Holywell Lane: A Squatter Community in the Shropshire Coalfield

Abstract

The thirty or so cottages which lined Holywell Lane in the parish of Little Dawley, about 2 miles from the Iron Bridge, formed one of many squatter communities in the Coalbrookdale Coalfield. Documentary, oral, architectural and archaeological sources are here used to demonstrate the particular features of this kind of settlement, in its buildings, the long periods of tenure by some families, and the variety of occupations and by-employments of its inhabitants. It is argued that such open communities were an important influence on industrial development not just in the Shropshire coalfield, but elsewhere in Britain.