Goole - The Beginning
In 1811, the population of Goole was around 348.
The following excerpt from Gardiner's "Early History of Goole" gives a wonderful description of Goole in its early days:
The following excerpt from Gardiner's "Early History of Goole" gives a wonderful description of Goole in its early days:
About June 15th 1810. The following from the pen of the late Mrs Best who died on Christmas-day at the advanced age of 92, is a description of the first visit she paid to Goole. As far as I can find it is also the first r eliable description of Goole at so early a date:-
We set out for a journey from Selby to Blacktoft; it was no slight undertaking for our only means of transit was either on horseback (and at midsummer the roads were scarcely passable) or by water. We chose the latter and started on Friday morning, full of delight at the unusual excitement of a journey. Our vessel was a small schooner named “The Adventure” built expressively for the Leeds trade & therefore made to fit the lock on the way to that town; she was one of the first boats that ever made the journey from Leeds to London. Wind & tide must have been against us for it was Sunday morning before we cast anchor at the mouth of Dutch river. From this point you can have a view of Goole as it then was. On the New Goole Side your eye would have wandered hopelessly in search of anything to denote civilization; there was but one old thatched house & ploughed fields. This house stood rather nearer the docks than the present Lowther Hotel does, & was eventually pulled pulled down by Admiral Sotheron, who built the house now occupied by Mr George Duckles in its stead in 1822. These ploughed fields have strangely altered since then; a line drawn diagonally from the wooden bridge (now pulled down) to Shuffleton will give a fairly correct outline of the boundaries of that farm known as “Moorfields”; it all belonged, at that time, to Mr Thisleton, of Scarborough, who had to maintain in good order the whole of the banks surrounding this tongue of land. He was therefore exempted from the payment of highway; this land was afterwards sold for the purpose of cutting the docks at the rate of £95 an acre. The level of the land was much lower than at present; that part of Goole now-used for a Recreation Ground (now Stanhope Dock) is almost the only portion remaining at the original level. At the present day, it is neither an easy nor clean undertaking to land at the mouth of the Dutch river, but then our means were primitive, simply the backs of the boatmen. A narrow flagged footpath on this muddy bank was all the pavement possessed; my recollections suggest that every flag was broken & that every step produced a squirt-like motion from the mud beneath, which was not pleasant, but we had no local board in those days, and the pavement was almost as bad as it is in Old Goole. Two small public houses adorned this bank of the river, the Boat Inn & the Anchor; the latter has not long since disappeared.
Crossing the bridge, another public house met-our view, named Half Moon, (now pulled down) an old thatched cottage occupied by Robinsons, and their three cottages under one roof, afterwards known as Ivy House. Here I draw your attention to the old clough, neither altered nor improved since those days. William Storr, steward for the Commissioners for the Drainage of Hatfield Chase, was ordered to bring the Dempester drain down so far as to make an outlet for it into Dutch river, this he did apparently to the satisfaction of all posterity for no one has presumed to improve it since. The corner house, (also pulled down) though much dilapidated, was the nearest approach to a “good” house that we had yet come to, & what would our children think of it now.? Low & thatched, with deep eaves & open chimneys, its internal arrangements more barn-like than home-like, I fear a tenant would be difficult to find for it now-a-days. Grove house was built about 1780, but it had no neighbours until a few cottages on the left & Manor Cottage on the right reared. This house was slightly above the level of the road & a tongue of the moors came within two fields of the back of it. Goole Hall of that day was a picturesque old place with long lancet windows, possibly more ornamental than useful. As late as the year 1818, only twelve houses stood in the village or town, & eight of these were on old Goole side of the Dutch River. No warping drains existed, but the first one was cut soon after near Manor Cottage by the late Mr Earnshaw, & was opened with some ceremony on May 29th, 1814.
Our day was over, our captain blew a trumpet to announce that the tide would not wait for us, and we re-embarked; good fortune attended us and we reached Blacktoft with safety & speed on Monday morning, having travelled the entire distance from Selby to Blacktoft in three and a half days.
At the beginning of this century the land on which Goole was built was farm land - poor land indeed, if as an old man once said, it would only “keep a dozen geese an acre,” The only wagon road was from Murham Lane Staith to the Old Goole Bridge, running almost straight, & from which a path ran behind where the bridge is towards Potter Grange Farm, while another path consisted of a continuation of Pasture – Lane, which before the Dutch river had been cut, ran right across the Moors.
Many thanks to the late John Mitchell for his transcription of this document! Sadly John passed away early in 2020.