A COMMUNITY organisation is trying to trace relatives of an East Lancashire woman deported to Australia for her role in the mill riots of 1826.

Mary Hindle was arrested in riots at Higher Mill, Helmshore. Violence had erupted there - and in many other mill towns - after the introduction of power looms left thousands of weavers destitute.

She was taken to the magistrates' court and jail in New Thorn Inn, Bury Road, and later deported.

The New Thorn Inn is currently being converted into a multi-purpose resource centre, backed by a £138,000 Lottery grant and £90,000 from Action for Haslingden.

The Haslingden Community Forum - the body behind the project - plans to name the centre after Hindle.

But first they are trying to gather as much information about her as possible, from local people and also from Australia via the Internet. A forum spokesman said: "We are convinced that someone in Haslingden will be related to Mary Hindle of will know something about her because her father-in-law was a church warden at St James' Church and Hindle Street was named after him."

Mary was married with one daughter at the time of her deportation. Some years later, she wrote to the then Home Secretary asking for a pardon, and mentioned her husband and two children. It is thought, therefore, that her husband had followed her to Australia and that they had had another child there.

The new resource centre is expected to open early next year. It will house a computer cyber-centre, a drop-in youth centre and coffee bar and provide a local base for organisations, including Lancashire Youth and Community Service, voluntary groups and the community forum.

Anyone who knows anything about Mary Hindle should contact Catlow Communications on 01706 216996.

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