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Packhorse Roads
The Packhorse road (more of a track) went from Clough Lea to Hey Green and Easter Gate. Then it went over Clowes Moor to Rochdale. There are packhorse bridges at Clough Lea and Close Gate Bridge, from where it went up Willykay Clough to Denshaw and Ogden. Part of the packhorse road, called Rapes or Reeps Highway ran from Marsden to the Saddleworth boundary where is became the Buck Road.
Letters to the Editor - Huddersfield Examiner (Sept., Oct. or Nov. 1906)
Sir - It is not easy to find the road without a guide, but the following instructions will be sufficient to lead the stranger along the road in question. Leaving Marsden Station, the pedestrian takes the road on the top side of the line. This is followed past a wayside hostelry, named "The Junction," then along the road on the top side of the reservoir belonging to the L. & N.W. Railway Co., and used as a feeder for the canal. The end of this road lands the visitor at Hey Green, the charming summer residence of the late Mr. Joseph Crowther, who lost his life in a motor accident when leaving this place for Slaithwaite. The traveller then follows the footpath protected from the river Colne by iron railings, recently erected by the Council. Here is a relic of the past in the shape of an old hump-backed pack horse bridge that spans the river Colne, or rather one of its tributaries, not far from its source. This bridge takes the traveller on to the edge of the moor, where the old pack horse road is now observed. After scaling the rocks and proceed big along the path for some distance, one comes upon a well-made path, and a little further on the Council's workmen are to be seen engaged in making the path, bridging the "gruffs" or gullies, and laying stones where the ground is marshy.
One of the most commendable features of the undertaking, and at the same time the one that is most open to criticism, is that the Council has ordered nearly a dozen stone posts on which are hewn the following hieroglyphics, "P.H. ROAD." To the average wayfarer this post may suggest something connected with a prison or he may conclude that the road leads to Halifax or some other undesirable place. Obviously the posts should have had "Public Road" inscribed on them, in order to allay the public fear of trespassing. However, they are not all erected and we would suggest that the posts be made more intelligible by the following addition:
"PCK. HORS. ROAD"
The road leads over the moor within a stone's throw of the scene of the Marsden Moor murders. The path is followed past the foot of March Hill, a with its cone-shaped summit, and a clearly defined line of formation on the Marsden side. This, we understand, is caused by the crumbling process that is constantly going on on that side of the hill. The path then continues up the to steep incline, and is merged into the Buck road, at a point near the Marsden and Saddleworth boundary.
This is nothing but a plain, unvarnished tale of a road, that was in danger of being lost to the public, restored and repaired, and left as a goodly heritage to posterity. The approach to this road is through a bit of the choicest scenery that the Colne Valley can boast. In skirting the reservoir there is more than a passing suggestion of the road and scenery that are to be seen when passing through the Lake District. No words are needed to indicate the natural beauties of at Hey Green and the river, which at this point is of that dark brown colour that indicates its moorland origin. The old bridge is in a fine state of preservation, but bears unmistakeable signs of ages of exposure and wear. What a picture this old bridge conjures up of an almost forgotten past. ‘The weary traveller on his faithful steed ambles along the village street, until he reaches the end of Eastergate, and crosses the old bridge. As lie enters upon his solitary journey across the moor his hand instinctively seeks his belt and the protection of a pistol. At almost any stop of his journey he may be surprised by a masked gentleman of the road and demanding "your money or your life."
Just now the moors are seen in one of their best moods. The heather had turned a rich, golden brown, and is transformed into a gorgeous picture by the rays of the afternoon sun, or softened into shadow by the passing of some fleecy clouds. There is a spirit of the moors as distinct as that of the town or the country, but it to exacts as the toll of its manifestation the devotion mind and friendship of a Charlotte Bronte. In these days of barter and money-making there is need and for us to get on the moors, listen to their message, and learn something from their ever changing moods and habiliments. And this has been male easier by the restoration of the old pack horse road.
Sir, - Mr. Edwin Waugh, in some most interesting sketches entitled "Roads out of Manchester", gives description of Failsworth, and the manners and customs of our forefathers at the end of the 18th century and the commencement of the 19th. He relates that at the loop of an old road at Failsworth there is an inn bearing the sign of the Pack Horse, and he goes on to say: About the beginning of the 19th century this ancient roadside inn was the house call for old Lame Luke o' Marsden who served the country grocers, or badgers as the were called with meal and flour which he brought all the way from Huddersfield on the backs of pack horses, the leading horses of old Luke's gang having one of more bells hung from the neck. - Marsden however, about the period referred to, did possess some other carrier whose memory is still kept green, named James and William Brearley. They were brothers, and lived the house formerly occupied by the late Mr. AIfred Sexton, general dealer in the town of Marsden being the carriers for the district.
Rochdale seems at that era to have been the metropolis for Marsden perhaps because it was the nearest large town. At that date it was a very popular town. The Brearleys drove their string of pack horses over the Reeaps, that is Clowes Moors exactly in the manner described by Mr. Waugh. They took corn and meal and other articles of food into Lancashire and brought back other goods in exchange. The highway for and connecting both Marsdens was then up the River Colne For Marsden-in-Huddersfield this watercourse road was entered upon at the Green, and for Marsden-in Almondbury at the Back Lane. The river-bed road was the only public road to Clough Lee and Clough Head in those days and was repaired jointly by the two Marsden townships as far as Tunnel End. It thence proceeded to Hay Green forward over the existing picturesque bridge at Eastergate and across the Clowes Moor on the way to Rochdale. There was a water trough hear Badger Slack, where it joined the Buck Road.
It is stated that the whole length of this pack-horse road, from the Tunnel End as far as Buckstones was originally repaired out of the rates of Marsden-in Huddersfield. This same Eastergate and bridge, and the pack-horse road over Clowes Moors are named in a document written by the perpetual curate of Marsden the Rev, lsaac Walton, in the year 1711. The people who enjoy a moorland walk for pleasure and health, owe their best thanks to the Marsden Urban Council for repairing the road, and putting guide posts up, and the owners of the moors, and those who enjoy the shooting rights, should be equally thankful.— Yours truly
A. B. C.