Cockfield Fell (NZ120250)

Hooked around the northern reaches of the village of Cockfield, Co.Durham, are large expanses of open and largely redundant common land. It is not the prettiest place on the planet, nor is it, you would have thought, the most obvious haven of historical interest. But, whilst you may not want to take your family a-picnicking on the low-lying hills of Cockfield Fell, you may be surprised to learn that hereabouts forms one of the most important sites in the region when it comes to industrial heritage. And it is, in fact, the largest Scheduled Ancient Monument in England.

At 350 hectares (that’s 850+ acres in old money), Cockfield Fell has been described as “one of the most important early industrial landscapes in Britain”. There are traces of human activity here (in the shape of flint arrowheads) stretching back 10,000 years; and there is clear evidence of pre-Roman occupation, too, by way of at least four Iron Age settlement enclosures. A rectangular-shaped earthwork may, it is thought, be Roman; and there are plenty of Medieval remains to be found, too (field systems, quarrying, etc.).

Most interestingly, though, documents name Cockfield Fell as one of the earliest (the earliest?) known sites in the North-East for coal mining – the Bishop of Durham having issued a licence for such activity in 1303 – and a proper colliery was established in 1375 by William Vavasour. Consequently, a good deal of waste soon built up on the fell; and the general mess was greatly added to when whinstone quarries were subsequently dug around and about. The railways also made their mark, primarily with the Bishop Auckland-Barnard Castle line which once swept across the fell (1862-1962). In 1869 the moorland became a ‘regulated pasture’, which effectively turned it into a grazing area.

Its pock-marked appearance is clear to see on aerial photographs and satellite images. And it has been thus for many, many centuries – which probably explains why it was never enclosed during the 18^th and 19^th centuries. Its unusual look and protected status thus gives this corner of the North-East a somewhat mysterious and eerie air, providing the curious visitor with a thirst for more information. If ever there was a place ripe for further archaeological examination it is Cockfield Fell…

Winston Bridge (NZ142162)

© Copyright Hugh Mortimer and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

Winston Bridge straddles the River Tees at a point which may once have been bridged by the Romans. There was certainly a medieval bridge dating from around 1424, though the current effort was thrown up in the 1760s.

It is a rather special structure in that at the time of its erection it was the largest single-span stone bridge in England – and most probably, in fact, the whole of Europe. It was the work of amateur architect, Sir Thomas Robinson, and measures some 112ft (34m). Impressively, it was one of a handful of bridges on the Tees to survive the Great Flood of 1771.

It is built from hard blue ragstone – which means that the material, astonishingly, came from Kent – though even this robust old structure has recently been strengthened by the addition of iron bolts (which can be clearly discerned in the picture above). It once played a crucial role in the transportation of coal from Durham to Yorkshire, but the rise of the railways soon put pay to that. Still, though, it rose to fame again as recently as 1988 when a Spitfire was flown through its airy expanse for the TV war drama A Piece of Cake – an impressive piece of footage which was then reused in the even more recent Foyle’s War.

Brick Train, Darlington (NZ325143)

© Copyright Dr Brian Lynch and licensed for 

reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

For a sculpture with a difference, you can do little better than the splendid full-size brick effort at the side of the A66 to the east of Darlington. It is called simply ‘Train’, and was built to the designs of David Mach in 1997.

It was, of course, commissioned in celebration of the town’s rich railway heritage, and represents a Mallard-type locomotive travelling at full pelt, with steam billowing from its funnel. It appears also to be emerging from the hillside as if leaving a tunnel. The landmark can be viewed from any angle – including above, thanks to a specially-built platform, from where you can cast your eyes over its 185,000 bricks. It is 23ft high and 130ft long, and took a team of 34 men five months to build. It was funded from several sources, including the National Lottery and Morrisons supermarket, and was unveiled by Lord Palumbo of Walbrook.

In case you don’t really like it and are wondering, well, it cost around £760,000. But it does contain time capsules from local schoolchildren and, curiously, special ‘bat bricks’ to encourage wildlife to make use of its hollow interior.

Barclays & Backhouses (NZ288146)

Barclays Bank, Darlington

© Karenjc and licensed under the
 Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported 
license (see here).

Quakers have played a very important role in the history of Darlington and its environs – and at a time when they were barred from political life, universities, the judiciary and a whole host of other roles in society. Being forced into their own businesses, they often found themselves acting as our bankers, financiers and industrialists – with startling results.

One such tale is the rise of the mighty Barclays Bank, which can trace a substantial portion of its roots to the town of Darlington. James Backhouse, a wealthy Quaker flax dresser and linen manufacturer, set up Backhouse’s Bank in the town in 1774 – originally as a sideline to his main business (from the 1750s), then subsequently as an entity in its own right. As the Industrial Revolution took hold in the years following this bold move, the institution grew, too – essentially bankrolling the growth of the railways and related industries of the area (most notably financing the Stockton & Darlington Railway).

James’s sons, Jonathan and James Jnr, helped and then succeeded their father; and in turn Jonathan’s son (another Jonathan) took over. The next generation (Edmund) took things even further; to be followed by his son, Sir Jonathan Backhouse – under whose guidance the bank merged with Gurney’s Bank of Norwich and the existing Barclays of London in 1896 to form the nationwide monster that we now know as Barclays Bank. At the time of the merger of these institutions – all of them Quaker-run – there were 20 Backhouse branches across the region, and this northern powerhouse was one of the lead banks in the amalgamation.

Interestingly, the Backhouse and Barclay families even intermarried. Alfred Backhouse, who for a time ran the HQ of the Backhouse empire from what is now the Barclays Bank building in High Row, Darlington, married Rachel Barclay in 1851. The couple, who were extremely wealthy, were pioneers of public health, helping to establish two hospitals in the town. Similarly, Alfred’s nephew, James Edward, also married into the Barclay family.

Many of the above named individuals are buried in the Quaker (Friends) Burial Ground in the town.

Shildon: Trains for the World (NZ233257)

If Shildon is known for anything it is its contribution to the history of the railways. If you’re not sure what I mean, then look it up. We’re talking about the 1820s and 30s here, of course – the very earliest days of the industry proper, when a certain Mr Timothy Hackworth was the main man in these parts. I’m sure you’ll have heard of him.

You may also have heard of the Stockton & Darlington Railway, which hosted the very first passenger steam railway journey on 27^th September 1825. The workshops for this company (the Soho Works) were at Shildon, and it was Hackworth who was very much the man in charge at this famous establishment.

The North-East of England didn’t only give railways to the UK, of course, but it gave them, in turn, to the world. There are many examples of this proud boast, but two notable cases (at least) are linked directly with the Shildon plant. For both Russia and Canada have this modest County Durham town to thank for the founding of their rail networks.

Russia came knocking in 1835 when they needed a steam locomotive to make their very first railway line, from St.Petersburg to Tsarskoye Selo, viable. It was built to the standard designs of the day, then, remarkably, Hackworth put his sixteen-year-old son, John, in charge of operations. And, despite the huge logistical problems of transporting a loco 1,600 miles across land and sea and getting the engine up and running, the young man completed the task successfully. By the late summer of 1836, with the engine fully operative, the youngster was being praised from all quarters, including a very pleased Tsar Nicholas I.

The General Mining Association of Nova Scotia, Canada, then came along in 1838, and placed an order for three engines. These were the first contraptions of their kind to run in British North America, being shipped out in the spring of 1839. The very first loco was named Samson, and ran from its inaugural journey in the autumn of 1839 until 1882 – and it still survives to this day. Amazingly, its driver throughout its working life was a Shildon employee of Timothy Hackworth’s, George Davidson, who emigrated to Nova Scotia with the engine. 

The Samson, pictured above in days of old together with its very first passenger coach, is now on display at the Nova Scotia Museum of Industry. It is one of only three surviving locomotives designed by the great Timothy Hackworth (the others being Derwent and Sans Pareil).

Thomas Tredgold, Civil Engineer (NZ233401)

Born in Brandon, Co.Durham, in 1788, Thomas Tredgold was to become an unlikely hero of American history. Though he spent his early years as an apprentice cabinet-maker, by his death in 1829 he had established himself as a leading thinker and exponent in the field of civil engineering; and, thanks to his writings, his ideas and principles influenced many like-minded individuals for decades after his demise. Most notably, his theories held great sway in the early days of railroad construction across North America – which in itself is quite a legacy.

His road to the top was somewhat circuitous. He went from his apprenticeship days to journeyman carpenter in Scotland. Eventually, he found himself working in London for his uncle, William Atkinson the architect, during which time he studied architecture (of course), mathematics and engineering – much of it in his spare time. But from around 1820 he began writing in earnest – and on the topics he knew and loved so well: the principles of carpentry, the properties of materials and, essentially, the science of building.

From 1823, Tredgold became a full-time writer; and during 1825-27 came three important works on the mechanics of that brand new mode of transport: the railways. His final book, The Steam Engine published two years before his death in 1827, was perhaps his most famous, and was reprinted several times in the ensuing decades. Both this and his Practical Treatise on Railroads & Carriages (1825), were pounced upon by American railroad developers of the era as North American pioneers swept into the open spaces of the New World. Many of his recommendations were adopted on an industrial scale, propelling the Brandon boy to an unlikely form of celebrity.

Tredgold’s definition of civil engineering contained the memorable phrase “[civil engineering is] the art of directing the great sources of power in Nature for the use and convenience of man…”. Needless to say, he was an early member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, and was its president for a time.

  

Tragically, he died in London in 1829 aged only 40. It was said that his early demise was due to his general ill health following his years of dedicated study, during which he denied himself proper rest and sleep.

Stephenson’s Cottage (NZ127651)

© Copyright Ken Brown and licensed for reuse 

under this Creative Commons Licence.

On a quiet byway on the north bank of the River Tyne a few hundred yards east of Wylam, lies a lucky survival of North-East history. For, sitting sedately on a former waggonway out of the reach of motorised vehicles, can be found a modest cottage whose claim to fame is that it is the birthplace and childhood home of the ‘Father of the Railways’, George Stephenson.

It is nothing much to look at, made to seem all the more modest due to the fact that four families lived here at the time of the famous man’s birth – each crammed into a small apartment in the tiny two-storey abode. Humble beginnings indeed for the the little chap with the big future, who entered this world on 9^th June 1781.

At the time of his birth, railways, of course, did not exist. But waggonways did, and young George must have been used to the horse-drawn affairs rumbling slowly past his window. In later years much larger and noisier items would have trundled before the family home – though George, by this time, was long gone, of course. Interesting, though, that it was largely due to his own efforts that the transformation was made possible…

We are told in an 1857 account that… The lower room in the west end of this house was the home of the Stephenson family, and there George Stephenson was born, the second of a family of six children ... The apartment is now, what it was then, an ordinary labourer’s dwelling; its walls are unplastered, its floor is of clay, and the bare rafters are exposed overhead.

Bizarrely, the cottage is now painted white. Until around the turn of the millennium it bore its original bare stone walls. Institutionalised vandalism?

The Bowes Railway (NZ285589)

Many people don’t realise it, but the width of railway tracks around the world vary. The distance between the inside edges of the rails of any railway track is called the ‘gauge’, and the gap in the UK (and across most of the world) is 4ft 8 ½ in, or 1,435mm. It is called the Stephenson Gauge, after the famous George.

The Bowes Railway Museum near Springwell, Gateshead, has preserved amongst its many bits and pieces, stretches of this Stephenson Gauge – which, amazingly, date back to 1826. It is, in fact, the only surviving operational Stephenson Gauge cable railway system in the world.

The small site maintained by the museum is only a part of the bigger whole – this being the complex operation of getting coal from the Durham pits to the River Tyne. This particular stretch of cable railway hauled wagons up from Black Fell (just north of Birtley) to what we now know as the heights of Eighton Banks (Blackham’s Hill), then down again to Springwell village. The ‘hauler house’ controlled both ascents/descents from the highest point at Blackham’s Hill, and used rope to move the equipment in question.

The network around Springwell came to be called the Bowes Railway after prominent local mineowner John Bowes. Construction commenced in 1826 and continued in fits and starts until the 1850s. Incredibly, it continued working, essentially unchanged, until 1974 – testimony to the efficiency of the system. The present hauler uses electric power instead of steam, and the wagons were originally of the distinctive ‘chaldrons’ variety, but wooden and steel wagons eventually took over.

The present-day museum includes resident steam and diesel locos, a historic wagon collection, mining displays, an underground loco collection, as well as engineering workshops. Guided tours and special ‘operating days’ can also be enjoyed.

There’s a nice description, map and pics here. The whole railway, including the buildings, machinery and rolling stock, is now a Scheduled Ancient Monument.

Why not come along to...

The National Family History Fair

NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE

Saturday 7th September 2013

Durham City’s First Railway Station (NZ288408)

One’s arrival at Durham City’s present-day railway station, high to the north-west of the tight little conurbation, gives the lucky participant one of the finest views of the East Coast Main Line: the stunning vista that is Durham and its mighty Norman Cathedral. If ever there was an excuse to dismount and get out the camera, then surely this is it.

But Durham’s county town was not an easy place to reach by rail due to the awkward topography thereabouts. Following the birth of the railways in the North-East in 1825, the rail network spread rapidly throughout the region; but the task of linking County Durham’s two main towns, Sunderland and Durham, was easier said than done.

Shincliffe Village, a little to the south-east of Durham City – and very much outside the city boundary – was the unlikely setting of the very first railway station to serve the county’s ‘capital’. Moving coal from pit to port was the primarily use of the burgeoning rail network, of course, and one such line was thrown across the countryside from Sunderland to the pits and collieries to the south of Durham City at an early stage. This line passed through Shincliffe – the nearest it crept to the county town – so a decision was made to upgrade the line for passenger use as far as the little village. A brand new station was therefore built there to accommodate the travellers, and it opened on 28^th July 1839.

The village of Shincliffe had been served by a bridge over the Wear (which leads to Durham) for many, many centuries – possibly as far back as the Romans. A new structure had been thrown up as recently as 1824, so it was no doubt considered an easy enough two mile trip into town from this point – at least by the standards of the time. Needless to say, though, as people’s expectation grew, so easier access was sought, and a succession of new lines and stations eventually rendered Shincliffe Village Station redundant – though it hung on until 1893. Traces of it still remain in the village, apparently.

Teesside’s Sailing Coaches (NZ452183)

During 1845-6, ex-sailor, Joseph Taylor, struck upon the idea of using sails as a means of propulsion for railway carriages. 

Taylor ran a provisions shop in Middlesbrough near to the town’s first railway station.  In the absence of a Sunday rail service, he used to harness a horse to a railway carriage and haul his family to their place of worship – the Society of Friends Chapel – down the line to South Stockton (the northern end of the modern-day Thornaby), a distance of four miles. 

However, when the climatic conditions allowed, he was seen to dispose of the horse and affix a mast and lug sail to the carriage and glide gracefully into South Stockton at a brisk eight knots an hour.

[adapted from an article which appeared in The Monthly Chronicle of North-Country Lore & Legend of August 1891]

Remember, if you'd like to submit a short article for the 'North-East History Tour' then see the link at the top of the page. Anyone can do it!

Important Pub Meet (NZ419128)

© Copyright Pauline Eccles and licensed for 

reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

The little silver plaque betwixt window and entrance says it all:

S.&.D.R.

In the commercial room of this

hotel, on the

12^th Day of February, 1820

was held the

Promoters’ Meeting

of the

Stockton & Darlington

Railway –

The first public railway in the world.

Thomas Meynell, esq., of Yarm, presided.

Strangely enough, though, it wasn’t the first meeting of the railway pioneers for the construction of the famous S&DR – but it was the one from which the third, and successful, plan emerged which would eventually be approved by Parliament in April the following year.

Bedlington’s Place in Railway History (NZ276820)

The history of Bedlington Iron & Engine Works is a complex, detailed – if surprisingly short – one. However, it played an absolutely crucial role in the development of the railways. Sited on the tidal limit of the River Blyth, either side of Furnace Bridge, they were at the very forefront of the Industrial Revolution here in the North-East.

Ironworking probably began in this little rural corner of the region in the 1730s. Its progress was somewhat chequered, however, and it was not until Biddulph, Gordon and Co. took over the enterprise in the early nineteenth century that things really began to take off. The company ran the site for fifty years as the ‘Bedlington Iron & Engine Works’, exploiting the existent facilities to maximum effect with the dawning of the age of steam.

It was the invention (and patenting) of cleverly-designed malleable rails for the railways in 1820 at Bedlington by John Birkenshaw which brought the works into the limelight. This development – and the process by which they could be manufactured cheaply and in high quantities – enabled the laying of long lengths of rail, and greatly facilitated the birth and expansion of the new industry in the 1830s and 40s.

In the 1850s, rail production and forgings were at their peak as the Crimean War effort was in full swing. Additionally, between 1837 and 1852, around 150 steam engines were manufactured – including many for George Stephenson. However, it wasn’t to last. Competition from the likes of Middlesbrough forced the works out of the market in 1867, remnants of the site falling into gradual decay until the plot was cleared in 1959. Virtually nothing of this important piece of North-East history remains visible today.

For more information see here.