

















| |
A select gazetteer of local government areas, Greater Manchester County
This gazetteer has been prepared to assist in compiling places indexes for
archives purposes. Entries are therefore mainly for the local government areas
most likely to be useful for indexing, namely:
- Townships
In the North of England the measures for repairing highways and for
relief of the poor which were required by Tudor acts of parliament often
came to be undertaken by divisions of ecclesiastical parishes known as
townships. This arrangement was officially recognised by the Act of
Settlement of 1662 and, since townships were responsible for poor relief,
they asnounted to civil parishes. (In some cases such a division did not
occur; Warburton, for example,was both an ecclesiastical parish and a
township). Townships were the basis for defining other local government
areas e.g. poor law unions, boroughs. However, during the nineteenth
century they ceased to have direct responsibility for poor relief and
highways and they lost importance in local government to new local
authorities such as urban districts and municipal boroughs. From the 1890s
there was a tendency for townships and parts of townships within urban
districts and boroughs to be merged so that townships could be formed with
boundaries corresponding to those of the relevant urban district or
borough. This tendency was so general that merging of this kind is not
referred to below.
- Urban districts
The establishment of these was begun in 1894 by the Local Government
Act of that year.
- Boroughs
By this term is meant boroughs, including municipal boroughs and county
boroughs, existing from the time of the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835
to local government reorganisation in 1974, though medieval grants of
charters to towns are briefly noted. The establishment of
"improvement commissioners" or a local board of health is also
indicated since often it meant the beginning of modern forms of local
government in a locality.
It is hoped that at least the major changes in the areas of the above
mentioned types of authorities have been indicated in this gazetteer.
Titles, e.g. townships, boroughs, are omitted except where needed to
prevent confusion between local government authorities with the same name but
greatly different in area, e.g. "Stockport Borough" (to 1974) and
"Stockport Metropolitan Borough" (from 1974). The order of names
(and titles, if any) is the natural one, e.g. "Great Bolton", not
"Bolton, Great". The method for alphabetical arrangement consists'
of treating each entry as if it made up a single word (e.g.
"Littleborough" before "Little Hulton").
Of the other types of local authorities the ones chiefly referred to are
poor law unions and rural districts. Unions are mentioned because of the
importance of their functions in local government and because of the way in
which their areas were used to determine other local government areas. Rural
sanitary districts, for example, which were established under the Public
Health Act of 1872, consisted of those areas of unions for which no local
board of health, improvement commissioners or borough council existed. In 1894
they were succeeded by rural districts, often of the same name. The tendency
from 1894 for rural districts to disappear, either by conversion into urban
districts or by absorption of their areas into neighbouring local authorities,
was particularly strong around Manchester; only Bucklow and Wigan Rural
Districts survived until 1974 in the area that was to become Greater
Manchester County.
Localities smaller in area than townships are noted where similarity of
names might cause confusion (as between Werneth in Oldham Borough and Werneth
township) or where it seemed helpful for local history purposes. For such
localities which have not been included, information on their location can be
obtained from Bartholmew's Gazetteer of the British Isles, Ordnance Survey
maps or indexes to books on place-names (as below).
Choose a link Placesnames 'A'
Placenames 'B'
Placenames 'C'
Placenames 'D to F'
Placenames 'G to H'
Placenames 'I to L'
Placename 'M to N'
Placenames 'O to R' Placenames 'S'
Placenames 'T to W'
References Used
13 March 1997
A select gazetteer of local government areas, Greater Manchester County
This gazetteer has been prepared to assist in compiling places indexes for
archives purposes. Entries are therefore mainly for the local government areas
most likely to be useful for indexing, namely:
- Townships
In the North of England the measures for repairing highways and for
relief of the poor which were required by Tudor acts of parliament often
came to be undertaken by divisions of ecclesiastical parishes known as
townships. This arrangement was officially recognised by the Act of
Settlement of 1662 and, since townships were responsible for poor relief,
they asnounted to civil parishes. (In some cases such a division did not
occur; Warburton, for example,was both an ecclesiastical parish and a
township). Townships were the basis for defining other local government
areas e.g. poor law unions, boroughs. However, during the nineteenth
century they ceased to have direct responsibility for poor relief and
highways and they lost importance in local government to new local
authorities such as urban districts and municipal boroughs. From the 1890s
there was a tendency for townships and parts of townships within urban
districts and boroughs to be merged so that townships could be formed with
boundaries corresponding to those of the relevant urban district or
borough. This tendency was so general that merging of this kind is not
referred to below.
- Urban districts
The establishment of these was begun in 1894 by the Local Government
Act of that year.
- Boroughs
By this term is meant boroughs, including municipal boroughs and county
boroughs, existing from the time of the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835
to local government reorganisation in 1974, though medieval grants of
charters to towns are briefly noted. The establishment of
"improvement commissioners" or a local board of health is also
indicated since often it meant the beginning of modern forms of local
government in a locality.
It is hoped that at least the major changes in the areas of the above
mentioned types of authorities have been indicated in this gazetteer.
Titles, e.g. townships, boroughs, are omitted except where needed to
prevent confusion between local government authorities with the same name but
greatly different in area, e.g. "Stockport Borough" (to 1974) and
"Stockport Metropolitan Borough" (from 1974). The order of names
(and titles, if any) is the natural one, e.g. "Great Bolton", not
"Bolton, Great". The method for alphabetical arrangement consists'
of treating each entry as if it made up a single word (e.g.
"Littleborough" before "Little Hulton").
Of the other types of local authorities the ones chiefly referred to are
poor law unions and rural districts. Unions are mentioned because of the
importance of their functions in local government and because of the way in
which their areas were used to determine other local government areas. Rural
sanitary districts, for example, which were established under the Public
Health Act of 1872, consisted of those areas of unions for which no local
board of health, improvement commissioners or borough council existed. In 1894
they were succeeded by rural districts, often of the same name. The tendency
from 1894 for rural districts to disappear, either by conversion into urban
districts or by absorption of their areas into neighbouring local authorities,
was particularly strong around Manchester; only Bucklow and Wigan Rural
Districts survived until 1974 in the area that was to become Greater
Manchester County.
Localities smaller in area than townships are noted where similarity of
names might cause confusion (as between Werneth in Oldham Borough and Werneth
township) or where it seemed helpful for local history purposes. For such
localities which have not been included, information on their location can be
obtained from Bartholmew's Gazetteer of the British Isles, Ordnance Survey
maps or indexes to books on place-names (as below).
Choose a link Placesnames 'A'
Placenames 'B'
Placenames 'C'
Placenames 'D to F'
Placenames 'G to H'
Placenames 'I to L'
Placename 'M to N'
Placenames 'O to R' Placenames 'S'
Placenames 'T to W'
References Used
13 March 1997
|