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This page consists a list of people, places, events, buildings etc concerned with the history of Heysham to enable users to navigate around the website. All have one or more links to pages in this website or elsewhere on the internet.
Links to those pages of this website will also occur elsewhere in the form of cross references. Links to pages in this website are indicated in bold blue type.

Alternatively you may search the site:

People:

The Heysham Historians page records a few notable contributors to the chronicling of Heysham’s historu.
One obvious aim of the Heritaged Association is to promote the history of Heysham and equally obviously we are just continuing a theme pursued by many before us.

Thomas Dunham Whitaker a celebrated eminent historian of his day was Rector of Heysham from 1813-1819..D

J M W Turner the renowned English landscape painter visited Heysham in 1816 during the hectorship  of T D Whitaker to make sketches for his watercolour Heysdham and Cumberland Mountai

William Woodhouse;lived in Heysham and is a nationally known artist ; a biography about him has recently been published - Accolade to an Artist by Pam Corder-Birch. Two previously unknown paintings by him have recently surfaced in Canada  and latterly one on Yorkshire..

Like any village Heysham has some well known characters - read about two of them   Polly Blacow and Jake Edmondson..

Heysham is well known for ‘nettle beer’ and one of its original suppliers was  Granny Hutchinson.

Thomas John Knowlys lived in Heysham Tower for a short period in the 19th century and had a considerable influence in Heysham.

In the 20th century a very active group of local people  was the Heysham Amateur Operatic and Dramatic Society                                               .

Places

 St Peter’s Church, is more than 1000 years old and is most well known place in Heysham

The rock cut graves are Heysham’s oldest recognizable historic site adjacent to St Patrick’s Chapel

The Heritage Centre: this was a principle aim of  Heysham Heritage Association  when it was founded in 1990. It is housed in a listed building a 17th century longhouse (cottage and barn) owned and converted by the   Heritage Trust for the North West .
                   
Heysham Harbour (opened 1904) brought a remote agricultural and fishing community abruptly into the industrial age. .
For a shorty period the harbour had its own ‘Mission’ Church which was part of the Parsih of Heysham and eventually became known as St Andrew’s.

On the new railway line to Heysham Harbour a station at  Middleton Road had a very short life.

Klondyke and Dawson City were two temporary villages built to accommodate the huge   numbers of workers needed to build the railway and harbour and many had their  wives and fanilies with them..

Heysham Head from 1926-1964  was the site of Pleasure Gardens and very popular with visitors and residents

 Strawberry and Pleasure Gardens on Heysham Road was the first Pleasure Gardens in Heysham .

Heysham Road  between Cross Cop and Strawberry Gardens is an example of ribbon development between 1925 and 1935 .

Events

J M W Turner visited Heysham in August 1816 and made sketches which were the basis of his watercolour (1818) Heysham and Cumberland Mountains

The Heysham Tithe Map: dated 1838 following the Tithe Commutation Act of 1836 which replaced tithes in kind to payments of money.             
The wreck off  Heysham Harbour  is of the sailing ship  SV Vanadis in 1903 when a gust of over 100 mph was recorded during the construction of the harbour

Heysham Rectory became an Auxiliary Hospital In World War One 1914-1918:at which l ocal volunteers  played a notabke part.
 
Also in World War One in 1917 a huge explosion occurred at a munitions factory   on White Lund.

In World War Two an attempt was made to bomb the refinery at  Midddleton which produced fuel for Spitfires.  The refinery and Nuclear power stations wee also home to some unusual ‘fireless’ shunting engines. 

Morecambe Bay has its share of  storms at sea like the one which wrecked the SV Vanadis. In 1894 the worst tragedy in terms of losss of life occurred in 1894 with the loss of the yacht  Matchless on a holiday trip to Silverdale.                                       
                                                                                                                            

Buildings

St Peter’s Church and the rock cut graves by St Patrick’s Chapel have already been mentioned.

St Peter’s School is a C of E Primary school. It originally opened in 1769 as Heysham School

The Old Hall is a listed Elizabethan building completed in 1598  and occupied by tenants for nearly 200 years. and then by  a succession of owners. There were significaant additions in  about 1888. Since 1958 it has been a public house.

Greese Cottageis a listed building known as the Old Rectory; it was built during the second half of the 17th century when William Ward was rector.

The Royal Hotel  according to local tradition was built in 1502 as a grain store. No evidence has so far been found  to substantiate this tradition.

Heysham Tower was a distinctive neo-Gothic private residence  probably built in the 18th century; the Tower was added in the 19th century
When the railway and the harbour  came to Heysham  the Tower first was converted to a hotel for the Midland Railway
and finally became  a popular holiday camp..

During World War Two the holiday camp was requisitioned by the military chiefly as a Training Unit for Officers,   OCTU .                                                           
Carr Garth is a listed building in Heysham with an interesting history.                                                                                          

The Battery  is the most northerly place in the old Heysham parish .
The first Battery hotel was built about 1862/3

The Pot House (Bay Cottage) was a prominent building in the Coastal Fields to the north of Heysham village.

Heysham House, is a modest early 19th century (possiblky late 18th) building still in existence opposite the Post Office in Middleton Road.

Heysham Hall, the third building to be called that name, no longer exists. It was the largest,  possibly grandiose and built in1838-40.

Both the last two buildings were at one stage the homes of Members of Parliament.

Higher Heysham had some older buildings about which little is known and their sites have been used for later buildings such as The Tower.

Ancestry

We frequently hear from people tracing their ancestors in Heysham. The way in which two of our volunteers were able to help a visitor recently is recorded here.                                                                                                                                                                        
A remarkably detailed ancestry type website containing much about Heysham is http://shissem.com/Index.html