In 1870-72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described Mossley like this:
MOSSLEY, a town and a chapelry on the mutual border of Lancashire, Cheshire, and W. R. Yorkshire. The town stands on the river Tame, the Huddersfield canal, and the Manchester and Leeds line of the Northwestern railway, under Heartshead Pike, 3 miles NE of Ashton-under-Lyne; was originally a hamlet of Ashtonunder-Lyne parish, all within Lancashire; has risen, since about 1840, into great manufacturing importance; was recently placed under the provisions of the local government act, and then defined to include portions of Micklehurst and Tintwistle townships in Cheshire, and the entire tract of Quickmere in Saddleworth township. ...
W. R. Yorkshire; includes suburbs called MossleyBottom and Mossley-Brow; carries on industry in handloom woollen weaving, in several woollen factories, and in extensive cotton factories; is supplied with gas from Staleybridge gasworks, and with water from Ashton and Staleybridge waterworks; and has a railway station with telegraph, a post office ‡ of Mossley, under Manchester, a post office of Mossley-Bottom, under Manchester, a church, four dissenting chapels, a mechanics' institute, and parochial, national, British, and Roman Catholic schools. The church was built in 1755, and enlarged in 1788; and contains nearly 1,000 sittings. The Independent chapel stands at Mossley-Brow, and is a large and handsome stone structure. The Wesleyan chapel stands in Stamford-road, was built in 1867, is in the Lombardo-Venetian style, and contains 600 sittings. The mechanics' institute was built in 1858, and is a large and well-contrived stone structure. Fairs are held on the last Friday of Feb., 21 June, and the last Monday of Oct.; and wakes are held on the last Saturday of July. The chief residences in the vicinity are Apsley House, G. Andrew, Esq.; Whitehall, G. Mayall, Esq.; Highfield House, J. Mayall, Esq.; Breage Hill, S. Shaw, Esq.; Waterton, E. and J. Buckley, Esq.; Limefield, if,. Andrew, Esq.; and Valley Cottage, J. Kershaw, Esq. The assessment under the local act, in 1864, amounted to upwards of £26,000; and the population, in that year, was upwards of 13,000. The chapelry was made ecclesiastically parochial in 1865; and is bounded from N to SW by the County brook, and the river Tame. The living is a p. curacy in the diocese of Manchester. Value, £300.* Patron, the Rector of Ashton.
Mossley through time
Mossley is now part of Tameside district. Click here for graphs and data of how Tameside has changed over two centuries. For statistics about Mossley itself, go to Units and Statistics.
GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth, History of Mossley, in Tameside and Lancashire | Map and description, A Vision of Britain through Time.
URL: https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/1073
Date accessed: 25th April 2024
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