Hell Gill Reservoir

A familiar feature for those in the know. Tucked away a few metres up from the main forest track. A much used control site in orienteering races.

This reservoir near the head of Hell Gill was built in the 1870s to supply water for Joseph Whitwell Pease’s Hutton Estate.  The mains ran first to Home Farm, then to the Hall, Pease’s private railway station, Hutton Field House, and, finally. Galley Hill Farm. Water was diverted to it via a small filter bed from ‘The Race’ on Great Ayton Moor, part of the Chaloner Estate and a scheme to capture some of the rain falling on the Esk side of the moor to supplement the supply to Chaloner’s mills in Guisborough. Hutton village, built in the late 1850s, was also owned by Pease but would have been already served by its own smaller brick lined reservoir.

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