Cold Keld
John Fothergill was a tenant farmer at Cold Keld, and is mentioned in a Land Tax assessment for the parish of Ravenstonedale dated 12 September 1734.
The Land Tax was the government's chief source of revenue, and amounted to 4/- in the £ on the annual rental value of land. Each year, assessors had to calculate and collect the tax. John Fothergill's contribution for Cold Keld was 4/4 - twopence more than Foggygill, 10½d more than Elm Pot, but John was also responsible for paying 9/4½ on land he had elsewhere.
He did not own Cold Keld (or 'Could Keld', as it was spelt in 1734), being described as a husbandman, and not a yeoman.
John Fothergill must have been fairly old at this time, and had relations in Cautley, in Orton, at 'Askill' (i.e. Aisgill) in Mallerstang, and at Lockholme.
He died, and was buried on 17 January 1736 at Ravenstonedale. A fortnight earlier, he had made his will, leaving the bulk of his estate, after bequests to his numerous relations, to his wife, Mary.
After his death, four neighbours assessed the value of his estate as £175/11/-, of which £100 represented 'money owing to the deceased in Bills, Bonds, etc.' Almost two thirds of the remainder was the value of 'beasts, sheep and hay', appraised at £48/17/-. His clothes and the money in his purse were valued at £9/10/-, and his bedding and bedstocks were worth £7/1/-. Then there was cheese, valued at £2/7/6. This was presumably in the back of the house, for goods 'in the fore-house' were priced at £5/2/6. There was beef in the meat-loft, above a smouldering peat fire, and a good store of peats laid in for the winter - a guineasworth.
MARY FOTHERGILL, John's widow, lived on at Cold Keld for a while, but we do not know for how long.
Cold Keld was for many years associated with the Shaw family, and Robert Shaw was owner of the farm from at least 1783 until the time of his death in 1800.
Robert was born in 1741, and he he married Margaret Robinson on 23 May 1776. Margaret was the daughter of John and Isobel Robinson (née Fothergill). The couple were living at Cold Keld in 1783, when a daughter, Alice (?), was born and baptized on 2 May. The Bishop's Transcript - the copy of the parish register sent to Carlisle - says she was christened Margaret, but the parish register itself has Isobel crossed out, and Alice written in. Certainly, Robert had four daughters, Sarah (baptized at Ravenstonedale on 12 April 1777), Isabella (5 April 1780), Alice and Mary (5 April 1784).
Some time after this, Robert moved to Stennerskeugh, and Cold Keld seems to have been let out to tenants. The first of these we know about was Robert Fawcett, who died at the early age of 43. He was buried on 30 May 1796.
John Metcalf and his wife, née Blades were the tenants on 4 December 1803, when a daughter, Ann, was christened. They probably came from outside the parish.
Meanwhile, Robert Shaw had died early in 1800. His three farms were divided between three of his four daughters, Cold Keld falling to Alice, who was only seventeen at the time, however.
William Dixon married Alice Shaw on 14 (or 30?) November 1804, and thus came into ownership of Cold Keld. His father, Richard Dixon, had been High Constable and Treasurer for the East Ward of Westmorland. The couple probably moved into the house after their marriage. They were there on 30 August 1812, when their son, Richard, was baptized. Richard was to farm later at Causeway End, and it may have been there that the Dixons moved to in the 1820's.
By 1823, the farm was again let out to tenants, this time to Thomas Kirkbride. By now the farm's rateable value was £30, and the Land Tax came to 9/5¼.
Thomas Kirkbride was born at Lockholme in 1789. In 1823 he was at Cold Keld, though in 1829 he was tenant at one of the farms at Dovengill. At the time of the 1841 census, Thomas Kirkbride was living at Cold Keld with his wife Mary and children Thomas (20), Jane (9) and Edward (who was seven). His 88-year-old father was also living with them. A relation (perhaps Thomas' son), John Kirkbride, (born in 1812), was living at Studfold.
By 1849, Thomas Kirkbride had left Cold Keld. His place was taken for a few years by Henry Parkin, from Murthwaite. He was the 27-year-old son of Bell Parkin and husband of Isabella (née Tunstall) from Dovengill. Bell was in his seventies, and gave up farming in the 1850's, and Henry returned to Murthwaite and farmed there. (Bell died at Murthwaite on 10 December 1866, aged 86.)
Robert Shaw Dixon was born in 1819, the fifth child, and second son, of William and Alice. He married Isabella Parkin in the second quarter of 1843. She was the sister of Henry Parkin, and daughter of Bell Parkin. In 1853, he and his wife Isabella moved into Cold Keld, at first as tenants, but from 1857 onwards as owner.
In 1861, Robert and Isabella had their daughter, Aley, living with them She married Richard Shaw on 13 March 1869. However, in 1871, Aley's five-year-old daughter, Sarah Dixon, was staying with her grandparents. Henry Parkin's sister, Mary, and his son, Robert, were also staying in the house. They are described as servants.
Robert Shaw Dixon died on 22 February 1877. His widow moved to Studfold, where she died in 1881.
Richard Shaw, Aley Dixon's husband, inherited Cold Keld in 1877. (The Shaw family had left the Fell End area in the early 19th century, the nearest being an Anne Shaw in the 1850's, who was landlady of the 'Ewe and Lamb' (i.e. Crossbank).)
Richard had been born in Cautley in 1842. He married Aley Dixon on 13 March 1869. Their eldest son, William Dixon Shaw, was born in Ravenstonedale in 1870. Another son, Robert was born in Cautley in 1875, and John Hird Shaw was born at Cold Keld.
The couple farmed at Cold Keld, retiring around 1900 - Aley died on 12 August 1898. By 1901, the farm was being worked by William Dixon Shaw, Richard's son. He had married Barbara Thexton from Low Sprintgill. He was at Cold Keld until 1929, but by 1934, the farm was run by Mrs Barbara Shaw - his widow. Subsequently the farm was taken over by Richard Shaw in the late 1930's.