Alderley Edge

Type: Village

An attractive village with Victorian houses and a pleasant shopping centre. Many pleasant walks close to the sheer face of the Edge, complete with legends of King Arthur. Up until the 1840s, Alderley Edge was a hamlet and one of the earliest leafy retreats to be promoted by a railway company for merchants - due to its close proximity to Manchester.

Alderley Edge takes its name from the long sandstone escarpment nearly 2 miles long and rising 600 feet above the Cheshire Plain.

Traces of Iron Age settlement in the form of flint tools have been found on the Edge and the Romans are believed to have mined copper here. The mines were worked off and on until the World War I.

The railway arrived in Alderley Edge in 1842 and attracted many wealthy merchants. Indeed it was the railway that gave the town its name when it was looking for a name for its station. From the mid-19th century an impressive variety of villas and houses were built - one edifice was even castellated, complete with tower. Anyone who had a house built of the right value, got a free pass from the railway in the form of a key fob to hang on his watch chain. The company got their return from the regular journeys by wives, children, servants, tradesmen and visitors.

Alderley Edge also has a wishing well in which the custom was to put bent pins in if girls wanted husbands or children. Its inscription is bogus and aimed at the most gullible visitors from Manchester by the local stonemason.

Alderley Edge is entered into the annual Best Kept Station competition.