Chapel-le-Dale is a hamlet in the civil parish of Ingleton,

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is the largest ceremonial county (lieutenancy area) in England, covering an area of . Around 40% of the county is covered by national parks, including most of the Yorkshire Dales and the North York Moors. It is one of four co ...

, England. It is in the

Yorkshire Dales The Yorkshire Dales is an upland area of the Pennines in the historic county of Yorkshire, England, most of it in the Yorkshire Dales National Park created in 1954. The Dales comprise river valleys and the hills rising from the Vale of York w ...

and was previously in the

West Riding of Yorkshire The West Riding of Yorkshire is one of three historic subdivisions of Yorkshire, England. From 1889 to 1974 the administrative county County of York, West Riding (the area under the control of West Riding County Council), abbreviated County ...

History

The hamlet is situated on the

B6255 road New B roads are numbered routes in Great Britain of lesser importance than A roads. See the article Great Britain road numbering scheme The Great Britain road numbering scheme is a numbering scheme used to classify and identify all roads in ...

between Ingleton and

Ribblehead Ribblehead is the area of moorland at the head of the River Ribble in the area known as Ribblesdale, in the Yorkshire Dales National Park, England. Ribblehead is most notable for Ribblehead railway station and Ribblehead Viaduct on the Set ...

near to the

Ribblehead Viaduct The Ribblehead Viaduct or Batty Moss Viaduct carries the Settle–Carlisle railway across Batty Moss in the Ribble Valley at Ribblehead, in North Yorkshire, England. The viaduct, built by the Midland Railway, is north-west of Skipton and so ...

. The name derives from Old French and literally means ''Chapel in the valley''. It was first recorded as ''Chappell ith Dale'' in 1677. Historically, the hamlet, and its parish, were both in the

Wapentake A hundred is an administrative division that is geographically part of a larger region. It was formerly used in England, Wales, some parts of the United States, Denmark, Southern Schleswig, Sweden, Finland, Norway, the Bishopric of Ösel–Wiek, ...

Ewcross The historical area of Ewecross or Ewcross is a district in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England. It included the parishes of Bentham, Clapham, Horton in Ribblesdale and Sedbergh and parts of Thornton in Lonsdale. Ewcross was split from th ...

and up until 1974, they were in the West Riding of Yorkshire. The hamlet is in close proximity to

Ingleborough Ingleborough () is the second-highest mountain in the Yorkshire Dales, England. It is one of the Yorkshire Three Peaks (the other two being Whernside and Pen-y-ghent), and is frequently climbed as part of the Three Peaks walk. A large part o ...

and Whernside and there are several potholes in the vicinity, the best known being

Great Douk Cave Great Douk Cave is a shallow cave system lying beneath the limestone bench of Ingleborough in Chapel-le-Dale, North Yorkshire, England. It is popular with beginners and escorted groups, as it offers straightforward caving, and it is possible t ...

. There is a pub in the village, ''The Old Hill Inn'', which is used as a starting and ending point for various walks on Whernside or Ingleborough. The source of the

River Doe The River Doe is a river in North Yorkshire, England. The river's source is near God's Bridge close to the settlement of Chapel-le-Dale and flows through Twisleton in a south-westerly direction to Ingleton, where it meets the River Twiss to f ...

is nearby. Lych gate, St

There is a church in the hamlet (The Church of St Leonard) which is now a

grade II listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern I ...

building. It was used as a burial plot for the

navvies Navvy, a clipping of navigator ( UK) or navigational engineer ( US), is particularly applied to describe the manual labourers working on major civil engineering projects and occasionally (in North America) to refer to mechanical shovels and ea ...

, and their family members, who died whilst constructing the nearby Ribblehead Viaduct between 1869 and 1876. In all, over 200 people died during the construction from accidents and outbreaks of

smallpox Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus) which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) c ...

. A plaque was erected in the church to their memory.

References

External links

Chapel-le-Dale
{{Authority control Hamlets in North Yorkshire