Some time ago, Paul Black led a party from Bradwell history group around the attractions of Tideswell and so on the evening of June the 9 our local history club had a reciprocal visit around
their ancient village with all its old workshops, chapels and Sunday school buildings etc. We started off from the Wesleyan Chapel, visiting the grave of Seth Evans who, in 1912 wrote Bradwell Ancient and Modern which is one of the most informative books about Derbyshire ever written.This book contains the famous photograph taken as early as the 1850’s of a big group of lead miners nearly all of whom are wearing their “Bradda Hats”. This photograph has been reproduced so many times in more recent books.
We then walked downhill and turned right to Brook House. This is the well-known building which forms a bridge over the river and is one of the many buildings that was once a Sunday school. Bradwell,150 years ago was a hot-bed of non-conformism and several different branches of Methodism found a home here. These old chapel buildings still exist but most have been converted into dwellings.
A few paces further on we came to the Lumb, where we went through a little gate, down some greasy steps and were surprised to see a powerful torrent of water roaring out of the left-hand wall. This is the main resurgence for all the caves and lead mines right the way up on to Bradwell Moor. This torrent once powered a waterwheel which drove a fan to blow the flames of the lead smelter at the bottom of Bradwell Dale. A dozen years ago there was a huge winter rainstorm and the water table rose so high inside these hills that suddenly many people realised to their horror that they had resurgences under their homes.
Just like Tideswell, some of the place-names in Bradwell have been renewed over the years. So what is now Church Street – where the traffic lights are, used to be called “Watter Lane”( because it led to the brook).
The present-day road past the Shoulder of Mutton is quite recent – 1938. The old road used to go past the original Shoulder of Mutton across the way. Our guide told us that because the new pub was built before the Peak Park came into being, it ended up as the only brick building in Bradwell and was built to the standard design of a suburban hotel. Near the traffic lights a stainless steel plaque on a wall told us that this was the birthplace of Samuel Fox, producer of the first collapsible umbrella frames and founder of the mighty steel works at Stocksbridge. There are many notable buildings near the bridge, in one of which, an enterprising electrician charged accumulators ( for the old-fashioned wirelesses) using a redundant waterwheel next to this abandoned mill.
The Bradwell group later entertained us with refreshments up in the old Sunday school building and we are very grateful to them for a very informative evening. We shall be back in business with talks and visits from November onwards, please listen out for us.
Brian Woodall