History in Maps
Produced just over ten years after the previous map, the 1849 map is the first to resemble the Ordnance Survey style we recognise today. It provides far more detail than earlier maps.
The parkland surrounding Crofton Hall dominates the village. The Fish Pond — today’s Coppers Lake — is clearly marked. A Methodist Chapel and a Rectory are marked nearby.
Several public houses are shown, including the Masons Arms (possibly the Royal Oak), the Cock and Crown (still retaining its name today), and the New Inn, located where the telephone exchange now stands at the end of Slack Lane. Windmill House on Towers Lane is also marked as an inn.
A pinfold at the junction of Slack Lane and Doncaster Road is visible on the map and still exists today. Historically, it held stray sheep, possibly until a fine was paid, perhaps indicating the historic use of nearby land.
Many modern street names are already present, including Shay Lane, Cock Lane, Slack Lane, Spring Lane, and Middle Lane. Names now associated with housing estates, such as Spring Hill and Brand Hill, also appear, though not necessarily in their modern locations.
The map marks a feature called The Balk, between Shay Lane and the historic Ings Lane (a continuation of today’s Hare Park Lane). This feature, unnamed on the 1838 map, is still visible in satellite imagery. A balk is defined as "an unploughed strip of land in an open field, used as a field division and sometimes as a right of way".
Crofton Windmill is shown close to what is now Weeland Road and is marked "Corn", again indicating how some of the land will have been used. A short distance to the west of the mill is a building marked Shelling Mill. The Shelling Mill would have been used to seperate the corn or wheat from the chaff before being milled at the windmill.
The quarries from the earlier map remain, now labeled Sandstone, and are joined by a new quarry at Windmill House.
The nearest railway station is at Oakenshaw, on the Midland Railway’s Derby–Leeds line. It was intended to serve Wakefield by omnibus and as a result was a more substantial station than one might expect for modern day Oakenshaw.
Outside Crofton, part of Charles Waterton’s Walton Park appears in the bottom-left corner. Produced during his lifetime, the map provides a glimpse of what the park may have been like.