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Apples, Arithmetic and the Aristocracy!
History of 8 Aberford Road


Barwicker No.124
Summer 2017


I love researching property history, finding out the details of what properties were used for, who lived there, when they were built and the stories of events they were part of. An opportunity to do this sort of research presented itself in December 2013 when I purchased number 8 Aberford Road, Barwick-in-Elmet, a detached house overlooking All Saints Church on the corner of Aberford Road and Chapel Lane. A quick glance at the house would suggest a 1970s property but peeling back the facade has revealed a much more fascinating story.

The house has three bedrooms, a kitchen, lounge, dining room, bathroom, etc. However, it has a quirky layout with different levels, there are nooks and crannies, walls show evidence of different types of construction, in parts of the downstairs they are 4 foot thick. In the loft a modern roof built onto breeze block walls appears straightforward but look slightly below and you find the breeze blocks are placed on top of stone walls. A huge stone chimney breast in the centre of the house has a cavity accessible from the loft which goes all the way to the ground floor. The 1970s house appears to be wrapped round a much, much, older house.

The house plot is also strange, an L shaped area raised on the side of a hill, part of the garden is enclosed with rough limestone built walls 9ft high with strange filled in openings.

Once the house purchase was completed I eagerly awaited the deeds from the Solicitor, hoping to unlock its secrets. I was much disappointed when I only received a copy of the electronic deeds from the Land Registry which were very brief. It appears all the original deeds have been thrown away probably many years ago. The only clue in the modern deeds is that mine and mineral rights were excluded from the purchase. From my extensive research around Barwick I know the Gascoigne family as the local estate owner included these clauses when they sold land, so I had a clue.

My usual approach to research is to carefully go back in time from the known to the unknown using linkage records (deeds, sale record, etc). I had little to go on.

The previous owners indicated they had purchased the house in 1995. I started to ask neighbours and search the Historical Society's resource room. The name Perkins appeared a couple of times, most interesting was a single sheet of paper the Society had on buildings near All Saints Church "Notes on Barwick - J. T. Kirk - December 1977 .... Mr D. Perkins - modernised cottage was original farm house to Low Farm in Parlington Court". Photographs came to light to show that the house had been modernised in the early 1970s, fitting in with the actual discoveries inside.

I searched the Council records of the Tadcaster Rural District Council (the Council for the area in the early 1970s) which are split between Leeds Archives and North Yorkshire Archives in Northallerton. There I discovered that in April 1971 Mr and Mrs D. Perkins had been granted planning permission for alterations and modernisations of 8 Aberford Road. Sadly, the detailed plans which would have accompanied the permission had been destroyed in the "weeding" of the records before they were deposited by the Council into the Archives.

I now had the scent of a trail, another name which had appeared in my initial investigation was Ingham and that was the key which unlocked the extensive Barwick property records and information started to pour in. In September 1970 William Henry Ingham of Rose Cottage, 8 Aberford Road, died, the local paper the Skyrack reported
"MR INGHAM. - The death has occurred at the age of 74, of Mr. William Henry Ingham, Aberford Road, Barwick, well known in the village." Mr Ingham, before his illness, was local representative of the "Skyrack Express," and an active member of the Labour Party, the United Nations Committee and the Maypole Committee."
His will left the house to his wife Annie, who died in 1974 and then to a relative Louisa Mary Perkins. The link between the two families had been found.

I now moved my research to Wakefield and the West Riding Registry of Deeds (a record of all freehold property sales in the district from 1704 to 1970). There I found that in March 1953 William Ingham of 8 Aberford Road had purchased two condemned houses adjoining 8 Aberford Road on Chapel Lane which were unoccupied and subject to a demolition order made by the Tadcaster Rural District Council.

I was now not researching one house but the history of two or three! The story will now continue in separate articles telling the history of the Aberford Road house and the Chapel Lane houses, and what a story I found they have to tell!
DAVID TEAL


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