Demage Farm.
Its age is unknown but in a map of 1829-31 it was referred
to as Demage Hall. The
two cottages mentioned, in the Tithe Award composed the original farmhouse.
Before the opening of the By-pass Road, the only approach was through Demage Lane,
formerly a narrow trackway with deep ditches on either side. Often the miller's
carts would slip into these and on occasions have been known to stay there all
night. Two points of Interest are;-
(1) the wooden shippon which was built from parts of an old ship, purchased
from Liverpool by Mr. T. A. Rigby.
(2) the old dairy which has the last known remnant of
thatch in Upton. The thatched roof is falling into disrepair as there is no
local thatcher. In this dairy the famous Cheshire Cheese was made. To-day it contains
the most modern of milk-cooling appliances.
The Grange Farm
This is situated at the north east end of the
village, with the boundaries between Upton, Picton and Hoole crossing its land.
Originally the old house was surrounded by a moat, but this has practically
disappeared. From its position it might have been the "Heath House"
referred to in sixteenth century records (see History section). The old house
stood behind the present farm and now forms farm cottages. It is reputed to
have been the original Upton Grange. The present farm has been built since
1839. On its land is a pit named 'Donkey's Hole' about whose name we have no
information. However much the land is flooded around it the hole remains
perfectly dry, and again we have no explanation to offer.
Upton Farm
Its exact age is unknown, may be the oldest existing farm in Upton. It is L-shaped with 16" thick walls. From its style it may be either late seventeenth or early eighteenth century. Of interest in the kitchen is the "spence" – in this case not built under the stairs; it is a space with the lower half partitioned and the top half railed off from the rest of the room. The farm had its own pump and supplied the Smoke Street cottages with water.
There was a Knowles Meadow near the site which
may have given the farm its name. Like many of the farms it had its own well.
(48)
Farms which have been extended or converted were
at Upton Grange and The Urban Stores. The former was a farm until about eighty
years ago, and many extensions have been made to the original building. The
latter, now a shop, was once a farm shippon and the farmhouse was the next door
cottage. There was a pit near it called The Chemistry Pit, which seems to have
served as the local rubbish dump, and about which there were many complaints at
the Ratepayers' meetings in the last century.
Among farms no longer in existence was an
ancient farm at the top of the sandpit, off Upton Lane, farmed by the Ithells
until about 1820. It fell into ruins and finally only the old barn was left
standing. In the Vestry Minutes for July, 1911, we read that "The old Barn
on the brink of the sandpit was taken down by the contractors of the new
buildings at the County Asylum, for rubble" -"An old Parish landmark
gone." The slates from the old farm, much bigger and heavier than those of
to-day, are to be seen on the roof of an outbuilding at the home of Mr. and
Mrs. F. Morris of Upton Heath.
Another old farm stood on the site of Oakfleld,
now the Zoological Gardens. We have no information about this.