Ness

NESS, a township, in the parish of Neston, union, and Higher division of the hundred, of Wirrall, S. division of the county of Chester, 1¼ mile (S. S. E.) from the town of Great Neston; containing 485 inhabitants. This place is mentioned in Domesday survey as being part of the possessions of Walter de Vernon; in the time of Richard II., it was held by the Duttons under the king as Earl of Chester, in capite, by military service. On the marriage of the heiress of that family, 7th James I., to the heir of Thomas, Lord Gerard, Ness became the property of the Gerards, of Gerard's Bromley; and in 1668 it was purchased from them by the Masseys. By the will of the late Sir Thomas S. Massey Stanley, the manor was bequeathed to his second son, Rowland Errington, Esq. Here are very extensive collieries, situated on the margin of the Dee, under which the veins of coal run for a considerable distance towards the opposite coast of Flintshire: they have yielded an immense supply since they were first opened. The greater part of the township, which altogether comprises 852 acres of a sandy clay soil, is of very inferior quality, and much of it absolutely worthless. The village consists of hovels inhabited by the colliers. Denhall House stands on the bank of the river, and, with the grounds attached to it, forms a pleasing exception to the bleak and dreary prospect; it is the seat of Charles Stanley, Esq. (uncle of Sir William Stanley), who, and Mr. Errington, the Earl of Shrewsbury, and others, are proprietors of the collieries and the township.