In 1870-72, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described Almondbury like this:
ALMONDBURY, a town, a township, a subdistrict, and a parish in the district of Huddersfield, W. R. Yorkshire. The town stands near the Colne river and the Sheffield railway, 2 miles SE of Huddersfield. It has a post office under Huddersfield, and a fair on Easter-Monday. It was anciently called Albanbury. ...
It is supposed by some antiquaries to have been the Campodunum of the Romans; and it seems certainly to have been a seat of the Kings of Northumbria. An ancient castle crowned an eminence at it, strongly fortified by double wall and trenches, and interiorly disposed in outer and inner courts; and a few traces of this still exist, in an almost vitrified state, proving it to have been destroyed by fire. The township includes also the hamlets of Coldhill, Fennybridge,-Castlehillside, Oaks, Newsome, and Thorpe. Acres, 2,585. Real property, £22,943. Pop., 10,361. Houses, 2,225.-The subdistrict comprises the townships of Almondbury and Farnley-Tyas. Acres, 4,208. Pop., 11,063. Houses, 2,376. The parish, in addition to this subdistrict, comprises the subdistricts of Lockwood, Meltham, and Honley, and part of the subdistricts of Slaithwaite and Holmfirth. Acres, 28,092. Rated property, exclusive of the chapelries of Nether-Thong, Armitage-Bridge, and Helme, £175,443. Pop. in 1841, 37,315; in 1861, 42,889. Houses, 8,884. The property in many parts is much subdivided. A large proportion of the inhabitants are employed in cotton and woollen factories. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Ripon. Value, £571.* Patron, Sir J. W. Ramsden, Bart. The church is in the perpendicular English style. The chapelries of Honley, Meltham, Marsden, Linthwaite, Lockwood, Crossland, Nether-Thong, Upper-Thong, Holme-Bridge, Farnley-Tyas, Meltham-Mills, Milns-Bridge, Armitage-Bridge, Rashcliff, Wilshaw, and Helme, are all within the parish; and there are various chapels for Independents, Baptists, and Methodists. A free grammar school was founded in the time of James I., and has £75 a year from endowment; and other charities have £348.
Almondbury through time
Almondbury is now part of Kirklees district. Click here for graphs and data of how Kirklees has changed over two centuries. For statistics about Almondbury itself, go to Units and Statistics.
GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth, History of Almondbury, in Kirklees and West Riding | Map and description, A Vision of Britain through Time.
URL: https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/11152
Date accessed: 28th April 2024
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