Dalehead Hall Stones
The Stones are part of the wider Thirlmere Stone Circuit - The Valley of Styans. The entire circuit consists of the Thirlmere Feat Stone, the Stenoch Stones, the Nags Head Stones, the Daleshead Stones and the Wythburn Church Stones.
Weights
Laithe Stone - 136kg / 300lbs
Thwaite Stone - 89kg / 196lbs
Location
View on what3words - paddocks.complains.recent
Original Challenge
Stones to Chest
Name Origin
The Laithe Stone is named after the generational family that once looked after the estate. The Thwaite Stone is named after Thomas Thwaite who lived in the old barn that was part of Dalehead Hall.
Stones Placement
The two modern Stones were discovered and placed by @conortoms_strongman just off the Thirlmere shoreline, down from the Dale Head Hotel. With thanks to @sherlock_stones for assisting with the name origins and history of the site.
History
Dalehead Hall wasn’t just a house — it was the centre of a substantial Lakeland estate. When Adam Laithes bought the property in 1577, he didn’t just acquire the hall itself; he gradually consolidated ownership of the surrounding farmland, woodland, and grazing rights.
Over the next three centuries, the Laithes family became the dominant landowners in the Legburthwaite and Wythburn area, holding the title of Lords of the Manor and controlling much of the valley that would later become the Thirlmere reservoir.
By the 18th and early 19th centuries, the estate stretched across the lower slopes of Helvellyn and around the original natural lake (then two smaller lakes known as Laithes Water and Wythburn Water). The family’s influence was woven into the landscape — tenant farms, sheep walks, and rights of way all traced back to the hall.
Everything changed in the 1870s. Manchester Corporation, searching for a reliable water supply for the rapidly growing city, set its sights on Thirlmere. After the death of Thomas Stranger‑Laithes in 1877, the entire estate — including Dalehead Hall and the surrounding land — was sold to the corporation.
This sale effectively ended centuries of private family ownership and opened the way for one of the most ambitious engineering projects of the Victorian era: the damming of the valley and the creation of the reservoir.
Once the land passed into municipal hands, the hall’s role shifted. It was no longer the seat of a rural manor but a property within a managed water catchment. Over time it was altered, extended, and eventually converted for modern use, but the core of the old house still carries the memory of the landscape it once managed.
