HISTORY, DIRECTORY, & GAZETTEER, of the COUNTY PALATINE of LANCASTER in TWO VOLUMES |
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ms in Oldham there in occ: of Rog. Taylor and of James Rodes and not payd for 52 y[ears.]" Oldham has had the honour to produce two of the most munificent benefactors of this county - Hugh Oldham, bishop of Exeter, and Thos. Henshaw, Esq. an opulent hat manufacturer. The richly endowed Free School, at Manchester, is a perpetual monument of the bounty of the former; but the charity of the latter has hitherto been obscured, and is almost unknown. It has already been stated, in this work, but it may not be improper here to repeat, that Mr. Henshaw, by will, dated the 14th of November, 1807, bequeathed £20,000. for the endowment of a Blue Coat School, at Oldham, and the same amount for a Blind Asylum at Manchester. By a codicil to this will, made in the following year, he bequeathed the further sum of £20,000 for the endowment. of the Blue Coat School, leaving to his trustees. an option either to establish the school at Oldham, or at Manchester. A provision in the will disqualifying the trustees from building, or purchasing lands, or erections, for the use of these establishments, has hitherto prevented them from carrying into effect the benevolent intentions of the testator, and the money has in consequence accumulated to the. sum of £90,000. Endeavours are now making by the trustees to bring these charities into active operation, and it is fervently to be hoped, that some method may be devised to withdraw this immense fund from the unfruitful embraces of the high Court of Chancery, and apply it to the use of those for whose benefit it was intended. Though the will forbids that any part of the principal sum devised should be expended in the purchase of lands or buildings for the use of the charities, the restriction may not apply to the appropriation of the accumulated interest to this purpose, and £30,000. would provide sufficient premises for both institutions. The Bible Society has an auxiliary in Oldham, established in the year 1821, connected with which there is a Ladies' Bible Association of the same standing. The Benevolent Society for the relief of the sick is another of the charities of this place, established in 1814; and the Humane Society administers both to the temporal wants of the sick, and to their spiritual necessities. Manufactures have grown in this place with astonishing rapidity. Sixt -years ago there was not a cotton mill in the chapelry; at present there are no fewer than sixty-five, of which all, except two, have been built during the present century. These mills, which are wholly employed in spinning cotton, are all worked by steam, and there are, within the same limits, one hundred and forty steam-engines used in the various processes of manufacturing. and mining. The vicinity of Oldham to Manchester, the great mart for cotton goods, the advantages of water, but above all the abundant supply of coal, from the mines in the surrounding townships, have constituted this one of the most extensive and improving seats of the staple manufacture in the county. The goods chiefly made here are fustians, velveteens, and cotton and woollen cords. The manufacturers of Glodwick, in this township, lay claim to the invention of the spinning jenny; but that claim is urged with so entire an absence of dates and particulars, that it is not likely to shake the well-founded pretensions of the reed-maker of Leigh, as exhibited in the history of the rise and progress of the cotton trade in this work.* The original staple trade of Oldham, and that for which this place has been for many ages pre-eminently, distinguished, is the manufacture ................................................................................................ * See vol. 1 p 113 - 119
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