Skulferatu #153 - Berwick Castle, Berwick upon Tweed, Northumberland

In the mood for a wander around a ruin, I took a trip down to Berwick upon Tweed to visit the castle there.  Unlike many castles I’ve been to before, the ruins of this one are pretty easy to find as the train station is right in the middle of them.  Not that you’d really notice, as the ruined wall on the far side is the only real hint of the once grand structure that stood there.  Most people would never realise that they are passing through the great hall of a castle where some major events in the history of Scotland and England took place.  While they are sitting there waiting for their train to pull out of the station, various ghosts from the past are wandering around them, kings, noblemen and lowly peasants strutting and flitting around much like the pigeons on the station platform who bob and flap by.

 

 

Castle ruins at Berwick upon Tweed Railway Station

 

Berwick Castle was built for King David I of Scotland in the 1120s to protect the important harbour town of Berwick upon Tweed from English forces.  The castle was then used by Malcolm IV to imprison those who had fallen foul of him.  In 1175 the castle and the town were surrendered to King Henry II of England as part of a ransom after the capture of the Scottish King, William the Lion, at Alnwick Castle.  A little while later, 1189 to be exact, the castle and town were sold back to the Scots by King Richard I so that he could fund the Third Crusade.  It all stayed in Scots hands for a quite a few years, despite being ransacked in 1216 by King John I of England who had much of the population of the town tortured until they handed over their valuables to him and his men.

 

 

Berwick upon Tweed Castle by James Newton, 1790

 

 

Chateau De Berwick by Francois Alexandre Pernod, 1830

 

In 1292 King Edward I was asked to arbitrate on who should succeed to the Scottish throne following the death of the only remaining heir to Alexander III.  At the great hall in Berwick Castle, he announced that he had decided in favour of John Balliol rather than Robert the Bruce.  Edward and Balliol soon fell out though and this led in 1296 to Edward and his army capturing the castle and the town.  Edward ordered that the Scottish garrison stationed at the castle and the inhabitants of Berwick were to be slaughtered as a warning to those who rebelled against him.  It is recorded that – ‘When the town had been taken…and its citizens had submitted, Edward spared no one, whatever the age or sex, and for two days streams of blood flowed from the bodies of the slain, for in his tyrannous rage he ordered 7,500 souls of both sexes to be massacred...So that mills could be turned by the flow of their blood.’

 

 

Ruins of the tower at the White Wall, Berwick Castle

 

 

Ruins of the tower at the White Wall, Berwick Castle

 

 

Passageway through the tower

 

 

The White Wall of Berwick Castle

 

 

Castle tower by the Royal Border Bridge

 

In 1306, the Countess of Buchan, who was a close ally to Robert the Bruce and had taken part in his coronation, was captured by the English and held at Berwick Castle.  There King Edward ordered that she be ‘closely confined in an abode of stone and iron made in the shape of a cross, and let her be hung up out of doors in the open air of Berwick, that both in life and after her death, she may be a spectacle and eternal reproach to travellers.’  For four years she was imprisoned in this way before being released to the Carmelite Friars at Berwick.

 

 

LNER poster by Doris Zinkeisen - 1930

 

In 1318 the castle and town were recaptured for the Scots by Robert the Bruce and were held for a few years before falling again to the English.  And so, it went on and on until finally in 1482 they were taken for the final time by Richard, Duke of Gloucester (later King Richard III) for the English King, Henry VI.

 

 

The ruins of Berwick Castle

 

 

The ruins of Berwick Castle

 

 

Ruins of the Barmekin Tower at Berwick Castle

 

 

Ruins of the Barmekin Tower at Berwick Castle

 

 

Stone walls in the sunshine

 

 

A window in the walls

 

 

The jagged remains of Berwick Castle

 

Under Queen Elisabeth I, ramparts were built around the town of Berwick, and the castle became somewhat redundant.  It quickly fell into disrepair and in 1603 after the Union of Crowns when King James VI of Scotland also became King of England, the castle was sold to the Earl of Dunbar.  He demolished part of it to make way for a grand house for himself, but he died before the project could be completed.  A lot of the stone from the castle was then taken and reused in the construction of various other buildings. 

 

In 1847 the great hall of the castle was demolished to make way for the railway station that now stands there, and all that remains now are a few walls and ruined towers.

 

After taking a wander round and through the ruins of the castle, I left a Skulferatu in a gap in the stones of the White Wall.

 

 

Skulferatu #153

 

 

View along the white wall to the tower

 

 

Skulferatu #153 in a gap in the White Wall

 

 

Skulferatu #153 in a gap in the White Wall

 

 

Map showing location of Skulferatu #153

 

The coordinates for the Skulferatu are -

 

Latitude 55.773434

Longitude -2.013114

 

what3words: power.stocks.gent

 

I used the following sources for information on Berwick Castle -

 

The Antiquities of Scotland

Francis Grose

1797

 

English Heritage – Berwick upon Tweed Castle and Ramparts

 

 

Skulferatu #151 - Southern Lower Promenade, Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear

I am of an age where I can remember the fading glory of seaside towns.  The children’s parks and paddling pools, the outdoor swimming pools and the dodgy amusement arcades.  As a kid in the seventies, my family spent some holidays near and around these towns.  Holidays in rented caravans in parks near the sea where it seemed to rain for much of the time.  No wonder everyone else was buggering off on cheap holidays to Spain.  Though, like most kids, we didn’t care.  We paddled in the slightly scummy water in concrete paddling pools near the beach and we built sandcastles in the rain.  Went for picnics in the howling wind and ate our sand blasted egg sandwiches.  Washing away the grit in our mouths with bottles of lemonade – carefully wiping away the damp sand from around the top first before taking a swig of lukewarm fizziness.  We loved it. 

 

 

Postcard showing the Lower Promenade in its heyday

 

While wandering around Whitley Bay I came across the remnants of one of these faded glories down on the lower promenade.  There I stumbled over the remains of the children’s paddling pool.  Blue edged concrete with a faded aqua blue pool and a puddle of stagnant water sitting in the middle.  Oh, how it brought back memories of those holidays from long ago.  Traipsing around I found that much of the promenade had been covered with a layer of tarmac.  This was now disintegrating to reveal the old slabs laid in patterns that would have once given a jolly holiday feeling to the place.

 

 

A view over the Lower Promenade

 

 

The paddling pool

 

The Southern Lower Promenade was once a popular spot.  Built in 1926 along with the sea wall, it had, as well as the paddling pool, crazy golf, a sand pit and lots of stalls selling various things.  Part of the promenade was also transformed into gardens with grassed area, paths, staircases and seating.  It remained popular up until the 1980s when it was closed by the council, who deeming it unhygienic, covered a lot of it up in the crumbling tarmac that still defaces it today.

 

 

Old slabs revealed

 

 

Concrete and blue

 

 

The paddling pool

 

 

A view over the Southern Promenade

 

Though now rather an ugly, disfigured spot it seemed popular enough as I walked around, though mainly with people coming to stand by the railings of the sea wall and dodge the huge spraying waves.  I took a turn at this game as well until looking out at one wave coming in, I got soaked by the spray of another that had sneaked up upon me.  So, deciding to cut my losses I cut back along the cliffs sloping down to the promenade and there I left a Skulferatu in a gap in the rocks there.

 

 

Skulferatu #151

 

 

Skulferatu #151 in a gap in the rocks

 

 

Skulferatu #151 in a gap in the rocks

 

 

Map showing location of Skulferatu #151

 

The coordinates for the Skulferatu are -

 

Latitude 55.042111

Longitude -1.436511

 

what3words: organs.magma.books

 

I used the following sources for information on the Southern Lower Promenade –

 

Rockliffe Remembers – Southern Lower Promenade

 

 

Skulferatu #150 - Curry's Point, Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear

While out walking along the coast from Whitley Bay heading towards Hartley, I came to a pleasant spot on the headland that looked out towards the causeway leading to St Mary’s Island and the lighthouse there.  This little promontory is known as Curry’s Point and is named after a rather gruesome landmark that once stood there – a gibbet, from which hung in chains, the rotting corpse of a man called Michael Curry.  Back in the good old days this sort of thing was seen as being a way to deter crime, get up to no good and you too could be executed and then hung up for all to see while the crows pecked the flesh from your bones.

 

 

Memorial to Michael Curry at Curry’s Point

 

 

Memorial plaque to Michael Curry

 

So, you may wonder who was Michael Curry and what was the crime he committed that merited this horrible treatment?  Well Michael, in his own words, was a ‘laborious, honest man’ who ‘had the grace to keep the Sabbath Day holy’, though he did admit to enjoying a drink and having a bit of a potty mouth.  Michael worked in a physically demanding job digging some of the numerous bell pits around the North East of England.  These pits were a way of mining coal from seams near the surface.  A shaft was sunk down to reach the coal, and as it was dug out and removed the pit formed a bell shape.  These bell pits tended to collapse after a while, so when they did another one would usually be dug nearby and mined until it too collapsed, and so on and so on…. This job probably meant that Michael would travel where the work took him and then take up lodgings nearby.

 

Sometime before December 1738, Michael took up lodgings in Hartley at the Three Horseshoes Inn, an establishment run by Robert Shevill and his wife Isabel.  Not long after arriving there, Michael and Isabel began a hot, steamy affair with Michael sneaking into Isabel’s bedroom while her husband Robert slept soundly in his.  This bonk fest didn’t go unnoticed for long though, as one night Robert woke to some strange noises and upon investigating found Michael naked in Isabel’s room.  Demanding an explanation, he was told by Michael that he had just been looking for a drink of water.  Robert pointed out that the water was downstairs, and Michael mumbled some apologies and left the room.  The next morning Robert, who had a deep suspicion of what had been going on between Michael and Isabel, demanded that Michael leave the Inn immediately.  And that is where it could have all ended, but it didn’t.  Isabel was having none of this and told Michael he could stay, and so he did.  It seems that Robert then just had to accept this, which suggests he was either frightened of his wife or Michael, or maybe even both.  Days went by and Michael was still at the Inn.  Robert became increasingly worried by this and when Michael’s father came to visit, Robert told him that he wanted his son to leave.  This appeared to have some effect, as shortly after the visit Michael left and presumably took up lodgings elsewhere.

 

All was well for a few days, but then on Thursday, 11 January 1739, Michael returned to the Inn for one last time.  The Three Horseshoes was locked up for the night and all were supposedly asleep in bed when someone unlocked the door and let Michael in.  Probably Isabel sneaking him in for a bit of rumpy pumpy.  Michael however was not in the mood for a bonk, he had murder on his mind and taking a razor from a cupboard he made his way up to Robert’s room.  There he woke him up with a few punches and kicks before slashing his throat with the razor.  Robert, bleeding heavily managed to escape and made his way to a neighbour’s house.  There, virtually unable to speak, he wrote on a piece of paper what had happened and who had attacked him.  Later that morning, Michael was found sleeping at his father’s home and blood-stained clothing belonging to him was found drying by the fire in the house.  He was then taken to the Three Horseshoes Inn where a bedbound Robert, who in the presence of all gathered there, pointed at Michael and declared that he had cut his throat.  Michael denied this but was carted away and locked up.  A few days later Robert died from his injuries.

 

In August 1739, the trial of Michael took place.  Originally Isabel had also been indicted for aiding and abetting Michael in the murder, but these charges were dropped before the trial began.  Michael was found guilty of the charge of murder and sentenced to be hanged at Newcastle with his body to be then taken and hung in chains near Hartley.  Shortly before his execution Michael admitted that he had indeed murdered Robert but said that Isabel played no part and had not helped or encouraged him in attacking her husband.  Whether this was true or he was just being a gentleman and getting her off the hook, who knows?

 

On Tuesday 4^th September 1739, Michael Curry was executed by the West Gate in Newcastle and was said to have ‘behaved well under his unhappy circumstances.’  His body was then cut down and transported to the coast by Hartley where it was hung in chains from a gibbet.  And just in case any of his friends or family were tempted to remove his corpse and give it a decent burial the local paper gave the following warning –

 

 

Newcastle Courant – Saturday 8^th September 1739

 

That then was the end of Michael Curry, but not the end of my wanderings.  Just across from Curry’s Point is the causeway that leads to St Mary’s Lighthouse, and that was where I headed off to next.

 

 

View from Curry’s Point to St Mary’s Lighthouse

 

 

Causeway to St Mary’s Lighthouse

 

 

St Mary’s Lighthouse

 

 

View of St Mary’s Lighthouse

 

I’ve always liked lighthouses and have harboured a fantasy of being a lighthouse keeper, even though I don’t think there is such a thing anymore.  And anyway, with my dodgy knees and dicky heart, the constant climb up and down the stairs would probably cripple or kill me.  Thankfully I managed the ascent up with no mishaps and was rewarded with a view out over the coast and the sea.

 

 

Stairwell up the lighthouse

 

 

Lighthouse lantern

 

St Mary’s Lighthouse was built in 1998 by the John Miller Company of Tynemouth and replaced an earlier lighthouse that had stood there.  Its light warned ships of the dangers of the nearby rocks right up until 1984 when it was decommissioned.

 

 

 360 view inside the Lantern Room of the Lighthouse

 

After taking in the views from the lighthouse and watching the colony of seals sunbathing on the rocks, I made my way back over the causeway.  Cutting back over Curry’s Point, I left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me on a small ledge on the memorial stone.

 

 

Skulferatu #150

 

 

Skulferatu #150 on ledge of memorial stone

 

 

Map showing location of Skulferatu #150

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are -

 

Latitude 55.069467

Longitude -1.452236

 

what3words: meant.slower.drums

 

I used the following sources for information on Curry’s Point –

 

Newcastle Courant

Saturday 13^th January 1739

 

Newcastle Courant

Saturday 8^th September 1739

 

The Gallows Tree

Crime and Punishment in the Eighteenth Century

Northumberland and Berwick-upon-Tweed

Barry Redfern

2013

 

Tourist Info at St Mary’s Lighthouse

 

Skulferatu #149 - Sewer Lamps, Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear

Arriving in Whitley Bay for a few days away, I made my way down to the sea front and the hotel I was staying in.  After booking in, having a quick cup of tea and spending a few minutes staring out from the window of my room at a rough and booming winter sea, I went for a wander.

 

Outside, I admired the large bronze sandcastles while the wind licked my face with salt and the waves crashed against the shore.  From the promenade railings Seagulls stared out forlornly to sea while a flock of starlings swirled in the sky like a little hyperactive cloud.  A hungry little cloud that every so often swept down to crowd around anyone who sat down on one of the benches or who stopped to look out to the sea.  Once in a while they got lucky and scraps of a sandwich or a burger bun were tossed to them and would bounce up between a hundred squawking hungry beaks before being downed in a crumble of crumbs.

 

 

Winter sea

 

 

Bronze sandcastles

 

Cutting up from the promenade and onto Marine Avenue I came to one of the objects I had been wanting to have a look at – an old iron, late Victorian lamppost.  Nothing that special you may think, just a rather ancient and ornate bit of street lighting, but there you would be wrong.  This was no ordinary lamppost, but rather an old sewer lamp. This, and the other two surviving sewer lamps in Whitley Bay are part of the sewer system from the days of old when raw sewage went straight out into the sea.  The days when after arriving at your seaside holiday destination you could pop to the toilet and empty your travel weary bowels in the evening, then go for a bracing swim in the sea in the morning and watch your turds float past you. Ah, those good old days when men were men and Typhoid was rife.

 

 

Sewer lamp on Marine Avenue

 

Heading down from this lamp I found the next of the three sewer lamps just off the Links, standing proud next to a large street sign.

 

 

Sewer lamp by the Links

 

A bit further along and I came to the last of the lamps by the Promenade where it stood with a great view out to sea.  These lamps were once part of a group of seventeen that stood in the Whitley Bay and Monkseaton areas.  These, and lamps like them, were designed by Joseph Webb in the 1890s as ‘sewer gas destructor lamps’ and at one time were installed all over England.  They were a vital part of the old sewer systems, which were poorly vented allowing the build-up of explosive gases such as methane.  However, these lamps didn’t just vent the sewer system, they also burned off the sewer gases.  They were lit from the local gas supply and had three mantles that created an intense heat within the hood of the lamp, this then drew off the gas from the sewer so that it was harmlessly burned away rather than building up.  Clever stuff.

 

 

Sewer lamp at the Promenade

 

Now the remaining lamps are redundant and really just not much more than street ornaments, historical curiosities and roosting places for starlings.

 

 

Starlings on the sewer lamp

 

 

A place to rest and watch the world go by

 

 

A murmuration of starlings

 

In the railings by the Promenade sewer lamp, I left a Skulferatu as a thousand hungry starlings gathered around and gabbled noisily at me. Then, just as quickly as they had gathered, they flew off and zoomed over and around an old man who had sat down on one of the nearby benches.

 

 

Skulferatu #149

 

 

Skulferatu #149 in the railings by the sewer lamp

 

 

Map showing location of Skulferatu #149

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are –

 

Latitude 55.048014

Longitude -1.446351

 

what3words: nature.nature.feared

 

I used the following sources for information on the Sewer Lamps –

 

Historic England – Sewer Gas Lamp, Whitley Bay