Bringing the ruins to life

Bringing the ruins to life

Above: The app will bring the ruins of Errwood Hall to life. You have to wonder what Samuel Grimshawe would have made of the recently announced plan to create an augmented reality app for his country house, Errwood Hall! Built in the early 1840s, the hall was...
Rare photo discovered

Rare photo discovered

Above: After attending the Grimshawe’s one-room school, Mary Heather went on to work as a servant at Errwood Hall. She told her daughter that the photo was taken inside the hall – perhaps before one of the Grimshawe’s many house parties. It may seem...
The Heathers

The Heathers

Above: The four Heather brothers in army uniform (from left): Fred (b.1891), Bert (b.1892), Joseph Harold (b.1893/4) and Arthur Percy (b.1895). Above: The five Heather sisters (clockwise from top left): Florence (Marie’s grandmother), Lily, Winifred, Genevieve...
Three lost homes

Three lost homes

Above: From left to right; The Hollows, Upper Lodge and Lower Lodge. I’ve finally managed to complete a job I’ve been meaning to do for a while – to add the details of three houses at the northern end of the valley to the ‘Houses &...
The Braddocks

The Braddocks

Above: 19-year-old Elizabeth Braddock died some eight years before her father and must have held a special place in the heart of the Grimshawe sisters to be buried on the family’s hill-top cemetery. One of the graves at the Grimshawe’s family cemetery,...
Rewilding the valley

Rewilding the valley

Above: The views opened up by last year’s tree-felling are already starting to vanish, as the newly planted firs shoot up. It’s now a year since the Forestry Commission started work on tackling the tree disease phytofra in the valley by felling great...
Fencing the valley

Fencing the valley

Above: a newly erected gate and stretch of fencing along the old Cromford & High Peak Railway track. They mystery over the fencing that started appearing over a year ago in various parts of the valley seems to have been solved. A recently erected noticeboard...
Footpath closures

Footpath closures

Above: The more larch the Forestry Commission fells, the better I like it! The inset map shows the path closures (see below). Page update, August 2021: The Forestry Commission have changed their plans and they won’t be working around Goytsclough until 2022....
Lost shelter or shrine?

Lost shelter or shrine?

Above: Perched on the hillside opposite Errwood Hall, could this once have been a shrine used by the staunchly catholic Grimshawes? I’ve often wondered whether there may once have been some kind of shelter or shrine along the narrow track that runs above the...
Pictures in colour

Pictures in colour

Above: The caption under the photo of Goyts Bridge mentions a ‘very pretty old mill’. I don’t think there was a mill in Goyt’s Bridge, so it must have been the one at Goytsbridge. This closed in 1890, so it must have been derelict at the time....