The Wilds of Wannie (NY932833 & thereabouts)

On Tyneside, certainly, and quite possibly further afield, could once be heard the phrase ‘The Wilds of Wannie’ when referring to some remote situation or circumstance. It has been passed down through the centuries and the generations with increasingly little thought given to whence and where its roots lie. But ‘Wannie’ does exist, though it is hardly wild anymore.

In the lawless days of the border reivers and the moss troopers (c.1300-1600), the boundary between England and Scotland was not only prone to shift but the area in question was a place to generally avoid – or at least pass through very quickly. Some spots were so dangerous that they were essentially ‘out of bounds’ – and one especially dodgy tract of land centred on the very upper reaches of the River Wansbeck around Sweethope Loughs, east of the present-day A68 a few miles south of Elsdon. These were ‘The Wilds of Wannie’.

Essentially, the area is bleak, open moorland with outcrops of rock. Hereabouts, these days, you will find Great Wannie Crag, Little Wannie Crag and many more besides, peppered with the odd rock climber or two. The river’s name comes from here, of course, the Wansbeck being the ‘Wannie Beck’, and the spot represented the very edge of civilisation at one time to the folk of the North-East. Beyond lay danger and the unknown, wild men and lawlessness  … and, of course, Redesdale, one of the blackest spots in Britain for general mayhem and mischief.

With nearby A-roads skirting the moors and ramblers and climbers scrambling around, the wilds are not as forbidding as they once were – and even the good folk of Redesdale are not half as troublesome as they were half a millennium ago!