Industrial Archaeology in Bury, Lancashire

Introduction

The north-west of England was one of the centres of the industrial revolution and Bury's History includes rapid expansion by industrialisation.

Bury, just north of Manchester, is mainly known for its textile industry, initially woollens and later cotton. One reason for this is that the two rivers in the town, the Roch and the Irwell, provided power for early spinning mills and also supplied the large amounts of water needed for textile finishing, such as bleaching and dyeing. Several paper mills also took advantage of the plentiful water supply. The Manchester, Bolton & Bury canal provided a transport link to Manchester from 1808, and from there goods could be exported worldwide.

Although Bury's traditional industry declined during the second half of the twentieth century, remains of some of the early buildings and engineering works still survive, sometimes just in the form of collections of stone blocks or rusty ironwork.
This site is an attempt to catalogue these remnants and give an idea of their original purpose.

This supplied water to reservoirs in Radcliffe.

This was used to unload canal narrowboats to the factory below.

Supplies water to the Manchester, Bolton and Bury canal.

One of the last water powered mills in the area.

There were various small factories along Kirklees valley. This is one of them.

A number of narrow-gauge tramroads were linked to the Manchester, Bolton & Bury Canal.

There were once several coal mines in and near Bury.

Map to locate the above remains.
(500KB file)

Links to other sites about local and industrial history.