29 October 2011

Stanedge

Like thousands of others visitors to Stanage Edge, I have often noticed a large windswept building about half a mile due east of the edge on a vast tract of open moorland - a good distance from any public footpaths. I referred to it earlier this week. It is Stanedge Lodge. The private moors around it make ideal grouse shooting country and it's clear that past occupants of the lodge were intent on enjoying that upper class "sport". There are several grouse "butts" and more than a hundred large flat stones were specially hollowed to allow rainwater to gather for the grouse. Apparently, the birds find the acidic water that gathers naturally in peaty hollows undrinkable.

Yorkshire has enjoyed some fantastic weather this October but Thursday was an unsettled day with cloud and rain so I toddled off to the local studies room of the city's Central Library - intent on finding out more about Stanedge Lodge. I was there for two hours but came away little wiser than before. It's almost as if the history of the place is concealed behind a veil of secrecy.

I studied an ordnance survey map of the area dated 1931. Then the large pine plantation due east of the lodge didn't exist so the property would have been even more exposed although the nearby small deciduous Broadshaw plantation was mapped.

In "Sheffield Topic" (August 1982) - a magazine that is no longer published - I discovered that the lodge had been up for sale for £50,000 and that it boasted seven bedrooms and seven acres of land but had no mains electricity. The article claimed that the lodge used to be called Lumley Hall and part of the building dated from the eighteenth century. There was also this remark - "the history of the property seems somewhat patchy".

"Westside" is a free magazine that is only distributed within Sheffield's wealthiest suburbs. In the December 1990 edition, there were a few black and white interior pictures of the lodge showing its new entrepreneurial owner a Mr Hardy in the snooker room. It seems he had been in the process of setting up an exclusive clay pigeon shooting facility called The Redmires Sporting Club and there were plans to turn the lodge into a country hotel. There were tantalising references to "visiting royalty" and antique graffiti and the reporter called the place an "18th century shooting lodge".

If the lodge was built in the eighteenth century, the building process would have been as monumentally difficult as erecting a small pyramid and just getting up to that isolated location on horseback, in carriages or on foot would have made for an extremely long and arduous journey.

So, as I say, I am not much wiser about Stanedge Lodge. I will keep my eyes and ears open to discover more and perhaps I'll make a more determined visit to the local studies library or pose a couple of questions in the online Sheffield History Forum. Funny how such questions can get under your skin and gnaw away at you like ticks. This was Stanedge Lodge on the horizon - viewed from a remote moorland reservoir yesterday afternoon:-

10 comments:

  1. Not knowing sort of STANds your teeth on EDGE. I know the feeling.
    But you are doing your due diligence.

    Please stop by me lit'l blog and help answer MY question.

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  2. With all that stark, open land around it, that would be an ideal place for solar power. All they had to do was wait a couple of centuries for technology to solve their problems.

    I'm amazed that there are isolated places like that in a country that's been civilized so much longer than mine. I love it.

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  3. An atmospheric photo, YP.

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  4. The more I'm finding out about the masonic middle and blue blood upper classes following the demise of Jimmy Saville, the more I feel places like this seal more than physical secrets.

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  5. RHYMES WITH...Your wish is my command.
    JAN B Civilized? No way Jose! We are like animals! Sheffield is a very lucky city - to have so much natural beauty and "wildness" right on its doorstep.
    JENNY Thanks again ma'am.
    BANGKOK FLOOD REFUGEE BOOTH - I am sure you are right - there are wheels within wheels. BTW (By the way) missing so much school because of the flooding is sure to disrupt your schemes of work. How will you cope? Say hello to the Hua Hin monkeys for me. There was one that looked rather like Jimmy Savile!

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  6. and possibly having to work for the 1st week of the Xmas hols to maintain the required amount of days for the school year!

    I have alszo fell off a motorbike again and fractured my collarbone...

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  7. What a remote place, very atmospheric. I know what Jan means about the wide open spaces you find in the UK. We imagined it to be more crowded when we first visited but found lots of vast reasonably empty spaces in the countryside, especially in Yorkshire.
    Cheers

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  10. On an 1850 Ordnance Survey map it is showing as Lumley Lodge. It was also purchased by William Wilson of Sheffield in 1896 I believe, William Wilson was famour for Snuff in Sheffield

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