Possible Roman Navigation Features at The Mouth of The River Tyne

By William Trow

16th July 2021.

Summary

The following text explains my idea, from evidence found, how the Romans could have created a permanent high tide allowing navigation up to Newburn or Wylam at all times.

South Shields

The Roman fort, Arbeia, at South Shields is situated on the Lawe Top overlooking the mouth of the River Tyne at a level of 75ft (22.9m) above datum. The following description of the area is taken from; The Borough of South Shields: From the Earliest Period to the Close of the Nineteenth Century; George B Hodgson, 1903.

“There is reason to believe that the Tyne at one time entered the sea by three mouths : the first, or southern channel, diverging from the main stream at the creek now known as the Mill Dam, and following the depression still plainly traceable to the south of St. Hild’s Church, and seaward through Waterloo Vale, debouching into the ocean about where the road between the Marine Parks now runs ; the second, the present channel through the Narrows ; and the third following the depression between Tynemouth and Collingwood’s monument, discharging at Prior’s Haven. Upon this theory the ancient Lawe — that portion of the modem town roughly represented by the Shields and Beacon Wards of the Municipal Borough — would originally be an island,^ separated from the mainland by the more southerly of the three channels. The oldest existing map of the district, of the time of Henry viii.,* preserved among the Cottonian Mss. in the British Museum, shows this channel with a triangular-shaped island between it and the main stream, and although the island is shown too far to the north and west on the map, it probably represents what is now Shields Heugh. Confirmatory evidence of this theory was unearthed little over sixty years ago in the shape of the blackened remains of a large vessel, which were found at considerable depth in this old channel, embedded in sea sand mixed with shells.^ The eastward end of this channel appears to have been gradually choked and converted into a morass, but in Fryer’s map, published only a century and a quarter ago (1773), the tide is shown as flowing up the gut from the Mill Dam as high as the Sunderland Road, as it was then called, now Fowler Street.”

So it is presumed the Mill Dam Creek flowed down the present Ocean Road and the land containing the fort became an island. WHD Longstaffe, in his 1850 ‘Map to Elucidate the History of the County of Durham and Sadberg Before the Conquest’ appeared to agree with this.

Longstaffe’s map shows the Mill Dam Creek forming an island enclosing the ‘Lawe Top’ with the North Sea to the north east and the Tyne to the north west.

The description that the Mill Dam Creek was silted up towards the eastern end of the creek, the sea end, appears to be a natural occurrence due to wave action. The large boat remains found covered in sand and sea shells confirm the Mill Dam Creek was navigated and silted by sea action. There is also an oral report of a boat found at a depth of 15ft while constructing a sewer in Denmark Street. This was presumed to be Viking but there is no evidence for this supposition. The Mill Dam inherits it’s name from two mills that existed in the area closest to the River Tyne. Apparently they only operated at full tide. This implies that the west end of the creek filled up at high tide and emptied back into the Tyne at low tide. To achieve this and create a mill pond there would have been a dam, or some form of barrage hence the name of the creek. The Wrekendyke Roman road on a gentle slope from Arbeia towards the west is said to cross in the area of the dam. This therefore, would be an ideal site for a Roman port to supply the multiple granaries at the fort. There does not appear to be a suitable route to the fort site at the Lawe Top from the North Sea up the Tyne until the Mill Dam site is reached. Smeaton the great engineer wrote that the Mill Dam, “if properly converted into a wet dock, that would hold a great number of ships”.

The Mouth of The Tyne

The mouth of the Tyne, before the north and south piers were built in the late 19th century suffered from a natural bar across the river, stretching from the Herd End to the south and the rocky mouth of the river to the north (Fig 2). Many lives were lost as ships caught in stormy seas tried desperately to make a run at low tides for the safe haven of the river and sunk while helpless residents looked on from the rocky north bank. It is not certain what the sea level was during the Roman period or the height of the natural bar.

This old map shows the position of the bar in relation to the Herd End. It appears the beach, at low tide, extended further east than present.

The easterly extent of the Herd End was still indicated on the 1st Ed. OS map but is not shown on the 1899 map after the piers were constructed to allow the flow of the Tyne to push the bar further east into deeper water. The British Geological Survey Map indicates a narrow finger of rock projecting north east under the Herd End towards the point and the present pier has been built on this rock. Further east and away from the bedrock the pier was seriously damaged by storms during construction because the foundations had not been deep enough.

1st Ed. OS map showing the Herd Sand in relation to the bedrock finger of mudstone, siltstone and sandstone indicated by red dotted line. Blue line approximate course of Mill Dam Creek. Blue arrows indicate the low water mark of the Herd Sands.

1899 OS map showing south pier, the western section of which appears to have been constructed on the natural rock formation. The Herd Sands in the river mouth have now been reduced in size.

There is a possibility the height of the bar may have already dammed the Tyne to some extent creating a lake upstream and causing silt deposits at the river mouth. If the Romans deposited stone on the top of the bar and possibly the natural rock under the pier then that would have created a dam. There is no record of that but scrutiny of The History and Antiquities of The County Palatine of Durham; Robert Surtees, 1823, Vol 11; Page 95 states the following:

———directed to the private persons operating the salt pans, regulations.———
1. The great charge, cost and paines, before that manufacture could be brought to perfection, as first set out of a waiste and rocky piece of ground upon the river (Tyne), in taking upp the rockes and stones, and building wharfes and steathes along the said river, and after placing salt-pannes hereupon, the removeinge of which rocks hath made the river thereabouts farr more navigable than before, but with great charge to the owners of the pannes.

I am not sure of exact date but first mention of salt pans was in 1499 leading to a maximum of 143 pans in 1696. An excellent source of stones would be the bar. That would greatly aid navigation into the river.

North of the River

It was previously mentioned by Hodgson that the River Tyne entered the sea by three mouths. The course was from the Prior’s Haven and behind Collingwoods Monument. The western limit of the course was at a point where it met the Tyne called Swaddles Hole (see maps).

The 1852 OS map shows the channel between the Priors Haven and Swaddles Hole was used as a railway for the construction of the north pier.

A close up (blue line) of the old channel. The channel is called Howl Ings. Ings is Viking or Norse and ‘refers to water meadows and marshes’. Note the position of the Prior’s Haven in relation to the bar as any water flowing down the channel would have the effect of a spillway

The OS map clearly indicates a silted up channel between the Prior’s Haven and Swaddles Hole. There is however further evidence of the channel in old maps of Tynemouth.

Elizabethan map shows the channel as “Olde Fyshe Poundes” now a olde dyke.

Map of 1720. Note the straightness of the channel, but elsewhere many field boundaries are not drawn straight. The channel appears to be man made.

The above features superimposed on a Google Earth map show how a Roman navigation could be achieved at the mouth of the Tyne. The white arrows indicate the navigable passage from the sea into the Mill Dam area at high tide. This could be achieved by seaborne boats. Imported grain could be moved to the fort via the Wrekendyke Roman road and stored in the granaries before moving on by smaller craft up the River Tyne. The height of the bar in the Roman period is not known but it could have been heightened without too much effort to achieve a permanent high tide. Materials for this could have been obtained from the Howl Ings, which, because of it’s straightness may have been excavated by the Romans as a spillway to remove flood water from the Tyne. As can be seen from the above, the discharge at the Prior’s Haven is on the necessary seaward side of the bar.

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Penbal 1 – Lee Stoneman

No air-built castles, and no fairy bowers,
But thou, fair Tynemouth, and thy well-known towers,
Now bid th’ historic muse explore the maze
Of long past years, and tales of other days.
Pride of Northumbria!—from thy crowded port,
Where Europe’s brave commercial sons resort,
Her boasted mines send forth their sable stores,
To buy the varied wealth of distant shores.
Here the tall lighthouse, bold in spiral height,
Glads with its welcome beam the seaman’s sight.
Here, too, the firm redoubt, the rampart’s length,
The death-fraught cannon, and the bastion’s strength,
Hang frowning o’er the briny deep below,
To guard the coast against th’ invading foe.
Here health salubrious spreads her balmy wings,
And woos the sufferer to her saline springs;
And, here the antiquarian strays around
The ruin’d abbey, and its sacred ground.