Hareshaw Linn: The Waterfall That Forgot Its Past

Standing here at the foot of Hareshaw Linn, I would swear nothing had ever disturbed this place. Dripping rock. Ancient ferns. A waterfall cascading thirty feet into a rust-brown pool. It feels, as one writer put it, like “an ancient rainforest.“¹“Day Out: Hareshaw Linn, Bellingham, Northumberland.” Countryfile.com, 25 Jan. 2022, https://www.countryfile.com/go-outdoors/days-out/hareshaw-linn-bellingham-northumberland. Accessed 24 Apr. 2026.

It is not. Not even slightly. As we discovered from the information board at the foot of the gorge.

Less than two centuries ago, this quiet Northumberland gorge was a full-scale industrial site. In 1833, Messrs Bigge and Partners built what amounted to a small town’s worth of heavy machinery here: two blast furnaces, seventy coke ovens, and twenty-four roasting kilns, all grinding away at once.²“Hareshaw Linn.” Northumberland National Park Authority, https://www.northumberlandnationalpark.org.uk/discover-explore/places-to-visit/north-tyne-redesdale/hareshaw-linn/. Accessed 24 Apr. 2026. The scale of it is almost comic in hindsight.

The iron they made was good. The problem was getting it anywhere. Transport by cart to Hexham was ruinously slow and expensive.³“Hareshaw Linn.” AA RatedTrips.com, 19 Mar. 2021, https://www.ratedtrips.com/walks/northumberland/hareshaw-linn. Accessed 24 Apr. 2026. The ironworks closed in 1848. The railway that might have saved everything arrived thirteen years later. Thirteen years. The margin between triumph and total collapse.

By 1858 the plant was auctioned off and the buildings knocked down.

Nature moved back in quietly and thoroughly. Today, barely a brick remains above ground.

• 1
  “Day Out: Hareshaw Linn, Bellingham, Northumberland.” Countryfile.com, 25 Jan. 2022, https://www.countryfile.com/go-outdoors/days-out/hareshaw-linn-bellingham-northumberland. Accessed 24 Apr. 2026.
• 2
  “Hareshaw Linn.” Northumberland National Park Authority, https://www.northumberlandnationalpark.org.uk/discover-explore/places-to-visit/north-tyne-redesdale/hareshaw-linn/. Accessed 24 Apr. 2026.
• 3
  “Hareshaw Linn.” AA RatedTrips.com, 19 Mar. 2021, https://www.ratedtrips.com/walks/northumberland/hareshaw-linn. Accessed 24 Apr. 2026.