Pendleton, Greater Manchester

Pendleton is an inner city area of Salford, Greater Manchester, England. It is about 2 mi from Manchester city centre. The A6 dual carriageway skirts the east of the district.

Historically a part of Lancashire, Pendleton is a former rural township of the Hundred of Salford, which experienced rapid urbanisation following the Industrial Revolution.

Pendleton is a densely populated area of Salford which has several high-rise blocks of flats (tower blocks) – typically between seventeen and twenty seven floors high – some of the tallest buildings in Salford and Greater Manchester. The area also has two colleges; Pendleton College and a Salford College campus, Salford's largest shopping precinct, Salford Shopping City, and Pendleton Police Station.

History
The township has been variously recorded as Penelton in 1199, Pennelton in 1212, Penilton in 1236, Penhulton in 1331, Penulton in 1356 and Pendleton from about 1600.

In the Middle Ages the manor was named Pen-hulton when it was held by the Hultons of Hulton Park.

Until 1780 the village was rural, a group of cottages around a village green with a maypole. The Industrial Revolution brought about rapid expansion in the population and large cotton-mills and premises for dyeing, printing, and bleaching were built providing employment. Collieries were developed from the early 19th century.

Violence and looting occurred in Pendleton during the 2011 England riots. In August 2012 Salford City Council announced a £430million regeneration scheme for the area.

Governance
Pendleton emerged as a township and chapelry in the ecclesiastical parish of Eccles in the hundred of Salford in the historic county of Lancashire. After 1837 Pendleton was part of the Salford Poor Law Union which took responsibility for the administration of the Poor Law and provided a workhouse.

Pendleton was part of the County Borough of Salford, and in 1974 became part of the metropolitan borough of the City of Salford, and metropolitan county of Greater Manchester.

Geography
Pendleton is 2½ miles north west of Manchester City Centre by the River Irwell and at the junction roads to Liverpool, Preston, Bolton and Manchester. The Manchester Bolton & Bury Canal, the Liverpool and Manchester and Manchester and Bolton railways pass through the area.

Pendleton sits on the coal measures of the Manchester Coalfield, part of Lancashire Coalfield. In the early days of coal mining in the area the seams lying on or close to the surface were exploited, but as time went on it became necessary to dig progressively deeper; by the beginning of the 20th century Pendleton Colliery had the deepest shafts in Great Britain, at 3474 ft.

The area gives its name to the geological feature known as the Pendleton Fault, one of four large faults running under Manchester. The faults are geologically active, and cause earthquake tremors that have been recorded for centuries, most recently in August 2007, when Manchester experienced six minor earthquakes.

Clarendon Park is within the bounds of Pendleton.

Transport
Pendleton railway station closed in 1998, having been severely damaged in an arson attack. Salford Crescent railway station now links the district and the adjacent University of Salford, with central Manchester (Piccadilly, Oxford Road and Victoria) and many towns in North West England and Scotland from as far south as Buxton to as far north as Windermere and Glasgow.

Parish church
Pendleton Church, St Thomas', is a Commissioners' Church and replaced the original chapel. It was built in 1829–31 to the design of Francis Goodwin and Richard Lane in a Perpendicular revival style with a west tower and three galleries.

Notable people
The 19th-century industrialist and Liberal politician Sir Elkanah Armitage lived at Hope Hall in Pendleton from 1853 until his death in 1876. Albert Finney the actor was born in Pendleton and baptised at St George's Church, Charlestown. James Agate the theatre critic was born in Pendleton, as was Tommy White, the Everton and England footballer. The actor Christopher Eccleston, best known for his role on the TV series Doctor Who, was raised in the Langworthy area.