Deep Waters

The Bramleys and Jennings of Skipton

The story of the Bramleys of Skipton tracks the lineage of one Elizabeth Bramley who married George Horner, a factory worker, from Austwick near Clapham in North Yorkshire, in 1837.

The Bramleys originated from Toxteth Park, Liverpool in the late eigteenth century. The opening of the Leeds Liverpool canal between Holme Bridge near Gargrave to Leeds in 1777 probably helped this move. However it is also possible that there were connections with the Bramleys of Embsay who had been in Addingham since the sixteenth century. These Bramleys had built the cotton mill Milhome in Embsay in the early nineteenth century

The Bramleys married into the Jennings of Skipton and Kildwick. The Jennings line can be traced from Stirton and Thorlby to Silsden in Kildwick Parish in the sixteenth century. The Jennings story is one familiar to many Yorkshire families. The Jennings had held Silden Manor in the fifteenth century. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the older Jennings line moved to Ripon, leaving the younger lines dividing their property and finding alternative occupations..