St Helens () is a large town and the administrative seat of the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens in Merseyside, England. The town was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1868, responsible for the administration of the four townships and manors of Eccleston, Parr, Sutton and Windle. In 1887 this role was expanded to a county borough, which was superseded in 1974 by the larger metropolitan borough.

St Helens is in the far south west of the historic county of Lancashire in North West England, six miles (10 km) north of the River Mersey. This portion of the county was partially settled by the Celtic Brigantes who were subsequently subjugated by the Romans in the 1st Century, with nearby Wigan probably the location of the Roman settlement of Coccium. No archaeological evidence has been uncovered to tie either group specifically to the St Helens area, though Eccleston derives its name from either the Latin Ecclesia or Welsh Eglwys suggesting a link to a church, (none are formally recorded in the township until the 19th century).

The first settlements are the manors, parishes and titled lands listed in the Domesday Book ten centuries later in the 12th century that encompass the modern townships as part of their fiefdoms, though it may be inferred from tithes that the land was populated before then.

The area developed during the 18th and 19th centuries into a significant centre for coal mining, and glassmaking. Before and during this time there was a cotton and linen industry, particularly sail making, that lasted until the mid-19th century as well as salt, lime and alkali pits, copper smelting, and brewing.

The town and greater area are notable for the construction of the St Helens sections of the Sankey Canal and also the first competition for steam locomotives at the Rainhill Trials.

The borough is home to 147 listed buildings, and 12 scheduled monuments. Some of the most prominent include Windle Chantry (dating to the early 15th century), St Mary's Lowe House (known as "The Poor Man's Cathedral" due to its construction from donated funds from the working class), the red brick Gamble Institute (home to the Central Library and other local authority offices constructed in 1896), the Beechams Clock Tower (built 1877) and The Quaker Friends Meeting House. Converted for use as a meeting place by George Shaw of Bickerstaffe, in 1678, a sign at the front of the building reads "so used" since 1678, partly leading local historians to believe the building had been used for another purpose for quite a number of years before then.

History

Formation of the Town

St Helens did not exist as a town in its own right until the middle of the 19th century. The town had a complex evolution spurred on by rapid population growth during the Industrial Revolution. Between 1629 and 1839 St Helens grew from a small group of dwellings, surrounding the chapel, to a village centred around a larger church within a township, before becoming the significant urban centre for the four primary feudal lay manors that make up the modern town.

The origin of the name "St Helens" stretches back to a "chapel of ease" dedicated to St Elyn, The Section dedicated to Windle. the earliest reference to which is in 1552. The first time the chapel is referred to is in 1558 when Thomas Parr of Parr bequeathed money towards maintaining the chapel and finding a man of the cloth to take residence.

Early maps show that the chapel was on Chapel Lane, around the site of the modern, pedestrianised Church Street. Historically this was within the berewick of Hardshaw, a holding in the township of Windle entailing the southern border of that area abutting onto the open farmland of Parr to the east, and sharing boundaries with Sutton and Eccleston to the south and west respectively.

Throughout the Middle Ages the area was predominantly arable land and was noted for large swathes of moss, heath and bog land while elsewhere it was covered by the greater Mersey Forest (the larger "Community Forest" was not established until much later).

Largely flat, the elevation increased further away from the Mersey, and several small tributaries flowed to the river. The lay of the land was conducive to moving goods to the south and west respectively, towards the larger population centres of ancient Warrington and Chester, plus the rapidly growing and more influential Liverpool.

The name St Helens was not set in stone until the 19th century, and it was variously named as St Hellins, St Helins, St Hellens, St Helyns, St Elyns or variations after it was officially incorporated in 1868.

Lords and Earls In 1139 the Peerage "Earl of Derby" was created. His lands encompassed a region from Liverpool to Manchester, and to the north beyond Lancaster and were primarily turned to meeting the pastoral needs of the people.

Norman descendant Robert De Ferrers was installed as the 1st Earl. The family held the title for 150 years before it was forfeited to Henry III's family whereupon Henry of Grosmont, 1st Duke of Lancaster and subsequently John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster became Earl before it merged with the Crown under his son, Henry IV.

In 1485 the title was re-established and granted to the Stanley family. The Stanley ancestral home was established in Knowsley, to the west of the modern St Helens borough, with the foundation of a hunting lodge in the 15th century and Knowsley Hall in the 18th century.

Townships and manors

The completion of the Domesday Book in 1086 reveals several manors existed although there are no specific references to "St Elyn", or the "vills" or villages. Windle was recorded as "Windhull" (or variations thereof) in 1201, Bold in 1212 (as Bolde) The Section dedicated to Bold. and Parr, or Parre in 1246, The Section dedicated to Parr. whilst Sutton The Section dedicated to Sutton. and Ecclestone The Section dedicated to Eccleston. composed part of the Widnes "fee", a hereditary entitlement of ownership under a Knight or Earl. Many of the original parishes, townships and local areas are named for the families that held the land between the 11th and 18th century.

The Hospitallers held lands in Hardshaw as early as 1292. Their land was known as Crossgate, located in the vicinity of the former Cross Street in the town centre now buried beneath the College campus.

The Ecclestone family owned the Eccleston lands. Their ancestral home dates to 1100, built by Hugh Ecclestone, and lived there until the 18th century when they moved to Southport

The manor of Parr remained in control of the Parr family and their descendants throughout the 13th to the early 15th centuries when William Parr, 1st Marquess of Northampton, brother of Henry VIII's wife Catherine Parr, sold the manor to the Byroms of Lowton. The Byroms supported the Royalists during the English Civil War and Henry Byrom, son of the Lord of the Manor, died at the Battle of Edgehill. The Section dedicated to the Byroms.

The extensive lands of Sutton Manor stretched across open and flat land leading towards the Mersey. In 1212 William de Daresbury was the title holder of the manors. The manor's name is of unknown origin, but the land within the enlarged estate belonged to several leading families including the Elton Heads, Ravenheads, and Sherdleys. The Sherdley family trace back to the Northales who had settled in the area since 1276 when they are referred to as plaintiffs in a boundary dispute with the Lords of Rainhill.

Windle contained the Hardshaw (or antiquated Hardsheigh), described as a berewick in the Domesday Book. The Windle Family were Lords of the manor from the Norman period onward, before ceding control to the Gerards of Bryn. The Chapel of St Elyn was in Chapel Lane, Hardshaw.

In 1956, construction work in the vicinity of Bridge Street / Church Street in the town centre unearthed remains of grain pounders and two ancient wells, dating back several centuries.

Chapel of St Elyn In 1552 the chapel was noted as "consisting only of a 'challis and a lytle bell". The chapel was at the crux of the four townships of Eccleston, Parr, Sutton and Windle, and lay on the intersecting roads that served as a major thoroughfare for traffic between Lancashire towns such as Liverpool, Ormskirk, Lathom and Cheshire towns south of the River Mersey such as Warrington and Chester. The chapel was sited between the port of Liverpool, and the landlocked Lancashire townships that would become important in the development of St Helens and Wigan.

The road links are attested to by the existence of Chester Lane, the modern B5419, that originally wound through the west of the town heading south to the Mersey crossing point of Warrington and beyond to the ancient Chester Road that is part of the A56 between Chester and the Manchester townships.

As a busy thoroughfare it is suggested by historian and genealogist, William Farrer, that a village existed in the vicinity for centuries, later sharing the name of the chapel. It is known from the diaries of a local Puritan by the name of Adam Martindale, that by the time the King's Head Inn was constructed in 1629 on "the great road" between Warrington and Ormskirk, there were a number of houses, farms and manors in the area. Martindale noted that by 1618 that the original chapel had been demolished and rebuilt. A school was later built after a donation by local resident John Lyon and in 1679 the Friends Meeting House was established by George Shaw of Bickerstaffe, it is a Grade II Listed building.

Religious ties The strong link to Roman Catholicism in the area was maintained by the Lords of Sutton Manor, the De Holland family, starting in 1321. Roger Holland was burnt at the stake for "heresy" for his professed belief in the Reformed churches in 1558, during the Marian persecutions of Queen Mary. Thomas Holland, a local Jesuit priest, was arrested and tried for high treason in October, 1642 as "taking orders by authority of the see of Rome and returning to England" which was the first step in the process of beatification by Pope Leo XIII in 1886. Ravenhead Hall was the site of a Catholic chapel during the Catholic Persecutions in the 17th and 18th century. The Lathom family and the Ecclestons maintained Rainford's close connections with Catholicism.

Windle has a connection to witches. In 1602 two women were sent to Lancaster Castle for trial, and a decade later, Isobel Roby was submitted to Sir Thomas Gerard, Lord of the Manor, accused of upsetting the ship upon which Princess Anne of Denmark was travelling. She was executed at Lancaster, along with the Pendle and Samlesbury witches, on 20 August 1612 as result of the religiously fuelled witch-hunts in the era.

The precedence of St Helens

In 1746 St Helens, composed of the area of the four townships (and their collieries) beyond Prescot, was referred to in a statement in Parliament related to the extension of the extension of the Liverpool to Prescot Turnpike.

The rapid growth of St Helens at the epicentre of the townships is attested to by several authors. The Penny Cyclopaedia states in 1839 that "Saint Helen's, Lancashire, is in the township of Windle, in the chapelry of St Helen's, Prescott parish. The township contains 3,540 acres, and had in 1831 a population of 5,825'. The town has risen into importance of late years"

In contrast by 1854, 20 years before the establishment of the Borough of St Helens, George Routledge stated a reversal of the roles, "St Helens, originally an inconsiderable village, is now a very thriving town" and later states that the town "... may be said to contain the four townships of Sutton, Parr, Windle and Eccleston".

The composition of the town described by Routledge largely mirrors those observations made by Samuel Lewis in 1848 and later still in 1874 by John Marius Wilson and John Bartholemew in 1887.