Reeth Holiday Cottages: over 100 years in the family...
Rose and David Atkinson are your hosts at Reeth Holiday Cottages!
We inherited the cottages in 2017 from my (Rose’s) parents, Trish and Chris.
Our goal is to provide a relaxing retreat at any time of year, with the the properties being luxurious, cosy "home from homes".
Ensuring a 5* guest experience is at the heart of what we do.
In 2018 and 2019, significant changes were made to all properties. Each cottage underwent a full refurbishment, with Greystones receiving a completely new interior layout.
How did this begin?
My parents Chris and Trish originally began a holiday letting business in 1991, using the house they had been living in, Burton House. They formed the perfect partnership: Dad managed a building firm and Mum had been head housekeeper at The Stafford Hotel in London before they were married. All areas of holiday lets were covered!
Dad then renovated the other cottages, beginning with Greystones, then round the corner to Turbine House, and finally in 1998, Charlie's Stable. Mum ran them to the highest possible standard, until she sadly passed away in 2012.
They both formed many great friendships with guests, who return to the cottages year after year. When Dad died in 2017, I took over the business. I wanted to keep the family legacy going and allow people to continue enjoying peaceful holidays in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales, just like Mum used to do.
The Generation before...
Burton House was passed down to Mum when she and Dad got married. My Grandparents, Kathleen and Handley Burton, lived there after getting married in the 1940's, until they moved to Northallerton later in life.
Handley was a celebrated electrician in the village, initially starting out helping his father run the Askrigg and Reeth Electric Supply Company from Turbine House. They diversified when the National Grid took over, renting out and maintaining electrical appliances to the village.
Mum remembered fondly walking around the village on a Friday evening, collecting rents for electrical appliances that were supplied by Handley's business, and people have fond memories of the excitement of getting an electrical appliance in their own home!
For the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, Handley and Kathleen were one of the only people in the village to have a television in their home. They had quite a crowd around to watch it all on the screen!
The Askrigg and Reeth Electric Supply Company
William Handley Burton (Rose’s Great Great Grandfather) started out as a joiner and builder in Askrigg in the 1870’s. His speciality was making Hay-Rakes so when the chance to buy the old corn mill came up he jumped at it, and started using it as a saw mill and made rakes in their thousands. Machinery used for making thousands of hay-rakes in the late 19th and early 20th centuries is still in place in the old mill buildings, some of it designed and purpose-built themselves.
At the turn of the century William Handley Burton’s ingenious nature led him to transform part of the saw mill into a Hydro Electric Power Station, utilising the power of Mill Gill Force. The Burton family were seen as “100 years before their time” and as pioneers in their field. In 1908, William Handley Burton and his sons generated electricity for the town of Askrigg before many major cities were lit by electric light. It was one of the earliest schemes of its kind in the country.
The Askrigg Electric Lighting Company installed electric lighting schemes in country houses and villages in both Wensleydale and Swaledale, and Askrigg had electric street lighting installed the following year. 2 pence a unit was charged for electric in the early days!
The move to Swaledale
In 1910 William Handley Burton and his son, William Burton bought the old corn mill in Reeth. The people of Reeth thought they were mad, as there was no money left in milling corn! Little did they know that they were going to be the first generators of electric light in the village.
The old corn milling buildings were knocked down and in their place a new house was built, “Askrigg House," along with a purpose built building for housing the turbines to generate the electric, and a stable for the horse. The old mill stones were even used as stone lintels above the doors and windows of the house!
The dam was already in place a little way up the Arkle Beck, and the mill race diverted the water in to power the turbines. The mill race can still be seen in the field behind the cottages today. Unfortunately the dam was washed away during the flood of 2019, but stood the test of time until then as a reminder of what came before.
The Burtons were highly regarded in the area for their contributions, helping numerous villages establish their own hydro electric supply. I discovered this during a chance encounter in 2020 when I was talking to the wife of a man who, as a boy, remembers the Burtons assisting their family in installing turbines and setting up their own power station in Bainbridge. He remembers fondly his very own job in the proceedings - to keep the header tank grid free of leaves so that the electric supply didn’t dwindle and the lights didn’t dim!
Changing times...
The electricity in Reeth was generated by the Burtons for decades, eventually needing to be supplemented by diesel generators to keep up with demand. The North Eastern Electric Supply Company eventually took over the generation of electricity in the area, but the Burtons fought the take over for years until they had to succumb to a compulsory takeover, after the 1947 Electricity Act led to the nationalisation of electric generation. They were compensated around £1200 for the inconvenience.
William Burton and his son Handley carried on with electrical engineering and supplying and maintaining appliances in the village. Handley moved to Northallerton to set up an electrical shop in the 1950’s, also supplying and maintaining electrical appliances. This shop is still thriving today - Maxwells of Northallerton.
At some point, “Askrigg House” was spit into 2 properties, “Burton House” and “Greystones.” William lived in Greystones until his death in 1964, and his wife, May, lived out the rest of her years there too. It was when she sadly died in 1992 that Rose’s parents Trish and Chris renovated Greystones and started letting it as a holiday home, after first starting with Burton House in 1991.