Ashton upon Mersey is an area of Sale

Sale, Greater Manchester

Sale is a town within the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford, in Greater Manchester, England. Historically part of Cheshire, the town lies on flat ground on the south bank of the River Mersey, south of Stretford, northeast of Altrincham, and southwest of the city of Manchester...

 in the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford

Trafford

The Metropolitan Borough of Trafford is a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It has a population of 211,800, covers , and includes the towns of Altrincham, Partington, Sale, Stretford, and Urmston...

, Greater Manchester

Greater Manchester

Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 2.6 million. It encompasses one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and comprises ten metropolitan boroughs: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, and the...

, England. It lies on the south bank of the River Mersey

River Mersey

The River Mersey is a river in North West England. It is around long, stretching from Stockport, Greater Manchester, and ending at Liverpool Bay, Merseyside. For centuries, it formed part of the ancient county divide between Lancashire and Cheshire....

, in the northwestern part of Sale, and is situated about 5 miles (8 km) south of Manchester city centre

Manchester City Centre

Manchester city centre is the central business district of Manchester, England. It lies within the Manchester Inner Ring Road, next to the River Irwell...

.

Historically

Historic counties of England

The historic counties of England are subdivisions of England established for administration by the Normans and in most cases based on earlier Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and shires...

 a part of Cheshire

Cheshire

Cheshire is a ceremonial county in North West England. Cheshire's county town is the city of Chester, although its largest town is Warrington. Other major towns include Widnes, Congleton, Crewe, Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Macclesfield, Winsford, Northwich, and Wilmslow...

, it became an urban district

Urban district

In the England, Wales and Ireland, an urban district was a type of local government district that covered an urbanised area. Urban districts had an elected Urban District Council , which shared local government responsibilities with a county council....

 in 1895 under the Local Government Act 1894

Local Government Act 1894

The Local Government Act 1894 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales outside the County of London. The Act followed the reforms carried out at county level under the Local Government Act 1888...

. In 1930 the Ashton upon Mersey urban district was abolished and the area became a part of the urban district of Sale.

History

A 4th-century hoard

Hoard

In archaeology, a hoard is a collection of valuable objects or artifacts, sometimes purposely buried in the ground. This would usually be with the intention of later recovery by the hoarder; hoarders sometimes died before retrieving the hoard, and these surviving hoards may be uncovered by...

 of 46 Roman coins was discovered and is one of four known hoards dating from that period discovered within the Mersey basin

Drainage basin

A drainage basin is an extent or an area of land where surface water from rain and melting snow or ice converges to a single point, usually the exit of the basin, where the waters join another waterbody, such as a river, lake, reservoir, estuary, wetland, sea, or ocean...

. In the 18th century, it was thought that Ashton upon Mersey might have been the site of a Roman station, next to the River Mersey, called Fines Miaimae & Flaviae. However, this was based on the De Situ Britanniae

De Situ Britanniae

De Situ Britanniae is a fictional description of the peoples and places of ancient Britain. Purported to contain the account of a Roman general preserved in the manuscript of a fourteenth century English monk, it was considered the premier source of information on Roman Britain for more than a...

, a manuscript forged by Charles Bertram

Charles Bertram

Charles Bertram was the author of the forged manuscript De Situ Britanniae , a spurious history that was highly influential in the reconstruction of the history of Roman Britain for over a century. It had a similar impact on the explanation of Scottish history over the same period of time...

, and there is no evidence to suggest any such station existed. The name Ashton is Old English for "village or farm near the ash tree

Ash tree

Fraxinus is a genus flowering plants in the olive and lilac family, Oleaceae. It contains 45-65 species of usually medium to large trees, mostly deciduous though a few subtropical species are evergreen. The tree's common English name, ash, goes back to the Old English æsc, while the generic name...

s", suggesting that Ashton upon Mersey is of Anglo-Saxon origin. The township is first mentioned in 1260.

The poet Lascelles Abercrombie

Lascelles Abercrombie

Lascelles Abercrombie was a British poet and literary critic, one of the "Dymock poets"...

was born in Ashton-upon-Mersey.