a branch of the Shireburnes of Stonyhurst who held the manor until the time of the English Civil Wars. Much land being sold during this period, the Slinger family acquired the remnant which they held until 1728. Thereafter, the manor passed to Robert Parker, a relative of the Slingers, who sold it to the Wilkinsons in the early 1800s. The current Dunnow Hall dates from the nineteenth century. The last so-called Squire of Dunnow, John King-Wilkinson, died in May 2011. Knowlmere was a mesne manor of the Lords of Bowland originally subinfeudated to the Savile family but held by the Hammertons from 1382. From at least the mid-thirteenth century, some thirty acres, the core of the estate, had been tenanted by the De Knoll family from which the manor takes its name. The Hammertons suffered severe penalties for Sir Stephen Hammerton's involvement in the Pilgrimage of Grace and their lands, including Knowlmere, were confiscated in 1537. By this time, the manor of Knowlmere comprised "some eighteen farms and lesser holdings which included Birkett, Foulscales, Thorneyholme, Mossthwaite and other properties on the south side of the Hodder between Newton and Dunsop Bridge". A portion of the original Knoll family holding, close to Burholme, appears to have been retained by the family until 1503 when it came into the possession of the Earls of Derby. There has been some speculation that the mysterious Bogeuurde in Domesday - identified by Ekwall with Barge Ford, near Foulscales - may in fact be the manor of Knowlmere in its earliest manifestation. Title to the Manor and Liberty of Slaidburn, West Bradford and Grindleton, including the township of Newton, was bought by Tory MP, Ralph Assheton, later first Baron Clitheroe, in 1950. In 1977, his second son, the Hon Nicholas Assheton, was granted title. Since 2003, the Lord of the Manor and Liberty of Slaidburn has been Thomas Assheton, son of the Hon Nicholas Assheton and nephew of the second Baron Clitheroe. Newton was an early centre of Nonconformist religion. Richard Leigh of Birkett, the founder of Newton's first independent chapel in 1696, was closely associated with the great Congregationalist preacher Thomas Jollie. Thomas Jollie's grandson, also Thomas, married Leigh's daughter while his nephew, John Jollie, served as Newton's first Congregationalist minister from 1696 to 1702. The original chapel was replaced in 1887 and was finally closed to services in June 2012. Newton also boasts an