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Updated: June 28, 2025
The apparition was so sudden and strange that he immediately concluded that it was a ghost. The weird sight was reported at the stations along the canal, and also at Wolverhampton, which was the boatman's headquarters. He told the people at Patricroft on his return journey what he had seen, and great was the excitement produced. The place was haunted: there was no doubt about it!
Nasmyth at once wrote to his partner telling him what he had seen, and urging that the taking out of a patent for the protection of the invention ought no longer to be deferred. But trade was still very much depressed, and as the Patricroft firm needed all their capital to carry on their business, Mr. Gaskell objected to lock any of it up in engineering novelties.
I then made a speculum of ten inches diameter, and but for the unhappy circumstance of his death in 1831, it would have been mounted in his proposed observatory at Norwood. After I had settled down at Fireside, Patricroft, I desired to possess a telescope of considerable power in order to enjoy the tranquil pleasure of surveying the heavens in their impressive grandeur at night.
I set out for Manchester. It was a long but pleasant walk. I well remember, when nearing Manchester, that I sat down to rest for a time on Patricroft Bridge. I was attracted by the rural aspect of the country, and the antique cottages of the neighbourhood.
The arrival of so numerous, well-dressed, and respectable a corps of workmen and their families was an event in the neighbourhood, and could not fail to strike the "pickets" with surprise. Next morning the sixty-four Scotchmen assembled in the yard at Patricroft, and after giving "three cheers," went quietly to their work.
The reader may remember that while on my journey on foot from Liverpool to Manchester in 1830, I had rested myself for a little on the parapet of the bridge overlooking the canal near Patricroft, and gazed longingly upon a plot of land situated along the canal side.
The cottage was situated on the banks of the river Irwell, and was only about six minutes' walk from the works at Patricroft. It suited my moderate domestic arrangements admirably. The village was surrounded by apple orchards and gardens, and situated in the midst of tranquil rural scenery.
I would take the telescope in my arms and plant it in some suitable spot, where I might get a peep at some special planet or star then above the horizon. It became bruited about that a ghost was seen at Patricroft! A barge was silently gliding along the canal near midnight, when the boatman suddenly saw a figure in white. "It moved among the trees with a coffin in its arms!"
Nor had he ceased to cultivate the art during his residence at Patricroft, but was accustomed to fall back upon it for relaxation and enjoyment amid the pursuits of trade.
He forbade them coming by driblets, but held them together until there was a full freight; and then they came, with their wives, families, chests of drawers, and eight-day clocks, in a steamboat specially hired for their transport from Greenock to Liverpool. From thence they came by special train to Patricroft, where houses were in readiness for their reception.
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