Hell’s Kettles & Lewis Carroll (NZ281109)

© Copyright Hugh Mortimer and licensed for

 reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

A couple of miles south of Darlington, in a lonely field near the A167, lies a curious geological feature called Hell’s Kettles. Its story, amazingly, goes back to the 12^th century, and it may well hold a unique place in the history of our nation’s literature.

The ‘kettles’ themselves are a couple of ordinary looking ponds by the roadside – the sort of thing you would skirt past without even noticing, ordinarily. They are said to have been formed in 1179 following a dramatic incident of subsidence. There are only two these days, but historical reports suggest that four ponds once existed here – one having been filled in, and two of the others have merged into one.

The sudden appearance of these sink-holes can be explained by the rapid erosion of the gypsum-like rocks near the surface which resulted in the sudden collapse of the ground. Surface run-off and underground springs then filled the voids – and, of course, the seemingly bottomless nature of the little lakes has since fed the imaginations of the locals over the centuries. Of the two that remain, one is unremarkable in that it is filled by run-off water, but the other (the southerly one, called ‘Croft Kettle’) is the only open-water expanse in the county fed by subterranean springs, and has therefore attracted a very special collection of biological growth. Hence, Hell’s Kettles is now a Site of Special Scientific Interest.

A twelfth century chronicler described the formation of the kettles in dramatic fashion, thus:

In the reign of Henry II, the earth rose high at Oxendale, in the District of Darlington, in the likeness of a lofty tower, and so remained from nine in the morning until evening, when it sank down with a terrible noise, to the terror of all that heard it, and being swallowed up it left behind a deep pit.

Intriguingly, it has recently been suggested that Hell’s Kettles may have inspired the scene in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland in which Alice tumbles down a rabbit hole. Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) would certainly have been familiar with Hell’s Kettles, living, as he did, at nearby Croft for so long. Additionally, of course, he would have been well versed in the local legends surrounding the feature: animals and humans drowning and being lost in the pools, the voices of lost spirits thereabouts, and endless stories of the ‘bottomless’ nature of their depths.

The Ravensworth Arms, Lamesley (NZ250577)

© Copyright Alexander P Kapp and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

The Ravensworth Arms pub in the tiny village of Lamesley, a little to the south of the Team Valley Trading Estate, has connected to it two rather significant literary stories. The detail is brief, sketchy and may never be provable one way or the other, but the ‘facts’ are remarkable none the less.

We have come across the great Catherine Cookson before on this blog. Well, it transpires that had it not been for a chance encounter at our drinking hole in Lamesley, the literary world would never have been blessed with the storytelling skills of our famous Dame. For though Cookson was born in Tyne Dock, she was actually conceived during a fling between her unmarried mother, Kate McMullen, and one of the punters of The Ravensworth Arms. Kate just happened to be working there at the time (in late 1905), when in walked the shady Alexander Davies – about whom very little is known – for a brief, but very productive, encounter. Davies is supposed to have been a fairly well-to-do native of Lancashire – and a bigamist and gambler by some accounts – but he soon disappeared from Catherine’s life – probably before she was born, in fact.

Even less is known about the other ‘writing link’ of note. It seems that around four decades or so beforehand, the soon-to-be-famous Lewis Carroll had stayed at the pub for a spell. Not so remarkable you may think, but it is believed that he was working on his ‘Alice’ adventures at the time – enabling The Ravensworth Arms, Lamesley, to claim another notch on its literary bedpost.

Ghosts of Sockburn (NZ350070)

At the southern-most tip of the Diocese of Durham lies the parish of Sockburn. It’s a busy little place, history-wise, though you wouldn’t think it looking at it today, amounting, as it does, to little more a large farmer’s field situated in a giant loop of the River Tees.

There’s a nineteenth century mansion, a slightly earlier farmhouse and a ruined parish church – the much contracted population numbering little more than a few dozen (if that). There seems to have been something about the place, though, in times past which attracted the great and good to the spot. Higbald, Bishop of Lindisfarne, was crowned there in around 780 – ditto Eanwald, Archbishop of York, in 796. What are described as ‘Viking Age sculptured stones’ lie (still, I think) among the ruins of All Saints church, which add to the mystery of the place – as does the legend of the Sockburn Worm (or Dragon), slain by the Conyers family who for centuries owned the manor. The creature is said to be buried hereabouts.

Due to its geographical situate, Sockburn was for centuries the spot where each new Bishop of Durham was ceremonially welcomed into the diocese by the Lord of the Manor – a practice recently revived, in fact.

William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Lewis Carroll all have connections with the place – which encounters seem to have found their way into some rather famous works. Coleridge’s Love was written at Sockburn after the married poet fell for local girl, Sara Hutchinson, whilst staying at her brother’s farm. And Carroll is supposed to have based Jabberwocky on the legend of the ‘worm’ – though the Lambton Worm also claims this distinction.

Get more of a feel for the place here.

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Whitburn’s Carroll Connection (c.NZ410620)

It is a connection from not so very long ago, but it is a link which has already become swathed in legend, myth and hearsay. Just how strong is, in fact, Whitburn’s claim to be the source of inspiration of so much of Lewis Carroll’s genius works of child fiction?

Carroll certainly visited the town on a regular basis: on the occasions of his visits to his relatives, a Mr and Mrs Wilcox – the former being his uncle, the latter his cousin. He stayed at their residence in High Croft, Lizard Lane, and would often also visit the Williamsons at Whitburn Hall – who themselves often entertained their child relatives, among them the famous Alice Liddell.

The writer would often entertain the younger members of the families with which he stayed by utilising his imaginative story-telling skills. He would undertake walks in the nearby woods and along the local beaches, and weave his experiences into tales and poems – ditties and yarns which would often find their way into published works such as the Alice books in later years. Hence Whitburn’s claims for its expansive beach and the roots of The Walrus and the Carpenter, and that of Jabberwocky in the local legend of the Lambton Worm.

Jabberwocky was, indeed, most probably first narrated to his little friends at Whitburn; and it is now generally accepted that The Walrus and the Carpenter was written during one of Carroll’s stays in the town, too. However, various (rather more direct) Walrus connections to the area have yet to be proved beyond doubt – the appearance of a stuffed animal at Sunderland’s Museum certainly seems to have occurred after, and not before, Carroll got lively with his imagination. There is some evidence, however, that he may have encountered such a rigid incarnation at his sister-in-law’s house, Southwick Rectory, around 1869.

There is something rather pleasing about the uncertainty, nay, daftness, of it all.

More Carroll nonsense (actually, a very eloquent piece) can be found here.