Back along the Old Road

This is another story of the old road.  It is one of those places I keep coming back to, partly because to walk it is still to get a feel of what Chorlton would have been like.

It ran from Hardy Lane, down past the Brook, skirted the church and green before running off across Turn Moss to Stretford.

In its time it would have been a busy place and made more so with the coming of the Duke’s Canal which offered a quick service  from Stretford for passengers using the fast boats and farmers taking their produce to the Manchester markets.

I am a romantic but even I am realistic enough to know that what you see now is not what our traveller in  1841 would have seen.  For a start there is really only the stretch from Hawthorn Lane to the canal left to walk along, and that is very different.

Today it is a pleasant walk bordered for a great part by trees and hedges with limited views of the meadows and playing fields.  It is secluded, quiet and a bit magical.

In 1841 it was more open and while there were trees along its course and an orchard, the land on either side was more open and afforded views across to Turn Moss Farm and back towards the parish church in the village.

And my enthusiasm for the road has rather blinded me to Edge Lane which after the railway station was built was the obvious route to use and of course this is where the fine houses began to be built.  All of which I guess pushed the old road into a quiet track way used by those who farmed either side of it and the odd traveller intent on an alternative way to Stretford.

But all that misses the point that once it was my old road which would have taken you directly into the heart of Stretford which as Lawrence pointed out to me was further south clustered around St Matthew’s.

Edge Lane runs further north and any one leaving the village would first have had to walk away from the direction of Stretford to join the lane and then turn back towards it.

Not so the old road, which led directly out of the village straight towards Stretford.  And I have to say I suspect it was not that much of a popular destination before the opening of the Duke’s Canal.  Look at any map before the late 18th century and the place is not even mentioned.

All of which was to change when it became  a major centre for the processing of pigs for the Manchester market as well the manufacture of black puddings and  gained the nicknames of Swineopolis and Porkhampton.    During the 1830s, between 800 and 1,000 pigs were slaughtered each week and sent into the city.  By which time the old road may well have been just a back water earning it's name as Back Lane.

Picture; from the collections of Andrew Simpson and Lawrence Beedle