Bygone Burnley: Padiham workhouse and Altham corn mill, with historian Roger Frost MBE

Local historian Roger Frost MBE reveals how the ruins of the former workhouse, hidden away among trees off Blackburn Road, started life in Elizabethan times in a different building as a poorhouse.

We then visited the site of a former corn mill, further along the road to Altham, with its distinctive rare circular chimney.

Roger explained: “Padiham once had its own workhouse, and not many people in the town know that. Like many, it was situated on the edge of town, in this instance on the road to Altham.

“It was constructed around 1729. However, it’s clear from the documents there was a building there before that, perhaps at the beginning of the 17th Century when the first Poorhouse Act was passed in the reign of Elizabeth I.

“It was a farm converted into a workhouse by the township of Padiham. At first, it was only a small workhouse, catering for everyone who was poor but by the 19th Century it became the workhouse for the Burnley Union and it specialised in caring and catering for children, whereas the Burnley one in Calderdale Road was for elderly people and for people of working age.

“The workhouse in Colne was for the eldest people, long into retirement.”

Our next stop took us a minute’s drive to the former Altham Corn Mill, which mainly ground oats, according to Roger.

“This was built by a Burnley firm named Eltoft and Company. The main grain was wheat but wheat in most years won’t grow in Burnley.”