Wigan Album

Postcard - Carriage Drive to Haigh Hall Wigan c1900 (No 18 - The Milton 'Elite-Glazette' Series No 72 Woolstone Bros, London EC - printed at their works in Germany)

As a small girl in the early 1950s I saw near the coach house at Haigh Hall a dilapidated scaled down replica of a hooded carriage, possibly for use with a very small pony, for the Earl of Balcarres' children. As youngsters we used to cross the "Bloody Mountains" fields from our house, accessible from our garden, and join the carriage drive a few hundred yards from the Wigan Lane gates. If on foot, we'd treat ourselves to a ride back on the little tractor pulled carriages, otherwise we'd cycle, dismounting if we saw anyone as I think cycling was banned. We enjoyed many an ice cream up at the Hall. The boathouse on the canal was always an attraction and we occasionally to rowed a boat. Aged fifteen I was walking in the plantations with my boyfriend and another couple when my friend's boyfriend disappeared behind a tree to relieve himself. As he emerged, his girlfriend went white and declared that a curious swirl of mist above his head was the ghost of Lady Mabel so we all fled! It was said that from Hall Lane gates at night, a lantern might be seen slowly progressing through the trees, that of Lady Mabel doing her penance ie walking to Mab's Cross for remarrying when she mistakenly thought her husband Sir William Bradshaigh killed in the Crusades. When we were old enough to drive we would park at the end of the lane with lights out and ghost watch!