Old Furnace Bottom (General)

by Paul Andrews , Shropshire, England, Thursday, July 29, 2010, 20:19 (5331 days ago) @ lyndar

Many of the cottages and gardens in Blakeney walk in 1752 (fn. 69) were presumably at Blakeney Hill, at the south-east corner of the Forest, on a steep hillside above Blakeney village. (fn. 70) The hill, on which 34 cottages were recorded in 1782, (fn. 71) has been extensively quarried and the east side was known as Gibralter in the early 19th century. (fn. 72) Many of the early cottages were on the south- west side in the Blackpool brook valley, (fn. 73) the floor of which was known as Old Furnace bottom from early ironworks. (fn. 74) By 1834 there were c. 80 cottages, including one dated 1830, on the hill and in the valley, (fn. 75) and later there was much new building and rebuilding there, typical cottages being dated 1848 and 1850. On the south-west side of the hill, which became known as Blakeney Woodside, some houses and bungalows were built in the later 19th and the 20th centuries on the Blakeney-Coleford road, constructed along the valley in 1841. (fn. 76) A school was provided, at Blakeney Woodside, in 1851 (fn. 77) and a nonconformist chapel, in a prominent position at the top of the hill, in 1874. (fn. 78)

From: 'Forest of Dean: Settlement', A History of the County of Gloucester: Volume 5: Bledisloe Hundred, St. Briavels Hundred, The Forest of Dean (1996), pp. 300-325. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=23266 Date accessed: 29 July 2010.