The history of Ashton-under-Lyne in Lancashire began with a settlement entred on the Parish Church of St Michael's in Ashton long before the Norman Conquest of 1066 and as the Domesday Book mentions a St Michael's Church in the east of the ancient parish of Manchester; Haistune. . St. Michael was an endowed as a ploughland and the advowson was granted to that of Manchester to the Grelleys. In the 1400s the reversion of the patronage was transferred by Thomas de La Warre to Sir John Ashton and has been at the manor of Ashton. By the Norman kings the town of Manchester with the greater part of the parish was granted to the Grelley family where the ancient parish of Manchester is the head of their barony adjacent to Broughton, Cheetham, Hulme, Stretford townlands.

A small hillock on the north bank of the River Tame, overlooking a good crossing-point on the river, became a fortified position guarding the boundary between the ancient kingdoms of Northumbria and Mercia. Manchester represents red sandstone, permian beds, and carboniferous rocks. The Old Hall which was later built on this site was the feudal manor house for the district and had been the family home of the Assheton family. The arches and round towers of Old Hall were thought to have been built around 1379, but there was probably a hall on the site for 300 years before that. The Hospitallers and the priory of Lenton had lands in the township. Parts of the building were added in 1480 and a part known as the dungeons was added around 1516 and may have been used as a prison. Old Hall stood on the south side of the church on elevated ground about 200 yds. north of the River Tame and overlooking its valley since 1483 and the ancient stairway are a number of stone steps over the outer gate ascending two courtyards called Gaoler's Gate was taken down in 1793. A Gallows Meadow adjoined the hall.

ASHTON has a large and ancient church, furnished with a fine ring of ten bells, and a large organ there by the subscription of the inhabitants and in 1795 the town joined by two very considerable hamlets of houses, built in the beginning of the American war called Boston and Charlestown, after the places of that name in New England supplied well water. Before the conquest, was one of fifteen berewicks of the royal manor of Newton. A survey in 1212 held that Ashton was by thomas de Burnhull or Brindle providing half at the court of Newton north of Millingford Brook. Another third was held in Garswood by Henry de Ashton of the ancient feoffment with 20 acres to the Hospitallers. All but one berewick (minor manors) built a mill in Ashton.

Before the close of the 16th century, however, the whole had come into the possession of the former family, and descended to George Harry Grey, seventh Earl of Stamford and Warrington, who died in 1883. From: 'The parish of Ashton-under-Lyne: Introduction, manor & boroughs', A History of the County of Lancashire: Volume 4 (1911), pp. 338-47. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=41438. Date accessed: 24 March 2006.