Manchester, Bolton & Bury Canal Web Site

Bury Castle

It is twenty-six years since, in a flurry of excitement, a group of amateur archaeologists uncovered some of the stonework of Bury Castle. There were ambitious plans to turn it into a tourist feature and promise of funding to support the scheme. But after a few more explanatory digs during the next four years the site was in filled and returned to function as a back street car park. Nevertheless hopes were kept alive as the site remained, year after year, unsurfaced and undeveloped, the valuable remains lying beneath awaiting a new dawn. Now that dawn has arisen and once more the stones are revealed.

There had for a long time been scepticism that there had been a castle there at all, yet there were several reasons to support the claim. The name of Bury is of Saxon origin and could mean a market town or a castle. The site was on a high, rocky promontory with a commanding view of the land to the north and west, ideal as a defensive position. John Leland, Henry VIII's Antiquary visited Bury about 1540 and wrote of 'a ruin of a castle by the Parish Church in the town' and in 1753 in a report for the Transactions of the Royal Society Thomas Percival drew a plan of the wall foundations then visible. It took the form of a rectangular enclosure some 600 feet by 270 feet lying East to West with a steep descent to the old course of the River Irwell to the North. In 1795 John Aitkin in his 'Description of the Country Thirty to Forty Miles around Manchester observed that there 'are no remains of ancient buildings here, but in the adjacent gardens have often been dug up parts of the foundation walls'.

Seventy years later in 1865 the new body of Improvement Commissioners authorised the laying of new drainage in the area and more foundations were revealed. Charles Hardwicke set about the task of recording the evidence in a Transaction to the Historical Society of Lancashire and Cheshire. He found a Keep or defensive tower some 82 feet by 63 feet with walls six feet thick. The keep stood within an enclosure 120 feet by 113 feet with walls two feet thick and buttressed every few feet. Clearly a substantial structure. Edward Baines in his History of Lancashire claims that this was one of the twelve ancient baronial castles of the County. Following the Norman Conquest Bury had become part of the Montbegon barony and the manor was held by Adam de Bury for 'one knight's fee'. Early in the 14th. century his descendant Alice de Bury married Sir Roger de Pilkington and their son Roger inherited the manors of both Bury and Pilkington. In 1469 Sir Thomas Pilkington was given Royal consent to 'build to make and to construct walls and turrets with stone, lime and sand around and below his manor house in Bury in the County of Lancaster, and to shut in the manor house with such manner of walls and turrets; also to embattle, crenellate and machiolate those towers......' The Pilkingtons generally supported the Yorkists. At the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485 Sir Thomas fought on the side of Richard III against the Earl of Richmond. But Richard was defeated and the Earl was crowned Henry VII. In consequence Pilkington had his lands confiscated and his manors of Bury and Pilkington were given to Thomas Stanley, who was created Earl of Derby. Maybe Stanley, already a wealthy man, had no use for another manor house or perhaps he feared that its fortifications might again fall into the hands of the Yorkists, but by the middle of the next century it was no more than a ruin. Local people plundered the site for masonry as the town grew around the nearby Market Place. The moat became the local tip and by the mid 17th. century the rubbish had become sufficiently compacted to allow buildings to be constructed. Even wells were sunk to provide for the growing community. It is said that when work began in 1867 on the construction of the castle barracks (now known as the Castle Armoury or Drill Hall) 'old red sandstone cobs' from the old Bury Castle were included in the fabric.

The barracks was used by the 8th. Lancashire Rifle Volunteers, but in the last years of the century the building provided a depot for Bury's steam trams. In 1904 these were replaced by electric trams and a new depot was built in Rochdale Road. Subsequently the Drill Hall was extended and refurbished and officially reopened by the Duke of Connaught in November of 1907. The new building, now almost twice the size of the 1867 structure, further obscured the site of the original castle and when Bury Archaeological Group began an exploratory dig in July of 1973 they were restricted to a plot of land facing the Drill Hall hidden away behind Bolton Street.

The dig, however, proved to be surprisingly fruitful. A section of the buttressed wall of the inner enclosure, discovered during the 1867 work, was again revealed together with a number of artefacts including wooden bowls, a stone cannon ball and various animal bones. Later the opportunity was taken to extend the dig to an area behind the 'Two Tubs' inn and here was found a fine corner buttress to the north-east of the inner enclosure. Beyond the north wall in an area not excavated in 1867 yet more artefacts were found including a carding pad used for combing fleeces. Several of these finds are now on display in the Bury Museum. Here was tangible evidence of the day to day life of the people of Bury over several centuries. Fragments of earthenware and pottery were found to predate the fortifications of the manor house and the earthworks in which the walls are set may suggest a defensive structure on this commanding outcrop existing well before the 14th. century. Now at least something of this important part of the town's history is to be realised. A substantial length of the enclosure wall has been revealed and some of the original stone found in the moat is to be used to restore the wall. From the base of the wall a grassy bank will follow the contour of the moat and in the pedestrian area at street level the pattern of the paving will indicate the line of the enclosure wall and part of the manor house concealed beneath. The area is to be known as 'Castle Square'. The site has been designated as a 'Scheduled Ancient Monument' and is under the protection of English Heritage. It will provide a point of interest for tourists and it is hoped that some of the catering businesses, whose premises back on to the Square, will reorient themselves to face the castle site and create a pleasant leisure area. The enduring benefit of the excavation is however a revelation of ancient stones which had notably extended the dimension of Bury's history. Text taken from The Rediscovery of Bury Castle by Terry Ashworth Bury Local History Society Journal Summer 1999.