The Turnpike Road from Balderstone to Burscough Bridge is perhaps somewhat misleading when thought of in modern terms. At first glance, it’s likely that this route would be seen as road between Balderstone and Burscough, the town and civil parish in the district of West Lancashire. However, this is not the case. It was a road between Balderstone and Walton le Dale. Much of this route is now known as Cuerdale Lane, and the it is likely that beyond that much of it has been adopted into the modern day A59. Looking at old Ordnance Survey Six-inch Maps (courtesy of the National Library of Scotland), the road appears to terminate a Mellor Brook in the east. The current A59 doesn’t follow the same line here. The original road passed through the land now occupied by BAE Systems Samlesbury.
The National Library of Scotland has a ‘side by side’ georeferenced maps viewer that can be seen here. It allows you to compare two maps, the cursor will show the same geographical location on each map as you navigate around the viewer. The system can be used to compare an old map with a newer map or a satellite image.
National Library of Scotland
https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/side-by-side/#zoom=15.1&lat=53.75615&lon=-2.63454&layers=257&right=ESRIWorld
It’s a fascinating way to explore the ever changing landscape.
Burscough Bridge
The following is an extract from
THE HUNDRED BRIDGES OF THE HUNDRED OF BLACKBURN IN THE 17th CENTURY.
By A. Langshaw, J.P. Read 25 May, 1946.
The southern approach to Preston was well provided with bridges, and all the roads converged upon the Cop at Walton and the main bridge over the Ribble there. The importance of the town and the amount of traffic on these roads leading to it may be well gauged by the frequency with which these bridges figure in the Minutes and Orders, from the beginning of these records in 1626.
The two natural barriers to easy communication were the sluggish and swampy-margined Lostock Water, and the more turbulent but more closely confined River Darwen. Six bridges
are to be noted, sometimes under different names. Two spanned the first stream, three the second, while Burscough Bridge carried the road past the Low Church over the Mill Goit between the Darwen and the Ribble.
The two over the Lostock were Lostock or Bamber Bridge, and Lower Bamber or Stone or Dandy Bridge. As the southern ends of these two bridges lay in the Leyland Hundred the inhabitants of both Hundreds were called upon to pay ” according to such quantity and proportion as the same Hundreds ought to be charged by the Book of Rates and Taxes usual for the taxing of sums therein,” a proportion of 2 : 1 for Blackburn and Leyland respectively.
The text also includes the following:
Nor were public benefactions entirely unknown in the 17th century. In Minutes and Orders of Quarter Sessions for January, 1637, it is stated that Burscough Bridge was ” lately built on the
sole charge of (very unfortunately the space for the name is left blank), of Burscough, deceased, who hath left neither lands nor any personable estate chargeable with the repair of the Bridge,
so as by law the same is to be repaired upon the charge of the country.”
This implies that the bridge was paid for by somebody of note from Burscough and thus adopted their name. Another passages goes on to say:
It was not until 1662 that Burscough Bridge, lying on the secondary road from Blackburn to Preston, was made into a cart bridge, and at the same time the roll was issued to cover the cost of ” purchasing a new way there.”
Act of Parliament
Whilst there was already a known road on this route, an act of parliament gave consent for the road to be improved. The act stated that the existing road was, “much out of Repair, narrow, and incommodious.”
The document uses a long s in the print, which looks like a lower case f. The long s, ⟨ſ⟩, also known as the medial s or initial s, is an archaic form of the lowercase letter ⟨s⟩, found mostly in works from the late 8th to early 19th centuries. It replaced one or both of the letters s in a double-s sequence. The modern ⟨s⟩ letterform is known as the “short”, “terminal”, or “round” s. The long ‘s’ stopped being used in printed materials in England during the 1810s and 1820s.
This is the text of the document using the “short”, “terminal”, or “round” s throughout.
Cap.54.
An Act for making and maintaining a Road from Balderston to Burscough Bridge in Walton-in-le-Dale, in the County Palatine of Lancaster.
[18th May 1814.]
WHEREAS the Road leading from or from near a Public House (occupied by Thomas Ashworth) in Balderston, through into the Townships of Balderston, Samlesbury, Cuerdale, and Walton-in-le-Dale, to Burscough Bridge, within Walton-in-le-Dale aforesaid, all in the Parish of Blackburn, in the County of Lancaster, is very much out of Repair, narrow, and incommodious; and it would be advantageous to the Neighbourhood, and to the Public in general, if the said Road were amended, widened, diverted, altered, improved, made Turnpike, and kept in Repair, so as to communicate with the Turnpike Road leading from Preston to Wigan, in the said County of Lancaster: May it therefore please Your Majesty that it may be enacted; and be it enacted by the King’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the Authority of the fame, That Sir Henry Philip Hoghton Baronet, Edmund Alker, Thomas Alston, William Assheton, William Assheton the younger, Richard Baldwin, James Barnes Clerk, William Barton Clerk, Matthew Barton, Thomas Barton, Joseph Baxendale, Wilfon Gale Braddyll, Thomas Braddyll, Richard Calrow, William Calrow, Thomas Calrow, John Calvert, Richard Cardwell, William Carr, Thomas Carr, George Clayton, Thomas Clayton of Carr Hall, Ralph Clayton, John
[Loc. & Per.] 10 P Clayton,
The Red Lion Inn
Looking a newspaper cuttings from the middle of the nineteenth century it can be seen the the Trustees for the Turnpike Road from Balderstone to Burscough Bridge regularly held their meetings at the Red Lion Inn, which was on the Turnpike Road. The former inn is now a private house, and the building appears to date back to 1763.
The Red Lion Inn (Hotel) has recently been added to the Chorley’s Inns and Taverns Blog/Website. Whilst the name suggest that these pages cover just Chorley, they feature public houses from all over Central Lancashire. That excludes Preston, which is covered by the PRESTON’S INNS, TAVERNS and BEERHOUSES Blog/Website. The Chorley’s Inns and Taverns blog is about the Inns, Taverns, Pubs, Hotels and Beer Houses of Chorley (Lancashire) and its outlying villages and their Landlords, Inn Keepers and Licensed Victuallers with images, photos, press cuttings and census records.
Red Lion Inn: https://chorleyinnsandtaverns.blogspot.com/p/walton-le-dale-red-lion.html
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The first General Annual Meeting to be held at the Red Lion Inn at Walton le Dale that features in the newspaper cuttings took place in 1846.
The last General Annual Meeting to be held at the Red Lion Inn at Walton le Dale that features in the newspaper cuttings took place in 1858.
TURNPIKE ROAD
From Balderstone to Burscough Bridge.
THE next and also the GENERAL ANNUAL MEETING of the TRUSTEES of this Road will be held at the “Red Lion Inn,” in Walton-le-dale, on FRIDAY, the 19TH DAY of MARCH NEXT, at Eleven o’clock at noon.
The term of the local Act having been limited to the 1st of November next, it will be necessary for the Trustees to take steps for removing the Toll-houses, selling the Materials and sites, with the Gardens and Appurtenances, and winding up the affairs of the Trust.
J. HARGREAVES & SON.
Blackburn, 22nd February, 1858.
This indicates that road ceased to be a toll road in 1858.
Decline in the Turnpike System Nationally
By the 1840s–50s, the entire turnpike system was being dismantled across England and Wales. Key reasons:
- Railway expansion: The railways had taken over much long-distance freight and passenger travel, undermining toll revenues.
- Improved local governance: Highway responsibilities were increasingly being transferred to local highway boards or, later, to county councils (especially post-1888).
- Public opposition to tolls: People had grown frustrated with paying tolls on roads that were increasingly seen as public infrastructure.
Parliamentary Policy
- After about 1830, Parliament became increasingly reluctant to renew turnpike acts.
- Many trusts were allowed to lapse or were formally dissolved in a managed way.
- The Turnpike Acts Continuance Act (passed annually) would specify which trusts could continue temporarily.
- But most were wound up between the 1840s and 1870s, with Lancashire seeing major declines by the late 1850s.