The local historian Arthur Hopwood told me about this stone.
It’s his opinion that this is one of the many stones erected around the beckside by Edward Oates, who bought this land in 1834.
Mr. Oates put up the large stones around the pond just north of this, and also installed the ‘clapper’ bridges found there. It seems he had a thing about having ‘ye olde looking stones’ on his estate.
Edward Oates was a member of the Mill Hill Chapel, in Leeds City Centre, and apparently brought some of the stone from there, including the two rough stone ‘pillars’ that are to be found near the pond, a little further up the beck from here.