interests in coal mining in the area and, by the 1750s, Fletcher owned the collieries.
Astley Green Colliery was a coal mine in Astley, Greater Manchester, then in the historic county of Lancashire, England. It was the last colliery to be sunk in Astley. Sinking commenced in 1908 by the Pilkington Colliery Company, a subsidiary of the Clifton and Kersley Coal Company, at the southern edge of the Manchester Coalfield, working the Middle Coal Measures where they dipped under the Permian age rocks under Chat Moss. The colliery was north of the Bridgewater Canal. In 1929 it became part of Manchester Collieries, and in 1947 was nationalised and integrated into the National Coal Board. It closed in 1970, and is now Astley Green Colliery Museum.
William Hulton was an English landowner, magistrate and collier who lived at Hulton Park, in the historic county of Lancashire, England. The Hultons owned the estate since the late-12th century.
The Hulton Colliery Company was a coal mining company operating on the Lancashire Coalfield from the mid 19th century in Over Hulton and Westhoughton, then in the historic county of Lancashire, England. The company had its origins in small coal mines on the northern part of the Hulton Park estate in 1571 owned by the Hultons who had held the estate from medieval times.
Peelwood Colliery was a coal mine operating on the Manchester Coalfield after 1883 in Shakerley, Tyldesley, Greater Manchester, then in the historic county of Lancashire, England.