Lowca

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Lowca
Lowca-cumbria.jpg
The main street of Lowca village
Location map Borough of Copeland.svg
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Lowca
Location in Copeland Borough
Cumbria UK location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Lowca
Location within Cumbria
Population888 (2011) [1]
OS grid reference NX976220
Civil parish
  • Lowca
District
Shire county
Region
Country England
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town WHITEHAVEN
Postcode district CA28
Dialling code 01946
Police Cumbria
Fire Cumbria
Ambulance North West
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Cumbria
54°34′59″N3°34′59″W / 54.583°N 3.583°W / 54.583; -3.583 Coordinates: 54°34′59″N3°34′59″W / 54.583°N 3.583°W / 54.583; -3.583

Lowca is a village and civil parish in the English county of Cumbria, just to the north of the village of Moresby. It had a population of 773 in 2001, [2] increasing to 888 at the 2011 Census. [1]

Contents

It was formerly a mining area but is now noted for its wind farm.

Lowca looks out over the Solway Firth to the west. The village used to stand next to a huge black slag heap called Pit Bank until the slag heap was redeveloped in the 1980s, along with a new road leading directly through Lowca from the A595.

Lowca has its own community school, previously known as Lowca Primary School, and rugby team.

History

In 1800, brothers Adam, Thomas and Crosby Heslop, formerly associated with the ironworks at Seaton near Workington, established an iron foundry and engineering business on the seashore by the mouth of the Lowca Beck. The impetus for the business was probably the success of the twin-cylinder steam engine Adam had invented while working in Shropshire in 1790, and there was no shortage of finance, hence the company title "Heslops, Milward, Johnston & Co." The three brothers were all dead by the mid-1830s so the investors sold up, and the works was taken over by local iron mining partnership Tulk and Ley which began a long tradition of locomotive manufacture. In 1857 it was sold again, to Fletcher, Jennings & Co.

Lowca also had large reserves of coal, which were mined for centuries, providing even more employment than the engineering works. In 1911 a chemical works was established to exploit the latest coal by-product technologies which had been developed in Germany. This plant was shelled by a German submarine, U-24, during World War I, on 16 August 1915; an event which the Germans made much of at the time, and Lowca has made much of ever since. Local legend has it that a quick thinking local worker opened a relief valve which sent up an impressive plume of burning gas, so the submariners thought they had destroyed their target and left. Apparently the only fatality of the incident was one local dog. [3]

The village used to be served by Lowca railway station on the Lowca Light Railway which connected with the Cleator & Workington junction railway at Harrington Junction.

Related Research Articles

Tulk and Ley was a 19th-century iron mining company in west Cumberland which also ran an engineering works at Lowca near Whitehaven.

Fletcher, Jennings & Co.

Fletcher, Jennings & Co. was an engineering company at Lowca near Whitehaven, Cumberland, England.

Lowca railway station Disused railway station in Cumbria, England

Lowca had two railway stations that served the village of Lowca in the former county of Cumberland, England, which is now part of Cumbria.

Harrington, Cumbria Human settlement in England

Harrington is a village on the Cumbrian coast south of Workington and north of Whitehaven in England. Historically part of Cumberland, its industrial history, which largely ended in the late 1930s, included a shipbuilders, iron works, coal mining and steel making. It once had five railway stations. It still has one railway station, on the Cumbrian Coast Line, near the harbour.

Parton, Cumbria Human settlement in England

Parton is a village and civil parish on the Cumbrian coast, overlooking the Solway Firth, 1¼ miles (2 km) north of the town of Whitehaven in England. The parish had a population of 924 in 2001, decreasing to 914 at the 2011 Census. Formerly a port and a mining centre, it is now purely residential, benefiting from its location between the A595 trunk road and the Cumbrian Coast railway line.

Seaton Iron Works was an iron works which operated between 1763 and 1899 under different titles and various owners. The site chosen was on the north bank of the River Derwent and was in the parish of Seaton, Cumberland. As well as making iron it also manufactured iron goods, tin plate and under control of Adam Heslop a foundry owner of Lowca, Cumberland was a manufacturer of stationary steam engines.

Cleator Moor West railway station Disused railway station in Cumbria, England

Cleator Moor West railway station was opened as "Cleator Moor" by the Cleator and Workington Junction Railway (C&WJR) in 1879. It served the growing industrial town of Cleator Moor, Cumbria, England.

Distington Human settlement in England

Distington is a large village and civil parish in Cumbria, England, 3 miles (4.8 km) south of Workington and 4 miles (6.4 km) north of Whitehaven. Historically a part of Cumberland, the civil parish includes the nearby settlements of Common End, Gilgarran and Pica. The parish had a population of 2,247 in the 2001 census, increasing slightly to 2,256 at the 2011 census.

Seaton railway station (Cumbria) Disused railway station in Cumbria, England

Seaton railway station served the village of Seaton, near Workington in Cumberland, England.

Moresby Junction Halt railway station was opened by the Cleator and Workington Junction Railway (C&WJR) in 1910. Very few people lived near the halt, which served nearby Walkmill Colliery and coke ovens in Cumbria, England.

Keekle Colliers' Platform railway station was opened by the Cleator and Workington Junction Railway (C&WJR) in July 1910, closed the following January, reopened in June 1913 then closed for good on 1 October 1923. The halt was provided to enable residents of the isolated Keekle Terrace, less than 100 yds from the track, to get to and from work at the equally isolated Walkmill Colliery and coke ovens in Cumbria, England. The Platform is not shown by Jowett.

Moresby Parks railway station Disused railway station in Cumbria, England

Moresby Parks railway station was opened by the Cleator and Workington Junction Railway (C&WJR) in 1879. It was situated just north of the summit of the company's main line and served the scattered community of Moresby Parks in Cumbria, England.

Harrington Junction Disused railway station in Cumbria, England

Harrington Junction was a railway junction in Harrington, Cumbria, England. It joined three branches to the Cleator and Workington Junction Railway's (CWJR) main line from Workington Central to Moor Row via Cleator Moor West. No station ever existed at the junction, High Harrington was the nearest, 48 chains (0.97 km) to the south.

Distington railway station Disused railway station in Cumbria, England

Distington railway station was opened jointly by the Cleator and Workington Junction Railway (C&WJR) and the LNWR and Furness Joint Railway on 1 October 1879. It was situated on the northern edge of the village of Distington, Cumbria, England where the C&WJR's north-south main line crossed the Joint Line's east-west Gilgarran Branch.

Harrington and Lowca Light Railway

The Harrington and Lowca Light Railway was a short railway on the coast of Cumberland, which is now part of Cumbria, England.

Parton Halt railway station Disused railway station in Cumbria, England

Parton Halt railway station was opened by the LNWR and FR Joint Railway in January 1915 and closed by the LMSR fourteen years later in 1929.

Gilgarran Branch

The Gilgarran Branch was a 7-mile-32-chain long (11.9 km) single track railway line connecting four separate railway companies in the former county of Cumberland, now part of Cumbria, England.

Micklam railway station served the fireclay mine and brickworks at Micklam, a short distance north of Lowca in the former county of Cumberland, England, which is now part of Cumbria.

Copperas Hill railway station served the small clifftop community of Copperas Hill, south of Harrington in the former county of Cumberland, England, which is now part of Cumbria.

Rose Hill Platform served workmen in the Rose Hill area of Harrington in the former county of Cumberland, England, which is now part of Cumbria.

References

  1. 1 2 UK Census (2011). "Local Area Report – Lowca Parish (E04002493)". Nomis. Office for National Statistics . Retrieved 24 April 2021.
  2. ↑ UK Census (2001). "Local Area Report – Lowca Parish (16UE013)". Nomis. Office for National Statistics . Retrieved 24 April 2021.
  3. ↑ Carruthers, F.J., article on Lowca shelling, Evening News & Star, 3–4 October 1968


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