As you approach the dark, peaty landscape around Kinder Scout you are following in the footsteps of John Leonard Waterhouse. John walked this area extensively between 1920 and 1940, picking up any interesting pieces of stone that caught his eye. Waterhouse enjoyed hill walking and picking out the tiny arrowheads and scrapers hidden amongst the stones
Eventually he amassed a large collection of stool tools and debris. The oldest are over 6,000 years old and date to the Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age). They also include arrowheads between 6,000-4,000 years old, and most recently gun flints from the 1700s.
He mounted his finds for examination, now on display at Buxton Museum:
In 1926, Dr JW Jackson of The Manchester Museum wrote praising Waterhouse: “I am glad to hear of your interesting find of flints at Ashop Head. I have expected something to turn up around Kinder in view of finds on hills further north, but I don’t think anyone but yourself has located them.”
Many stone tools from between 10,000 – 6,000 years ago have been found on and around Kinder Scout, and further north along the Pennines. The people who made and used them were hunter-gatherers, passing through seasonally following herds of animals and other natural resources.