Page:History of the Fylde of Lancashire (IA historyoffyldeof00portiala).pdf/315

 in Little Bispham and Norbreck, and an additional sum of 2s. to Sir Thomas Butler, for lands in Great Bispham. After the Reformation, Bispham was granted by Edward VI., in the sixth year of his reign, to Sir Ralph Bagnell, by whom it was sold to John Fleetwood, of Rossall; and in 1571, Thomas Fleetwood, the descendant of the last-named gentleman, held Great and Little Bispham and Layton. The manors remained invested in the Rossall family until the lifetime of the late Sir P. H. Fleetwood, by whom they were sold to the Cliftons, of Lytham, John Talbot Clifton, esq., of Lytham Hall, being the present lord.

The subjoined account of a shipwreck on this coast is taken from the journal of William Stout, of Lancaster, and illustrates the uses to which the church was occasionally put in similar cases of emergency:—

"Our ship, Employment, met with a French ship of some force, bound to Newfoundland, who made a prize of her. The French were determined to send her directly to St. Malo; when John Gardner, the master, treated to ransome her, and agreed with the captors for £1,000 sterling. The French did strip the sailors of most of their clothes and provisions; and coming out of a hot climate to cold, before they got home they were so weak that they were scarce able to work the ship, and the mate being not an experienced pilot, spent time in making the land, and was embayed on the coast of Wales, but with difficulty got off, and then made the Isle of Man, and stood for Peel Fouldrey, but missed his course, so that he made Rossall Mill for Walna Mill, and run in that mistake till he was embayed under the Red Banks, behind Rossall, so as he could not get off; and it blowing hard, and fearing she would beat, they endeavoured to launch their boat; but were so weak that they could not do it, but came to an anchor. She struck off her rudder, and at the high water mark she slipped her cables and run on shore, in a very foul strong place, where she beat till she was full of water, but the men got well to land. But it was believed if they had been able to launch the boat and attempted to land in her, the sea was so high and the shore so foul, that they might have all perished. This happened on the 8th month, 1702, and we had early notice of it to Lancaster, and got horses and carts with empty casks to put the damaged sugars in, and to get on shore what could be saved, which was done with much expedition. We got the sugar into Esquire Fleetwood's barn, at Rossall, and the cotton wool into Bispham chapel, and in the neap tides got the carpenters at work, but a storm came with the rising tides and beat the ship to pieces. The cotton wool was sent to Manchester and sold for £200."

In the early years of this century Bispham contained a manufactory for the production of linsey-woolsey. The building was three stories in height, and employed a considerable number