The Ormerod Family.

A Memory of Burnley.

Ormerod House passed out of the Ormerod family when the male line died out and the three daughters of the last Ormerod married. Their husbands were John Hargreaves, a local coal mine owner, the Rev William Thursby who became vicar of the local church and General Scarlett who led the Charge of the Heavy Brigade to retake the field after the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava. The family fortunes grew with the mines during the Industrial Revolution and the boom in the cotton industry but in their enthusiasm to mine more and more coal they managed to extend the mine workings from the pit head some four miles away, under the house which caused subsidence damage to such an extent that the main house had to be demolished in about 1929. Only the outbuildings and stables now remain. The Ormerod family goes back to 1290 at the same location.