Yeardsley, with Whaley
YEARDSLEY, with Whaley, a township, in the parish of Taxall, union and hundred of Macclesfield, N. division of the county of Chester, 10 miles (S. E. by E.) from Stockport; containing 663 inhabitants. It is situated on the west bank of the river Goyt, on the road from Manchester to Buxton, and comprises 1266 acres, of a stony soil. The lands appear to have been the property of the Jodrells since the time of Henry VI.: Sir Francis Jodrell, of Henbury, is the present proprietor. Some very productive collieries are worked, and one of the seams of coal is crossed by a vein of lead-ore, a circumstance of very rare occurrence; there are also quarries of flag and building stone. In the village, which is of considerable antiquity, a small manufacture of tape is carried on; and a wire-mill in the township employs about fifty persons. The Peak Forest canal commences here. An act was passed in 1846, enabling the Manchester and Sheffield Railway Company to make a branch to Whaley bridge, 12ΒΌ miles in length; and in the same year, another act was obtained for a railway from Stockport, by Whaley, to Buxton, Bakewell, &c. There is a place of worship for Wesleyan Methodists.
Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.