Townships: Upper Allithwaite

UPPER ALLITHWAITE

This township occupies 2,675 acres (fn. 1) of the southern end of Cartmel Fell. Judging from its name, the boundaries may at one time have been so arranged that it was adjacent to Lower Allithwaite, the Grange district, afterwards in Broughton, belonging to it; but the connexion may have been due simply to common lordship in early times, as suggested below.

While the main part of the surface is hilly, rising to over 700 ft. above sea level, there is a comparatively low and level strip on the eastern boundary between the foot of the fell and the Winster. The village of Newton lies near the centre of the township in the hollow between two hills; Lindale is on the lower slopes at the south end, with Castlehead to the southeast of it on a little bluff above the Winster. In 1901 there was a population of 763.

From Lindale roads go south to Grange, north to Newton and Cartmel Fell, and north-east to Levens. (fn. 2) At Newton the road from Lindale divides, the chief branch going north-west to Newby Bridge, and a minor one going north to Height, and passing the old meeting-house there. Another road from Newton crosses the Winster into Witherslack by Blea Crag Bridge (rebuilt 1816), adjoining which is a knoll called Gallows Hill, a murderer having been hanged there in 1576. (fn. 3)

Castlehead is supposed to be haunted.

Township affairs are administered by a parish council of six members.

Manor

It seems probable that this township received its name from having been at one time under the same lords as Lower Allithwaite, among those lords being the Flemings. NEWTON has already been recorded as one of the manors of Earl Tostig in 1066. John le Fleming granted lands in Newton and Allithwaite to Richard de Copeland at a rent of two pairs of gloves, and gave other lands in Newton in Cartmel which John Celer formerly held, at the rent of 1 lb. of cummin. (fn. 4) William son of William de Asmunderlaw gave his estate to Richard de Copeland. (fn. 5) The Copelands have already been shown to have been owners in Lower Allithwaite. Richard de Copeland in the second quarter of the 1 3 th century granted to his son Peter land in Newton and in Allithwaite, (fn. 6) and Peter gave land in the hamlet of Newton and the piece called Flemingfield to Cartmel Priory in 1245. (fn. 7) About thirty years later the prior and canons acknowledged that they held lands in Newton and those called Flemingfield in Allithwaite of Sir Alan de Copeland. (fn. 8) After this Newton does not seem to have been regarded as a separate manor, and the Cartmel rental of 1508–9 shows a considerable number of small tenements there. (fn. 9)

LINDALE (fn. 10) was granted to the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem by Reyner le Fleming, (fn. 11) and was held by them, as a member of the Preceptory of Newland in Yorkshire in 1292, (fn. 12) and down to the suppression of the order in England by Henry VIII. It was again restored to them by Queen Mary, (fn. 13) .but lost on the accession of Elizabeth. (fn. 14) The manor was sold by James I in 1611 to John Eldred and another, (fn. 15) who transferred to Robert Dalton of Thurnham and another, and these in 1622 sold to William Thornburgh. Not long afterwards, in 1636, it was purchased from him by Robert Curwen and Robert Rawlinson, and descended with Cark Hall (fn. 16) until 1860, when on partition it was allotted as part of a third of a moiety to Millicent Ann (Moore), widow of T. F. Johnson, whose representative is the present lord of the manor. (fn. 17)

Atterpile Castle, now Castlehead, was sold in 1611, (fn. 18) and became the property of the Thornburghs of Hampsfield. (fn. 19) It was afterwards held by the Turner family of Grange, and about 1765 was purchased by John Wilkinson, the great ironmaster, who built himself a house there, and was buried in the garden in 1808. On the estate being sold in 1828 the body was reinterred in the church. (fn. 20) Castlehead has had several owners in the last eighty years, and is now occupied as a junior school of studies by a religious community, the Holy Ghost Fathers, who are devoted to foreign missions. It is called St. Mary's.

John de Lancaster, about 1300, granted the canons of Cartmel a free fishery on Helton Tarn and leave to use a boat anywhere upon it, either on the Witherslack side or on their own Cartmel side. (fn. 21)

There are a few other references to the township in pleadings (fn. 22) and inquisitions, (fn. 23) but they are of little interest.

Church

A chapel at Lindale probably existed before the Reformation, but nothing certain is known. (fn. 24) Lawrence Newton was 'reader' there in 1627. (fn. 25) In 1650 it had 'neither minister nor maintenance, though the same be a place of great necessity for both.' (fn. 26) In 1717 the income was £5 8s., partly from interest on benefactions and partly by an ancient levy made by the inhabitants on themselves. There was then a chapelwarden. (fn. 27) A report made to the Bishop of Chester in 1708 shows that the chapel was almost destitute of books and furniture. There was nothing belonging to the communion, because it was never administered there; the table was not railed in, nor was there a surplice. The reader was a man of sober life and conversation who read 'prayers and some pious and profitable discourses of some approved divine of the Church of England,' and did what else was thought 'sufficient for such a reader to do.' (fn. 28) The register of baptisms dates from 1734. In 1770 a brief was obtained for the rebuilding of the chapel, but nothing more than repairs was effected. The rebuilding took place in 1828, and the present church is called St. Paul's. Further endowments have been secured from time to time, and the net value is now £298 a year. (fn. 29) Since 1867 the Bishop of Carlisle appoints the perpetual curates. The following have been in charge (fn. 30) :—

The Plymouth Brethren have a meeting-place at Lindale.

The Friends' meeting-house at Height in Newton was built in 1677, George Fox having found some of his earliest disciples in this part of Cartmel. (fn. 32) It is still used once a month. Over the doorway is a stone inscribed—
LN
ANNO
DOMINI
1677