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Other Works

St. James' Church

The Fylde Water Board demolished and rebuilt St. James' Church, Stocks-in-Bowland. The last service took place in the old Church on the 24th May 1936. The Church and graveyard was relocated to a site higher above the proposed water level of the reservoir, although the original site was never actually flooded. It remains today as the car park at the bottom of "School Lane".  

Demolition of  Dalehead Church

Photograph used by kind permission of Mr. M.  Pye

The site for the new graveyard was drained by Richard Wallbank.  The new site was consecrated by the Bishop of Bradford on the 12th November 1926 and on 30th November a 15 year old girl from the temporary village at Hollins who had died was buried there. 

Some 150 bodies were exhumed during 1927 and reburied in the new graveyard, including 30 unknown bodies which were buried in a special mass grave.

"The Water Board offered £15 to any family that were willing to move their own relatives' bodies but I couldn't say how many took 'em up on it. If you didn't move the bodies then the Water Board would do it anyway..." (G. Robinson)

The exhumations took place, as is traditional, at dead of night between 1am  and 4am. It is reported that the workers involved in this task were well fortified with rum, but that the work was carried out with great decorum and respect for the dead. 

New Graveyard c. 1926

The Water Board rebuilt the Church in a similar style though it was somewhat reduced in size.  Although it was felt that it was not needed as a Church as there was no longer much of a congregation, some local people expressed a wish to be buried there and so the Fylde Water Board rebuilt it as a "Mortuary Chapel". The present church was consecrated by the assistant Bishop of Bradford William Mounsey on the 30th July 1938. 

Since that time, displaced Dalehead families and other local people have continued to want to worship at St. James' Church so regular occasional services are held still there.

The graveyard is now noted for the wide diversity of plants which grow there which make it of particular interest to botanists including those from "English Nature".

Road Diversion

Certain sections of road were diverted in the course of the works at Stocks.   

Lane blocked off behind the Vicarage, Dalehead. Church in the background

Photograph used by kind permission of Mr. M.  Pye

The same view towards the former Vicarage 2003

“The first job that I did was carting stone for the works. I was on the road from the Vicarage to the forestry. I was 16 or 17 when I was doing that. When I started the first stone we were carting was from the old houses that had been demolished: Higher Croft House and Birch Hill. The man who last lived at Higher Croft House was Jimmy Smith and he became an engine driver. 

The foreman overseeing the road building gang lived at the "Traveller’s Rest" at Stocks; we called him “Ocking”.

The road took a couple of years’ full time work to make. There were about four carts carting stone for the road. They didn’t dig foundations; they put big stones at the sides then filled in the middle with “rubbish” stone. That’s why the road is no good. The first piece from the Vicarage across the first field “never was nowt”, but then the rest of the road was a bit drier. 

The road finished about the time we quit Lower Croft House in 1932.” (T. Swales)

In order to divert the Bowland Knotts road an embankment and culvert, now commonly known as the "causeway", to cross Bridge House (or Bottoms) Beck had to be constructed. 

Construction of the Bridge House Beck culvert & embankment- May 1930

Photograph used by kind permission of Mr. A. Walmsley

Concrete was poured into timber and steel shuttering to produce the Bottoms Beck culvert. Stone for the facing of the embankment was brought by rail from Jumbles Quarry.

Construction of the Bridge House / Bottoms Beck culvert & embankment

 

Bottoms Beck Culvert and embankment - low water,  Autumn 2003

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