Cornelius Bagot Moves Back to Blackpool

The son of C. Bagot, Esq of Blackpool, yeoman, who for over forty years held the honorary office of Overseer of that town, Cornelius Bagot was born in Blackpool, 15 February 1838, and was educated at the Marton Grammar School, under the Rev. Joseph Bryers, M.A., and Rogers’ School, Blackpool. He served a full apprenticeship to William Stones, of Blackburn, and afterwards had over thirty years’ experience in Manchester with Peter Bradshaw Alley, architect and surveyor, John Lowe, FRIBA, and with William Dawes, architect surveyor, and others. He commenced practice in Manchester in I886, and was engaged upon numerous schools, churches, parsonages, private residences, and important public buildings and engineering works. He joined the Society of Architects in 1901. By 1903 he had been joined by his son, Henry Nickson Bagot, quantity surveyor.

© Alamy

Marton (in Blackpool) had a watermill until the mid-18th century, and another wind-powered gristmill up to the late 19th century, both at Great Marton. Bagot moved back to his hometown Blackpool and moved into 251 Whitegate Drive in 1924. Little Marton Mill stopped working in September 1928 and Bagot restored it, and in 1937 gave it to the Allen Clarke Memorial Fund as a memorial to the local teacher, writer and windmill enthusiast C. Allen Clarke (1863–1935). The mill was extensively renovated in 1987 at a cost of £88,000. The mill is now open on Sundays to members of the public to visit and features demonstrations and information from volunteers about the milling process and its history.