Wigan Album

As the name of the street infers, the Brook was the boundary between Wigan Borough and Ince Urban District. Maps show its course as passing at an angle under Warrington Road and through the edge of the pub, which became Twiss' bakery. It passed through the row of houses on the canal bank. There's a 1974 picture on the Flickr site showing that the houses on the Ince side of the boundary had been demolished by then, leaving the Wigan ones still standing. It then went across the line of the canal, under the two railway embankments, and through the middle of the power station site. It re-crossed the canal on the Leigh Branch between the two Poolstock Locks, and then turned due south at the back of what is now Helmsman Way, where water once again appears, before it joins the waters of Scotman's Flash. I doubt, however, whether the watercourse survived all the disturbances of canal, railway and power station building, even though its line is still our Parish boundary, as well as the Parliamentary Constituency boundary. I would guess its waters were diverted in the canal building and are part of the flow which emerges from beneath the towpath opposite the Leigh Branch junction.