Hilton Park

The area took its name from the local Hilton/Hylton/Hulton family who were land owners in Prestwich. Ellis Hylton served as a Grand Juryman during the reign of Henry VIII (1509-1547)and founded a chantry in St Mary's Church, which later became the Wilton Chapel. Read more about the Hilton family,

In the tithe returns of 1839, front meadow - what we know as Barnfield Park today - was under the ownership of John Ashton who had bought it from George Scholes of High Bank. Samuel Ashton, his brother, had purchased Woodhill from George's son Thomas in 1839.

Broom field, and the Dog Shambles meadows were still owned by the estate of Mr Scholes (who had died in 1837). John & Henry Bleakley of Myrtle Grove (& Dye Works) owned the Top Gate & Big Pasture meadows, with John Munn owning the remainder, what was Hilton House with formal gardens, plus fields.

The census of 1851 shows no properties between Hilton Lane and Sedgley House - similar to Hilton Park, Sedgley Park was yet to become a place name.

The first occurrence in St Mary's Registers of Hilton Park as an abode was for a gardener George Nutter and his wife Agnes, who had baptised their son James in March 1857.

George had been present in the census of 1851 serving as a labourer for John Prince Lee,The Lord Bishop of Manchester, at Sedgley House, and was again present in the census of 1861, one of only two families listed at Hilton Park, the other was William Anderson, a coachman living in Hilton Park lodge house. This suggests that both the North and South Lodges had now been built, and the remaining North Lodge gives us a clue as to who was behind the development.

On the bell tower of the surviving North lodge at Hilton Park, now just South of Barnfield Park, a family crest is still visible today. ("Vincit Omnia Veritas" - "Truth Conquers All Things").

This crest belongs to John Munn, of Hilton House who was recorded as a land auctioneer in the census of 1881, and also as Captain in the 3rd Royal Lancs Militia. His wife Sarah was listed as "captain's wife".

John had also placed a Southern Lodge at the corner of George Street and Bury New Road, and Hilton Crescent was laid down between the two lodges.

This select housing estate was called Hilton Park and was bounded by Myrtle Grove on Hilton Lane to it's junction on Bury New Road, where it is called George Street and Bury New Road up to the gated entrance beside Barnfield.

1871

By the census of 1871, along with both the lodges being occupied, the larger houses of North Leigh, Thorndale, Encliffe and a property called Hilton Park (a.k. Hilton Hall) were listed. Uplands and The Shrubbery were not named in the census.

At this Hilton Park property lived Seigfried Adolphus Meyer (b:1812), a Naturalised British Subject Commissioning Merchant born in Holstein, Germany, with his wife Johanna, their daughter,son,governess, cook, two housemaids and a butler. In the North Lodge lived a coachman. Siegfried was a Cotton Manufacturer under S.A. Meyer & Co. Here's is a quotation for goods along the Barbary Coast (North Africa).

Encliffe House was home to Frederick J Astbury, Fellow Chartered Accountant and a manufacturer employing 100 hands as Astbury & Co. He was living with his wife Margaret, three daughters, one visitor Sarah Slingsby, and four servants. He was partner in Astbury & Eckersley Chartered Accountants, estate and insurance agents of 64 Cross Street, Manchester.

Frederick married a Prestwich born wife, Margaret Munn, the daughter of John Munn of Hilton House, at St Mary's in April 1859. Their son, who was absent in 1871, had been born at Grove House in Broughton in 1860 , and was to become Sir John Meir Astbury who was born at Grove House, Broughton in 1860. Sir John established a legal practice in Manchester, principally dealing with cases at the Palatine Chancery Court and at the Lancashire Assizes. He became Queens Counsel in 1895, and went on to be elected Liberal MP for Southport, 1906-1910, a high court Judge in 1913, and Privy Councillor in 1929.

An Engine driver in a factory, who was called David Partington lived at a property between Encliffe and Thorndale House. The property is also recorded in the same census as uninhabited. This can only be Uplands, standing between the other two named properties, so perhaps David and his wife were living in the part-built or empty house.

At Thorndale lived Theodore Drayton Grimké (b:1818), a naturalised British Subject and medical doctor (nonpracticing) born in South Carolina, USA. He lived there with his wife Emma (Nee Evans b:1827), four children, a visitor Lizzie Garrett and three servants.

[Ref New Zealand Library]

After Emma and Theodore moved to England, Theodore initially worked for his father-in-law Richard Evans.

They then settled in Manchester and began their religious and philanthropic work amongst the poor. In Oct 1875 at St Mary the Virgin in Prestwich, Robert Harvey, a Surgeon in the Bengal Army, married one of Theodore's daughters, Emma Josephine.

The following year, 1876, Dr Theodore Grimké established the Salford Medical Mission in Greengate, which distributed free medicines to the very poor in one of the poorest districts of Salford. After Grimké's death at Thorndale in 1888, his widow formed a group of trustees to carry on the work of the Mission, later known as the Greengate Dispensary and Open Air School.

A small in-patients department was opened at the dispensary, called the Grimké Ward. This Ward became a special institution for the treatment of paralysis and disablement by manual methods. The Hospital and School eventually closed about 1948.

Emma also established a home for “Fallen and Destitute Women” at 200 Great Cheetham Street. The Grimkés were part of the evangelical Anglican movement that had earlier led to the formation of the Church Missionary Society, which played a significant role in the early colonisation of Aotearoa (New Zealand).

The religious cards began as a result of Emma’s work amongst the poor in Manchester. During her visits to people’s houses, she noticed 'the dreary bareness of the cottage walls' and came up with the idea of colourful cards with clearly printed text that would both spread the Christian message and provide something bright for people’s walls.

Emma ended up producing scripture cards in over 50 languages before she died in 1905.

Back in the census of 1871, at North Leigh, Robert G Underdown, General Manger of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway since 1861, lived with his wife, three children and four servants. One of the clerks in Roberts Office was Joseph Rostern of North Deyne, Poppythorn, and after the MS&LR became part of the Great Central Railway, he became assistant Manager, and was honoured with a CBE for his wartime work. Read more about Joseph and the Walkden family.

In 1884, Robert identified the body of Massey Bromley, engineer and for many years locomotive superintendent of the Great Eastern Railway, one of twenty-four fatalities in the Penistone railway accident of 16 July 1884.

Robert Underdown was also a Lieutenant Colonel in the Engineer and Railway Volunteer Staff Corps until he retired his commission in 1886.

Finally in the 1871 census, at the southern Lodge, which faced the side of the George Inn on George Street, lived coachman Thomas Charmley.

1881

Checking the census for Hilton Park in 1881, North to South, at the North Lodge (Hilton Park Lodge) was Arthur Hawes, coachman, his wife & 2 visitors. The Shrubbery was home to George Parkinson, a building contractor, and presumably involved with the construction of Hilton park. He lived with his wife, two children and two servants.

At Hilton Park (a.k.a. Hilton Hall) Johanna Meyer, the widow of Seigfried from 1871, was now living on dividends, with three children and four servants. Seigfried had died in 1877 and is buried at St Mary's with his wife who outlived him by 20 years.

Next along heading south was Encliffe, and still home to the Astbury family, with their son (the future Sir) John Meir Astbury now present, recorded as an undergraduate at Oxford, along with five more children and three servants.

John Munn is next to be recorded as living at Hilton Park (this must have been Uplands), he was now living from the income of his land and housing developments, and serving as a captain in the 3rd Royal Lancs Militia with his wife three visitors and three servants. At his stables lived Swainson West, coachman, and his wife and son.

Theodore Grimké was still at the next property (Thorndale), with his wife and three servants.

At Northleigh lived Henry M Richardson, solicitor, now living with his wife, two children and three servants. He replaced the Railway Manager who had lived there ten years previously, and was employed as a Chartered Accountant by Mr Astbury of Encliffe.

Finally, a printers reader lived in the south lodge with his wife and two children.

1891

Hilton Park finally made an appearance on the map of 1891 and in the census of that same year Arthur Hawes, coachman was still living in the North Lodge. At The Shrubbery, Thomas Kenyon (b:1843) a Manufacturing Chemist had take up the residence, along with his wife, eight children and (just) one servant.

Thomas also had premises in Tib Street, Manchester, and was director of the English Velvet & Cord Dyer's Assoc. Ltd. This association was incorporated in April 1899, for the purpose of amalgamating fourteen firms engaged in the cotton velvet and corduroy dyeing industry. Most of the associated businesses were located in or around Manchester and Salford, or in Yorkshire. The company traded until the late 1950s, when its last name was E.V. Industrials Ltd.

In 1900 Bleacher's Association Ltd was formed and Thomas became a Director. This association brought together around 60 bleaching companies mostly from Lancashire and were based at Blackfriars House, Manchester.

Thomas was also a director of the Kellner-Partington Paper Pulp Co. originally formed in Manchester in 1889, with exports to America. When he died in 1917, he was buried in St Mary's churchyard and left an estate worth £974,000 ( £83m today). The company was transferred to Borregaard under Norwegian ownership in 1918.

Next door at Hilton Park (Hall) Johanna Meyer (widow) was still present with two children, one grand child, one Lady Companion, and six servants.

Encliffe was now home to Goodman S. Maudley, the director of an Indian Rubber Manufacturer, his wife, two children and four servants.

Uplands had changed hands and was now home to the family of Duncan Mathewson from Inverness, J.P. and cotton merchant. He was a widow and lived with his daughter and four servants.

At Northleigh Arthur Spavin, domestic Gardener was present with his wife, daughter niece and nephew. Benjamin Butterworth, caretaker lived at a small property next to the South Lodge where Elizabeth Priestley, a charwoman lived, along with her son.

1901

In 1901, Daniel Livsey , gardener and family were living in Hilton Park Lodge, and a Police constable, John Lowther was living in Hilton House Cottage. The Kenyon family still lived at the Shrubbery with six children and two servants.

At Hilton Park (Hall), Joseph Hargreaves a gardener was present, with his wife & son. While at Encliffe, Frederick Astbury, cotton merchant, and his brother Charles, Barrister at Law, had taken over the property from his father, with two servants present.

At Uplands Cottage was a coachman, Arthur Brown, along with his wife and three children, with Uplands itself uninhabited. Next door at Thorndale lived John Strachan, a professor of Greek at Owens College, the forerunner to Manchester University. His wife and seven children had 1 servant attending.

John was a scholar of Sanskrit, Ancient Greek and the Celtic languages, best remembered as a leading figure in the revival of Celtic studies and his works: the "Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus", a collection of material in Old Irish, and for the textbook "Old Irish Paradigms and Selections from the Old Irish Glosses".

He also established the School of Irish Studies in Dublin in 1903, in partnership with Kuno Meyer (who doesn't seem to be a relation of the Meyer family of Hilton House). It was this School that eventually made Dublin the world center of Celtic studies.

Finally at the South Lodge was Silvanons Bufton, from Wolverhampton, who apparently owned a corn cart.

1911

In the census of 1911, Daniel Livsey (gardener) was still present at the North Lodge with his wife and nephew, Thomas Kenyon (Chemist Manufacturer) was still present at The Shrubbery, with his wife, six children and three servants.

Hilton Park had now been renamed Hilton Hall, and was being run as boarding for boys from the Manchester Grammar School. James Worthington was a schoolmaster at Manchester Grammar School and lived at the house with his wife and a vistor present. There were eight boys boarding there on census day, with birthplaces such as Ceylon, Malay, India, Spain, Cumbria and Berkshire.

That was it, just the two large houses and the north Lodge were recorded in 1911, no other properties in Hilton Park are listed in the census and there was a reason for that...

The map of 1915 shows a major change had occurred, with mass housing spreading up from Sedgley Park towards and into Hilton Park.

Between the Wars Hilton House on Hilton Lane was also replaced by the housing along Bland Road. Just Hilton Hall and The Shrubbery clung on.

The Shrubbery became a synagogue from 1937, and parts of it were used as a Fire Station during WWII and into the 1950's. When it was demolished and a purpose built Synagogue opened on the site in 1960.

Hilton Hall was let as flats, then demolished in 1984 to make Way for the houses of Crescent Grove.