The Gleedon Hill Waggon-way
An article by Dr. Trevor Hill
In 1870 William Ferriday and his partners, who ran the Lightmoor furnaces, signed a 21 year lease to extract limestone near Gleedon Hill.

In 1780 William Ferriday and his partners, who ran the Lightmoor furnaces, signed a 21 year lease to extract limestone near Gleedon Hill and the Coalbrookdale Co also leased land in this area to extract some 1,500 tons of limestone per annum. In the 19th century part of this area of Wenlock Edge was within the Moseley estate centred upon Buildwas Park. In a deed of 1824 William Moseley assigned quarries to the partners of the Madeley Wood Co as follows:

'all those limerocks or quarries of limestone called or known by the name of Glyddon Hill now opened or as are discovered in or under the same hill being part of a farm situate at Whitwell near Much Wenlock.' 1

This deed also states that William Moseley would receive royalties of 5d per ton or a minimum of £30 per year which ever was the highest. It is clear that he was uncertain as to the future of the iron-trade which had been in depression since 1815 for the deed insists that a proper record be kept of the tonnage extracted which was to be subject to inspection. The deed also gave permission for burning limestone for agricultural purposes, this was not for general sale but for the use of George Reynolds who held Whitwell Farm. Further it granted to the Madeley Wood company the right of:

'… free and full liberty to make rail roads, ways, or passages over and through the said farm and lands as shall be found necessary or convenient for carrying on the said works'.

Subsequently this group of ironmasters built a waggon-way from Gleedon Hill (SJ 627020) to a wharf on the River Severn near Park Farm, Buildwas (SJ 633042). Barrie Trinder records that the limestone went to Lightmoor from Buildwas by barges to Meadow Wharf and apparently then on to the canal system to supply the furnaces at Madeley Wood, Ketley, Horsehay and Lightmoor.2 When this waggon-way went out of use is uncertain but it is likely that it was still active when the Botfield family bought the Gleedon Hill quarry in 1826. The conveyance says of its location:

'All that piece or parcel of land by estimate four acres lying at the top of Gleedon Hill and adjoining the lands formerly of Thomas Stephens being the lands and premises of Sarah Minton, widow, declared mother of the said Priscilla Beddoes and all that other land 3 acres 1 rood and 20 perches by estimate being part of the enclosed piece of land heretofore of Sir Watkin Williams Wynn called the Yeld situated and lying and being towards a certain field called Homer Field abutting towards the south-east of the road leading from Wenlock to Buildwas, on the north-wards on a field called Gleedon Hill, on the south-wards on the residue of a said parcel of lands commonly called Upper and Lower Yeld and containing 6 acres 3 roods and 16 perches in the parish of Much Wenlock and now or late was in occupation of George Reynolds his assigns and under-tenants… the said Edward Dodd and Richard Collins to have and to hold. 3

Eventually the quarries on Gleedon Hill were absorbed into a much larger quarry known as Farley Quarry and with the development of main-line railways and the high demand for limestone a railway was built from Buildwas to Much Wenlock in 1862. This gave access to the new quarries at Farley and Shadwell, however by then the earlier waggon-ways had long been abandoned. The course of this waggon-way can be followed today as a footpath from Gleedon Hill but only as far as Seven Springs Farm. On walking this footpath it became clear that at certain points along the waggon-way either branch lines or tracks led into various quarries. Apart from the main track of the waggon-way little remains to be seen because most of the original quarry faces have been destroyed by the extension of Farley Quarry or have been covered by surface spoil removed from that quarry. A map of the Buildwas estate dated 1837 does not indicate a wharf or much detail of the waggon-way so it is assumed that it only operated for a short period between 1824 and 1837. 4

1 Shropshire Archives 1681/184/1.
2 Trinder B., The Industrial Revolution in Shropshire (Phillimore 1981), p. 44.
3 Shropshire Archives 1150/818.
4 Shropshire Archives 1671/15 1-2.