A brief history of Oak Hill Park

In the 18th century, the owner of Oak Hill house was recorded as Daniel Henry Woodward of Gloucester, who later changed his name to Lee-Warner and inherited Walsingham Abbey.

The original mansion at Oak Hill was built in 1793 by Thomas Hargreaves, owner of the Broad Oak Print Works, Thomas built the mansion at Oak Hill and married his first wife Margaret, they had two daughters and a son. His wife subsequently died, and having other business interests outside Accrington, Thomas decided to leave Oak Hill and in 1802 he built and moved into Oakenshaw House, where he married his second wife Nancy, and they had five sons.

In 1812, Thomas returned to Accrington, and took control of Broad Oak; the family once again took up residence at Oak Hill, and extensively changed and enlarged the house, demolishing the remainder of the old house. The mansion and its gardens remained in the Hargreaves family until its acquisition by Accrington Corporation. The last private owners of Oak Hill were Reginald Hargreaves and his wife Alice Liddell.

The idea of purchasing the land and mansion was first brought before the Town Council in 1890. Negotiations with the owner were not successful in agreeing a price for the land, so the decision was put to the ratepayers who, in July 1892, voted in favour of the acquisition. The land was acquired for �12048, with the vendor returning �1000 toward the work required to prepare the park.

The park was opened on Whit Monday the 22nd May 1893 by Reginald Hargreaves. The mayor presented the two cannons which were installed in the higher position of the park now occupied by the War Memorial, and Councillor Joseph Duxbury presented the Bandstand.



In 1900 the mansion was opened as a museum. At its peak, the museum housed tens of thousands of specimens and exhibits in eight rooms.

On the first of July 1922, the memorial to those who fell in the First World War was unveiled by H. H. Bolton.

The Ornamental Rock Gardens were opened 25th May 1932 by Henry Parkinson ('Accrington Friend and Well Wisher'), in memory of his grandfather, also Henry Parkinson who had died 50 years previously.

In 1933, the museum received a gift of probably Accrington's most noted collection of fine-art, the Tiffany Glass collection of over 140 Art Nouveau glass pieces, created by Louis Comfort Tiffany of New York. It was donated by Joseph Briggs, a former Accringtonian who worked for the Tiffany glass company for many years. The collection remains the largest of its kind outside of the USA, and is now held at Haworth Art Gallery.