Tag: history
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Bousdale Hill Farm
Early morning jog up Roseberry. The day before the storm — Arwen, I hear it’s been named — a character from Lord of the Rings? A farm had been established on Bousdale Hill, the long spur extending northwards by Roseberry Common, by 1868. Prior to this it would have been rough upland pasture. The farm…
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Stanah, St. John’s in the Vale and Thirlmere
A low walk before the rain set in. I’m not sure what to call this valley. Thirlmere, Thirlspot, St. John’s in the Vale? Helvellyn Gill flows down it before its confluence with St. John’s Beck, the natural outflow of Thirlmere, which lies in the Wythburn valley. It’s all very confusing, but maybe not if you’re…
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Lammerside Castle
In the Mallerstang valley overlooking the River Eden, the ruined Lammerside Castle dates from the 14th-century. It is a Peel-house, a fortified house built by a lesser landowner to protect his family, livestock, and retainers against predatory raids. Life in the Middles Ages was hazardous, particularly so in Northern England where a state of insecurity…
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Causey Arch
Prior to the late 17th-century, transportation of materials across the country was slow and difficult. Either by horse drawn carts or teams of ponies. More forward thinking industrialists were developing wagon-ways, horse-drawn first with wooden rails and rollers, then with flanged iron wheels. In the 1720s, when coal-owners were considering exploiting the coal fields below…
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Roseberry from Carr Ridge
It seems a bit of a waste. Posting a distant photo of my local hill. I had planned a wander over Urra Moor. A dull start but I could see this patch of sunlight slowly making its way over the Eston Hills. I figured sooner or later it would shine on Roseberry. I wasn’t disappointed.…
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Cod Beck Reservoir
The head of the reservoir in the Sheep Wash valley captures the low-lying November sun. Cod Beck Reservoir was opened in 1953 for the Northallerton and District Water Board, but one had actually been mooted in the 19th-century as part of a proposed scheme by the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees. In the Parliamentary session for 1869,…
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How York paid its MP’s
The autumnal colours of Kildale Wood are overpowering. Just the other day, I pulled up a page from an 1889 edition of the York Herald for a completely unrelated subject, when I noticed the headline in the next column: — HOW YORK PAID ITS M.P’s. It was just a short piece, a letter I think…
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The Tragedy of the Commons
Aireyholme was once the common pasture for the parish of Great Ayton. Parishioners had various rights on the land. Usually this would include the right right to pasture cattle, but Common Land may include other rights such as collecting wood, piscary, the right to fish and turbery, the right to cut turves of peat for…
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Westerdale Hall
Originally built as a shooting lodge by Colonel Duncombe in the “Baronial Tudor style”, sometime before 1874, between 1946 and 1992, Westerdale Hall was a youth hostel but now it is a private residence. Today, the hall is largely hidden, surrounded by mature trees, but would, in its day, have commanded good views over the…
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Scarth Wood Moor
Another one of those local tales. I was told by an Osmotherley resident a few months ago, that this gulley, about 3 metres long and a metre or so deep, was used for rifle practice by a “home guard” unit during WW1. Now I’m not sure if there was a home guard during that war.…