[2] In 1305 a huge ditch and earth bank were dug to enclose a large area that included most of the west side of Musbury township (later becoming Helmshore).

This created an enclosure to keep in fallow deer for the estate of Hugh de Lacy, and supplying venison for his table.

[3]: 19/20 During the period after the decline of the hunting park most people in the valley made a living combining farming and textile making.

Raising cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry, and growing a few cereal crops on their land.

Several farms near Hare Clough were raided by excise men in the 1880s and there are stories of distilling in Musbury throughout the 19th century.

William Turner died in 1852, while the Porritt family were developing Sunnybank and for a while, during the cotton famine, things were less secure in the Musbury mills.

[3]: 34–40 The older mills in Musbury began to disappear after 1850, as production switched from the outlying districts to the new village that was growing up in Helmshore, and this pattern continued to be the case.

After WWII the remaining companies pooled resources and opened a research centre which, in 1956 moved across Holcombe Road into a new building, but this finally closed in 1981.

During this period much of the valley was abandoned and fell into disrepair, but access remained available and so it became a popular picnic and walking area.

[3]: 57–61 Heavy rain in July 1964 caused a flood which destroyed much of the brook-side footpath at the bottom of the valley.