A1-The Great North Road

[ Home ] [ Up ] [ Contents ] [ Tithe Farm ] [ Horse Troughs ] [ Milestones ] 

North from Doncaster

North from Doncaster the Great North Road took various routes.  The A1 is the most westerly, past Ferrybridge, Wetherby, Boroughbridge, Leeming, Scotch Corner and Darlington.  In horse-drawn days, only the Glasgow coaches went to Scotch Corner.  The Edinburgh road turned east at Dishforth for Topcliffe, Northallerton and Darlington.  Much of the traffic went via York and then either left the city through Micklegate Bar for Boroughbridge, or north through Bootham Bar for Thirsk before reaching Northallerton and Darlington.  But there were two alternative routes to York.  Just north of Ferrybridge, at Brotherton, the road divided, the eastern branch taking the traffic through Sherburn-in-Elmet and Tadcaster before reaching York from the west by Micklegate Bar while another road branched east earlier on leaving Doncaster.  This road went through Askern, Selby and Riccall, entering York from the south through Fulford and Fishergate.

Topological map of Great North Road alternatives between Doncaster and Darlington.

Ogilby, in 1675, took the Ferrybridge, Tadcaster, York, Boroughbridge, Dishforth, Topcliffe, Northallerton and Darlington road. Armstrong, in 1776, offered two alternatives; Ferrybridge, Tadcaster, York, Easingwold, Thirsk, Northallerton and Darlington and also Ferrybridge, Wetherby, Boroughbridge, Dishforth, Topcliffe, Northallerton and Darlington. Fletcher described both these roads but called the western route the Old North Road and the York branch, the Great North Road. Harper, in 1901, followed Armstrong in the west but for his York branch, while acknowledging that some of the older York coaches went through Tadcaster, preferred to describe the Selby route.  Garfoot-Gardner does the same.

Let's take the Selby road first.  It is now the A19 and runs through Askern, Eggborough, Selby, Riccall and Escrick before reaching York.

This is a strange part of the world, easily overlooked, un-heard of by most people, called the Humberhead Levels in academic circles and not called anything by the rest of the world.  The land east of the A19, between Askern and Thorne is a peculiarly pretty area, called the Meadows, of small fields bounded by old hedgerows with a lot of big trees.  It contrasts with the Thorne and Hatfield Moors, further east, an extensive area of lowland peat bog and the only English home to an endangered species, the mire pill-beetle, Curimopsis nigrita.  Here's its Species Action Plan.  This area was a vast ice-dammed lake towards the end of the Ice-Age and, despite the efforts of Vermuyden and the Dutch engineers, water still dominates the landscape; bogs and ponds, rivers and canals, are always close by.  Humberhead Levels: value in wetness is a very thorough and detailed report to the Countryside Agency about this area.  The Humber Wetland Survey: Vale of York Region and Humberhead Levels from the Centre for Wetland Archaeology at the University of Hull, also provide fascinating reading about geography and archaeology in this area.

Askern

Just south of Askern is Sutton Common, an iron age settlement, currently the object of archaeological study.  There is an open day on Sunday 3rd August 2003.

Went Bridge and its keystone.

Askern used to have a coal mine.  It still has a greyhound track.  The road runs straight, almost due north, across the floodplain of the River Went, the same Went as is crossed by the A1 and the western branch of the Great North Road at Wentbridge. The road is built up well above the flood level on a causeway with a series of fine stone bridges over rivers and streams.  The bridges have low inconspicuous parapets and most drivers will hardly notice their existence.  But stop a moment and scramble down the bank to appreciate the old masons' craft.  The bridge over the Went has curious sculptures of a man's head on the keystones.  The river, clear and swift-flowing, reminiscent of its passage through the Magnesian Limestone upstream, marks the boundary between South and North Yorkshire.  On top of the bridge is an old sandstone milestone, the lettering very faded but still showing 11 miles to Selby and 26 to York.  Up the road, the cooling towers of Eggborough power station interrupt the flat horizon.

Some of the old milestones still stand on the east side of the road, mostly in the grassy verge but the milestone at Whitely is by the garage forecourt.

North of Whitely, the road crosses the M62 on a high level roundabout.  The old road used to be just to the west and crossed the Aire and Calder Navigation before turning sharply to the north-east to run through Eggborough and rejoin the new road just before Eggborough power station.  Another milestone stands tall on a neatly mowed lawn.  It may now appear dwarfed by the cooling towers but when the age of fossil fuel is over the milestone will surely outlast the power ststion.

The road is built on a particularly substantial causeway as it approaches the River Aire, now crossed by a modern concrete bridge at Chapel Haddlesey. Another bridge takes the road over the railway where though the original road to a level crossing is still visible and then Burn Bridge takes us over the Selby Canal.

Defoe, in his A Tour of (not quite) the Whole of Britain, says; "...the country on the right or east lies low and marshy...but travelling in those parts being difficult, and sometimes dangerous, especially for strangers, we contented ourselves with having the country described for us...and with being assured that there were no towns of note, or anything to be called curious, except that they dig old fir trees out of the ground, which have lain there ever since the Deluge."  I suppose we must excuse the credulous Defoe in his acceptance of the deluge myth as being a man of his time and he did report, albeit second hand, that : "...the lands are very rich and feed good store of cattle", and that in Selby: "...some merchants live and thrive here".  Defoe did not then pursue the Selby road, he was after all travelling before the road was improved with causeways across the floodplains of the Went and Aire.  These rivers may not even have been bridged in the early 18th century.  Instead he reports: "Having found nothing in this low part of the country but a wonderful conflux of rivers, all pouring down into the Humber, we turned up into the post road...and went on for Tadcaster." 

Selby

There is a legend associated with the Pin Well at Brayton.  A serving girl thinking of her lover Robin the Bowyer and going to the well for a drink, asked the fairy of the well for an image, in a dream, of her future husband.  Brayton Braff, a nearby hill, was the dwelling place of a tribe of fairies who could not smelt their own metal and so they caused a vision to appear to the girl to attract people to wish at the well, and drop pins in to the water.  These they would use for arrow-heads. The girl awoke to find herself fairy-sized and a fairy with a staff told her that they were imbuing the water with nature so the above would happen. The fairy said or chanted 'Wish - Pin - Sleep' - 'Dream of husband'.  The girl awoke and told people of her dream and the well and the fairies kept their promise, until the local clergy exorcised the well and christened it 'Well of Our Lady'.

In 1068 Matilda, William the Conqueror's wife, gave birth to their son, the later King Henry I, here while William was busy subjugating the North.  George Washington's forbears came from Selby.  Their coat of arms, having three stars and stripes, is thought to have been the origin of the American flag.

Selby has a surprisingly magnificent church, the Abbey, surrounded by 18th century shops and houses, all clustered onto a patch of ground a few inches higher than the surrounding land.  The height difference only becomes noticeable when the River Ouse floods, leaving the Abbey and old town on an island amidst the floodwaters.   

The Ouse itself is crossed by a swing bridge, which from 1791 until 1970 was operated by hand. The left half of the bridge opens, pivoting about the triangular structures.  Parts of the old manual mechanism are fixed to the bridge house wall.

Across the swing bridge, the road runs along the Ouse past great mills that have seen more prosperous times, to a roundabout.  Here the old Great North Road is the left fork while the A19 now follows the course of the Selby-York railway to form a by-pass for Barlby.  Take the old road through the village centre; it is more interesting.  One can admire the way the village was sited on ground just above the flood level while a new housing estate on the south side has been built on more dangerous ground.  The floods of autumn 2000 made the error clear.

Harper ranted against level crossings and, as a keen cyclist would have approved the Selby-York cycle way but I am not so sure he would have appreciated the legacy of Mr. Beeching. To leave Selby for York, one must needs cross the Ouse bridge, one of those few places where tolls still survive.  Foot-passengers and cyclists are on an equality, paying a halfpenny each. Level-crossings again have their wicked will of the road, and are indeed its principal features, through Barlby and Riccall. We need some modern Rebeccaite for the abolition of these unpaid-for easements granted to the Railway Companies by an indulgent legislature; composed largely of Railway Directors, for the mingled danger and waste of public time caused by level-crossings over public roads constitute a scandal urgently in need of being removed.  Yorkshire people might be recommended to see to it, as their forefathes saw to the abolition of turnpikes, collecting in armed and disguised bands and wrecking and burning the obnoxious gates for great distances.  In May 1753 they assembled at Selby at the summons of the public crier's bell, and proceeded at midnight to demolish all the gates in that neighbourhood.  The military were called out to quell these Hampdens.  They did not succeed in saving the gates, but shot and captured a number of the "rioters," who were sent for trial to York Castle.

Looking north towards Riccall from Newgrove Farm. Trans Pennine Trail on left, A19 on the old railway, centre old Great North Road, right, Riccall Mine, behind the tree far right, Skipwith Common nature reserve, over the horizon beyond the mine.

The Trans Pennine Trail is a long distance footpath and cycle way with a strange name as it crosses the very un-Pennine like Humberhead Levels.  Coming from Thorne over the Meadows, it crosses the Aire at Snaith to meet the Great North Road at the Ouse swing bridge in Selby.  It follows the old road through Barlby and on to Riccall along the A19, though a pleasanter route here would be along the old road to the east of the new, on the road that leads to Riccall mine.

Riccall lies to the west of the main road but this is a modern by-pass, and again, like Barlby, it the A19 uses the old railway line.  Do not be deceived, by the straightness of the A19 hereabouts, into thinking that a Roman alignment is being followed.  The old Great North Road is preserved going through the village centre, making a pleasant detour especially for those in search of a pub or shop.  North of the village we are still on the old Selby-York railway but then the road swings to the north-east leaving the trackbed to the Sustrans inspired cycle path route of the Trans Pennine Way, this section opened in 1987.

The road from Riccall to York, as well as Skipwith Common, lies on glaci-fluvial deposits giving slightly higher ground between the Ouse and Derwent. 

Riccall is famous for its skeletons. They have turned up in the fields on the Ouse bank in enormous numbers.  Drs. Andrew Millard, Sam Lucy and Charlotte Roberts of Durham University Department of Archaeology studied the isotope geochemistry of some of the bones.  They concluded: At Riccall, O-isotopes showed clearly that all the burials were of first generation Scandinavian origin.  They are likely to have been the remnants of Harold Hadrada's army of Vikings, defeated at the Battle of Stamford Bridge in 1066.  Riccall was where the army had left its perhaps 300 ships and perhaps a third of the force to guard them.  The skeletons may represent this ex-force.  Harold took his first and only journey up the Great North Road for the twelve miles to York, beat the locals at the Battle of Fulford Gate on the southern outskirts of the city and did a deal with the city by which the City didn't get sacked but had to hand over some hostages and promise to support the new master.  Harold moved on the Stamford Bridge and then they were history.  Stamford Bridge was sung about in the Norse Sagas but it is Riccall that has the achaeology.

At the north end of Riccall, the old Great North Road, having wended its way through the village centre, emerges onto the A19 but continues on the opposite side, heading north-east.  It doesn't really lead anywhere except to rejoin the main road a mile further north.  But take the detour to retrace the tracks of elder days.  At Scorce Bridge the road crosses the Dam Dyke, a stream that drains the Skipwith area.  The bridge is of 18th century stonework but its parapet has been replaced with a modern brick wall, curiously incorporating a couple of the old stone blocks.  Just upstream the channel is dammed and there is a pumping station which switches itself on and off from time to time.  Flow in the Dam Dyke, therefore, alternates between stop and go.

Those old posts at Scorce Bridge are a gateway to a curious chapter in the history of the Great North Road.  The road used to run straight on but the road was diverted by Act of Parliament in 1756 to a route further west when John Carr, the York architect, extended the 17th century Escrick Hall.  The old road became a driveway to the house with the gate posts marking the southern entrance to the Escrick Park.  Even the village of Escrick was moved a little north.  Escrick was developed as an Estate Village by Sir Henry Thompson who acquired the village and the Hall in 1668.  Sir Henry’s great grandson, Beilby Thompson, inherited the Estate in 1742 and was responsible for shifting the road.  The village was extended towards York and the Church relocated from beside the Hall to its present site on the York Road (A19).  Part of this re-organization involved stopping the main village street at the gates to the Hall and creating a by-pass which has become the present day A19.  The house is now a girl's boarding school.  In 1923 Belloc wrote of privilege when he noted, ...the deflection of an old line of road by Act of Parliament in order, for instance, to add to the privacy of a park - there were not a few examples of this some generations ago.

The old  road through the village crosses a stream with a bridge built of hand made bricks.  The bridge's parapet has been rebuilt in the 19th century with the 1776 date-stone incorporated in the newer work.  A hundred yards to the west, the newer road crosses the river with a modern concrete box section culvert but the OS maps, even the 1st edition from 1851, marks a 'New Bridge'.  It did not last like the old bridge, now illuminated by a lamppost commemorating the 1937 coronation of George VI.  Further up the  street, where it is met by the post-1755 road, joining from its westerly route, stands a gloriously late Victorian fountain.  The Escrick Duck Decoy is described by York RSPB

Top

Tithe Farm Bed & Breakfast

Lincolnshire

©Biff Vernon 2002, 2003