Loftus History
Sword Dancers
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Sword dancing in pictures
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Scrap Book by Noel Agar
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Duties of a Country Policeman
Derick Pearson Collection
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General Photographs of Loftus
Skinningrove
Mining
Liverton
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Liverton 1891 Census
More recent photographs of Loftus
Ralph Jackson's Diaries
For King & Country
Tracing Family History
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1891 census Individual houses & farms
Zetland Terrace
Zetland Road
Westfield Terrace
West Road
Cliff Crescent
High Row (West Lofthouse)
Hartington Street
St Hilda's Terrace
Duncan Place
High Street
Arlington Street
East Crescent
Spring Head
Cleveland Street
North Road
John Street
East Street
Gladstone Street
Seymour Hill Terrace
Park Terrace
North Terrace
Street Houses
Arthur Fields
Upton
Micklehow Road
Whitecliffe Mines Houses
Railway Terrace
Dundas Street
Church Row
Dam Street
South Loftus
Station Road
Liverton Road
St Hildas Place
Westry Terrace
Rowland Terrace
Tees Street
Whitby Road
Tyne Street
Sword Dancers from the area
Tweed Street
Jackson Street
Easington Road
Waupley
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Loftus History
 | Loftus (see link below for picture)
Lcotvsv, in the Doomsday book, from Laghthus meaning low houses.
Is a place of great antiquity and from the name of the adjacent hamlet Street Houses was evidently known to the Romans.
The fee of the extensive Baronial Liberty of Langbaurgh (Long Hill) Wapentake was sold by King John in 1207 to Peter de Bruce, Lord of Skelton for 400 marks.
Langbaurgh takes its name from a portion of the ridge of the great Whinstone Dyke forming the north eastern division of the North Riding, 40 miles long and 18 miles wide.
This is taken from a book written in 1859.
This also states that the Lofthouse and Boulby Alum works commenced in 1615, and in the cliffs were found antedeluvian remains such as the enormous Ichthyosaurus.
Loftus of 2006 has seen many changes.
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Loftus Town Hall
 | Loftus Town hall, picture taken about 1955
(see link below for some different photographs) |
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Bulmers Directory
Transcript of the entry for the Post Office, professions and trades for LOFTUS in Bulmer's Directory of 1890.
use link below to access the page
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Loftus 1840
Taken from a History and Gazetteer written by William White and published in 1840.
A small market town consisting of one long street of stone houses its parish contains 1,038 inhabitants and 3,700 acres of land including extensive Alum works.
The poor of Lofthouse have 12s a year out of Grange Farm,left by Ralph Robinson.
Post Office at the Golden Lion, letters arrive at half past 10 in the morning and are dispatched at a quarter to 2 in the afternoon.
Inhabitants
Dundas, Hon Robert Lawrence Bart resides at Lofthouse Hall.
Adamson, Thomas, Gentleman.
Adamson, George, gardener.
Barwick, William a clogger.
Bell, John, Esq Handall Abbey.
Brown, Capt retired.
Cook, Mrs Emma,
Corner, Robert, and Coward, Joseph, gents.
Dixon, William,tinner and brazier.
Fidler, George, stone mason.
Hull, Ann, straw hat maker.
Hunton, Wm, agent alum works.
Jowsey, Joseph, cooper
Langstaff, George, gentleman.
May, Wm, baliff at Handale Abbey.
Mclean, Alexander, land agent.
McMichael James, schoolmaster.
Overend, Thomas, slater.
Parkin, Hannah, gentlewoman.
Pearson, Jane, dress and straw hat maker.
Rowland, Thomas and Smith, John, gentlemen.
Toase, Thomas, painter and glazier.
Watson, George, schoolmaster.
Wild, Wm, Rectory.
Wilkinson, John, gentleman.
Yeoman, John, surgeon.
Walker, Wm, and Easby, Wm, druggists.
Inns and Taverns:
Angel Inn, John Atkinson.
Black Bull, John Wilson
Golden Lion, Henry Britton.
Wauply New Inn, Stephen Garbutt.
Bakers:
Wm Chapman, and John Hastewell.
Blacksmiths:
Wm Highmarch, and Isaac Robinson.
Boot and shoemakers:
Joseph and Robert Brown, R, Dawson, John Harbron, Joseph Hudson, John Rowntree.
Butchers:
Christopher, and William Mann, Thomas Walker.
Grocers, and Drapers:
Robert Adamson, My McNaughten, Daniel Patten, John Proud.
Thomas Rowland and Mathew Seymour, drapers only.
Sadler and clog makers:
Richard Barwick, and Richard Webster.
Tailors:
Henry Grainger, Micheal Hull, John Johnson, Thomas Linsley.
Wheelwrights:
John Dobson, John Wake, and John Walker.
Farmers:
Thomas Addison,
George Atkinson,
David Bell,
Fras Cornforth,
Bryan Crossley,
Nicholas Fawcett,
John Hicks,
Chpr, John and Thomas Hudson,
Thomas Rowland,
Anthony Severs,
Bowser Smith,
John Walker,
The Coach leaves for Guisbrough, Mon, Wed and Sat, at 11 in the morning, and
To Whitby, Tues, Wed and Sat at 2 in the afternoon.
Carriers James Duff, goes to Whitby Fridays and Stockton Tuesdays.
Mgt Johnson goes to Whitby Mon, Guisbrough Friday, and Staithes Thursday.
A market is held every Thursday, and fairs for cattle on June 24th and 25th, and on the Thursdays before May day and Martinmass.
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Loftus professions and trades 1890
Kindly contributed by 'Jaguar' (see message Board)
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The Neolithic Earthen Long Barrow at Street House, Loftus
 | The Street House Long Barrow at Loftus lies on the Cleveland coastline between Saltburn and Staithes. This area was the final resting place for many Bronze Age individuals. They erected numerous burial mounds, many of which still survive.
The excavation of a Bronze Age mound at Street House was prompted by the threat of plough damage and the need to record the monument before it was destroyed. At this point of the project the excavators did not realise that they would be dealing with a complex sequence of deposits that would include a unique Neolithic mortuary structure.
please use link below for updated information
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Know your Parish - LOFTUS
NOTE: Loftus Parish in the 19th century and up to World War II comprised the township of Loftus plus the hamlets of Waupley and Streethouses.
When you set about getting to know Loftus, the first thing to get straight is its name. The Parish registers date from 1697 but the name on their covers read LOFTHOUSE – the spelling as the names of two other Yorkshire villages – both in the west of the county. Loftus in Cleveland kept that early spelling unitl c1890 so that it is written as Lofthouse on all census returns currently available to researchers. So if an ancestor of yours is recorded as being born at Lofthouse, Yorkshire, it may NOT mean your having to seek out prish registers covering Lofthouse in Nidderdale, or Lofthouse near Leeds – what you want could wel be Lofthouse in Cleveland and therefore at Teesside Archives.
Loftus was a pre-conquest settlement, held by Siward, Earl of Northumberland. By the time Domesday Book was compiled, however, the land around it had suffered a great deal from King William I's efforts to subdue his rebellious northern subjects. Much of it was recorded as 'lying waste'. The Percy family held the land for several generations, and Guisborough Priory owned more than 700 acres of it in the late 13th century.
The Parish Church of St Leonard (rebuilt 1811 and again in 1901), is believed to have dated from the 13th century, although it was almost certainly built on the site on an earlier, Saxon Church, as a record of its clergy dates back to 1294.
Two miles to the south of Loftus lies the site of Handale Abbey – home of a religious community founded in 1133, though the ruins of it had all but disappeared at the beginning of the 19th century. From the dim and distant past of this area, a legend has survived (being more durable than bricks and mortar!). Most people will have heard of Wearside's 'Lambton Worm'. Loftus too, was plagued by a fearsome serpent which ate cattle (and fair maidens, of course) until one, Scaw, put an end to it with his trusty sword.
It's a pity that no local musician set the tale to music, as they did at Lambton, then perhaps the name of Loftus in Cleveland would be more widely known. (“Oxford Dictionary of Place Names” mentions Lofthouse in Nidderdale, Lofthouse near Leeds, but its compilers seem to have been unaware that we have a Lofthouse/Loftus in Cleveland).
Such reference books may overlook Loftus in our own times, but it was an important place in 18th and 19th century Cleveland. Unlike Skelton, Brotton and Marske, which were mainly agricultural communities until ironmaking started. Loftus had an 18th century industry – Alum mining. At the beginning of the 19th century, it ranked as a 'Market Town'. Alum miners mostly lived at Streethouses, coming into 'the township for the Thursday market.
Loftus has another distinction that dates back to 1801. Family historians are sometimes heard to lament the fact that England's earliest censuses – 1801, 1811, 1821 1831 include only numbers: no names. All we know about most East Cleveland parishes in 1801 is the number of households, and the number of men and women each contained. Loftus, however can boast something very like a complete census that was taken in 1801.
At that time, it was feared that French troops might attempt to invade the North East coast. Parish Constables in the danger area were required to supply certain information about farm stock, stores of bay and corn, numbers of inhabitants willing to help with defence arrangements, and number who would help if an area had to be evacuated.
Some parish Constables filled in the required returns with mere numbers; others listed names of those willing to help. But William Dobson, Parish Constable of Lofthouse, did the job with commendable thoroughness. He wrote down the name of every householder, men as well as women, giving occupations, number of people in each household and the capacity in which each able bodied male was prepared to serve, should the need arise.
For example, we know that one, Joseph Toas, had three people in his household who would need help if evacuation became necessary; that he earned his living as a labourer; and that he was prepared to undertake the driving of farm stock to a place of safety. William Dobson actually went one better than the census takers later in the century. He recorded Thomas Atkinson, Sailor, absent at sea, and Kenneth McClean, away in prision. No need for researchers to scour the returns for 'strays' in this mini-census.
(You'll find it all in Appendix 3 of “Escape the Monster's Clutches” compiled by M Y Ashcroft. There's a copy in Teesside Archives and the Society also holds a copy) (Library is now at Teesside Archives. Ed)
One name is missing from William Dobson's list. Zachery Moore had been Lord of the Manor at Loftus until a few years before this time, but he was such a reckless spender that he had to sell out to the Dundas family who owned most of Loftus in the 19th century. John Walker Ord in “History of Cleveland” (1846) pays tribute to Sir Robert Dundas who died in 1844 having done a great deal to improve farming standards in the area and improving the quality of life for his tenants. He also built Loftus Hall.
In the 1850's, Loftus seems to have declined somewhat in importance. Whellan's “Topography of the North Riding” (1859) ranks it as a 'village' because its market had ceased to b e held, except for the sale of meat. Oddly enough, it was 1857 that Loftus achieved another distinction – it was the first parish in what is now Langbaurgh Borough (Now Redcar & Cleveland – Ed) to open a cemetery. The first grave to be dug there received what the sea had left of a poor chap called William Raine who drowned when the 'Amelia' was wrecked off Staithes. He was washed ashore eight months later.
Then in 1865, Loftus iron mine was opened and the 'village' expanded like a balloon. It acquired a railway link with the rest of the area, and a Town Hall (1879) became the administrative centre for the new Urban District created in 1894. It even had a local newspaper of its own. “The Lofthouse Advertiser” commencing in 1876. Published by Joseph Cooke, who also ran a printer's business, it lasted into the 20th century.
Mining came to an end at Loftus in 1958 and Loftus U.D.C. Was aborted by Langbaurgh Borough Council in 1974. (Teesside in 1968, Cleveland them Redcar & Cleveland – Ed.) Loftus has gone back to its village status now but is is a village that has every right to be proud of its history.
Parish registers for Loftus 1697 – 1909 are all at Cleveland County Archives, but some later ones have not yet been deposited. There are also some 18th and 19th century 'terriers' and an apprentice record 1809 – 1827 which could yield useful names. There are also non-conformist records for the area – Loftus and Staithes Methodist Circuit 1853-1966.
Census returns for the parish can be studied both at the archives and Redcar Reference Library. The F.H.S./ 1851 index volume 7 gives all Loftus inhabitants in that year. In its local Collection, Redcar Library has several booklets that will extend your knowledge. “The History of the Church of St. Leonard” by J.R.V Carter (1975) is one; “A brief History of Loftus” by former Loftus Librarian Michael Oliver, published in 1984 is another. There are a couple of articles about Loftus Sword Dance team founded 1890, and if you fancy a look at copies of “The Loftus Advertiser” keeping the town ahead with the newsbetween1879-1916, you will find issues for those years on microfilm at Recar Library.
Lastly Loftus, like Marske, has a museum. Their old iron mine had been turned into “The Tom Leonard Mining Museum” open from April to October, Photographs, mining tools and equipment can be seen there. Altogether, there's plenty to help you get to know Lofthouse / Loftus.
by the Late Mary Williams (Originally included in Journal of April 1992)
This version taken from CFH Journal October 2005.
(Ed- Editor of CFH Society)
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Loftus
(this article had been removed at the request of the Genuki Webmaster) Feb 08
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