The name Middleton is derived from the
Old English middel-
tun, in this case the middle settlement or farm on the road from
Morley to
Rothwell.
Flint and
bronze weapons have been discovered in the neighbourhood showing evidence of habitation during the
Palaeolithic and
Bronze Ages.
Roman discoveries were made in 1607 and 1823. Middleton was mentioned as
Mildentone and
Mildetone in the
Domesday Book as having three
carucates of land much of which was woodland. The land was given to
Ilbert de Lacy who had a castle at
Pontefract. Middleton Park is a remnant of the manorial estate which existed after the Norman Conquest. In the 13th century the boundary between Middleton and
Beeston became the focus of a protracted dispute over where it lay in the dense woodland which covered the area. The dispute between William Grammary and Adam de Beeston was settled in 1209 by
single combat and resulted in the construction of a boundary bank and ditch, a stretch of which can still be seen in Middleton Woods. The Creppings were
lords of the manor followed by the Leigh or Legh family.
John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, held the manor from 1363 to 1370 and Simon Simeon, whose will mentioned coal mines, from 1401 to 1406. The Leighs held the manor for much of the time between 1300 until 1697 when Anne Leigh married
Ralph Brandling of
Felling in Durham. The Leighs once occupied New Hall whose name is recalled in the street names in the area.
William Gascoigne, who invented the
micrometer and died fighting for the
Royalists at
Marston Moor in 1644, was another resident of New Hall. Middleton Hall on Town Street was built in the 18th century for the Brandlings but they chose to live mainly in Durham.
Charles John Brandling of
Gosforth House, the
Member of Parliament for
Newcastle between 1798 and 1812 and for Northumberland from 1820 until 1826, married Henrietta Armitage of Middleton. The Brandlings appointed John Blenkinsop to manage their collieries in Middleton and he was the hall's occupant in 1809. The hall was destroyed in a fire in 1962. The gate-house serving Middleton Hall still stands today on Town Street, alongside St. Mary's Church and graveyard and original public pathway into the then private,
Middleton Park. In 1760 the Brandlings built a new residence, Middleton Lodge, designed by
James Paine. It was situated in what is now the park possibly on the site the original manor house. Members of the family lived there until 1860 including R.H. Brandling who donated land on Town Street on which the church is built. The Brandling's fortunes declined and the estate was sold to the Middleton Estate & Colliery Company in 1862. William Henry Maude, a partner in the company, occupied the house with his sister in 1871. He died in a carriage accident in the park in 1911. His sister remained at Middleton Lodge after the land had been acquired by the council until her death in 1933 after which the house became the headquarters of Middleton Golf Club. Middleton Lodge was demolished in 1996.
Industrial history '' by George Walker, 1814 There is evidence of coal mining in the
Middle Ages in the shaft mounds, waggonways and similar archaeological features resulting from early mining activity in Middleton Woods. Before the 17th century the pits were
bell pits and
adits or day holes dug horizontally into the hill sides where the coal seam outcropped. In 1669 Frances Conyers of New Hall had "cole pits" in Middleton. The pits were small and numerous and many worked for a short time.
Gin pits using horses to turn the
windlass were the next development and the deeper pits had brick-lined shafts and wooden
headgear for hauling tubs of coal and miners out of the workings. This type of mine was in operation when Anne Leigh married Ralph Brandling whose family owned collieries in Durham. Brandling's 1,200 acre Middleton estate supplied coal to Leeds but was disadvantaged in the trade by poor roads. Deep mining arrived with the advent of steam engines to pump water out of the mines and keep the workings dry making it possible to raise coal from greater depths. In 1780 a
Newcomen engine was installed at Middleton and by 1808 the mine employed 90
hewers and 60 putters. The market for coal grew as Leeds and its industries expanded. The
Middleton Railway, founded in 1758, is the oldest continuously working railway in Britain to be established by an
act of Parliament; the first such act in England. The railway, owned by
Charles Brandling, (1733–1802) was a horse drawn wooden waggonway linking the collieries at Middleton to Cassons Close near
Leeds Bridge in the centre of Leeds. In 1810
John Blenkinsop, Brandling's agent at Middleton, was looking for cheaper ways of moving coal to Leeds. He designed the
rack railway and
Matthew Murray built the first Middleton Railway locomotive, "
Salamanca", at his
Round Foundry in Holbeck. The locomotive's first run, reported in The
Leeds Mercury on 27 June 1812, was "witnessed by thousands of spectators and crowned a complete success....". Three more locomotives were built. The Middleton Railway locomotives had a toothed cog wheel which meshed into a rack on the side of the rail, as it was felt this would provide the engines with a better grip when hauling coal wagons. Before 1840, women and children were employed in coal mines and there were frequent accidents. The worst disaster occurred in 1825 at the Gosforth Pit, named after the Brandling's Durham estate, where an explosion of
firedamp caused 24 deaths; the oldest a collier aged 48 and the youngest a child of seven. Broom Pit was the deepest at , and longest-lasting of the Middleton collieries. In 1896 the Middleton Broom, Little and Middleton Main Pits, all managed by John Neal, employed over 600 workers. By 1923 just the Broom Pit was working, employing more than 1,000 men and supplying coking, gas and household coal and
fireclay to the brickworks. Nearly 900 men were employed there in 1940. Operations at the pit ended in 1968 as the productivity of the colliery declined.
20th century In 1919, the grounds of Middleton Lodge were leased by Leeds Council for use as a
public park. The rural nature of the area changed soon after 1 April 1920 when the township was incorporated into the
County Borough of Leeds. Leeds Council acquired land to construct "a vast low-density corporation built cottage estate with circuses and avenues". The houses were built using bricks from the fireclay works at Broom Pit on land once used for agriculture including West Farm and parts of Sissons Farm. By 1934, 2,377
council houses had been built and the housing estate was considered to be a "garden suburb", but was found to be remote and lacking in facilities by the residents. ==Governance==