An Historical and Regional Survey of the Village of Styal, Cheshire

Abstract

THE last half-century has seen a very marked change in the pattern of settlement of the Manchester district. The boom years in the cotton trade, at the end of the last century, were largely responsible for the great influx of population into the area?the workpeople massed together in the present slum properties of Manchester and the nearby towns, and the wealthier people living in the new residential centres to the north of Man? chester, such as Worsley, Eccles, and Prestwich. Gradually however at the beginning of this century suburbs began to grow in South Manchester, in places such as Withington and Didsbury. More recently, this suburban development has spread into the country districts of Cheshire, with the build? ing not only of larger houses but also of great housing estates. This has of course only been made possible by improved transport facilities, but, as road and rail services have been developed, the growth of places such as Cheadle, Gatley, Wilmslow, Prestbury, and Alderley Edge has been extraordinarily rapid and has changed them almost beyond recognition. The village of Styal, situated in this new dormitory region, remained an anomaly in the suburban development of North Cheshire until a few years ago. This however is in accordance with the whole history of the village, which in many other features has been unique, and it is only now beginning to conform to type. The village is peculiar in that, as a mere collection of isolated farms, it developed little individual identity until the end of the eighteenth century, when a cotton mill was built there and community life started, centred round the mill and its founders, the Greg family. The village then grew rapidly, almost to its present form, in the years following the building of the mill, and was an excellent example of a self-contained community run on an almost feudal basis. To-day however Styal is a village in transition, for it is losing its identity in the face of larger units on all sides: the approach of Manchester, with the building of an airport which lies partly in Styal, has brought a new orientation, while on practically all sides of social and admini? strative life Styal is becoming merged in a larger community, generally that of Wilmslow.