Posted on 6th Oct 2025 by AWL Team
The Ghost Sign of Ashton’s Past You might have noticed the mural that’s gone up on the side of Andy’s All-Day Breakfast in Ashton-in-Makerfield. It shows a traditional cobbled street, the sort common in Ashton 100 years...
Posted on 22nd Sep 2025 by AWL Team
During the First World War, following the German invasion of Belgium in August 1914, around 250,000 Belgians came to Britain to escape the conflict. Refugees were mainly civilians but also included wounded and discharged Belgian...
Posted on 16th Sep 2025 by Helen Kavanagh
‘I don’t know much about Michal. Only that when Germany invaded Poland, he was taken prisoner and made to work in the German coal mines... for six months without being allowed up.’ So begins the handwritten note I...
Posted on 1st Sep 2025 by AWL Team
Over the course of eight sessions in the Summer Holidays, Archives: Wigan & Leigh has engaged 115 children in a heritage and technology project that brought local history to life in new ways. Alongside Computer Xplorers, we’ve...
Posted on 19th Jun 2025 by Thomas McGrath
This is part of a new blog series we will be sharing with our colleagues working on the 'Ashton Building History Project'. This post was researched and written by Anna Standring. Front Elevation of the Brian Boru Club on Byrn...
Posted on 11th Jun 2025 by Helen Kavanagh
Two hundred years ago, Ellen Weeton embarked on one of many adventures – this time to North Wales. Recorded in her diary which we hold in the Edward Hall collection, the entries for May to July 1825 reveal a woman ahead of her time....
Posted on 24th Apr 2025 by AWL Team
On 24 th April 1945, The Ince Urban District Council Peace Sub Committee met to make ‘arrangements for celebrating locally the cessation of hostilities in the European Theatre of War’. ‘In accordance with the wishes of His...
Posted on 6th Nov 2024 by Thomas McGrath
We are lucky at Archives: Wigan & Leigh to hold to photographic collection of Reverend William Wickham (1849-1929). Wickham was the vicar of St Andrew’s Church in Wigan from 1878-1916, and in his spare time he took photographs of people...
Posted on 23rd Jul 2024 by Thomas McGrath
We’ve just completed our first week of our annual closure period, during which we shut to the public and do essential maintenance work with our collections. We’ve had a busy first week and all the team were involved in different tasks...
Posted on 3rd Jun 2024 by Thomas McGrath
We’re lucky to have a fantastic team of volunteers across our heritage services for Wigan Council at Archives: Wigan & Leigh, Wigan Local Studies, and the Museum of Wigan Life. Last year (2023) our volunteers racked up an impressive...