Ashford-in-the-Water Revisited - Part 1

 

Entering Ashford-in-the-Water on the A6020 road

Alighting from the hourly Transpeak bus service from Bakewell at the Ashford Mill stop, I immediately set off to try and find the first of 33 listed buildings and other structures for my British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge for Ashford-in-the Water. 

 

My Ashford-in-the-Water Photo Challenge

 

The Mill was the first on my list and, as is very often the case, I could only get a glimpse through the hedge on the side of the A6 road, from which I could see that this C19 flour mill is built with the traditional vernacular building materials - Carboniferous Limestone walling, Millstone Grit dressings and a stone slate roof, which surprisingly has been partially replaced with red pantiles. 

 

A view of The Mill

 

Looking at one of my photos, I can see two watercourses between the road and the mill, which old Ordnance Survey maps show to be part of a complex of goits, weirs and sluices and other diversions of the River Wye, which once fed marble works and textile mills that operated between Ashford-in-the Water and Bakewell.

 

The 1883 Ordnance Survey map of Ashford-in-the-Water

Current maps assign the name River Wye to two separate channels but, to the east of the A6020 road, Ashford Lake formed part of the landscaping of the grounds of Ashford Hall in the C19, with this continuing to a large mill pond that formed part of the extensive water management works undertaken by Sir Richard Arkwright when constructing Lumford Mill. 

 

Lees Bridge

 

Walking along the bank of the River Wye for a short distance, I got a good view of the C18 Lees Bridge with its large cutwaters, which is built in gritstone and was remodelled in the C19. Just beyond this is the C18 Old Mill House, which provides a further example of limestone walling and gritstone dressings, with part of its stone slate roof being replaced by Welsh slate. 

 

Old Mill House

 

Mill Bridge (1664) is also built in gritstone with cutwaters on both sides and carries a track that the Derbyshire Historic Environmental Record considers to be an ancient trackway that forms part of the conjectural route of the Derbyshire Portway. 

 

A cutwater on the west side of Mill Bridge

 

On the north wall of the bridge, there is an inscription M. Hyde with a 1664 date, which local tradition suggests is related to the death of Reverend Hyde, the vicar of Bakewell, who was thrown off his horse and drowned in the river. 

 

The inscription on Mill Bridge

 

Further along the track, I was very interested to see a very elaborately decorated gritstone gate post, which has a modern wooden gate that opens into a field that is next to the River Wye and is grazed by sheep. I can only think that this perhaps belongs to the estate of Ashford Hall, as I can’t imagine that anyone but a wealthy landowner would spend such money on a utilitarian structure. 

 

An ornately decorated gate post

 

Before reaching the end of the track, I got a view of the most recent bridge to have been built at Ashford-in-the-Water, this time in 1979 as part of the improvements to the A6020 road. It has no features of obvious interest, but the gritstone ashlar to its lower part is quite reddened in places, which is a feature of the Ashover Grit that is still quarried at Stanton Moor and Birchover. 

 

The modern bridge on the A6020 road