Lundwood - History

History

Lying about three miles east-north-east of Barnsley town centre, the modern village of Lundwood takes its name from the Lund Wood the substantially wooded portion of the area of the old manor of Monk Bretton (or Burton). The name Lund is derived from the Old-Norse Lundr, meaning woodland, sometimes of sacred woodland, but usually of economically important woods. The name Lundwood is therefore a tautology (meaning Wood wood), a common feature of place-names where two languages are combined as in this case.

The Lund Wood was entirely within the old manor of Monk Bretton. The wood itself was still significant even in the nineteenth century and covered much of the land bounding Cudworth in the east almost down to the River Dearne near Storrs Wood. The ruins of Monk Bretton Priory which was founded in 1154 as the Priory of St Mary Magdalene of Lund by Adam FitzSwaine lie within modern day Lundwood near Cundy Cross. The road from the Priory ran towards the village of Monk Bretton by way of the hamlet of Littleworth. Littleworth is now subsumed within Lundwood but is remembered in the old road which is named Littleworth Lane, and also in the name of the primary school (see below).

The development of Lundwood as it is seen today was the result of the building of the turnpike road from Barnsley to Cudworth Bridge in 1825. The Act tells us in its preamble that the turnpike followed the old Barnsley to Pontefract road,inferring that the road was established and merely taken over by the turnpike trust. However, section 31 of the Act refers to "the making of this new piece of road" and authorises the trust to stop up "old roads and footways in the township of Monk Bretton, otherwise Burton" because they had become unnecessary and useless. Maps that were made just a relatively short time before, such as Thomas Jefferys (1771–72, Yorkshire), confirm that the road through Lundwood that we see today simply did not exist, and neither did the road through Beaver's Hole, so this "new piece" was quite extensive. The old road ran from Barnsley across the Dearne at Old Mill Lane and then turned east on the Burton Road, passing through Monk Bretton and down to Cudworth at Cudworth Bridge. The route of this new road may well have followed existing footways but nothing large enough to have been recorded on a contemporary map, nor large enough to cope with the intended traffic.