Vicker’s Row / Redfern’s Farm

Vicker’s Row / Redfearn’s Farm

To the west of Station Road in the village there was a row of three thatched cottages known as “Vickers Row”. The cottages had cruck roofs, with walls of lath and plaster.

John Vickers (1786-1860) was born there. He was a “cowkeeper”- he kept cows on land which he rented from other people. He was also a baker and an agent at the canal when it opened in 1793, shipping coal and stone. As a boy he went to the Dame School aged 4 and left when was 10. John married Hannah and they had four children. His daughter, Frances, took over the cow keeping business.

Frances Vickers (1821 – 1884) continued to farm the 20 acres with an agricultural labourer called Thomas Dawson who had been with the family for forty years. She described herself as a “cowkeeper”.  Meanwhle, her brother, William, worked at Church Farm and married the farmer’s daughter, Anne. They went to live at The Cotters and one of their daughters married Henry Redfern.

By 1901, the farm was taken over by Henry Redfern.  He called himself a carter and cowkeeper and lived in Vickers Row his wife and three children.  When he died, the farm was taken over by his son William. He also described himself a farmer or a “cowkeeper”.  He bought a field by the river and built three houses on it. He also rented some land from Charles Catt at The Outwoods on Rigga lane. William became a well- known figure in the village, selling his milk to villagers. Cows from Redfern’s Farm and Church Farm were taken through the centre of the village on their way to be milked.

The cottages were demolished in the 1930s and the farm disappeared.