Towns changing names

[JohnnyMo]

Middlesbrough drop the o sometime,

Don't know about that - the "-brough" spelling is quite common in northern England, e.g. Conisbrough, Kexbrough and Sprotbrough in South Yorkshire.

The original deeds for the town had the extra o, and the extra o was used for a few years afterwards. There is not a distinct reason why the o was dropped it just seemed to occur in the 1840's (IIRC)

[Piatkow]

I had always assumed that Blaenavon had always had the Anglicised spelling as it was originally a company town and that is the spelling in the name of the ironworks. However I bought a repro OS map from the 1830s earlier this year and found that it used the Welsh version Blaen Afon. Curiously the modern Welsh version of the name is a simple transliteration of the English as one work rather than a reversion to the original two word name.

Of course it is quite possible that the "original" spelling was simply a guess by a surveyor with a basic knowledge of Welsh orthography.

[Chris Bertram]

I had always assumed that Blaenavon had always had the Anglicised spelling as it was originally a company town and that is the spelling in the name of the ironworks. However I bought a repro OS map from the 1830s earlier this year and found that it used the Welsh version Blaen Afon. Curiously the modern Welsh version of the name is a simple transliteration of the English as one work rather than a reversion to the original two word name.

Of course it is quite possible that the "original" spelling was simply a guess by a surveyor with a basic knowledge of Welsh orthography.

Where placenames are concerned, Welsh seems quite relaxed about whether one, two or even three words are separate, hyphenated or run together. In one place you'll find Tal-y-bont, but up the coast there will be Talybont. Our friend Viator lives in Llan-giwg, or is it Llangiwg, or even Llan Giwg? Mind you, this even happens to non-Welsh placenames. The village of Crosskeys is named after the Cross Keys hotel at the former major road junction. But the rugby club still insists on being Cross Keys RFC and no-one seems worried by that.

On the subject of original anglicised company names, the Ffestiniog Railway is registered at Companies House under the name Festiniog (single F), and it's probably more trouble than it's worth to change this now.

[Piatkow]

On the subject of original anglicised company names, the Ffestiniog Railway is registered at Companies House under the name Festiniog (single F), and it's probably more trouble than it's worth to change this now.

You can always rely on a smug little post in a railway forum when sombody thinks that the railway company has the same spelling as the town.

[trickstat]

Middlesbrough drop the o sometime,

Don't know about that - the "-brough" spelling is quite common in northern England, e.g. Conisbrough, Kexbrough and Sprotbrough in South Yorkshire.

The original deeds for the town had the extra o, and the extra o was used for a few years afterwards. There is not a distinct reason why the o was dropped it just seemed to occur in the 1840's (IIRC)

You must be older than you look!

There is actually a Middlesborough Close in Stevenage. I've checked on the Royal Mail website and it is spelled that way on there. It is part of a development built about 30 years ago and I think the signs at the end have changed from Middlesborough to Middlesbrough and back to Middlesborough again.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.92757 ... 312!8i6656

[JohnnyMo]

You must be older than you look!

Thank You a thousand years of drinking virgins blood every full moon must be working

There is actually a Middlesborough Close in Stevenage. I've checked on the Royal Mail website and it is spelled that way on there. It is part of a development built about 30 years ago and I think the signs at the end have changed from Middlesborough to Middlesbrough and back to Middlesborough again.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.92757 ... 312!8i6656

I did notice that when I was looking for a new house 30 years ago ( I was living in Stevenage at the time )
Ruled out Middlesborough Close as the road was mis-spelt & the houses were to small.

[owen b]

Middlesbrough drop the o sometime,

Don't know about that - the "-brough" spelling is quite common in northern England, e.g. Conisbrough, Kexbrough and Sprotbrough in South Yorkshire.

Or indeed Brough, of which there are several in Scotland and a few in northern England and the East Midlands, but none in the south.

[Helvellyn]

The village of Buxworth was once Bugsworth (and the canal basin is still Bugsworth Basin, and the whole place gets colloquially referred to as Buggy). Sometime around the turn of the last century the locals thought Bugsworth sounded too crude and got the name changed. There was a vote a few years ago on whether to change it back, which failed.

[Rob590]

The Sabre Maps (eg Bartholomew 1920, MoT 1922) show that what's now known as Kirkby-in-Furness was still more commonly understood as the seperate hamlets of Soutergate, Wall End, Beck Side and Sand Side, next to 'Kirkby Station'. By the 1966 OS Quarter Inch the station is now 'Kirkby-in-Furness station' and the different hamlet names are shown around it. On the modern OS Map, Kirkby-in-Furness is shown as the settlement name, with the hamlet names still present as different parts of the village. Soutergate, as the largest hamlet, is still somewhat distinct, but the others have now merged into 1 village.

Elsewhere in Cumbria, Ulverston lost it's 'e' during the Nineteenth Century: the Ulverstone and Lancaster Railway opened in 1851, and the town lent its name to Ulverstone, Tasmania in the 1840s. All of the maps on Sabre Maps from the C20th show it as 'Ulverston'.

[Fenlander]

The Sabre Maps (eg Bartholomew 1920, MoT 1922) show that what's now known as Kirkby-in-Furness was still more commonly understood as the seperate hamlets of Soutergate, Wall End, Beck Side and Sand Side, next to 'Kirkby Station'. By the 1966 OS Quarter Inch the station is now 'Kirkby-in-Furness station' and the different hamlet names are shown around it. On the modern OS Map, Kirkby-in-Furness is shown as the settlement name, with the hamlet names still present as different parts of the village. Soutergate, as the largest hamlet, is still somewhat distinct, but the others have now merged into 1 village.

I suppose the restrictions placed by modern (and some less modern) database systems have stripped out some levels of detail when it comes to referring to places, once you start skipping a level it falls out of general use.

I'm currently sat at my desk in-
Company name
Unit number
Building name
Street name
Part of village/name of former distinct village
The village name
Postal town
County
Postcode


Depending on who I was talking to or where I was using the address I'd miss out several chunks of all that, especially so if I was ordering something online or over the phone and wanted it to stand a reasonable chance of arriving. It's only really a local that could navigate to 'part of village', whereas anyone with a map could find 'village' & 'streetname' quite easily. Give them a satnav (like 99% of the people who come here) and they want 'Postcode' & house number, which we don't have. The village name itself here used to be 2 words but they've been turned into 1. I suppose it's only once you start writing things down in some official document that spelling really started to become important.

[jgharston]

Something that kept tripping me up doing family history research was Lofthouse/Loftus.

[jgharston]

Give them a satnav (like 99% of the people who come here) and they want 'Postcode' & house number, which we don't have.

Unfortunately, most of the sites I work on I get given the post code of the post room or the nearest Royal Mail sorting office. Eg, Smith & Nephew in Hull is not at HU3 2BN, even though that is their publically declared postcode.

[RichardA626]

Give them a satnav (like 99% of the people who come here) and they want 'Postcode' & house number, which we don't have.

Unfortunately, most of the sites I work on I get given the post code of the post room or the nearest Royal Mail sorting office. Eg, Smith & Nephew in Hull is not at HU3 2BN, even though that is their publically declared postcode.

I've found a few commercial addresses that aren't geographic, not useful when I'm trying to find them.

[Vierwielen]

Ever thought of the problems that Cambridge Town gave the Post Office, especially when it was miles from Cambridge. The problem was solved in 1877 by renaming the town Camberley.

[Vierwielen]

A number of years ago I had a contract with the Newcastle and Gateshead Water Company. One of the sites that was of interest was known on all their documentation as "Riever Hill". I checked the Ordnance Survey map to see exactly where it was and found that the OS people spelt it "River Hill". Of course, "Riever Hill" might have been the Geordie spelling!

[Chris Bertram]

Ever thought of the problems that Cambridge Town gave the Post Office, especially when it was miles from Cambridge. The problem was solved in 1877 by renaming the town Camberley.

There is still another Cambridge in existence, on the A38 in Gloucestershire, a few miles south of Gloucester. And yes, it is on a River Cam.

[Isleworth1961]

Ever thought of the problems that Cambridge Town gave the Post Office, especially when it was miles from Cambridge. The problem was solved in 1877 by renaming the town Camberley.

There is still another Cambridge in existence, on the A38 in Gloucestershire, a few miles south of Gloucester. And yes, it is on a River Cam.

Although the Gloucestershire Cambridge is pronounced locally as 'Cam-bridge', not 'Came-bridge'. Cam itself is just up the road towards Dursley.

[Nwallace]

Give them a satnav (like 99% of the people who come here) and they want 'Postcode' & house number, which we don't have.

Unfortunately, most of the sites I work on I get given the post code of the post room or the nearest Royal Mail sorting office. Eg, Smith & Nephew in Hull is not at HU3 2BN, even though that is their publically declared postcode.

Same for Hospitals, If you put DD1 9SY into your sat nav you won't get Ninewells.

[KeithW]

Middlesbrough drop the o sometime,

Don't know about that - the "-brough" spelling is quite common in northern England, e.g. Conisbrough, Kexbrough and Sprotbrough in South Yorkshire.

The original deeds for the town had the extra o, and the extra o was used for a few years afterwards. There is not a distinct reason why the o was dropped it just seemed to occur in the 1840's (IIRC)

The settlement was called many things the earliest extant version seems to have been Mydlesburgh. The first church records refer to a settlement of Benedictine monks initially called The cell of St. Hilda the virgin of ' Myddilburge juxta Teyse,' It was dissolved at the time of Henry VIII and only the home farm was left. This was referred to as Middilburgh and valued at £12.

Most later accounts by travellers don't refer to it at all and can hardly be relied on for its spelling as they were based on oral accounts. Joseph Pease kicked off the whole process of building a new town by establishing a port to carry coal from his mines at a location on the Tees he called Port Darlington. This was on the site of the farm to avoid the winding old course of the Tees. The land that became the site of the port and town was purchased by a consortium called the Middlesbrough Estate Company which included Joseph Pease, T Richardson, H Birkbeck, S Martin, Edward Pease and F. Gibson in 1829. At that time it was just 500 acres of farmland along with two farm houses, the largest of which was referred to as Middlesbrough Farm. At the same time the Stockton and Darlington railway applied for and was granted the extension of the railway and this was granted in 1829 and the railway opened in 1830. Things really started to snowball when Bolckow and Vaughan realised the advantages of building a new ironworks close the source of all the ingredients necessary, coal and limestone from Durham and ironstone from the Cleveland mines.

The 1836 Railway Timetable uses an abbreviated form of the town name - Middlesbro'
https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/images/5/ ... ckDarl.jpg

The medal struck to celebrate the opening of the line uses the same form
https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/File:Im19 ... Medals.jpg

Middlesbrough did not in fact get an official name until awarded a Town Charter in which it was referred to using the current spelling. You can see this on the 1853 OS map on the NLS site at http://maps.nls.uk/view/102344164. Its likely that the final decision on spelling was taken at this time.

[baroudeur]

At some point Ffestiniog became Llan Ffestiniog. Barton on the Clay (near Luton) became Barton-le-Clay. Various places are now apparently "Royal". I'm surprised that Northampton and Southampton haven't been mentioned yet. This kind of thing seems to happen a lot and it generally seems to be for simplification, clarification, or snobbery.

A new member's first contribution.

As a very old local resident , to me, it is Barton in the Clay but 'gentrified' some years back to Barton Le Clay although, apparently, Barton Le Cley was preferred but rejected. The hyphens appear in some versions of the name but not others.

Shillington (Beds), mentioned earlier, was called **** until the early 1900s and my wife's grandfather's WWI enlistment papers shows his address as ****.