A1-The Great North Road
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Chester-le-Street
Margary
describes the Roman road north from Durham thus:
8ob DURHAM - NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE (I2¾~
miles)
From the old river crossing, Horse Hole Ford, the earlier road
to Chester Street followed the course of Millburngate to Framwellgate Moor,
where a turn to due north was made, and the road is straight and somewhat raised
right on through Pity Me, until, near Plawsworth, it has to bend in passing
through some hummocky country. At Chester le Street the old main
road marks the line almost due north right on to Birtley and Wrekenton.
North of
Birtlev it leaves the older road for short distances, first on the east near the
Coach and Horses Inn and then on the west near High Eighton, and here the
structure of the road has been examined. It was found to be I7 1/2
feet wide, built in three layers of 6-inch and 8-inch sandstone blocks, and with
kerbs, but it lacked small surface metalling, which may have been ploughed away.
Farther south, near the Coach and Horses Inn, where the road was Crossing
Leyburnhold Gill, it was on a causewav 26 feet wide, with a cambered mound of
gravel, 18 inches thick at the centre, laid upon the sandy subsoil without any
bottoming. Sandstone blocks had been laid upon the gravel for 6 feet on the west
side and 2 feet on the east to act kerbs.
No
traces of the road can now be seen in the open ground near Wrekenton, where an
important branch goes off north-eastward to south Shields, but it is known that
the course continued direct to the highest ground near Beacon Lough, where a
turn to west of north was made. The existing road and the High Street in
Gateshead then mark line direct to the Roman bridge, Pons Ælius, over the Tyne
to the fort upon Hadrian's Wall at Newcastle. This was the terminus of the
road, it did not continue to the north of the Wall.
That
seems rather final for our Great North Road but remember the main Roman route
went from Scotch Corner through Piercebride to Corbridge, well to the west of
the modern A1. It was, however, the end of the road for the congregation
of St Cuthbert. They fled from Lindisfarne on account of the Danish
invasion and settled at Chester in about 882 on the site of the Roman station.
Here they built a wooden church which remained until the time of Bishop Egelric
(1042-1056) who replaced it with one of stone.
Chester-le-Street saw
the first new test cricket ground for a century (June 2003) and one of the first major by-passes in
the 1930s with the Great North Road being taken east of the town but this has
been superseded by the A1(M) lying still further east. The old road, now
the A167, still passes through the delightfully named Pity Me. Just
imagine someone asking, "Where are you from?" "Pity Me,"
replies the native.
Here
is one version of the name's origin:
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The
origin of the name Pity Me is said to derive from Petit Mer, but today there is
not much sign of any water there, unless the HQ of Northumbrian Water counts!
A more attractive tale is as follows, of which I was reminded by Sallie Bassham
(somewhere in the Yorkshire Dales).
According to Bede, Cuthbert's remains were on Lindisfarne until 875AD. From then
until 995AD, the remains wandered around Durham and Northumberland (not of their
own volition).
Not according to Bede, the monks were trying to find a suitable resting place
for Cuthbert and in their journeyings stopped at XX. They were so tired that,
instead of placing the coffin gently and reverently on the ground, they
accidentally let it slip from their grasp and as the body bumped in the coffin,
a weary voice was heard to say "Pity Me, Oh Pity Me!". So the place XX
was called Pity Me from that time. Aware of Cuthbert's wearying at all this
journeying, they very soon found his new resting place - at Durham. More
of this from St.
Cuthbert's
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Pity
Me Carrs is a nature reserve just off the old Great North Road. 65
plant species have been recorded in its 8 hectares, including the strange little
Adder's-Tongue fern, Ophioglossum vulgatum. Here is a little about the ecology.
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The A1(M) crosses the River Wear near Chester-le-Street just south of
Junction 26. If one takes the A183 Sunderland road one soon crosses the
Wear again but just before the bridge there is a turning on the left which goes
over another bridge just north and downstream of the main road bridge. It
it called Chester New Bridge, or that's what it was called when it was new and
the name stuck. This takes a private road to Lambton Castle and the haunts
of a dragon known as the Lambton
Worm. Worm Hill is a little to the north of the castle.
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The
Penshaw Memorial |
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Lambton Castle was built in 1797 around the core of the earlier Harraton Hall
on the north side of the Wear. Lambton Hall, across the River Wear was
demolished about the same time. The old bridge, just off the A183 near the
A1 Junction 63, leads to the gates and nowhere else.
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This painting by Thomas Allom (1804-1872) was published as a print in 1835.
You can buy old prints like this from Richard
Nicholson
Virgin Well is a natural spring emerging from a
hillside overlooking Chester-le-Street. It's in a field opposite the lodge to
Lumley Castle on the A183 Houghton le Spring road. There's just a few stones and
a marshy patch of hillside. Maybe it was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, or
perhaps it was once a divining well where the look of the water was used by
virgins to predict their not being virgins too much longer.
Just before we leave County Durham to cross the Tyne and enter Northumberland
let us pause a moment and consider the view; and let us recall the view
described in 1835 by Oliver:
"About two miles south of Newcastle, looking to the north west, an
extensive view is obtained of the vale of the Tyne, one of the finest prospects
on the north road between London and Berwick. On the south of the river
are the woods which surround Ravensworth Castle, with the beautiful slopes of
Dunstan and Whickham, between which and the Tyne lie the low flat haughs of
Dunston and Stella, intersected with waggon ways and studded at the river side
with staithes, the blackened woodwork and red tiles of which, - so harsh to the
eye when viewed near at hand, - are softened by distance into harmony with the
rest of the landscape."
Of course views on this part of the road are now dominated by the Angel of
the North. Here's a poem.
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©Biff Vernon 2001, 2002
