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Charlton House
Charlton House is a Grade II listed house in Prestwich, built in the Victorian Gothic style of the era and popular in this region see other examples at Sir Edward Holt's Woodthorpe (now a pub), and Sedgley House (now GMP Sedgley Park Training Centre).
It is made of red polychromatic brick with stone dressing and lintels, it also has slate roofs. There are 2 storeys with attics and a front of 3 bays with 3 sash windows, some with gothic heads.
The first bay is gabled with arch braced bargeboards and contains a rectangular bay window.
The middle bay contains an arched doorway, and has a pyramidal roof with a weathervane.
There are two similar gables and a bay window in the right hand return.
The earliest mention of Charlton House by name was found in 1878 when when the wife of E C Harding of Charlton House gave birth to a daughter.
In 1881 Edward Harding and Thomas Lucas(?), of New Brown Street in Manchester, were listed as woollen warehouseman, and back in 1862 Edward (and a Charles Doody) appear to have applied for a patent for "improvements to braces".
In 1880 Edward had retired from the local board of guardians in Prestwich and a year after the census of 1881, Edward's business " John Harding, Son & Co.", which traded out of 18 & 20 New Brown Street (Shude Hill), and Dutton Street in Strangeways, hit trouble and went through liquidation. The house and its contents, including "useful Modern Household Furniture" along with Turkish Cigarettes and tobacco", went up at auction. Edward moved to Ambleside and died there in 1918.
Mary's father Owen was recorded as a manufacture on her wedding register. Owen had been born in 1823 at Machynlleth Montgomeryshire, Wales, and ran a factory in Rhiwsaeson in Montgomeryshire. They had four daughters before moving up to Prestwich.
The census confirms John's occupation as a Fishmonger. This confirms John as the son of Thomas Muirhead who lived at Barnfield in Prestwich, and died there only 7 months after he moved in. So father and son had houses just yards away from each other along Bury New Road.
Read more about the Muirheads & other occupants of Barnfield here.
A court case in 1895 then shows us that the Walker family had moved in to Charlton House. Samuel Walker & Sons owned the Eagle Iron Works on the Irwell and Atlas Mill on the Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal, both at Radcliffe.
The court case was claiming non payment for the installation of an automatic sprinkler in the Theatre Royal, Huddersfield. Mr Walker claimed the contracted price of £107, but the defendant claimed he had agreed £87 with Walker's agent, who had also granted a discount. The Defendant claimed to have paid the agent £85, but the judge sided with Mr Walker.
Samuel Walker was born in Prestolee in 1840 and had been granted several patents for his work over the years, he became a J.P. and was later appointed as a magistrate in 1898.
By 1908 occupation of Charlton house had passed to Edward Holbrook, who's daughter married at Chetham Hill in 1908, then in 1913 Arthur Douglas Hunter aged 32, a Cotton Salesman of Charlton House married Annie Warhurst (his father was Charles Hunter, Gentleman). The quick succession continued with a Mrs Hunter of Charlton House advertising seeking to employ a young girl as a Between-Maid in 1917.
Miss Milne was born in 1906 in Oldham. Her father Dr John Milne was born in 1874, he ran a Practice in Middleton and died in 1955. Her mother Mary nursed soldiers during the Boer war and was the daughter of Lord and lady Truell, she too was born in 1874 and she died in 1962.
[Ref MEN & Wikipedia & English Heritage]
Built circa 1866(?), possibly attributable to Alfred Waterhouse who also designed a conservatory across the road at Oak Hill and the Reformed Church at Besses o'th'Barn (not to mention Manchester & Rochdale Town Halls,the Natural History Museum in London and the chest tomb of John Slagg at St Mary's Churchyard.
An alternative architect for the property is Thomas Worthington, the man behind the Albert Memorial in Manchester’s Albert Square, and the Prestwich Union Infirmary, afterwards Delaunays Hospital and then the North Manchester General Hospital.
Charlton House Doorway
Charlton House (West face)
In front of the house are two cast iron standard lamps with globe lanterns.
Charlton House didn't appear in the census of 1861, though it's neighbouring properties of Green Mount and Bent Meadow were already in place. In the census of 1871, Beech Wood had appeared and an uninhabited property is recorded next it - though unnamed this was Charlton House either under construction or just empty.
Map of 1891 showing Charlton House and the neighbouring properties.
The following 1881 census shows Edward CHARLTON Harding aged 58 (b:1823), from Leamington near Warwick was living at the house with his wife Eliza and family. He was a Manufacturing Clothier (tailor) employing 600 Hands. Between 1864 and 1869 he and Eliza his wife, had four daughters and a son while living at Breeze Hill, a large semi detached house off Singleton Rd, Kersal/Higher Broughton. They had a further son and daughter after they moved to Prestwich (1877 & 1879).
Breezehill still stands today behind the hedges.
Also in the 1860's Edward had got involved in local politics when in 1868, Edward along with Roderick Anderson and Jesse Bryant, had accused Charles Edward Cawley of bribery by "hiring cabs to convey voters to the poll". Cawley had stood for election when Salford was granted a second MP, and he claimed that the cabs were to convey canvassers to workplaces an he had also "hired a gang of roughs" after hearing rumours about Irish interference, which the Judges criticised. 2s. 6d. of bribery by an agent was proved in isolated acts, however the election was judged to have been unaffected by the events. Cawley won by a small majority.
Charlton House (South face)
Back in Prestwich, in 1885 a Mary Owen, a daughter of Owen Owen of Charlton house, got married at St Mary's church to George Hayes, a widower and gardener living at 15 Rectory Lane in Prestwich.
Charlton House (East face).
Their stay here was short, and although their daughter Mary continued living on Rectory Lane, Charlton House had new owners by the census of 1891. [There is a potential burial of Owen Owens at St Mary's in Prestwich in June 1886 (aged 70)].
The Milne stone at St Mary's Church.
In 1890 the records at St Mary's show us that a new family has moved in when Dorothy Muirhead the Child of John Muirhead a game dealer & his wife Charlotte Jane, is baptised at the church. In the 1891 census we find Charlotte Muirhead, living with her son Stephen, and her husband is absent. Checking the 1881 census we find John & Charlotte living at Broadhurst on Bury Old Road.
Broadhurst still stands today.
S Walker & Sons.
Eagle Works off Sion Street (1970).
The next relevant entry at St Mary's records the burial of William Reid of Charlton House, aged 62 in 1905. I don't know much about him expect that his wife Janet lived until 1924 before being placed with her husband at St Mary's.
In 1907 a resident of Charlton house lost a brooch while visiting Heaton Park which had been opened to the public in 1902.
Reward offered
A notable resident from the 20th century was Margaret Milne. She was the only child of Dr John Milne, and had no children herself. She sold the house in the late 1980s and went to live on St Marys Rd. Recorded in an article from the MEN:
Marjorie Milne who had an estate of around £1.3m when she died in 1997, donated around £250,000 to the restoration of St Mary's Church as part of her will.
The late Ian Pringle, local historian, said of her, "She was a marvellous woman with many interests and great compassion for a variety of causes, and she led a remarkable life."
Miss Milne.
Miss Milne joined the Women’s Voluntary Service (WVS) during the war. Her job was to run a mobile canteen in Bootle, for residents made homeless in the air raids.
In 1983 the property was sold to Bradshaw Homes, who converted it into retirement flats. She moved to a house on St Mary’s Road, Prestwich, where she lived until her death.
