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

 

 

 

 

Skulferatu #130 - Tynemouth Priory, Tynemouth, Tyne and Wear

 

A few years ago, I was on holiday in the Netherlands and came back home on the Amsterdam to Newcastle Ferry.  In the morning, as we approached our home port, we passed the rather impressive ruins of Tynemouth Priory sitting high on the cliffs overlooking the sea.  At the time I said to myself that I’d have to come down and have a wander around them, and several years later I did just that. 

 

Tynemouth Priory, as seen from the sea

 

Tynemouth Priory, as seen from the sea

 

So, on a rain soaked and foggy morning I left Newcastle and took the Metro down to Tynemouth. A quick walk from the station and through the town took me to the craggy headland on which the ruins of the priory sit.  There, I roamed around the medieval gatehouse building, the historic ruins of the priory, through the weather worn gravestones of the graveyard and over to the Second World war gun emplacements.  Every so often the fog and mist would roll in, then I’d be lashed by rain, and then dried and scorched by the sun.  Basically, I had a day out in good old Northern weather, and yes, before anyone asks, like anyone who is from Britain I am obsessed by the weather.  But moving on …

 

The Gatehouse

 

The headland on which Tynemouth Priory sits has been inhabited on and off for a couple of thousand years.  This probably being down to the fact that it is a bit of land that was almost impregnable from attack given that it is connected to the mainland only by a narrow strip of rock, with steep cliffs on all other sides.  So, up until canon and big guns came along it was a relatively safe place to live, if not the most hospitable.  Remains of a settlement pre-dating the Roman occupation, probably from the Iron Age, have been discovered there, along with another from around the 2^nd Century.  The land, however, does not appear in the written record until the 8^th Century, when a monastic community was established there.  Their original wooden buildings were destroyed during the 9^th and 10^th Centuries, in the Viking invasions, which shows that even the safest places weren’t that safe back in the good old days. 

 

The stone ruins of Tynemouth Priory that stand there today date from the late 11^th Century and on being built were dedicated to St Oswine, with his remains kept in a shrine within the building.

 

Tynemouth Priory with Coastguard Station in background

 

Tynemouth Priory

 

View from the Priory to Gatehouse

 

Tynemouth Priory

 

Who was St Oswine you may wonder, I certainly did.  Well, in 644, on the death of King Oswald of Northumbria, the land was basically split into two with Oswine succeeding as King to an area called Deira, while a bloke called Oswiu became King of the other bit, Bernicia.  For a few years all was fine, but then Oswiu decided he wanted to rule over the whole of Northumbria so declared war on Oswine.  Oswine, being a good man who did not want any bloodshed, refused to do battle with Oswiu.  He then sought refuge with his trusted friend Humwald.  Unfortunately for Oswine, Humwald was a bit of a shit friend and betrayed him to Oswiu, who promptly had him murdered. After having Oswine killed, Oswiu was obliged by Ango Saxon tradition, being one of Oswine’s nearest relatives, to seek some sort of justice for his death.  This made things all a bit awkward, what with Oswiu being the one guilty of the murder, so, in order to even things out he splashed some cash and founded an abbey at Gilling in North Yorkshire.  There monks offered up prayers for Oswin’s soul and a cult gradually grew up around the slain king.  It was said that after his death he had carried out various miracles, and at some point he became venerated as a saint.  He is now the patron saint of those who have been betrayed, so if your girlfriend/boyfriend/non-binary other half has ever done the dirty on you, he’s the one to pray to.  Not sure what he’d do, maybe get a seagull to poo on their head or something like that.

 

 

The Priory graveyard

 

The Priory graveyard

 

Weather worn

 

A weather worn gravestone by the Priory

 

Tynemouth Priory thrived up until the Reformation in the 16^th Century, though appears not to have been the most popular posting for monks with the abbots of St Albans sending misbehaving monks there as a punishment.  One monk sent there in the 14^th Century wrote a letter complaining of the relentless noise of the sea and the seabirds, the rough sea sending many ships onto the rocks below, that the monastery was a ‘comfortless place’ and that though food was plentiful it was mainly just fish.  He did however find that the church there was of ‘wonderous beauty’.

 

Talk of food leads me on to another story, in the grounds of Tynemouth Priory stands a stone known as the Monks Stone.  It originally stood in the village of Monkseaton, but was moved to the priory in 1935.  The tale behind this stone is that long, long ago a monk from Tynemouth was paying a visit to the home of one of the noble families in the area, the Delavals.  On arriving there, he found that dinner was being prepared for the master of the house who was out hunting.  One of the dishes was a roast pig, and on seeing this the monk’s mouth began to water.  Oh, what he’d give for some delicious pork, so much tastier than the boring fish dishes he was used to at the monastery.  The monk was offered some food, but told that the pig had been specially prepared for Mr Delaval, and should therefore not be touched.  The monk didn’t listen though, and when no one was around he cut off the head of the pig, which was considered to be the tastiest part of the animal in those days, stuck it in his bag and snuck off back towards the priory.  Mr Delaval, on returning home, saw that the pig’s head was missing and flew into a rage.  He demanded to know who had taken it and on being told about the monk, he ran out of the house to chase after him.  He soon caught up with him, as the monk had only gone a short distance before he’d sat down to gobble up his ill-gotten gains.  Delaval then beat the monk up so badly that he could not even walk and had to crawl his way back to the priory.  There he was nursed back to health, but then died the following year.  It was said that his beating had not been the cause of his death, but the monks at the priory, spotting a way to get some cash out of this, charged Delaval with murder.  He was then absolved of this on the condition that he gave them a hefty chunk of the land that he owned and also that he erect a stone at the spot where he had ‘murdered’ the monk.  The stone was erected and on it was inscribed – ‘O Horor to Kill a man For a Piges head’.    

 

In 1539, stooges acting for King Henry VIII forced the Prior to surrender Tynemouth Priory and all its possessions to the king.  All the valuables were seized, and the shrine of St Oswine was broken up with his bones being removed and scattered.  However, one small part of the priory survived pretty much intact, a small chapel called the Percy Chantry.  A place I found gave welcome shelter every time the rain came in.

 

Presbytery wall & entrance into Percy Chantry

 

Once there were windows

 

Interior of the Percy Chantry

 

Detail of the Chantry roof

 

Stained glass windows in the Chantry

 

Chantry door hinge

 

The headland on which Tynemouth Priory stands was, up until the 1950s, seen as having strategic importance in guarding over the mouth of the Tyne.  It was quite heavily fortified with various buildings added for its defence.  Of these all that now remain are the Gatehouse, which was built in the 14^th Century, and various gun emplacements built up from the 19^th Century through to World War II. 

 

In the 17^th Century a lighthouse was built on the headland to guide ships into the Tyne and away from nearby rocks.  By all accounts a spectacular building, it sat there until 1898, when having become obsolete due to the construction of the piers at the entrance to the Tyne, it was demolished.

 

Illustration of Tynemouth Priory from the Antiquities of England & Wales

 

Illustration showing Tynemouth Priory and the lighthouse

 

The ruins of Tynemouth Priory

 

Weather worn wall

 

Tynemouth Lighthouse

 

At the end of my soggy trip to Tynemouth, I left the Skulferatu that accompanied me in one of the pockmarked and weathered stones in the priory wall.

 

Skulferatu #130

Skulferatu #130 in a weathered & pockmarked stone

 

Skulferatu #130 in a weathered & pockmarked stone

 

Map showing location of Skulferatu #130

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are -

 

Latitude 55.017694

Longitude -1.417866

 

what3words: trials.erase.punchy

 

I used the following sources for information on Tynemouth Priory –

The Antiquities of England and Wales, Volume 4

Francis Grose

1783

 

History of Tynemouth, its Priory & Castle, and Strangers Guide by railway or turnpike to places of interest in the vicinity of this justly celebrated bathing place

1869

 

Tynemouth Priory and Castle

Grace McCombie

2008