The Beat Bank Branch Canal - the Canal that never was 
by Peter J Whitehead 

Childhood Memories of the Hamlet of Beat Bank 

It was in 1937, when I was nearly two-year's old, that my parents and I moved into our new home on Stockport Lane, Beat Bank, Denton, Lancashire.¹ The house was built on the brow of a hill known as Beat Bank² and this is how the hamlet came by its name. We were situated almost midway between the Fletcher's Arms Inn and Shaw Street. The Fletcher's Arms was an old hostelry formerly known as the Waggon and Horses Inn but its name was changed in deference to a mine master of Denton Colliery just a few hundred yards up the road.³ Shaw Street was obviously named after someone but I have been unable to determine who he was. However, it is likely that he was an important local person connected with coal mining. 
¹     Stockport Lane became Stockport Road when it ceased being an unmetalled track and strip housing       development started.
²     'Beat' is also spelt 'Beet' or 'Beight'.
³     A direct antecedent of Captain Mark Phillips, the first husband of Anne, the Princess Royal, hewed coal at Denton Colliery
I was far too young to remember anything about the move but by the outbreak of World War II, in September 1939, I was more aware of my surroundings and had made three little friends. It was with these friends that I first sallied forth to explore the virtually derelict hamlet of Beat Bank. 
The General Strike in 1926, followed by the Great Depression, sealed the fate of the local coal mining industry to leave just one local pit which was still economically viable. This was in nearby Bredbury on the Cheshire side of the river Tame.⁴ It was located in the angle formed by the junction of Lingard Lane with Ashton Road. Mine masters did not provide pit-head baths in those days and colliers were obliged to walk home just as they were when they reached the surface at the end of their shift. I used to look out for those weary men trudging home from Bredbury to Denton, a distance of more than two miles, after eight gruelling hours underground. They were completely covered from head to foot with coal dust. 
⁴    This was the Bredbury Colliery Co Ltd and in 1908 there were 285 underground workers and 30 surface     workers.
My grandfather had been a collier, as had many generations of my family before that, going back to the 18th century. On my grandfather's insistence, my father and his three brothers had finally broken the long tradition of coal mining and had gone into engineering instead but there was no escape from the remains of the coal mining industry in those days, for we were surrounded by disused pits. 
From the side window of our house we overlooked Shaw Street. This originally consisted of nine terraced cottages in the shape of a letter 'L' but one leg of five had already been demolished by 1937. Of the four which remained, all were inhabited by former mining families. The McAvoy family lived at No. 2, the Saunders at No. 4, the Brooks at No. 6 and the Johnsons at No. 8. 
Two of my friends lived at No. 8. Father, Joseph, a keen pigeon fancier, had two sons, Joseph and William (Billy). It was Billy who was my friend, as we were about the same age, while his brother was much older. The other friend who lived there was Alan Cross and he was the 'adopted' son of the family for reasons which I never discovered. The fourth boy in our 'gang of four' was Paul Greenhough and he lived nearly opposite to me on Stockport Lane and he belonged to a family of hatting masters. 
At the bottom end of the hamlet one other building was still inhabited. This was a small brick-built mansion standing in its own grounds with a commanding view of Reddish Vale and the moated Arden Hall on the far side of the river Tame. This may once have been the residence of a mine master for it was not unknown for masters to live close by their employees and this was all the more remarkable when one considers the dislike and distrust that colliers had for their employers. 
In my day it was occupied by three spinster sisters called Leather who were the daughters of the farmer who once owned Yew Tree Farm. To us, they were ancient beyond belief and we unkindly called them the 'Three Ugly Sisters'. Only the youngest sister was employed and she worked at either a dress shop or haberdashers somewhere on Little Underbank in Stockport. Being infirm on her legs, this doughty lady walked down Beat Bank to Hulme's Lane in the morning to catch the bus but on her way back she caught the bus to the Fletcher's Arms and then walked down Beat Bank to her home. 
To our delight and their dismay there was a small orchard in the grounds and we could not resist the temptation to help ourselves to a few apples as they ripened on the trees. Nevertheless, our delight was short lived because we were soon in pain with upset tummies; it served us right. 
Beyond the front garden, a narrow field stretched down the hill towards the river bank. At the top of the field the Home Guard had dug a small system of trenches to defend Beat Bridge which carries the main road over the river. All this, of course, was supposing that the Germans would have advanced from Stockport to Denton and not the other way round.
On Sunday mornings Home Guard Serjeant Arnold Thorley,⁵ who lived opposite to us, would put his men through their paces. Carrying a clothes-prop, with a yellow duster attached to it, he proudly marched his platoon down Beat Bank for exercises. 
⁵    A hat master
In spite of World War II being at its height, our parents often spoke about World War I, even though veterans would never talk about it, so we were aware of trench warfare. With this knowledge, we used these trenches to re-enact battles of World War I but fortunately we did not understand anything of the horrors perpetrated in trench warfare. 
At the bottom of Beat Bank, on Hulme's Lane, there was another terrace of four cottages. Three were uninhabited and derelict while the fourth, the end cottage closest to the lane, was still the home of a former collier at Hulme's Pit. He lived there alone in conditions of squalor and we were always cautious whenever we walked by. We did not dare to provoke him in any way but whenever he spotted us he would always dash out and give chase. Fortunately, we could all run a lot faster than he could. As he ran, he shook his fists and shouted obscenities at us. Goodness knows what he would have done, had he ever caught us. He did not single us out just because we were children as he was like that with everyone who passed by. Years passed before I could understand the reasons for his behaviour. He was much more than an unwanted and embittered old collier, who had never worked since the pit closed, for he was the last of his kind. In all probability, he had never travelled far from Beat Bank and, as far as he was concerned, all passers by were untrustworthy foreigners. 
As the war progressed, Beat Bank became a large adventure playground for us. A barn, once associated with pit ponies, still stood and was used by Ben Phillips of Yew Tree Farm to store potatoes. Adjacent to this, a row of three derelict terraced cottages still stood although they had been badly vandalized.⁶ In our imagination, these cottages became a set for all kinds of war games and World War II battles, sieges and commando raids were often played out there. The only problem was that no-one ever wanted to be a German.
⁶    It was said that vandalism did not occur in those days, but it did.
Other cottages had already been demolished but the footings and overgrown gardens remained. These gardens contained several crab-apple trees and on one occasion Paul ate some of these and was quickly doubled up in acute pain far worse than anything experienced from eating apples from the Leathers' orchard. 

Having explored Beat Bank, our curiosity to explore further afield became all the greater. We began to venture more frequently along Hulme's Lane to investigate the remains of Hulme's Pit but not before creeping quietly by the end cottage just in case we were spotted. Nothing much was left here, apart from the footings of two stone walls constructed of massive stones. These identified the site of the winding house and shaft. On one side of this was an empty reservoir and on the other we could just about see the remains of a row of terraced cottages by the river bank. Their overgrown gardens survived and it was curious to see lupins and garden shrubs still growing in thick woodland among the ferns. 
As our confidence increased, our next adventure was to cross over Stockport Lane to explore Reddish Vale. This is a relatively small valley through which the river Tame meanders on its way to Stockport where it joins the Goyt to become the Mersey. In those days, the river regularly overflowed its banks to flood into water meadows but with the coming of the M60 motorway, the river channel was straightened and the water meadows were lost. 
Before long, we came across a row of trees alongside a shallow trench. As we walked along this, I wondered what it was for. There were trenches on the other side of Stockport Lane, so had the Home Guard dug trenches here as well? It then struck me that this one was rather overgrown with long grass, nettles, brambles and the occasional hawthorn, so it was not new. At that time, I was interested in anything to do with castles and this just had to be the moat of some long lost castle. Especially so, when Arden Hall stood nearby on Castle Hill and that did have a moat. There was also a legend about a tunnel connecting Arden Hall and Hyde Hall on either side of the river. I was completely satisfied with my second explanation and there the matter rested for more than 30 years. 
The wooded slopes of Reddish Vale are hereabouts called Holt Wood and as we walked along the trench undulated and in some places it was practically non-existent. I now understand that the valley side is unstable and prone to slippage, which explained why the trench changed levels as we walked along. Eventually we left the wood and in front of us lay an imposing trench both level and wide. We walked along this until we reached the first signs of civilization. This was an unmetalled road which I later discovered was called Ross Lave Lane. Here the trench abruptly stopped with no trace of it to be seen in the low hillside on the opposite side of the lane. 
On our left, we got our first close view of the famous 'sixteen-arches' railway viaduct which carries the Stockport and Guide Bridge line over Reddish Vale. We were very much tempted to count the arches to check that there were, indeed, sixteen of them but we dared not because they had been cursed. In the 19th century, a witch had cursed them to the effect that anyone who counted them would die soon afterwards. 
It was 1942 when I first discovered those trenches in Reddish Vale and wondered what they were for but it was not until 1974 that I discovered their true purpose. I had actually stumbled upon the Beat Bank Branch Canal - the Canal that never was. 
A curious twist of fate concerns the mystery of Alan Cross and his 'adoption' by the Johnson family. We were growing up now and it was the summer of 1947. A few cars had made an appearance on the roads and for some reason Alan had to make an urgent visit to see his real family and Billy and I were invited to accompany him in a car which someone had managed to acquire. Having obtained my mother's permission, off I went with them on a really big adventure. 
I had no idea about where we were going but on arrival it was as though we had entered a time warp. We were in a village set on a steep slope in a valley but here the houses were all occupied and people were busily going about their business. There were factory buildings with smoke issuing from tall chimneys and even a railway viaduct and a railway siding leading down into the village. But what attracted my attention most was the appearance of the inhabitants for, to me, they were strangely dressed. Some of the menfolk resembled the colliers I was familiar with while others were wearing waistcoats with white mufflers about their necks but all of them were wearing clogs. However, the womenfolk were dressed in a manner which I had only occasionally seen before during visits to Manchester. I gazed in awe at the ankle-length sombre dresses they were wearing, with shawls on their heads and clogs on their feet. Years were to pass before I understood that the costumes I had seen, especially those of the womenfolk, were straight out of the Victorian and Edwardian eras. Before too long, Alan had completed his family business and we were on our way home again to Beat Bank. 
Occasionally, I would puzzle over the scenes that I had witnessed in that village and wonder exactly where it was. I had to wait until the 1970s before I got my answer. One day, accompanied by my son Anthony, I decided to explore Park Bridge near Bardsley, between Ashton-under-Lyne and Oldham. As we approached the village, I immediately recognised it. Those scenes from 1947 flashed before me but now the village was deserted and the buildings were silent and dilapidated. I glanced upwards and I could just make out the name 'Hannah Lees' painted in white on the gable end of one of the factories. My time warp had been real and it was at Park Bridge, just beyond the terminus of the Fairbottom Branch of the Ashton Canal. It was the former industrial community of Hannah Lees⁷ which lay before me but the furnaces, fired by coal from the many pits around it, were all cold now. And so it was that my friend Alan Cross had provided a link between my hamlet of Beat Bank and the village of Park Bridge. We will see later how the Fairbottom Branch, along with the Hollinwood Branch, determined the fate of the Beat Bank Branch. 
⁷    Park Bridge Iron Works was founded in 1783 by Samuel and Hannah Lees. Samuel was a member of the Lees family who were involved in the development of the coal and iron industries in the Ashton and Oldham areas.
Following Samuel's death, Hannah continued to successfully run the business on her own and in its day it must have been almost unique for a woman to do this. The business later passed to their sons and grandsons.
The Lees family initially acquired a water-powered corn mill on the river Medlock at Park Bridge and this became the nucleus of an iron works which supplied rollers for textile machinery. The factory remained open for about 180 years before finally closing in the early 1960s. In its day it employed up to 800 men and boys who lived in the industrial village built by the Lees.

The Beat Bank Branch Canal 
Construction and Abandonment 
The Act authorising the Ashton Canal received the Royal Assent on the 11th June 1792.⁸ This was 'An Act for the making of a navigable canal from Manchester to or near Ashton-under-Lyne and Oldham in the County Palatine of Lancashire'. The canal was to be constructed from the eastern end of Piccadilly in Manchester to Fairfield and from there to Dukinfield Bridge at Ashton. 
⁸    32 Geo III c.84.
This Act authorised one branch only which was planned to commence at Fairfield and be cut in a northerly direction until it reached the vicinity of the river Medlock near Waterhouses. From there it was to follow the southern bank of the river, upstream, and then cross the river to New Mill near Park Bridge. The Act also made provision for a short arm at Ashton to cross the river Tame into Dukinfield.⁹ 
9    The Peak Forest Canal starts at the Dukinfield (or southern) end of the Tame aqueduct. The remainder of the arm eventually became derelict but by 2000 it had been restored.
It is evident that concerns were soon being expressed within the Company about the adequacy of coal supplies for the canal to carry and thus generate sufficient income. On the 18th September 1792, the Manchester Mercury reported that a meeting of Proprietors was to be held to consider proposals and estimates for making branches from the Ashton Canal and the method of raising money to enable this to be done. On the 20th November 1792, the same paper announced that a General Meeting of the Company of Proprietors would take place on the 12th December 1792 to consider the draft of a proposed Bill intended to be applied for in the next session of Parliament. This draft contained details of proposed extensions to the Ashton Canal. 
The November press announcement stimulated new interest in the Company and on the day before the General Meeting a Notice was placed in the Manchester Mercury for the sale of shares¹⁰ in the Ashton- under-Lyne and Oldham Canal. Applications were to be sent to A B George's Coffee House, Temple Bar, London. 
¹⁰    Not to exceed 10 shares per application.

The Second Bill received Royal Assent on the 28th March 1793.¹¹ It authorised the cutting of a branch from Clayton to the Three Boars Heads Inn at Heaton Norris, Stockport, passing through Openshaw, Gorton and Reddish. It also authorised a lock-free branch from it, following the contour along the edge of the Tame Valley, to Beat Bank, Denton, on the Stockport - Ashton road, for access to collieries at Haughton Green.^12 
11    33 Geo III c.21.
¹²    The wording implies that the Beat Bank Branch would actually have terminated at the hamlet of Beat Bank but it is unclear as to whether or not it was ever the intention to extend it the short distance further to Haughton Green. The land rises by about 35ft between Beat Bank and the vicinity of the more important coal pits at Haughton Green. The construction of locks here was out of the question because there would have been no water supply for the very short summit pound and the construction of an increasingly deep cutting was probably not a feasible idea either. On balance, it seems likely that the intended branch would, indeed, have terminated at or near Beat Bank with a system of tramways, possibly gravity operated, connecting the various coal pits at Haughton Green to a purpose-built basin at the terminus of the branch. Coal from the several pits along the banks of the river Tame would, however, have required hauling up the valley side to Beat Bank

Simultaneously, plans for the northern branch from Fairfield were substantially modified. It was authorised that at Waterhouses the branch was to cross the river Medlock where, after rising through four locks, it was to divide with one arm going to Stake Leach at Hollinwood and another going near to Park Bridge following the northern bank of the Medlock upstream. The full extent of the canal between Fairfield and Hollinwood became known as the Hollinwood Branch and the arm between Waterhouses and its terminus near Park Bridge became known as the Fairbottom Branch. 
Subsequently, and fatefully as far as the Beat Bank Branch was concerned, the Werneth Colliery Company¹³ privately extended the Hollinwood Branch by about 1¬ miles. This company consisted of a group of collieries developed by John Evans, William Jones and John and Joseph Lees and, significantly, the Lees brothers were also shareholders in the Ashton Canal Company. 
¹³    The Werneth Colliery Company is not mentioned in the 1888 distance tables, the entry reads as follows:
Junction of Chamber Colliery Co.'s
    Private branch for
    Hollinwood Top Wharf (Company wharf)    8 miles 28 chains from
                                                                 Manchester, Rochdale Canal Junc.
It seems that by 1888 the Werneth Colliery Company had merged with others to form a larger group still.

Work started immediately on cutting the Stockport, Beat Bank and northern branches as authorised by the Second Bill. On the 24th September 1793, the Manchester Mercury reported that ' the Company is in want of an engineer to superintend the completion of the cutting of the Canal and several branches. The cutting of the canal from Clayton to Heaton Norris¹⁴ and from Taylor's Barn, Reddish to Beat Bank, Denton¹⁵ is to be let in several different lengths.' 
¹⁴    The Stockport Branch
¹⁵    The Beat Bank Branch

An inspection of both maps and physical remains of the Beat Bank Branch shows that it was, in fact, let to contractors in several different lengths. This was, and still is, standard practice in the civil engineering industry and it pays testimony to the accuracy of both the surveyors and their instruments in those early days. One can stand on Ross Lave Lane and look at the well-preserved length of an unfinished canal and then turn around to face in the opposite direction and look at the hillside on the other side of the lane. Here, no trace of the canal can be seen and yet the surveyors had absolute confidence that they had got their levels right for this isolated length. From the same vantage point one can also fully appreciate the magnitude of the work that would have been required of the navvies in digging through that hillside by hand. 
In common with most canal companies, the Ashton Canal Company soon became cash strapped and this gave cause for concern. A special meeting was held on the 10th June 1795 ' - to consider the propriety of Cutting so much of the Canal, as lies between Taylor's Barn, in the township of Reddish, and Beat Bank. (it being Doubtful whether it might be for the Interest of Proprietors to cut that part of the said Canal for the present).' On the 30th June 1795, the Manchester Mercury reported that this meeting was adjourned until the 10th July 1795. However, the outcome was that work on the Beat Bank Branch was discontinued. 
By early 1797 the main line and the Hollinwood and Fairbottom branches were complete and the Stockport Branch was nearing completion. Having ensured sufficient supplies of coal from the Hollinwood and Fairbottom branches, the Ashton Canal Company decided to formally terminate work on the Beat Bank Branch with its troublesome clay slopes on the side of the river Tame. They made representations to William Hulton, who owned pits at Denton and Haughton Green, that they simply could not afford to complete it. 
In 1798 the Company applied for a Bill to allow them to legally abandon the Beat Bank Branch, after paying compensation to landowners for damage done, and at the same time raise another £30,000 half of which was to be used to pay off debts. Unsurprisingly, Hulton opposed this Bill and the Company then offered to give him the unfinished branch. He refused this offer and simultaneously tried to get the abandonment clause defeated. He failed in this attempt and the Act¹⁶ was passed. 
¹⁶    38 Geo III c.32

An examination of the 1888 Distance Tables provides some reasons for the suspension of work on the Beat Bank Branch. It lists the following colliery companies who used the Hollinwood and Fairbottom branches to carry coal. 

By 1888 numerous coal pits, dating from both the 18th and early 19th centuries, would have either closed or merged but, nevertheless, the Tables illustrate that the Canal Company seems to have obtained sufficient supplies of coal from the Ashton and Oldham areas to generate revenue and also avoid the need to raise further capital at the construction stage back in the 1790s. Arguably, the economics of successfully operating the canal was the cause of the discontinuation of work on the Beat Bank Branch in 1795 and its abandonment in 1798 but the influence of the Lees brothers in this matter cannot be lightly dismissed.

Rationale for Abandonment 
It is intriguing to examine, in greater detail, the motivation behind the Ashton Canal Company in deciding to abandon the Beat Bank Branch. A little more than 200 years later this may seem a difficult task but, as military strategists will confirm, human psychology remains fixed. There was, and still is, a huge reserve of coal in the Denton and Haughton Green areas. It would seem that the Ashton Canal Company easily gave up the idea of carrying any of it on the proposed Beat Bank Branch at practically the same time that they received authorisation to do it and in so doing they lost an important source of revenue and some influence. Human avarice would suggest that if coal could be carried into the heart of industrial Manchester from both the north and south sides of the Ashton Canal, then it would have been done. One coal field could then have been played off against the other with impunity and lucrative deals could have been struck and tolls levied accordingly. 
The received facts are: 

At the construction stage, the Ashton Canal Company was cash strapped. 
The second Act of Parliament empowered the Company to exploit coal reserves both to the north and the south of the main line. 
The Lees brothers, to the north, were important coal masters as well as shareholders of the Canal Company. 
William Hulton, to the south, was an important coal master but it is understood that he was not a shareholder of the Canal Company. 
The Company offered to give the unfinished branch to William Hulton so that he could complete it himself. 
From a civil engineering aspect, the Beat Bank Branch was difficult to construct because the clay slopes of the Tame valley were prone to slippage. If this problem could not be properly addressed at the construction stage then there would almost certainly have been on-going maintenance problems with the constant possibility of breaches. 

In common with practically all canal companies, the Ashton Canal Company was cash strapped but it was the era of 'Canal Mania' and investors were flocking to put their money into canal companies. Somehow or other, they invariably managed to raise sufficient capital to complete their projects. The Company wished to exploit coal reserves both to the north and the south and their Second Act of Parliament confirms this. They curiously offered to give the branch to William Hulton in order that he could complete it himself. This was either a try-on or a sop. If he had called their bluff and actually completed it then could he have carried coal on it toll free? This leaves two imponderables. Was the Company genuinely anxious about future engineering problems and just how much influence did the Lees brothers actually have on Company policy? On balance, after considering the relevant facts, it seems that the Lees Brothers were a major influence in the abandonment of the Beat Bank Branch because its completion was not in their own interests..

The Canal Described 
Taylor's Barn in Reddish,¹⁷ at which point the Beat Bank Branch came off the Stockport Branch, was a mere 1 mile and 3 chains from the terminus of the latter. Looking at a map, without any prior knowledge of the lie of the land, one would reasonably expect this point to have been somewhere in North Reddish. However, in order to follow the contour along the river Tame, the point chosen was the only one possible. 
¹⁷    The location of Taylor's Barn is no longer identifiable but the later L&NY Ry (Stockport and Guide Bridge line passed immediately to the north of it.

From Taylor's Barn the branch was cut for a short distance in an easterly direction before turning northwards to pass by the eastern side of Reddish Hall and then on to Mill Lane, close to the Reddish - Denton border.¹⁸ The actual cutting ceased at this point. From there, its line changed to the north east where it ran alongside the narrow Denton Wood for a short distance. At which point the line then made an acute turn to the south east to pass through Denton Wood. A brook runs through this wood, so either a small aqueduct or a culverted embankment would have been required there. On leaving the wood, the line passed through a short tunnel before arriving in a cutting at Ross Lave Lane, Denton. At this point the actual cutting can be picked up again. Before the construction of the M60 motorway, this could still be followed along the contour to the southern end of Horse Close Wood. All construction work on the Beat Bank Branch terminated by Horse Close Wood which lies just short of the hamlet of Beat Bank.
¹⁸    Much of this land has not been built on and is now occupied by the Reddish Vale Golf Course. It is understood that traces of canal can still be seen here and at one point there is said to be a cutting which looks as though it could have been an approach cutting for a tunnel.

Although the distance between Horse Close Wood and Beat Bank is only about 25 chains,¹⁹ it was fraught with engineering problems. A stream flows through the wood which had to be crossed. This crossing also lay in close proximity to a hairpin bend in the river Tame which is particularly prone to erosion and bank collapse at this point.²⁰ After crossing the stream, the line would then have had to follow a particularly winding course with steep sides in order to follow the contour before arriving at yet another stream. At this point Stockport Lane traverses Beat Bank and the stream is culverted below it. Immediately beyond this, the branch would have entered the hamlet to arrive at its terminus. Even now, it is easy to understand why all work ceased at Horse Close Wood. This begs a serious question, was it the intention to terminate the branch at Horse Close Wood and then make the final connection by tramway? This was standard practice in canal construction, the Fairbottom Branch being a typical example which was under the jurisdiction of the Ashton Canal Company. 
At Taylor's Barn a short length²¹ of the Beat Bank Branch was fully completed and put into water. Ordnance Survey maps of 1848 and 1894 show no buildings associated with this truncated branch and the Distance Tables of 1888 provide no clues as to its use either.²² Moreover, as no streams flowed into it, it was not retained to act as a feeder. Consequently, its purpose or usefulness remains a mystery. 
¹⁹    550 yards.
²⁰    Even so, 200 years later, in spite of frequent bank collapses, the river is still some distance away from the proposed point of crossing.
²¹    About 12 chains.
²²    The Distance Tables simply reads:
        Junction of Reddish or Beat Bank
                Private Branch        6 miles 9 chains from
                                             Manchester, Rochdale Canal Junc.

Vestiges of trenches can still be seen at various places but, with time, these are disappearing for a variety of reasons. Large-scale maps show a short cutting immediately to the east of Denton Wood. This is the approach cutting to the tunnel which would have emerged near Ross Lave Lane. The very first trench I encountered as a child, close to Horse Close Wood, was more or less destroyed when a main sewage pipe was laid soon after World War II and the line of the branch can now only be identified by a row of trees and a slight depression in the ground. When the M60 motorway was built, huge embankments were necessary to provide approaches for the bridge across the river Tame and this resulted in more loss of the remains. Even when the branch was being cut, the Ashton Canal Company was well aware that the clay slopes of the river valley were prone to slippage. This process has continued and generated more loss. When I made my first informed exploration of the branch in the 1970s, I initially wondered why parts of it were at different levels to each other. I then realised that some of it must have slipped over the years. 

The Beat Bank Branch from Ross Lave Lane, Denton,
seen here in August 1981

In the 1970s, the owner of some of the land, Harold Phillips²³ of Hyde Hall Farm, Denton, confirmed that he was aware of some 'undulations' across his land but had always assumed that they were natural features of the landscape. He was unaware that their existence had been caused by the cutting of the Beat Bank Branch Canal. 
²³    Harold was the brother of Ben Phillips who owned Yew Tree Farm.

The Beat Bank Branch looking towards Horse Close Wood,
Denton, seen here in August 1981.

The Coal Pits of Denton and Haughton 
Green Early maps show a profusion of small coal pits in the Denton and Haughton Green areas with several of these being strung out alongside the river Tame. The access path²⁴ to these pits is still extant and nowadays it is extensively used by walkers. 
These pits were probably fairly shallow and from the bottom of the shafts many galleries would be driven into the coal seam at right angles to each other so that pillars of coal were left behind to support the roof. At some point it would be decided that the work could advance no further and the colliers would then withdraw back to the shaft and as they did so they would remove the numerous pillars of coal and in so doing cause the roof to collapse behind them.²⁵ The second stage of removing coal from a pit of this type was highly dangerous. Having completed this work, it was then a case of sinking another shaft somewhere else. Obviously, those pits close by the river bank would have had the added danger of flooding and readers are left to speculate as to how the colliers coped with water in the absence of pumps. 
²⁴    Hulme's Lane
²⁵    This method of working was commonly known as pillar-and-stall working and sometimes as bord-and-pillar working.

Eventually, some of the underground galleries would connect with those of other pits and this is how the larger pits may have emerged while others were abandoned as not being viable. There was also a need to sink deeper shafts and this required capital, especially for the acquisition of winding gear and pumps in order to continuously drain water away. In due time, the following larger pits, all relatively close to Beat Bank, emerged from the numerous smaller ones: 
Hard Mine Pit. There was a tramway connection between this pit and Ellis and Top Pits. Horse Holes Pit. 
Ellis Pit. 
Top Pit. 
Hulme's Pit.

Hard Mine Pit and Horse Holes Pit closed and were replaced by a more modern pit called Great Wood Pit. 
Ellis Pit lay on the north side of Stockport Lane and Top Pit was on the opposite side. These two merged to become Denton Colliery²⁶ and there was a tramway connection between Great Wood Pit and Denton Colliery. 
²⁶    This was the Denton colliery Co Ltd and in 1908 there were 315 underground workers and 108 surface workers.
Hulme's Pit seems to have retained some kind of independence until it closed. 
Beat Bank was simply a coal mining community for the surrounding pits but, as we have seen, there was a barn there which was used in connection with pit ponies. Shaw Street lay at its northern end and its construction dates from between 1848 and 1894. Prior to this, there was no street but there were two rows of terraced cottage parallel to Stockport Lane which were demolished to make way for the new street. Its principal catchment was Hulme's Pit and possibly Great Wood Pit, the latter being further away. It is not known whether colliers from Great Wood Pit ever lived at Beat Bank but a factor against this possibility is that colliers from different pits had a great distrust of each other. Nor is it known who owned the various buildings in Beat Bank but it is likely that it was the mine master of Hulme's Pit, especially when one considers the presence of the mansion house overlooking Reddish Vale. 
Beat Bank lies in the Parish of the Church of St Mary, Haughton Green, but the hamlet had no church or chapel of its own. There was no inn either, the closest being the Fletcher's Arms but there was the Arden Arms on the Cheshire side of Beat Bridge. There appeared to be no shop either so whether or not one of the houses, or even the barn, provided this facility is not known. Even though Beat Bank lies on the Stockport - Ashton road, it must have been a very isolated community until the 1930s. 
Denton Colliery provided its own cottages and there were more of them at the nearby hamlet of Burton Nook²⁷ on Stockport Lane nearly opposite the Fletcher's Arms. 
²⁷    Burton Nook did have a pit shaft of its own for a while which was sunk in 1841.
Today, little remains of the former coal mines or of the mining community which served them but with care some can still be found. The stone-retaining wall around Denton Colliery survives and this is located behind a showroom for second-hand cars. Adjacent to the showroom, the colliery offices remain and they have long been used as a private residence and display area for a monumental stone mason. By an Act of Parliament of 1911, it became compulsory to have mine-rescue stations. The one built for Denton Colliery, complete with mortuary, is still extant and is now used as two private residences. One collier's cottage associated with Denton Colliery still survives, although much altered. The Fletcher's Arms is still there but the original Waggon and Horses Inn was demolished and rebuilt before I was born. Traces of Hulme's Pit remain and have been excavated and here and there fence posts made from iron rail can still be seen alongside the river. Some dry stone walls which once formed boundaries at Beat Bank remain and have been incorporated into garden walls. The walls flanking the former road into Beat Bank at the southern end are particularly well preserved. In Hulme's Wood, a paved drainage channel associated with Great Wood Pit survives. Finally, the discerning eye can still pick out the landscaped remains of slag heaps but most have been completely removed.