Disley
Disley is a
village in the
county of
Cheshire, in the north west of
England, in the
Goyt Valley, very close to the county boundary with
Derbyshire at
New Mills, and south of
Stockport,
Greater Manchester. It is in the
borough of
Macclesfield. Today it is a
dormitory village retaining a semi-rural character.
Properly
"Disley, Newtown and Lyme Handley", Disley is in NE
Cheshire, on the very edge of the
Peak District.
The
River Goyt flows through the valley about a mile north of the village and
Peak Forest Canal, which opened in 1800, passes along the edge of the village.
Disley railway station is on the Manchester to Buxton line, with through trains to Preston and Blackpool.
Its Anglo-Saxon name was
Dystiglegh meaning "windy settlement". In the
13th Century, in the time of
Edward I, there are references to confirmatory grants of land made to Jordan de Dystelegh of Disley Hall and Roger de Stanley-de-Dystelegh of Stanley Hall in the district, pointing to even older local settlements. It later had the name
Dystelegh.
Sir Piers Legh of
Lyme founded St. Mary-the-Virgin Church in Disley (completed
1524 and consecrated as
parish church in
1558. The earliest parish register is from
1591.
From 1894 to 1974 the parish constituted the
Disley Rural District, one of the few single-parish rural districts to exist.
The village had at least one
cotton mill by the
mid-19th century. As the cotton industry declined, more varied employment became the norm. In 2005, there is a paper mill and some light engineering works, but most people travel out to work.
Past
Disley is the birthplace of the Anglo-American
novelist Christopher Isherwood.
A.J.P. Taylor lived there, and
Dylan Thomas visited him there.
Lord John Hunt who led the first successful
Mount Everest expedition in
1953 also lived in Disley.
Present
Disley is also the home of
Big Brother loser
Anouska Golbieski, the BBC's
Bargain Hunt programme presenter
David Dickinson, who had his first antique shop here, and
paralympic swimmer Sarah BaileyThe "Rams Head" inn c.
1650 at the centre of the village was formerly a lodge belonging to the
Lyme Park estate. It became a main
coaching stop on the
Manchester to
London route.
Lyme Park is located in Disley and was used by the
BBC as a setting in its adaptation of
Pride and Prejudice.
* Disley parish Council; The Parish of Disley (Official Guide). (1994).
