Clougha to Lancaster - distance 5.15 miles

LRO ref DDX 194/26

The surveyors went to the beacon at the top of Clougha Pike at 1,355 feet /413m, probably on horseback for most of the way and then measured the downhill distance to Lancaster. The way up is still easy to follow over moorland, streams and millstone grit outcrops. Accurate measuring over this terrain must have been difficult even with the wheel whose diameter was about 31.5 inches.

Starting at Clougha “Becon” they came off the top down a steady gradient in a semicircle to avoid the steep cliff. The way down was along side Rowton Brook as far as the valley bottoms. Near the top they wrote the names of Jepson and Townson at each side of the brook as they crossed it. This suggests that the brook bounded the land owned or occupied by these two men. At three-quarters of a mile was a wall separating the moor from the cultivated farmland. This wall is still in place and it is numbered 14 on the adjacent LCC route notice board.

At one mile was Townson’s house called Rooten Brook Farm with a door lintel dated 1675. The way crossed the brook again at Pike Foot and over a zigzag track they wrote “Desend to ye brook”; Trough Brook followed by “Asend”. At two miles “desend Gentlely” before the river Calder then “Asend” again on to the “flatt”. The “little fell” out crop is on the right but for some unaccountable reason he shows it half a mile to the left.

At four miles still on an open unfenced lane was George Hartley’s house 50 yards off the track. In a clear space on the field notes’ paper, Gregory King wrote obliquely “James ye 2d”. This could mean a new king was on the throne as Charles II died earlier in the year on 6 February 1684/1685.

Shortly after George Hartley’s house was a stone wall on the right side enclosing a large L-shaped three-chimney house, now Williamson Park. Further along was the Tibern [gallows. now known as Golgotha] with a diagram but no victim. There were two gallows in Lancaster not far from the prison but just outside the town boundary. Then came the Moorgate at 1,012 yards from the market cross. The first house on the left was 814 yards and that on the right was 700 yards from the town centre going down Moor Lane past Stone Well, St Nicholas Street and Market Street to the Cross.