The first mention of the existence of High Flatts is in 1453 in a lease for 40 years by Aymer Burdet, Lord of the Manor, “to John Parkynson of land in Overdenby... and an assart called 'Heghflatt' at an annual rent of 5s”.
It is a remote and secluded hamlet surrounded by farming land, well suited to the needs of the Quaker community who later settled there and farmed the land. George Fox (1624-1691) founded the Society of Friends, or Quakers, but as non-conformists they were outcasts and persecuted for their religion. It has been suggested that the first sign of Quaker activity at High Flatts was in 1652 when John Firth and local 'Friends' began to hold meetings in a barn at Quaker Bottom. Local legend says that John Firth of Shepley had been one of Fox's guards when he was imprisoned at Nottingham Castle in the early 1640s but had deserted in 1642. Returning home he began to talk to others about Fox and his ideas. But as practising this new religion was illegal he sought to find a way of doing so without attracting the attention of the authorities. There were other converts to Fox's ideas in the Wakefield area such as James Nayler and William Dewesbury who may have supported Firth.
The Meeting House
The barn at Quaker Bottom was converted into a purpose built Meeting House in 1697 which itself was completely rebuilt in 1754 on the same site and which still hosts services to this day. It became a centre for meetings for Quakers from a wider area – the Pontefract Monthly Meeting and the Yorkshire General Meeting were regularly held there. After the small graveyard in front of the Meeting House was full some members had to be buried at Wooldale Meeting House until land was acquired from Elihu Dickinson behind the Quaker Bottom building and a new one created. The first burial took place there in 1790. The headstones show several generations of the same family are buried there and the same few names crop up time and again. A door lintel at the back of the Meeting House with the inscription B J E 1697 refers to local landowner
at the time and his wife, Joseph and Elizabeth Bayley, who left the building and its graveyard to a number of local Quakers by deed gift in 1701. The early inhabitants of High Flatts were engaged in either farming or woollen textile production with some diversification later into milling, tanning and iron foundry work.
From the mid 19th century the importance of High Flatts as a Quaker centre began to diminish as travel to larger centres became easier than travelling to this remote village. Some of the houses were sold to non-Quaker families although some have been retained for use by those with Quaker connections. Attendance at Meeting House services declined during and after the World Wars but picked up again a little in the 1970s and members were able to add toilet and kitchen facilities to the building which had previously been absent.
Mill Bank House
Overlooking the graveyard is Mill Bank House which, in line with Quaker ideals of charity work, poor relief and care for others, was converted in 1866 into a sanatorium for the restoration of inebriate working or middle class women. This also fitted with their belief in temperance, refrain from drinking alcohol. The women were drawn from the Manchester area at first but eventually women from all over the country were accommodated. This sanatorium influenced the establishment of another at nearby Upper Denby. The house itself had been built by Elihu Dickinson (1745-1829) who owned the nearby tannery. It is a private residence again now.
The site of the tannery is in a wooded area on the edge of the hamlet. Nothing much remains but there is a flight of 40 steps descending to a small stream and other steps ascending again close by.
Schools
Another Quaker ethic was providing a good education for their children and to this end a Quaker boarding school for about 50 boys was established in the 1740s in
buildings at Low House Farm at Quaker Bottom, with day and adult schools at Three Wells (pictured) and the Guest House at Strines. Originally the boarding school had been set up in the Meeting House itself with the upper storey used as the schoolmaster's quarters.
The Guest House
The Guest House at Strines referred to was originally just called Strines and in 1802 belonged to Henry Dickinson. The buildings there were demolished in the early 20th Century and replaced by two World War I army huts purchased from Woodhouse Grove School, Bradford, which became known as the Guest House. The Guest House was used initially for Quaker residential gatherings, later as a YHA Youth Hostel. Barnsley Council then took it over for use as an outdoor centre during World War II and it was used by evacuees throughout the war years. By the mid 1950s it had been sold off for use as a barn and chicken run, to be replaced in the late1990s by the current private residence known as Strines Lodge.
Toby Spout
A mile or so below the hamlet is Square Wood Reservoir with an outflow stream known as Toby Spout. This was the source of a typhoid outbreak in 1932. Kitty Robson of Middle House, High Flatts, succumbed first but within weeks 72 people in Denby Dale caught the disease, 11 of whom died.