Mapplewell Village

Mapplewell Village in Barnsley, South Yorkshire

I arrived in Mapplewell just as the fog was clearing, on a very cold but soon to be sunny February afternoon

I am fond of Mapplewell. Perhaps it is because the place has such a long and distinctive history, a small but bustling former nailmaking and coalmining community which in many ways stands out from other Barnsley area settlements.

Mapplewells ancient place-name is a little different, meaning ‘Well near the maple tree’. I’m proud to say that my mother was a Mappellwellian for some of her childhood years, attending the village school on Blacker Road. A history of the school was published by headmaster David Peckett in 1990. It includes interesting extracts from the log books. The following is from an entry dated 28 November 1916: ‘Only 225 children present this morning. The serious decrease is caused by many of the pupils being up in the night on account of a Zepplin raid in the district.’ Modern properties now stand on the old school site.

The industrial and craft activities that once took place in Mapplewell were set within a countryside context. Some people may remember, for example, Albany Crowther at Low Carr Green Farm, Joshua Johnson (Hill End) or Mrs Cicely Janet Field (Swallow Hill); and Blackerhill farm was not far away. Many of the miners and nailmakers had smallholdings attached to or near their homes and places of work. Allotment gardens are marked on early twentieth-century large-scale maps, off Greenside and Blacker Road.

For many years Mapplewell was an almost self-sufficient community. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, when my mother lived here, there were many traditional shops and services. At Four Lane Ends there were several of the kind of stores that you would also see in towns: the Globe Tea Company, Meadow Dairy, Snowdens greengrocers and grocers Webster, Brady and Sons. Nearby, on Towngate was a large Barnsley British Cooperative Society branch which opened in the 1890s (now occupied by Sheps Pets, Wishing Well etc). There were two banks, Barclays and Yorkshire Penny. But a variety of small family run shops were commonplace: Mary Heptonstall’s, Wilfred Gee’s (fishmonger), Florence Beeton (milliner), John Stevens (greengrocer), Birkinshaw Brothers pork butchers and butcher Edward Poynton Birckinshaw. Nearby were more butchers: Horton Clayton, Thomas Charlesworth. It is interesting that Mapplewell has a long tradition of butchers’ shops, three surviving and one on Greenside. There were a couple of bakers: James Lunn (Main Road) and Tom Mothershaw (Spark Lane). It was also the heyday of the small corner and terrace shop: Ben Haigh’s, Beatrice Swinbank and Oswald Walker (Seth Terrace), Olive Littlewood and Mary Broadbent (New Street), Hephzibah Farrow (Prospect Place), Thomas Turner (Upper Carr Green), Selina Rontree (Pye Avenue) and Harold Roberts (Darton Lane), to mention but a few. Fish and chips? Well, you could try Rimmington’s and Sam Stephenson’s on Barnsley Road or Sam Senior’s on Pye Avenue or perhaps Bill Cooper’s on Main Road; for pots and pans there was Waring’s hardware shop (not forgetting Walter Waring’s wireless dealership) and footwear could be bought at Walter Beck’s or even from the premises of the sub-postmistress, Mary Wroe. You could have your boots and shoes repaired at Frank Ellis’s Spark Lane property and even order some clogs courtesy of Bill Milner. For serious aches and pains you could consult Robert Cross, physician and surgeon or call at Hunter’s chemist shop. For transport, there was even a reminder of the old four-legged variety, Frederick Frost still describing himself as a carter.

Mapplewell and Staincross have a long tradition of making nails by hand in small, stone-built workshops. Documentary references to the trade go back at least to the seventeenth century and hand metalmaking to medieval times. By the mid-Victorian period Mapplewell and Staincross nails were renown for their quality and the area was a premier centre for the trade. At the 1841 census 138 households (from 221) were involved in nailmaking and as late as 1871 there were still 221 nailmaker families in the area. Decline of the single, family assisted workshops followed. Probably the last old style Mapplewell nailmaker was Ibberson Haigh who was in business until about 1943. However, to meet the new demand of industry, larger concerns had developed. Steel teeth for rag shredding and moulders’ chaplets and studs were manufactured by Pecketts, Charlesworths and Darnsfields (and also the Goldthorpes) and were regarded as the ‘successors’ of the old nailmaking industry. Joseph Peckett had pioneered the use of ‘machine steel teeth’ from the mid-1850s. The new firms also provided employment for women and children. Pecketts survived as manufacturers after the Great War, finally closing in the 1950s. Dransfields finished in the 1960s at their ‘Longsight’ Darton Lane Head works.

Coalmining was fast developing at the time when nailmaking was on the decline, with an almost continuous flow of incomers arriving from places such as Staffordshire, Lancashire and Derbyshire. The biggest attraction was North Gawber Colliery which was sunk to the Barnsley seam from 1850-52 by the Thorps of Gawber Hall but taken over by Fountain & Burnley (who also owned Woolley) in 1882. The pit, with its associated coke ovens, dominated the eastern side of the village, reached via Blacker Road. A terrible disaster occurred in 1935 when 19 men were killed following an explosion in the Lidgett Seam, on 12 September. During heroic rescue operations an anxious crowd of 4,000 assembled at the pithead. After a short association with Woolley, North Gawber closed at the end of 1987.

Mapplewell, along with its almost inseparable neighbour, Staincross, also developed a distinctive cultural air based around its annual Feast Week and Sing. ‘Hospital Sunday’ or ‘Feast Sunday’, an event which helped to raise funds for Beckett Hospital, became a wonderful celebration of open-air music held during the last week in July. A large crowd would be entertained through selections from Handel’s Messiah, performed of course by a brass band and choir. In 1933 miners’ leader and Mayor of Barnsley Herbert Smith spoke at the Sing and Ben Ibberson was the conductor. Ben, a Great War veteran, was a great organist and much-loved village character who for many years was Head at Darton Primary School. Mapplewell Sing celebrated its centenary in 1987, when it was filmed for a documentary by Yorkshire Television. The well-known Mexborough-born actor Brian Blessed introduced the centenary event. Writing to me over ten years ago, former Mapplewell man Mr T Shaw, aged 88, recalled the Sing:

‘Sunday was the special day, when crowds came from near and far…A raised, many tiered wooden platform was erected by men from North Gawber Colliery in the recreation field and it was soon packed to capacity…there was a massed mixed voice choir consisting of local church and chapel singers and well-known soloists. For weeks practices were held following a choice of hymns and of course something from the Messiah. For many years the printed programme and hymnal bore a well-known name as Speaker. Miss Fountain, who later became Lady Sutherland, was often in attendance. The sale of programmes and collections helped us to make a good donation to the hospital…’

Church and chapel played a vital part in the lives of Mapplewellians for centuries. When Wesley came here in 1761 he attracted a good number of followers and during the next century Methodism was firmly established in the area. The earliest surviving chapel is the old Bethel of 1829, now a listed building recently converted to flats by a local builder, Masons of Darton. It’s an excellent piece of restoration, with new, complementary properties also being developed on this historic Spark Lane site. Also on Spark Lane, probably the most interesting street in Mapplewell, you can see the impressive facade of another large chapel, Providence Methodist, converted for commercial usage by the Denby Dale Shirt Company; and near Four Lane Ends is the Wesleyan Reform chapel of 1907, used by the Staincross Christian Fellowship.

Before leaving I called at the Mapplewell & Staincross Village Hall on Darton Lane which also houses the library which has computers with free internet access and an attractive children’s section. This is an excellent modern community facility which was opened in 2002. Inside there is the Maple Cafe and catering facilities are also available for special occasions, organisations and businesses. The Hall was presented with an Enterprise in the Community Award in 2005. A wide range of classes take place and the building hosts meetings for local groups such as North Gawber Male Voice Choir, Weight Watchers, Darby & Joan, Toddler Group and Rifle Club. I remember talking to the history group here on several occasions. Excellent publications have been produced about the local area. You can also just call in for help and advice.

Modern-day Mapplewell continues to have a good range of shops and services and is the home of Fosters, one of the largest and most innovative bakeries in the country (see our special feature). Near the public car park I notice a modern development which includes a variety of shops, a cafe, Italian restaurant and Mapplewell Ex-Servicemen’s Club. The small post office was busy and there were a variety of specialist shops around Four Lane Ends including Millers DIY, Hats & Flowers, Canine Beauticians, Greenside Chiropody and Birkinshaw butchers. On Towngate it was a similar story: Birkinshaws bakers and confectioners, Cloughs newsagents, A Stitch in Time, Serendipity Crafts, Wishing Well and Sheps Pets.

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