A Short History of Preston
Here on this page I want to give you some history about the city where I was born, Preston, Lancashire, England. Preston became a 'city' on March 14 2002 when HRH Queen Elizabeth II granted Preston cityhood for her Jubilee celebration, 1952-2002. Preston became the 50th 'city' in England on that day.
Preston is a busy market town situated in the north west of England, it forms a triangle with Liverpool, and Manchester, each being about 30 miles apart, Preston being the apex of the triangle to the north.
The town is situated on a rise overlooking the Ribble valley, with the River Ribble almost circling the town. Archaeological evidence found along the River Ribble, suggests that there were settlers in the area as long ago as 8,000 B.C. Very little is known about early Preston, but it is probable that the 'church' acted as the nucleus of the towns beginings.
One theory says that Preston was formed by monks from the famous monastery at Ripon in Yorkshire, after St. Wilfred aquired the lands 'juxta Rippel' ( by the Ribble) in about A.D. 670. This would explain how Preston got its name: it is derived from the words 'tun (i.e. town) of the priests'. PriestTown (Preston) There are many theories, this is but one.
During the 'middle ages' Preston saw some very 'hard times', (Charles Dickens based his best seller, 'Hard Times' on life in Preston) local wars, poverty, and illness took a very hard toll on the people. From 1314 to 1316 three harvests in a row failed, many people died of starvation. For years the town stuggled to recover, then in 1348 a terrible outbreak of bubonic plague which had already ravaged the European continent spread through England. In Preston at least one third of the entire population-men, women and children- died of plague, mostly during the summer months. There were recurrences of plague in 1361-62, 1369, and a very serious outbreak some years later..1630-31.
Kings and queens have have visited Preston on many occasions. In 1617 James VI of Scotland, (James I of England), son of Mary Queen of Scots, visited Preston and during his stay at Hoghton Tower, it is reputed that after dining on a delicious dinner of loin of beef, the king knighted the loin, forever after to be known as...Sir-loin.
The last battle of the English Civil War was fought at Preston on August 17 1648. Oliver Cromwell soundly defeated the Duke of Hamilton who fought for Charles I. On January 30 1649, Charles I was executed and a republic was established shortly afterwards.
Cromwell himself became Lord Protector in 1653. Charles II had actually been proclaimed king at the market cross in the town in July 1649, and when he was finally and properly restored in 1660, there was great rejoicing in the streets of Preston. The church bells rang for three days!
Within living memory of that bloody battle between Cromwell and Hamilton yet another battle took place in Preston. In November 1715 the armies of the Old Pretender (or James III), and loyal to the Jacobites , and an army loyal to George I fought a battle that ended with the surrender of the Jacobites. Among the reasons given for the surrender was this colorful explanation...The Ladys in this toune, Preston, are so beautiful and so richly attired, that the Gentlemen Soldiers mind nothing but courting and feasting during their days in Preston!
The Industrial Revolution was about to change England, and Preston was to play a major part in it. New roads and canals were being built to transport coal, iron, and other goods further and further afield. Mills and factories were becoming the 'work place' rather than the fields. Coal was needed for the fires that drove the steam engines in the factories.
Preston was one of the leading 'cotton towns'. A port was built on the River Ribble to bring the shipping to the town. Raw cotton from America, wood from Europe, fruit from Africa and beyond.
In 1768 Richard Arkwright, (a native of Preston), invented the 'spinning frame'. This invention overcame a major technical problem; how to spin cotton yarn mechanically using water or horsepower, and there fore cheaply and efficently. Preston and indeed the whole of Lancashire with it's very damp atmosphere was perfect for weaving cotton.
The cotton industry thrived and thousands worked in the cotton industry. The skyline of Preston was dotted with dozens of tall factory chimneys, each one belching out tons of pollution on the town each day. The 1851 census showed that more than 18,000 Prestonians worked in the cotton trade, a staggering 48-52% of the entire working population.
Not until the early 1960's did the cotton industry begin to crumble, when artificial dampness (air conditioning) was created and cheaper labor in other parts of the world stole the industry from Lancashire.
Preston was established as a port at the head of the estuary of the River Ribble. It became important from Roman times as a river crossing and rich from the weaving of wool in the Middle Ages.
John Horrocks established the first cotton mill in Preston in 1786. The first railway in the town was built in 1803 to connect the southern and northern sections of the Lancaster Canal. This was followed by a short railway between the quarries of Longridge to Preston.
Preston had been first represented in Parliament in 1295. Unlike most boroughs, the right to vote in parliamentary elections had been granted to all inhabitants of the town. Although Lord Derby, a supporter of the Whigs, controlled one of the seats, the other MP was often someone freely elected by the people of Preston. This created the possibility of Radical candidates being victorious
Preston was the first provincial town to have gas street lighting. In May 1815 the Preston Gas Company was formed and the three main streets in Preston, Church Street, Fishergate and Friargate, were gas lit. The gas 'pipes' used were in fact army-surplus musket barrels stuck end to end. One can only imagine the leakage and the potential for disaster ! One of the main reasons for the interest in gas lighting was its possible use in illuminating the mills so that longer hours could be worked.
In 1840 on a bend in the river Ribble the "Cuerdale Hoard" was found valued at approx. £300,000 in today's terms. There are believed to have been 8,500 pieces of silver, including 350 ingots, weighing 44 Kilogram. The latest coins in the hoard were minted around 905 AD. those of "Louis the Blind of the West Franks". There was also 5,000 Viking silver coins produced in York circa 900 AD, together with 1,000 silver pennies of King Alfred and Edward the Elder 899 A.D.
For more information on this subject please use a search engine for "Cuerdale Hoard". The 'Hoard' is now housed at the British Museum in London.
Engineering became a bye product of the cotton trade. Engineers were needed to keep the machinery running. Mass transportation was needed to get the workers to their jobs. Motorized trams took the place of horse drawn tram. Dick Kerr, of Strand Road was building tram cars, not just for Preston, but for shipping around the country. This then developed into railway engines and finally into aircraft.
The company became English Electric, then British Aircraft Corporation and finally British AeroSpace. The company employed more than 8,000 workers before cutting back it's production and closing the Strand Road plant. Aircraft production is still a major industry in the area with Samlesbury, and Warton areodromes building and testing military aircraft.
Preston is perhaps most famous for its 'Preston Guild'
The right to hold a Guild Merchant was conferred upon the Burgesses of Preston in a Charter of 1179.
The celebration of the Guild was held at irregular intervals during the next 150 years, the first trustworthy record of the celebration is dated 1328. At that Guild celebration it was decreed that the 'Guild' should be held every twenty years, but for various causes, the 'twenty year' interval was not upheld until the Guild of 1542 when the twenty year intervals were resumed and carried on in unbroken sequence to the Guild of 1922.
A celebration of the Guild should have been held in 1942 but because the country was involved in World War II, the 400 year sequence of Guilds was broken. Not until 1952 did the Guild celebration continue. Two more have been celebrated, 1972 and again in 1992. The next one being in 2012.
Preston was the site of the first Motorway (Freeway for our American friends) to be built in Britain. The six mile long motorway was built to ease congestion in the town. The then 'main A6' road linking London to Glasgow ran through the town and had become the biggest 'bottleneck' in the country. Thousands of miles of 'Motorway' are now in place throughout Britain. Many lessons were learned from that first six miles.
Preston has added at least one word to the English language, that is, teetotal. This came from a meeting held at the old Temperence Hall in 1833. Joseph Livesey, the founder of the Temperence Movement was holding the meeting when 'Dicky' Turner, who had a profound stammer, and a follower of Livsey, stumbled through his oath, in part trying to say "...total abstination", but came out as "..tee-tee-total. It is little wonder that the Temperence Movement was started in Preston for there is record that at the turn of the 20th century, the town had 'a pub for every day of the year'...365.
You can't talk about Preston without mentioning Preston North End Football Club. With a history and tradition second to none...founder members of the Football League they were the first winners of the Football League (1888-89, when thay also won the F.A. Cup). They won the league again the following year without losing a match and earned themselves the proud nickname..The Invincibles.
Between August 22nd 1885 and April 1886 North End were undefeated winning 59 of their 64 matches and scoring 318 goals while conceding only 60. Another worthy note ...in 1887-88 North End won 42 consecutive matches.
Since those heady days, they have not fared as well, winning the F.A. Cup in 1938, and being runners up in the Cup in 1954 and again in 1964. They have seen some lean times over the last forty years. Without doubt the most famous player to play for Preston is Sir Tom Finney who played in 433 league games for Preston scoring 187 goals. Sir Tom played for England on 76 occasions, scoring 30 goals. It is after Sir Tom Finney retired in 1960 that Preston North End floundered.
The FIFA Football Museum containing some 30,000 football related artifacts are housed in the new museum located under the Tom Finney Stand at Deepdale, the home of Preston North End. The museum opened to the public February 16, 2001.
Post World War II has seen many changes in Preston. That first stetch of 'Motorway' took a a lot of traffic out of Preston, but it also took a lot of 'trade' with it.
A new bus station was built on Tithebarn Street, the biggest in Europe at the time, it is now considered to be an 'eye sore' on the downtown area. Preston railway station is on the main line between Glasgow and London, and although rail travel is not as popular as it once was, the Preston station is still a major link with a total of thirteen platforms.
A new 'Ringroad' was built within the town, with the loss of many of the old 'familiar' buildings and streets.
The 'Prince Edward Dock' on the Ribble was closed. Reconstucted as a shopping/entertainment center, and casual boating area, it has at least been put to good use.
The old familiar (PRI), Preston Royal Infirmary was closed, replaced by the Royal Preston Hospital, built on the outskits of the town rather than almost downtown as was PRI.
Gone are the familiar cinema's of downtown, Ritz, Palladium, Empire, New Victoria, Theatre Royal, Prince's. Even the neighborhood cinemas are gone...Plaza, Queens, Guild, Carleton, Star, Empress, even the Lido where one could often see a 'foreign' film. Not to mention the 'Playhouses'...Hippodrome, and the Palace where one could see 'live' shows including the annual Christmas pantomime. Such is 'progress' ?
Church Street, once a busy shopping center on the way to the town center, is now an almost forgotten deserted area, almost devoid of the once splendid shops.
The downtown area is still one of the busiest shopping centers in the north of England. With two covered markets and one uncovered, and with several very modern shopping centers, and public houses serving excellent fare, the town is truly, and aptly know as...Proud Preston.
Key facts about the city of Preston:
population of 129,000
awarded city status in April 2002 by the Queen in celebration of her Golden Jubilee
located at the centre of Lancashire's business and transport network - within easy access of M6 (Birmingham and the Lake District), M61 (Manchester), M55 (Blackpool) and M65 (East Lancashire)
the commercial and administrative centre of Lancashire and the seat of Lancashire County Council
a major centre for learning and the location of the University of Central Lancashire which has a student population of 25,000
the average house price is £65,881
the average gross weekly earnings is £379.20
economy is largely based on traditional manufacturing industries such as
textiles and engineering. Major employers include: Alstom (train manufactures) and BAe Systems (military/commercial aircraft manufacturing)
The unemployment rate for Preston is 4.2% (January 2002
For a more detailed venture through Preston , please click on the link below....
Send E-Mail to: dave-doris@worldnet.att.net
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