British Listed Buildings

Listing Text

SOWERBY BRIDGE SOWERBY BRIDGE CANAL BASIN
SE 0623-0723
13/215 The Salt Warehouse (formerly
17.10.75 listed as Central Warehouse
(No 3), Bolton Brow)
GV II
Canal warehouse. Probably 1796. For the Calder and Hebble Navigation Company.
Coursed squared stone with ashlar dressings, unroofed and being rebuilt at time
of resurvey (October 1985). 3 storeys, 2 upstanding at time of resurvey. 6 bays.
West front: 3 left bays: each bay has a 2-storey elliptical archway with rounded
corners. The 2 left arches giving access to wet docks, the 3rd a through way.
3 right bays: wide central loading door to each floor flanked by 3-light windows
(ground-floor left window now of 2 lights). Former list description records 3-light
windows over archways and hipped slate roof as front. Interior: on ground floor
of right hand bays large scantling chamfered timber posts support cross-beams.
The through-archway has stone cross walls with a doorway to each side, that on right
with panelled double door. The left hand bay still has wet dock; the other former
wet dock is now flagged and in the floor of this bay is a large stone with socket
for a wooden crane which survives leaning against a toilet block to rear. Occupied
by Richard Milnes, the first large scale Trans-Penning carrier, until his last
failure in 1799 when it was let to the Rochdale canal Company (Sowerby Bridge, p23).
The 1793 Rochdale Canal Act instructed the Calder and Hebble Navigation Company
to build at Sowerby Bridge whatever wharves and warehouses the Rochdale Company
wanted, the latter to pay for the space they used (Hadfield, p 60). A contract
in 1796 to build a new warehouse is attributed to this building (Sowerby Bridge,
p23).
C Hadfield, Canals of Yorkshire and North-East England (1972).
Sowerby Bridge, Chamber of Trade and Commerce Official Guide RCHM(E) report.


Listing NGR: SE0648823687

Source: English Heritage

Listed building text is © Crown Copyright. Reproduced under licence: PSI Click-use licence number C2008002006.