Whalley is a large village and civil parish in the Ribble Valley on the banks of the River Calder in Lancashire, England. It was severely damaged by flooding in 2015 and its restoration continues.
It is overlooked by Whalley Nab, a large wooded hill over the river from the village. The population of the civil parish was 2,645 at the 2001 Census and rapidly increased to 3,629 at the 2011 Census.
The main road through Whalley is King Street, which leads through to Clitheroe Road. Neighbouring Whalley are the small villages of Wiswell, Billington, Barrow, and Read. Close by is Downham village and Pendle Hill which was made famous in William Harrison Ainsworth's book "The Lancashire Witches".
Known locally as "Whalley Arches", Whalley Viaduct is a 48-span railway bridge crossing the River Calder and a listed structure.
It was built between 1846 and 1850 under the engineering supervision of Terrence Wolfe Flanagan and formed part of the Bolton, Blackburn, Clitheroe and West Yorkshire Railway. It is a red brick arch structure and the longest and largest railway viaduct in Lancashire. It carries the railway, now known as the Ribble Valley Line, 21.3m over the river for 620m.
Over 7 million bricks and 12,338 cubic metres of stone were used in construction. 3,000m of timber were used for the arch centring, temporary platforms and the permanent foundation piles. During construction on 6 October 1849, two of the 41 arches then completed collapsed, with the loss of three lives.
The east side of the bridge, nearest the remains of the Abbey, has the only decorative treatment.
The village has the ruins of Whalley Abbey, a 14th-century Cistercian abbey. The monks of Whalley described the site of their abbey beneath Whalley Nab, on the banks of the Calder, as locus benedictus - a blessed place.
The parish church of St Mary and All Saints dates to 628 in the period when St. Paulinus was said to have preached at Whalley. The church has a large number of notable misericords - eighteen 15th century and four Victorian, the former known to have originated at Whalley Abbey. The church-yard has three Anglo-Saxon crosses.
It also contains war graves of 8 servicemen of World War I and 5 of World War II.
A Roman Catholic church, The English Martyrs, lies near the Abbey. Until the 1980s there was a girls' boarding school called Whiteacre. The village has a total of 23 listed buildings at Grade I, II* and II.
The River Calder has a man-made weir section at Whalley, which supposedly allowed the monks of Whalley Abbey to collect water easily. It has been suggested that was one of the main reasons for the abbey being built where it was. The river here has two small islands made of pebbles and rocks. The Dam/weir was built to guide water to a channel,that fed a water wheel in the Corn Mill,(there is a sluice gate where the dam meets the channel, this turns the wheel on and off) this gave power to grind the various products (Wheat, Barley etc.). The power to the Mill was all belt driven through a pulley system. The Mill has now been transformed into flats, but you can still see the remains of the wheel through an opening at the back of the building.
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