Following our research into the Blackburne family, we are delighted to publish this guest post by Mark Adams. Mark is a professional archaeologist who excavated the site of the Blackburne family’s residence before they moved to Orford Hall, and then Liverpool and Hale.
When we researched the Blackburne family, we could find little information about their earlier lives. Mark has provided fascinating new information, from the excavation of their family home in Newton-le-Willows, to the wills of the family. The extracts of Thomas Blackburne’s diary that Mark discovered pushed back the supposed date of the construction of the house. Over to Mark…
I was asked to write this guest blog after contacting Daz and Glenn about their fascinating blog on the Blackburne family of Orford Hall, Liverpool and Hale. We had a brief exchange of emails about the work I’d done on Thomas Blackburne (1604-1664) who lived at Newton Hall in Newton-le-Willows until moving to Orford Hall near Warrington in about 1638. It presents a short summary of some of my work and its conclusions, though if I was to include everything it would be at least twice as long and a lot harder to follow, I needed to follow several different documentary strands to disentangle the hall’s history; so make it easier to read I’ve omitted some details and kept to some of the highlights.
Excavation of the site Newton Hall in Newton-le-Willows
My interest in the Blackburne’s in general, and Thomas in particular, began when I worked in the Archaeology department at Museum of Liverpool where I helped run archaeological excavations until 2017. Most of the excavations I work on happen because the site is being built on, and in 2005 we were commissioned to excavate the site of the Blackburne family’s historic residence, Newton Hall in Newton-le-Willows, ahead of the construction of the block of flats which now occupy the site.
Newton-le-Willows has a long and very interesting history. Until the mid-19th century it was known as Newton-in-Makerfield and formed part of the Barony of Newton, before the Norman Conquest it was the head township of the Hundred of Newton. A hundred was a Saxon administrative unit, a sub-division of a shire and Newton’s status as the head indicates that it was an important place, the manor was also owned by the Saxon kings. However, the placename means ‘New Town’, so it may have been established shortly before the Conquest, unfortunately no records survive to tell us. A mound, likely to be the remains of a Norman castle survives to the north of the modern town, close to the M6 and the layout along the High Street preserves that of the medieval town. However, despite its civil significance Newton wasn’t a parish in its own right; it came under St. Oswald’s at Winwick, now a much smaller settlement to the south, but perhaps once a more important ecclesiastical center.
History of Newton Hall
Before the excavation in 2005, Newton Hall was thought to have been built in 1634, possibly on the site of an earlier moated manor house, and was demolished in about 1965. It stood just to the east of Newton-le-Willows railway station, in the shadow of the embankment for Stephenson’s Liverpool to Manchester railway which opened in 1830. The embankment and the brick viaduct it leads to radically altered the landscape, cutting the site off from the center of Newton-le-Willows and filling in a large mill pond which used to lie to the north of the hall. Even before the construction of the flats, it was difficult to visualise the site as the Blackburne family would have known it, though the fields to the south of the modern housing estates would probably look familiar to Thomas Blackburne.
One small survival from the 17th century is the ruin of Newton Mill. Known to have been in use from the medieval period but rebuilt after a fire in the late 18th century, the watermill survived until it burnt down a second time in 1906. Its remains lie to the east of the hall site but are slowly falling into Newton Brook and have deteriorated markedly since the 1990s when I first saw them.
I’d known of the site of Newton Hall for at least 10 years before the excavation took place, there had been several previous attempts to build on the site, and I was looking forward to an interesting project which would answer several questions about the building, the two key ones being when was it first built, and did the moat mentioned in historical accounts exist? A handful of similar sites have been excavated in the Liverpool and Manchester area since about 1980, but there are still many gaps in our understanding of how they were built and used.
Newton Hall was demolished in the mid-1960s but had been photographed and drawn beforehand by staff from the University of Manchester Department of Architecture, an early example of what is now known as ‘Historic Building Recording’, and a valuable tool in helping to design the excavation. It was clear from their record that Newton Hall consisted of a central timber framed cross-wing with two brick side wings which together formed the H-shaped ground plan typical of many higher status 16th and 17th century farm houses and manor houses in England and Wales. The timber framing used for the cross-wing suggested that that was perhaps the earliest part of the building, probably built 1550-1600, the brick side wings were perhaps later additions of 1600-1700.
Before the excavation started it seemed we had a very accurate date for when the hall had been built because several books and articles about the history of Newton-le-Willows mentioned an extract from Thomas Blackburne’s diary describing the construction of his new building in 1634, and it was always assumed that he was describing Newton Hall.
The archaeology of the site turned out to be slightly disappointing and I won’t describe it in detail here. Although we found the house’s foundations, the insides had been extensively modified in the 1880s and the walls underpinned, removing almost all of the earlier evidence, including any for the date the house was constructed. A small collection of 17th century pottery was recovered from rock-cut pits to the rear of the house and some tobacco pipe bowls, though the most interesting finds for me were fragments of glass drinking vessels which probably dated to the 1630s; like as not they were probably Thomas Blackburne’s and had perhaps been made by glassworkers known to have been producing similar vessels at Bickerstaff at about that date.
At first glance it shouldn’t have taken me long to write the excavation report, there was no evidence for the moat mentioned in some accounts, the foundations of the original building were badly disturbed by the restoration in 1880, the quantity of finds smaller than expected, and I should have got the report out in 3-4 weeks.
Who actually built the hall?
Except several things bothered me about the historical background. First of all, it wasn’t actually certain who had built the hall, most authors credited Thomas Blackburne, though others mention Richard Blackburne, Thomas Ireland and John Ireland. Some said it was newly built in 1634, others that it was moated and originally built by the Banastre’s (former Lords of the Barony of Newton) in the 14th century. A brief look at the Blackburne family’s genealogy also showed that there were two Thomas Blackburne’s (the other the uncle of the occupant of Newton Hall) living in Newton in the early 17th century, and it was unclear which one wrote the diary. The status of Newton Hall was unclear, some sources called it the manor house of Newton, which was unlikely, because despite their relative wealth the Blackburne’s were never Lords of the Manor of Newton, others just ‘The Hall of Newton’. From the 14th century that title of lord of the manor had been held by the Langton’s, was sold to the Fleetwood family in 1594, who then sold it to the Legh’s in 1660. Some 19th century accounts said that the manor house had been buried beneath the railway embankment when Stephenson built the Liverpool to Manchester railway to the north of Newton Hall. In addition, none of the published extracts of Thomas’ diary were explicit that he was describing Newton Hall, he only mentions his ‘building’, in actual fact it could have been a barn, perhaps not even in Newton; the Blackburne’s owned land in the Fylde, Bolton and elsewhere in Lancashire in addition to Newton.
To add to this uncertainty it was clear that the Blackburne’s had an association with Newton-le-Willows which extended much further back than 1634. So where were they living in Newton before that date? Gregson (1817-24) gives the Blackburne family’s origins as York, they moved to Scorton Hall, Garstang in the mid-16th century and Gregson then states that in the later 16th century Richard Blackburne purchased lands in Newton from the Fleetwoods. Farrer & Brownbill (1911, 134 n27) cite a document of 1586 recording Richard Blackburne’s purchase of ‘a house and other property’ from John and Anne Fairclough, which in most accounts is given as the earliest connection between the Blackburne’s and Newton. This implied that Newton Hall may have been standing when the Blackburnes made their purchase in 1586. One of the first things I found was that the family were associated with Newton from at least the 1570s because the Winwick parish registers for Newton mention the baptisms of Alis[sic] Blackburne on July 31 1578 and of Anne Blackburne on September 22 1581. Could Newton Hall date back to the 1570s?
Confused by these contradictions I decided to go back to the original records relating to the hall and the Blackburne family, especially Thomas’ diary, and attempt to disentangle the mess. The end result of that research is very complicated, with several parallel strands of evidence which would be difficult to describe in full in a short blog article, so I’ll keep to the more interesting elements.
Thomas Blackburne’s Diary
Thomas Blackburne’s diary took a lot of finding. Rimmer (1852) described the diary as being in the possession of ‘J. Robson’, a Warrington doctor and also a member of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire. Few further details survived other than that it was in code and had been purchased from a market stall in Warrington. Robson had decoded the diary and had presented it to a descendant of Thomas’, John Ireland Blackburne, who was then living at Hale Hall.
This raised some alarm bells with me. Could the diary be a forgery? Had Robson been fooled?
I started by trying the obvious places, Liverpool Archives, Lancashire Archives, Warrington Museum and other North-Western collections and drew a total blank. I even tried tracing Thomas’ descendants to see if one of them had inherited the diary. Again, no luck. It was only in 2014, when archive catalogues became widely available online, that I managed to trace the diary to Keele University Special Collections.
One of the questions archaeologists get asked all the time is ‘What’s the best thing you’ve ever found?’. One of my answers is this diary. As soon as I found the catalogue entry I wanted to drive down to Keele to look at it but had to wait a few weeks until work took me down that way.
I’m not a specialist in 17th century documents, but I have handled many wills, leases and indentures, and the parchment, ink and handwriting style all look convincing to me. Robson’s transcription also survives, and the names and relationships, for example frequent mentions of his wife Margaret and eldest son and daughter (also Thomas and Margaret) and mother-in-law in Bolton, provide further evidence of its authenticity. If it’s a forgery, it’s a very good one.
Most of the entries are single sentence descriptions of his daily prayers. However, there are many passages which give an insight into the man and his personality which are in the final section of this blog.
I found several additional sections to those already published relating to Thomas’ ‘new building’ and it is not clear that he’s referring to Newton Hall, he’s not even specific that he’s describing a domestic dwelling, it could equally have been a barn or other type of building, so a construction date of 1634 for Newton Hall is probably unlikely in the light of the other documentary evidence I uncovered. I’ll describe a selection of these below.
Other Documents relating to the Blackburnes and Newton Hall
Perhaps the most interesting of the documents I found was an extensive set of depositions (witness statements) relating to a court case between Raffe Stirrop and Sir Richard Fleetwood in 1628-30 (National Archives DL 4/79/31 and DL 4/78/45) which contain numerous details of the manorial estate and its management in the 1620s.
Stirrop had been appointed by Fleetwood to manage the manorial estate in Newton in 1622-3 and the arrangement seems to have worked well until it was alleged that Stirrop had mismanaged the estate and falsified his accounts to Fleetwood. Stirrop was summoned to Fleetwood’s main residence, Wooton Lodge in Staffordshire, at Christmas 1625 and allegedly held captive there whilst on 2 February 1626 Thomas Blackburne and others broke into ‘…the hall and house…’ and evicted Stirrop’s wife. The eviction seems to have been disputed by Stirrop’s wife, Henrye Towneley of Farnworth thought ‘…that the said Blackburne … [had the] … intent of doe the compl[ainan]t some hurt’.
It is not made entirely clear which Thomas Blackburne was one of the co-defendants (the diarist and his uncle of the same name were both living in Newton at the time) but he is referred to as ‘…beeinge then butt newly maryed…’ in February 1626 (Deposition of Richard Backster of Loton[sic]) which implies that it was the diarist; who had married Margaret Norris in April 1626 (Crisp 1911, 133). His uncle, also Thomas, died in 1633 but was married in March 1616/7 (ibid).
Fleetwood’s house in Newton is throughout referred to as the ‘hall of Newton’ and is clearly the manor house, though there are also references to ‘…the … new built house of the compl[ainan]t (i.e. Stirrop)…’ and it is clear that Stirrop had another dwelling in Newton in addition to living at the manor house. For example, in the deposition of Ellen Dombell of Whiston it is stated that ‘… Thomas Blackburne George Aynsworth and Jeffrey Cashe came to the hall of Newton where the pl[ain]t[if]s wyfe then dwelled and … Jeffrey Cashe did saie they … thought it best for her to goe to her husbandes … house…’ which was also in Newton.
However, although the depositions go into some detail about the contents of the manor house and the management of the estate, they unfortunately provide no detail about the manor house’s location, its size or layout. However, they do prove that the manor house was known as ‘Newton Hall’ or the ‘Hall of Newton’ from at least the 1620s whilst the wills of William and Richard Blackburne (Richard was Thomas’ father) suggest that they owned a dwelling of a similar size to Newton Hall located close to a water mill in Newton which would fit with the excavated site. For example, the inventory attached to William’s will mentions goods in the ‘Chamb’r next the milne’ and the ’Chamber that the doore oppeneth towards the kilne’, the proximity to a kiln and mill strongly suggest that it is the Blackburne’s Newton Hall being discussed, and mention of new and old buildings seems to imply that the house had been extended, perhaps by the addition of the side wings, though this must have happened before Thomas’ diary entries.
This, and several similar strands of documentary evidence, strongly suggest that it’s very likely that the Fleetwood’s and Legh’s Manor House was a distinct entity from the Newton Hall owned by the Blackburne’s, but that the two were located within close proximity. Both were known at various dates as ‘Newton Hall’ or the ‘Hall of Newton’.
Other documents show that the manor house was derelict by about 1670-1690 and that during the 1620s and 1650s none of the Blackburne’s were living at the manor house. Early 17th century Blackburne family wills (for example William’s quoted earlier) make it clear that they occupied a house of similar size and location to Newton Hall by 1614 at the latest and that this occupancy probably continued unbroken down to the 1660s and beyond, despite several changes of tenancy and the disputed ownership of the manor house. Whilst it is possible that the Blackburne’s occupied the manor house prior to the 1620s, moved back in the 1630s, left in the 1650s and reacquired ownership in c. 1660 this seems very unlikely and it is much more credible that Newton Hall and the manor house were separate entities, Newton Hall being occupied by the Blackburne’s from at least 1614 and probably from the 1570s. Unfortunately there was no evidence from the excavation to prove this.
Where was the Manor House Located?
If the manor house was a separate site, where was it located? At the end of the excavation all I had was a slightly garbled account in Edward Baines ‘History of Lancashire’ which appeared to suggest that it was either on the same site as Newton Hall, or buried beneath the embankment which forms part of George Stephenson’s railway viaduct. The excavation had found no evidence of a moat, so perhaps it really was located beneath the embankment?
It took some digging in archives and old books, but eventually I traced the origins of Baines’ account to John Britton’s ‘Beauties of Lancashire’ which was published in 1807.
Here is an old hall built of wood, with much painted glass still remaining in its windows. It stands on a rocky foundation; and behind it the rock is hollowed out in a very unusual manner, appearing to have had subterraneous passages, which, by removing the surface of the rock, are now laid open. Adjoining to this hall is a small rising ground, which was formerly nearly surrounded with a moat, of which a small remnant is still remaining. The tradition of the place is that it was the residence of a king.
Beauties of Lancashire, John Britton, 1807
The first element is clearly a description of the Blackburne’s residence, the painted glass is mentioned in several later descriptions of Newton Hall and there are photographs of stained glass windows in the Manchester University record of the house. The hollowed out rock is probably a set of rock cut pits of uncertain function which we excavated to the south of the hall. The second half, with the description of small rising ground surrounded by a moat is interesting as it is almost certainly a reference to the separate manorial site buried beneath the railway embankment twenty years later. The Blackburne’s house and the Fleetwood’s manor house were therefore neighbours, but separate entities.
Elements of Britton’s description recur frequently in most of the later descriptions of Newton Hall, mostly as almost direct plagiarism, with each author putting on a slightly different spin until by the mid-19th century the Fleetwood and Blackburne residences had become confused into a single site.
Thomas Blackburne and the Family’s Wealth
Thomas was clearly a significant figure in establishing the family’s wealth, the move from Newton Hall to Orford Hall an indication of his leap in status from yeoman farmer to wealthy merchant. However, I’ve found little direct evidence to date of where his wealth came from. His diary entries imply he was something of a worrier, though this may have resulted in a tendency to caution which saved him from taking the wrong side in the Civil War and that was perhaps part of what enabled him to make such progress. Many members of the North-West gentry were Catholics and/or Royalists and had their estates sequestrated causing huge financial problems. Thomas seems to have avoided taking active part in the conflict, he also seems, publicly at least, to have abandoned his Catholic faith and the two acts seems to have saved the family finances.
It’s not clear to me exactly how he made his money, I’ve found no mention of the trade with Russia William and Richard were involved with, he died before the rediscovery of Cheshire salt in 1670 and the rise of the slave trade from Liverpool. Some documents suggest an involvement in the cloth trade, he was involved in a dispute with London merchants over the sale of wool, and it seems likely that this was the source of his wealth.
One of the great things about conducting this research is that I really feel that I’ve got to know Thomas as a person. Most of the people associated with the sites I’ve excavated must remain nameless, dead before any significant written records were maintained, and in that sense unknowable (though we can still say a lot about how their lives were lived). It’s a shame no portrait of Thomas seems to survive, that would be a real find.
Selected Entries From the Diary of Thomas Blackburne
As is standard I’ve kept the original 17th century spelling in the transcripts below.
Rimmer (1852) cited the following excerpts:
Oct. the 13th, 1634.- Aboute buildinge I did spend the whole of this day. Reasonably well spente I this day in sivell outeward carriage; but inwardlye I am but wordly miended, could in devotion, and quire could in zeal, too earthly minded and troubled aboute bilding.
Oct. the 16th, 1634.-This was our rearinge day, and about this business I spent this whole day.
Oct. the 17th, 1634.- Much troubled with bildinge.
Oct. the 19th, 1634.-Sunday, my minde verye much disquited about my bildinge.
Oct. the 24th, 1634.-Incumbered very much with my bildinge.
Nov. the 11th, 1634.-Aboute my bildinge I spent all this whole daye: worldlye miended, and my thoughts are very much entangled about my bildinge.
Dec. the 1st, 1634.-This morninge, after I had saied my morninge prayers, I wente to the new bildinge, and there my selfe alone did pray and meditate.
The Robson’s transcript contains the following additional entries:
Nov 4th 1634 In and aboute worldly imploymentes, in my bildinge I spent the moste of this daye: and in the afternoone I did spende in sheeringe.
Nov 7th 1634 Aboute my bildinge I spente this whole day & but worldly minded and very much incumbered about my bildinge
Nov 8th 1634 In and aboute worldlye imployments about my bildinge I spente this daye: but worldlye
Nov 10th 1634 But worldly minded and my minde is very much incumbereed with my bildinge
Nov 28th 1634 In intended this daye to have fasted and prayed: and to have spente this whole daye well and holilye. But I did not sofor I spente it wholly aboute worldly matters in my bildinge: and the whole morning I spente at cards, and so I spent this whole day.
Thomas makes no mention of where he was when he made these entries and doesn’t name or describe the building, so there is no certainty that these entries relate to Newton Hall, in fact there are several strands of evidence which suggest that at most it relates to a modification or extension of the Hall. For example, William Blackburne’s will of 1616 strongly suggests that Newton Hall was standing by that date and was largely in the form first recorded in the 19th century. It is entirely possible that the diary entry in fact refers to the construction of another building elsewhere in the Blackburne’s estates.
Other entries give fascinating snippets of family life in the 17th century.
Jan 5th 1634 This morninge I did not saye my morninge prayers But earlye this morninge I did beate little margarett very sore and oute of measure and was a greate deale two blame for so doinge. I was exceedinglye angre and vexed in my mind this morninge and so did remaine and dogged all this daye: I wente to pouton (?) to my sister anne and was all nighte with her. I did not saye any parte of my morninge prayers.
This passage gives some insight into Thomas, he was a man of his time, a period when physical punishments of children and adults which were often brutal by modern standards were common. I suspect many of his contemporaries would have thought nothing of the beating he dealt out but it is clear that Thomas rapidly regretted it.
March 19th 1634 Aboute my Mother-in-Lawes business I spente this whole day at Boulton. This daye Thomas Heapie tould me that I had used Margaret Keele and had had a childe by her and the childe was deade which report did trouble mee exceedinglye inso muche.
This seems to have been a piece of local gossip, Thomas gives no clues about whether or not it was true, though I’ve found no claim for bastardy against him in the Quarter Sessions papers, so perhaps it was untrue.
19th Maye 1635 This whole daye I spente it in and aboute worldlye imploymentes could in devosion and deade in zeale. Nowe at this present time my wife douth lye in child bedd and I am lustfull and very much inclined unto wantonness and though I doo refraine carnale knowledge of my wife yet I am addicted and much delighted in touchinge and handlinge of her and very manye times my thoughts are carried to thinke of the act of venarye. I am but worldlye and carnal, for in time of prayer then thoughts so muster: this night betwixte two and three of the clocke in the morninge I did use or sitt uppe in my bedd to lett the little ladd (Thomas) ????? and juste then I did praye God bless him, incidentalye upon that, I thoughte within myselfe I might have done well to have prayed all night this God God to have blessed us both (that was both the ladd and myselfe) upon which mission in my mind I did presently offer to saye God bless us and I failed also the second time and onlye prayed God bless him but immediately rememberinge that I had missed the second time also I did praye the third time God bless us, and presently upon this did rise upp to make water myselfe and when I had done I was very harte sicke and presently I did fall down in a swoon and when I did somethinge? come? to myself I was I was exceedinglye sicke and more sicke than ever I was in my life: O Lord Jesus my lovinge and kindf redeemer have mercy upon mee and give mee grace that I may bee thankfull this and all thye mercyes and give mee grace of bessd redimer that I may good use of this so lovinge and fatherly chastisement and O Lord Jesus my blessed saviour give me the grace that a may make good use of all thy mercies.
Amen Amen
As an insight into the personality of a 17th century man this is as good as anything found in Pepys diaries.
July 24th 1635 I wente to Boulton this daye and there I spente most parte of the whole daye. Resonably well minded and reasonably well I spente the whole daye as I decided? This morninge I did meditate and paraye and did ???? much inwarde comfort and was made inwardly joyfull in my meditation and founde inward constant delight and assurance, and it did me goode at the harte to thinke that if I were once settled in the truth (which I did think was to be a Roman Catholicke* how that ever after I should live in peace and quite securitie after: since and s??? desire to persevere in the trewe sevice of allmightie God unto my lives end, which thinge I did moste heartilye desire and was in greate hope speedily to have my desire and request granted mee at the hand of allmightie God and so as there my payers and meditation I served inward joye and comforte. O Lord Allmightie shewe thy mercye upon me poor vile siner for Jesus my redeemers sake. Amen
*However, there are later references to Thomas being a devout Protestant. For example, ‘Thomas, son of Richard, …….. was a devout Protestant, but does not seem to have taken any part in the Civil War.’ Farrer & Brownbill (1907, 316-324).
It’s a shame that Thomas’ diaries for the Civil War period (if they ever existed) haven’t survived. Although by the 1640s he had moved to Orford and probably didn’t witness the Battle of Red Bank between Cromwell and an invading Scots army which took place about a mile south of Newton Hall, he must have been aware of events. However, he seems to have taken little or no direct part. He isn’t mentioned in the later sequestration accounts, though the Fleetwood family were.
Further Reading
This is a selected list of sources relating to Newton-le-Willows
Baines E 1825 History Directory And Gazetteer Of The County Palatine Of Lancaster With A Variety Of Commercial & Statistical Information In Two Volumes Illustrated By Maps And Plans By Edward Baines The Directory Department By W Parson Vol II Wm Wales & Co
Baines E. 1870 The History of the County Palatine and Duchy of Lancaster (Ed. J. Harland)
Beamont W. 1872 The Fee of Makerfield; With an Account of Some of its Lords, the Barons of Newton Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire Vol 12, 81-130
Beamont W. 1997 The History of the House of Orford.H. Wells.
Britton J. 1807 The Beauties of Lancashire
Cole C. 1912 A History of Newton-in-Makerfield
Crisp F.A. 1911 Visitation of England and Wales, Notes Vol 9. Grove Park Press.
Farrer W. & Brownbill J. 1908 The Victoria History of the County of Lancaster. Vol 2 University of London.
Farrer W. & Brownbill J. 1907 The Victoria History of the County of Lancaster. Vol 3 University of London.
Farrer W. & Brownbill J. 1911 The Victoria History of the County of Lancaster. Vol 4 University of London.
Gregson M. 1817-1824 A Portfolio of Fragments Relative to the History and Antiquities of the County Palatine and Duchy of Lancaster. Liverpool
Kendrick J. 1877 Warrington Local Sketches. Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire Vol 29, 33-42.
Philpott R.A. 1988 Newton-le-Willows. Historic Towns of the Merseyside Area: A Survey of Urban Settlement to c. 1800. Liverpool Museum Occasional Papers No.3, 8-20
Philpott R.A. and Irvine J. 1992 An Archaeological Evaluation at Newton Hall, Newton-le-Willows, St Helens, September-October 1991 (Site 19). Unpublished NMLFAU Report for Swan Motors.
Philpott R. & Lawrence R. 2000 Excavation and Survey at Newton Mill, Newton-le-Willows, 1985 Journal of the Merseyside Archaeological Society, 10, 33-44.
Rimmer A. 1852 Ancient Halls of Lancashire. Deighton & Laughton, Liverpool.
About the author Mark Adams
A member of the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists, Mark’s worked as a professional archaeologist since 1985. In 1994 he completed a PhD on British Bronze Age metalwork and then worked for the Archaeology Department at Museum of Liverpool until 2017. He currently works for Headland Archaeology as a Principal Archaeological Consultant and specialises in the archaeology of Merseyside, Cheshire, Greater Manchester and Lancashire where he has worked on sites dating to the Prehistoric, Roman, Medieval and later periods; he has a particular interest in the archaeology of Liverpool’s docks. In addition to the North-West of England he has worked on excavations in Wales, London, the Midlands and Bulgaria.
Thanks to:
Bygone Liverpool would like to thank Mark for this fascinating new information on the Blackburne family. We would also like to thank Liz Stewart at National Museums Liverpool for kindly giving us permission to use photographs of the dig and the pottery fragments.
You are free to share the information within the book, but please credit the site and supply a link to this post.
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