More information : (Area NU 10611396) The hospital at Bolton was founded c 1225 for a master, three chaplains and thirteen leper brethren, and for the relief of the poor and strangers. It was dedicated to St Thomas The Martyr and was under the supervision or granted to the monasteries of Kirkham and Rievaulx. The brethren were under a religious rule. Licence to build a chapel was granted during the priorate of Ralph Kerneth (1216-1233). In 1335/6 licence to crenellate the "dwelling place of Boulton hospital" was granted.
Lepers do not appear to be mentioned after c1338 and it then seems to have become more in the nature of a monastery, the brethren being called canons by Leland.
The hospital was dissolved c1547. The site of the cell, with a garden, about six acres of meadow and a croft called Ryecrofte was granted in 1575 to John Sonkye and Percival Gunson.
In 1233 the Master and Brethren obtained licence to stub 80 acres of land adjoining the hospital on the north and east. This land is represented by the enclosed fields on the north side of where the moor slopes down from the old watch tower (Jenny's Lantern ? at NU11961531) on Jenny's Lantern Hill to the Bolton Road. In 1234/5 a grant was made to the hospital that 150 acres taken out of Birchefald Wood on the east shall be disafforested. East Bolton (Name 13051613) went by the name of Birchhope till the beginning of the 19th cent and some of its fields (below the cottage of Midstead) still go by the nane of the Spital Fields.
The site of the chapel attached to the hospital, or the 'chapel on the island' was apparently in the grass field called the "Guards", on a spot which except for the draining of surface water from the boggy land is almost an island at the present day. There are still traces of foundations of buildings visible. (1-4)
The bottom of a bronze skillet, formed with concentric circles in high relief, was found in a large camp the "Guards" and was presented to the Soc of Ants Newcastle by Sir David Smith.
(5)
Base of stew pan from the native site at The Guards, Bolton (Exhibited with finds of the Roman period.) (6)
The area concerned is the higher point of the field called The Guards, locally known as Leper's Colony, the remainder being low lying and marshy. The whole area is under pasture. In the NW corner of the area there are several mounds, maximum height 2.0m, with undressed masonry and old foundations visible in places. Many of the stones are reddened by fire. The mounds are somewhat formless, but one does appear to conceal the remains of a large rectangular building with an E-W orientation, possibly the chapel.
On the mound in the extreme NW corner of the area, and partly buried, is a stone trough of crude workmanship. It is 0.7m square and 0.1m deep, and in the bottom is a hole 0.15m square. Purpose and age unknown. The remaining part of the area is ridge and furrow ploughed but with the buried foundations of old walls visible in places. The ridge and furrow either cuts these remains or swings to avoid them, and thus postdates the foundations.
The northern boundary of the area is marked by the foundations of a wall up to 0.7m high in places. On the south side of this wall is a wide ditch-like depression. Being inside this wall its purpose could not have been defensive, but it possibly represents the
remains of a fish pond.
From the above information and the local traditions there seems little doubt that the remains are those of the Leper Hospital. Before the era of modern drainage the area would be quite isolated and a suitable site for such an establishment.
Authorities 5 and 6 refer to the "Camp" and "Native site" at the Guards, but the topographical situation is not indicative of such, and it is concluded that the stew pan now in Black Gate Museum was a chance find and not in situ. (7)
The area is still generally as described by F1, although no large building site can now be identified amongst the amorphous mounds. The suggested fish pond appears to be part of a perimeteer drainage ditch to the hospital. Several similar features occur to the north and south-west of the site. (8)
NU 1063 1395. Bolton leper hospital. Scheduled RSM No 21048. An aerial photograph taken in 1989 shows more detail of the internal layout of the hospital, and at least one small rectangular building platform is visible with an entrance in its S wall.
Lepers do not appear to be mentioned on the site from about 1338, and the site seems to have become more like a standard monastery from then until its dissolution in circa 1547. In 1575 the site of the hospital with a garden, about 6 acres of meadow and a croft, were granted to John Sonkye and Percival Gunson. (9)
See source for details. (10)
This source documents a pele tower in Bolton in 1317. (11)
Additional information. (12) |