Collyhurst

Collyhurst

High rises at Collyhurst
Collyhurst
 Collyhurst shown within Greater Manchester
OS grid referenceSD855000
Metropolitan boroughManchester
Metropolitan county Greater Manchester
RegionNorth West
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post town MANCHESTER
Postcode district M40
Dialling code 0161
Police Greater Manchester
Fire Greater Manchester
Ambulance North West
EU Parliament North West England
UK ParliamentBlackley and Broughton
List of places
UK
England
Greater Manchester

Coordinates: 53°29′48″N 2°13′04″W / 53.496703°N 2.217846°W / 53.496703; -2.217846

Collyhurst is an inner city area of Manchester, England, 1.5 miles (2.4 km) northeast of the city centre on Rochdale Road (A664) and Oldham Road (A62). The River Irk passes through the area. Prominent buildings include two Roman Catholic churches, St Patrick's and St Malachy's.

On 15 August 1953, the front coach of a Manchester to Bury electric train fell from the Collyhurst viaduct over the River Irk after colliding with a local steam train. Ten people were killed and 58 injured in the crash.[1]

Collyhurst sandstone

Sandstone at Collyhurst Quarry
Entrance to Sandhills

Much of the red sandstone used for building in Manchester and the surrounding area, including stone for the Roman fort at Castlefield, St Ann's Church in the city centre, Manchester Cathedral and the original buildings of Chetham's Hospital, came from Collyhurst Quarry.[2] Geologists use the term Collyhurst Sandstone for this type of soft red sandstone, which occurs in North West England.[3] It is a fine to medium grained sedimentary rock, created from desert sands blown into dune formations during the Early Permian period when the area which now constitutes the British Isles was within the desert belts to the north of the equator. The rock is not very resistant to weathering and erosion and disintegrates relatively quickly. The quarry was mentioned by John Leland in the description of Manchester in his book. The Itinerary of John Leland in or about the years 1535 to 1543, saying that there was " a goodly quarre hard by the towne".[4] Stone was transported the short distance into Manchester by river on barges or rafts.[2] The quarry is disused and the area around it has been turned into a park called "Sandhills"[5] as part of Manchester City Council's Irk Valley Project.[6][7]

Churches

There are now two Roman Catholic churches in Collyhurst, St Patrick's and St Malachy's. There was once also St Edmund's in Monsall Street (architect P.P. Pugin, 1894). The three former Anglican churches have been demolished since they were described by Nikolaus Pevsner in The Buildings of England; Lancashire; I, 1969. The oldest was St Oswald's on Rochdale Road in the Gothic of the 13th century, the architect was E.H. Shellard; the east end was spectacularly picturesque and there was a steeple designed by John Lowe. Lowe was also the architect of the two other churches, the Albert Memorial Church in Queen's Road, 1864, a red brick building with a northwest tower topped by a spire; and St James's in Teignmouth Street, 1874 (this had a steeple at the northwest corner, a porch on the southwest, and a polygonal apse). The Union Chapel, Queen's Park, was designed by R. Moffat Smith and has a low turreted tower.[8]

In 1972 all the C of E churches in Collyhurst and Monsall were amalgamated into a new benefice of the Church of the Saviour. The church was established on part of the site formerly occupied by St Oswald's Church on Rochdale Road. This is an evangelical, Church of England church.

War memorial

There is a war memorial on Rochdale Road next to the former site of the Collyhurst Flats, erected by public subscription and unveiled by the Rt. Hon. Earl of Derby KG (Secretary of State for War) on 23 May 1923 to commemorate British servicemen who died during the First World War.[9]

Collyhurst War Memorial

Popular music

For a brief period in the mid-1970s, The Electric Circus, a run-down venue on Collyhurst Street (formerly the Palladium variety club), found itself at the centre of Manchester's punk rock scene. It played host to bands such as the Sex Pistols, the Jam, Joy Division—then known as Warsaw—[10] the Buzzcocks, Slaughter and the Dogs and the Clash's "White Riot" tour before its closure in 1977. It has since been demolished.

Notable people

References

  1. ↑ "Irk Valley Junction 1953". Danger Ahead! – Historic Railway Disasters. Retrieved 12 December 2007.
  2. 1 2 see Building stone in the city of Manchester: St Ann's Church Accessed on 2008-07-25
  3. ↑ British Geological Survey: Collyhust Sandstone Formation Accessed on 2008-07-25
  4. ↑ Bradshaw, L. D. (1987). Visitors to Manchester: a selection of British and foreign visitors’ descriptions of Manchester from c. 1538 to c. 1865. Radcliffe: Neil Richardson. p. 8. ISBN 1-85216-003-9.
  5. ↑ The Irk Valley:Sandhills Retrieved on 2008-07-26
  6. ↑ Building stone in the city of Manchester: Collyhurst Quarry Accessed on 2008-07-25
  7. ↑ "Irk River Valley". manchester.gov.uk. Manchester City Council.
  8. ↑ Pevsner, N. (1969) Lancashire; I: the industrial and commercial south (The Buildings of England.) Harmondsworth: Penguin; . 315-17
  9. ↑ http://www.iwm.org.uk/memorials/item/memorial/10721
  10. ↑ http://www.theguardian.com/music/2006/may/21/popandrock3
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