THE ORIGIN OF NORTH SHIELDS AND ITS GROWTH
BY
WILLIAM S. GARSON.
(1927)
FOREWORD.
EVERY Englishman is proud of the place of his birth, and Shieldsmen are no exception to the rule. Every old town, and particularly if it be a seaport, has a past and a history very dear to its inhabitants, whether young or old, and even dearer to those whose vocation in life has called them to far distant climes, and where can you go in any part of the world without finding traces of the Shieldsman? To all interested in the history of the old town, I can heartily commend this little volume. Its author, Mr. Wm. S. Garson, has made himself thoroughly conversant with his subject, and has treated it in a chatty and attractive manner. The early history of the ancient Borough is portrayed in vivid colours, and one can readily picture the old riverside of Shields with its forest of masts and its low town alive with the picturesque figures of the seamen of all nations. No wonder Shields became a happy hunting-ground for artists and photographers, and even now it presents many quaint and curious nooks and corners. All interested in local history—and who are not?—will peruse this little volume of Mr. Garson’s with pleasure and with profit.
JAMES HARRISON, M.D., J.P.,
President, Tynemouth Society of Antiquaries.
THE ORIGIN OF NORTH SHIELDS AND ITS GROWTH
BY WILLIAM S. GARSON.
ENTERING the Northumberland Park, by the gate opposite to the entrance of the Golf Course, one cannot fail to perceive the remains of St. Leonard’s Hospital, which the Tynemouth Monks kept for lepers, and from which Spital Dene is named. This same spot was also once a recognised burial-place. Early in the last century the grave-stones were removed and the land became pasture. So it remained until Northumberland Park was laid out in 1885, when many stones were unearthed which, no doubt, were the remains of the Hospital. Among the relics found were several skeletons, two stone coffins, and a stone slab of the early 15th century, upon which are the moulds of a man and a woman and their five children-four sons and a daughter. The brass figures themselves are gone, but the rivets by which these figures were once fastened to the stone may still be seen, the whole slab being in a good state of preservation.
POW BURN.
Close to this spot is a streamlet that runs through the Park, the age of which is unknown, named Pow Burn. It is derived from “pwl,” the Celtic name for a stream.
Pow Burn originally flowed into the River Tyne at the end of the Fish Quay, but for many years now it has entered through a culvert which is bricked over. At one time, upon the banks of the Tyne near to this little streamlet, there stood three turf huts which had been made by fishermen and called “shiels.” Those “shiels” were the origin and seed of the town in which we now live. Commencing from the building of those ramshackle huts, North Shields began to expand, and the story of its growth is a long and interesting one.
In 1225, Prior Germanus of Tynemouth Priory and his monks reclaimed a large portion of marshy ground at Shields by draining it, and then built houses, wharfs, and quays, near the mouth of the Tyne. Through time the fishing industry had become so very prosperous that six little vessels went out from Shields bound for as far north as Iceland. So even in those days enterprise was very strong among the inhabitants, who now numbered about 1,000 people, and whose little thatch-roofed cottages, numbering about 200, all hugged the riverside.
The principal trades were brewing and baking, and at Preston there was a tannery. The products were loaded from a quay at the west side of the Pow Burn, a considerable stream, up which the tide ran well into Spital Dene, where the Aldermen of Newcastle were wont to land from their state barges at the Governor’s Tree, being welcomely received by the Commander of Tynemouth Castle. We have records of such a quay being found in September, 1819. When workmen were excavating (previous to the erection of a gasometer on the site now occupied by the offices of Messrs. Richard Irvin & Sons, Limited), they discovered about 12 feet below the surface a framing of oak beams, taking the form of a quay, and close by were found hollowed-out oak trunks, used for conveying water.
A SERIOUS SET-BACK.
These undertakings were nipped in the bud, however, by the jealousy of Newcastle. When Shields was 40 years of age the Mayor of Newcastle, Nicholas Scott, came down with a well-armed rabble and burnt a number of houses, and also a mill which had just been erected. The Prior brought a law suit against Newcastle for this—the first of a series of law suits—and the case resulted in Newcastle consenting to keep off for some time. They evidently did so, as the little town continued to prosper, and in 1281 North Shields was returned as worth £200 to the burgesses, the advance in its value being attributed to the new trade in sea-coal, fetching in London 19/- a chaldron, including a 4/- excise.
In the year 1290 there was another law suit. Newcastle felt that its trade had been hindered by the little town at the mouth of the river, and they succeeded in enlisting the sympathy and support of King Edward I. by asserting that the Prior was receiving money which ought to go to His Majesty. This law suit ended in judgment being given against the Prior, and “Henceforth Tynemouth must not hold fair or market, or expose for sale meat, drink, or baked bread, and all quays above high-water mark to be destroyed.” No ship was allowed to take in victuals of any sort at this little port, and no coal was to be shipped, except by the freemen of Newcastle. Newcastle had won, and for about one hundred years North Shields practically ceased to exist, and, as the population was gradually leaving and houses falling into decay, the total annual rental of Shields dropped down to £16/7/8.
NORTH SHIELDS COLLIERY.
McKenzie in his “History of Northumberland” states that one of the houses in Union Street was built over the mouth of a pit, and that a pit engine formerly stood on the site of the old theatre at the corner of Union Street and Howard Street. This theatre was destroyed by fire early in the morning of December 2nd, 1851, but was subsequently rebuilt and carried on until 1876, when the Theatre was sold to Mr. Joseph Elliott, who pulled it down and erected on the site an Assembly Hall with Shops on the ground floor in Union and Howard Streets. The Hall was then known as “The Royal Assembly Rooms.” The Labour Exchange now occupies the whole of this Hall and Shops. The owners of the colliery, not being permitted to load their coals at Shields, although the pit was within a few yards of the river, were compelled to send them in carts to Newcastle, where they were shipped. The roads at that time were in a deplorable condition, and for the greater part of the year impassable to vehicular traffic, which often required the services of neighbouring farmers to drag them from the morass in which they had stuck.
The isolated position of Shields seems to have brought about extreme clannishness among the people, who to this day have an amazing affection for the place of their birth.
In later years this colliery belonged to Lord Howard, a member of the Carlisle family, and coal was worked from it as late as the 18th century. In 1796 it was sold to John Wright, of North Shields, the builder of Northumberland Square, for £6,000, including the whole of the farm land westward from Norfolk Street to Newcastle Street. About this time the ruins of a little Chapel dedicated in honour of St. David were discovered at the end of Howard Street. It was built by the Priors of Tynemouth for the sailors who began to resort to the port about the reign of Edward I.
RALPH GARDNER.
Ralph Gardner, of Newcastle, at the age of 25, came to live at Chirton Green Cottage, which formerly stood upon the site of the house now occupied by Alderman J. R. Hogg, J.P. Chirton Green Cottage was pulled down in 1856. Ralph Gardner, seeing the little town slowly decaying, was greatly stirred thereby, and began to interest himself on behalf of the inhabitants of Shields, and to destroy the oppression of the up-river town. He was a brewer by trade, and became a member and churchwarden of the new Parish Church, now known as Christ Church, which was consecrated on Sunday, July 5th, 1668, by Bishop John Cosin, of Durham. The church site, a part of the Brock Close, was given by the Earl of Northumberland. Ralph Gardner’s life was so full of cruel sufferings, which he endured so courageously in the cause of right against might, that it should be the duty of every Shields boy to make himself acquainted with the story of Gardner’s heroic fight for justice against the tyranny of Newcastle. If one cares to make the journey to Chirton Green, which was enclosed and planted with flowers in 1880, one will see, just opposite the site where Ralph Gardner’s cottage stood, the memorial which was erected by a few loving Shields people. On the north side of the memorial is the following inscription :-
RALPH GARDNER,
CHIRTON COTTAGE,
AUTHOR OF
“ENGLAND’S GRIEVANCE DISCOVERED”
1655.
ERECTED BY SUBSCRIPTION, 1882.
On the south side:—
“I APPEAL TO GOD AND THE WORLD.”—Gardner.
On the east side:—
“WHO SUFFERED COUNTLESS ILLS,
WHO BATTLES FOR THE TRUE AND JUST.”—Tennyson.
And on the west side:—
“A FAITHFUL SON OF FATHER TYNE.”—Dr. Lietch.
When standing at the memorial our lads would do well to remember that they are standing at the memorial of a hero, for he was a hero, who glorified not in being a hero, but a Christian, working in the cause of right against might.
It is of interest to know that Ralph Gardner’s cottage was but a short distance away from the mansion which, 150 years later, became the residence of the brave Lord Collingwood’s family, although that hero himself did not live to join them there. He died at sea off Minorca on the 7th March, 1810 in his country’s service, and was accorded a hero’s tomb beside Nelson in St. Paul’s Cathedral.
THE FIRST NONCONFORMIST MINISTER IN NORTH SHIELDS.
At the time when Gardner was fighting so valiantly another great character came to the town, in the person of the Rev. John Lomax, M.A., Rector of Wooler, who was one of the two thousand ministers of the National Church of England who, on August 24th, 1662, gave up their churches and comfortable homes because they were unable to accept the test imposed by the Act of Uniformity during that year, and, with his wife and family, he came to North Shields. As the law then stood he was forbidden to preach in North Shields. The meeting-place was, as required by law, more than five miles from a parish church, and the meetings were held in the loft of a house. The congregation had first to climb up a step-ladder, which. as a precaution against informers, was drawn up afterwards, and then pass through a small trap-door in order to reach their place of worship, for the victims of intolerance were chased about the country like unfortunate foxes. John Lomax is recorded, however, to have been sentenced to a fine of £5, or three months’ imprisonment, at the Morpeth Quarterly Sessions, for keeping a conventicle at North Shields.
In 1672 he obtained from Charles II. a licence of indulgence to preach and a licence for a place of worship; but these were withdrawn within two years, until the Act of Toleration of 1689. This time he ministered to his little flock in a meeting-house in Thorntree Lane, now known as Magnesia Bank. The congregation grew, and when the Rev. John Lomax died on May 25th, 1693 (and was interred in Tynemouth Priory Church-yard, where a stone still marks his grave) other notable and sincere men ministered to the ever-extending flock, until in 1811 the present Scotch Church in Howard Street was erected, which is the second oldest church in the town.
One of its foremost ministers, who for over thirty years officiated, was the Rev. David Tasker, a man of pronounced opinions, and never compromised on what he believed to be error. He was a stalwart figure in the Town, and inaugurated the North Shields Literary and Debating Society, in 1873, which provided many valuable lectures and debates.
When the Restoration took place, the majority of Shields people and the district were Puritan, and the following vicars, refusing to conform, were ejected from their livings: Alexander Gordon, Vicar of Tynemouth; William Henderson, Vicar of Earsdon; and Alexander White, Vicar of Benton. Thus the Nonconformists began a new chapter in our religious history.
THE FIRST LIGHTHOUSE AT NORTH SHIELDS.
In 1608 the Trinity Brethren of Newcastle were ordered by a warrant from King James I. to place two lighthouses at Shields. As evidence of the cheapness of the labour market in those days, the first lighthouse at the Low Lights was built at a cost of £8. Every English vessel had to pay a light due of 2d., but they appeared to have believed in protection in those days, for the foreigner had to pay 4d. Certainly the vessels had not much to pay, but then they did not get much for their money, for the lighthouse had but one tallow candle, which was lighted only between half-flood and half-ebb tides. Afterwards it was promoted to three candles, each being composed of half a pound of tallow.
As the sand-banks of the river mouth were constantly changing, the lighthouses were pulled down in 1658, and replaced by structures of timber, which were frequently moved from place to place, as was found necessary to guide ships to the best channel leading into the river. The timber erections eventually proved inefficient, were disposed of, and new lighthouses were built in 1727. One of these, the Low Lighthouse, was built inside the walls of Clifford’s Fort. Later, the old lantern turret was removed, a storey added, and the lighthouse converted into the Trinity Alms Houses. In 1921 the Tynemouth Corporation bought this quaint old Alms-house for £1,510. I am certain it will cause regret to many if it is ever pulled down, for it is a fine old building.
The new High Lighthouse was built at the foot of Beacon Street, and was in turn converted into an Alms-house, and is still to be seen.
On March 2nd, 1805, a meeting of Shipowners was held at North Shields, when it was resolved to obtain an Act of Parlia-ment for the building of two lighthouses, the cost to be defrayed by a duty of one-halfpenny per ton on each ship. On September 29th, 1807, the foundation-stones of the two new lighthouses were laid, and on May 1st, 1810, the lighthouses commenced operations; the tide flag being hoisted and lights burning. Both are fixed lights, one visible 16 miles, and the other 13 miles out at sea. There is also a buoy light at the Black Middens occulting every 10 seconds.
SHIELDS IN 1750.
The real history of the town, however, as our oldest inhabitants know it, began about the year 1750, when the bulk of the land north of Tyne Street was still farm land. At this time the foot of Bedford Street and corner of Liddell and Clive Streets was marshy ground where the tide flowed in. There was a stream called Dagger, or Dogger, Letch which was crossed by a wooden bridge, hence the name given to the locality, “Wooden Bridge Bank,” and near to it stood a toll-gate house, demolished in 1857 for street improvement.
Close to the mouth of Pow Burn, within the narrows of the river, was a deep pool, where sailing ships lay while waiting for a good bar, or high tide. On February 6th, 1765, the Peggy, a sloop-of-war of the press gang fame, sailed into the harbour and made anchorage in the pool. Since then, the pool has been known as Peggy’s Hole.
History states that the press gang came to the Tyne and pressed into service the pilots, and, when the vessel got outside the harbour the pilots took possession of the boat and its command, overwhelming the lieutenant, and made for Scarborough, returning from thence to their homes and becoming free pilots again. Hundreds of our seamen were dragged by the press gangs to fight against France in a quarrel they cared nothing about.
As more battles were fought at sea than on land at this time, the Shields seamen were in great request, and the press gang would enforce the services of such men as would not willingly volunteer for King George’s Navy. The sailors from the Tyne will be famous as long as European history is read as having formed the principal equipment of those fleets which, under Nelson, Collingwood, and others, raised the British flag to its proudest elevation. These handy Shields seamen were expert steersmen and leadsmen, and for skill in manoeuvring their square-rigged ships under sail in a crowded roadstead could not be surpassed. Those were critical days for Shields men.
Apprenticeship was the rule of sailors, and the sea service was a popular one in Shields. Lads went to sea at a very early age, often being apprenticed as cabin boys at the age of 15. They could “hand reef and steer,” and in due time, through having gone through the rough and tumble of ship life, they became able seamen in the truest sense of the term. Without doubt they were cruel, hard days for the sailor lads.
What really made Shields prosperous was the extraordinary activity in shipbuilding, which developed upon steady rather than upon speedy lines. Yard after yard was opened and ship after ship was built, while one of the greatest features of Shields life at this period was the carpenters and shipwrights going to work in their tall hats, and the collier skipper who wore knee breeches without braces, which required the regular “hitch” to keep them in proper trim. The day of a ship launch was a busy one for the carpenter. The launches generally took place in the afternoon, when the tide was at its greatest height, and the whole of Shields would turn out to witness the ceremony. It was made a gala day and was talked about for days before-hand. When ships of 750 tons were built, they were considered remarkable, and it was the old type of collier brigs that made Shields famous, for these brig-rigged vessels were the most common on the coasting and Baltic trades, in which the majority of Shields ships were engaged. They were painted after one pattern, the broadsides with alternate black and white squares or “ports,” like the sturdy old “wooden walls” of the British Navy. When a ship was in mourning, however, on account of a death in the owner’s family, she had black and blue ports. The harbour was said to be capable of containing 2,000 ships of 500 tons burthen.
The moorings for ships were very bad indeed, consisting of posts fixed along the shore between the New Quay and Peggy’s Hole, and between these two points many of the ships were loaded from keels brought down the river on the falling tide. A number of old men made an honest living by dredging at this spot. The working class people in Shields had no education, but in 1810 the Royal Jubilee School was founded, and erected by subscriptions, for children of the poor.
At high water, when the weather was favourable and the vessels were ready for putting to sea, it was often an anxious time for the shipowners, as the river was very intricate through the sand-banks that had accumulated on both sides, and the Bar, extending just from the Black Rocks on the north to the Herd Sand on the south, made the entrance to the harbour very narrow. In addition to this, it often happened that a little swell on the bar would stop the ships from getting out of the harbour for weeks, even when there was water enough in the river. The state of the sea had to be discussed with the pilots, and often there was a good deal of “signalling and bawling and pulling of ropes,” and some ruffling of temper, before the ship got fairly away to sea, the direction for shipmasters at that time being “Past the bar into the sea, is when a full view is gained of the village of Cullercoats.” Then the sailors up the mast would shake loose the sails, with a shanty, hoist the ship boat, and make all snug for the voyage.
The usual routine was three or four Spring voyages to London, thence to Quebec and back, and tie up for the winter.
When the Board of Trade came into power they granted all past shipmasters a Certificate of Servitude.
On August 26th, 1824, during an abnormally low tide, three pilots, L. Burn, Junr., J. Harrison, and William Tully, walked across from the south to the north side of the river on Tynemouth Bar, a circumstance which it was believed had never occurred before.
At high water on that day there was 24 feet 8 inches of water on the Bar, and when the trio set off on their adventure at low tide they found a depth of only two feet. What a contrast to day, when the river can carry the huge Berengaria of 54,000 tons on its surface.
It was not an uncommon sight, before the harbour entrance was protected by piers, to witness a dozen stranded vessels on the Bar during one storm. So it is not surprising that the very first lifeboat in the world should have been invented by a Shieldsman, namely, William Wouldhave, who was born in Liddell Street, near the foot of the Library Stairs, now called Harbour View. The first lifeboat was installed at South Shields, and the Duke of Northumberland gave an order for a similar boat to be stationed at the Sand End, North Shields, and named the Northumberland. The good work thus started in the two harbour boroughs of the Tyne over a century ago is still carried on now, but on quite modern lines, by motor-lifeboat, an invention which North Shields introduced in 1905; and what river in the world has such a record of life-saving as our own? (Wouldhave original tin model is preserved in the South Shields Museum.)
DOCKWRAY SQUARE.
In so short a time as 1762, the shipping trade had doubled, and this prosperous condition had a great influence on the position and social standing of the Shields shipowners, which is shown by the fact that the town began to grow over the bank. Strictly speaking, the Low Street, and it alone, was North Shields. Above the bank was the Tynemouth Parish, which was bounded on the north by Earsdon Parish; on the west by the parishes of Long Benton and Wallsend; on the east by the sea, and on the south by the river Tyne. In 1763 the first houses were built above the bank, in Dockwray Square, and this was a great event in Shields history. A number of shipowners each bought a site and built upon it his own particular house, not forgetting to take away many stones from the old Priory ruins, hence the many different types of houses we see to-day, some of them four storeys high. The south side of the Square forms a pleasant Terrace, commanding a fine view of the harbour.
The Square itself was named after the Rev. Thomas Dockwray, Rector of Tynemouth, and a descendant of an old local family, two of whom were Vicars of Tynemouth from 1668 to 1725, who also built Toll Square, and from this time the town grew rapidly northwards. It was the gathering together of the people in the region of Dockwray Square that gave birth to the familiar saying, “Aal tegither like the folks o’ Sheels.”
Rev. Thomas Dockwray, as chaplain to the Earl Sandwich, died on board the Royal James, which was burnt in an action with the Dutch, with 600 of her crew of 1,000 men.
Walker Place was built by a wealthy Whitby shipowner named Walker, who had settled in Dockwray Square.
Tyne Terrace was built by a Mr. Hutchinson, a shipbuilder, whose daughter resided in one of the houses to the close of her vigorous life of nearly 100 years, and in the days of its prosperity the row bore the simple name of Hutchinson’s Buildings.
The long naval war with France, which brought great trade to the Shields shipbuilders, was practically closed by Nelson’s victory at Trafalgar on October 21st, 1805.
Notwithstanding these large houses, however, for centuries the little town consisted mainly of narrow, crowded streets, in some places not more than 16 feet across, made up of a double row of red-tiled tenemented property with high-peaked gables, and on the river side propped up by wooden piles slanting out into the river like stilts. Here dwelt a dense population. In describing it, one writer has said: “Human beings seem to have been born and kept together since birth, like onions strung upon a string.” The narrow winding street, commonly known as the Low Street, which was divided into many streets under a variety of names, was the main business part of the town, consisting of a cosmopolitan “floating” population, representative of every maritime nation under the sun. In one stretch of a quarter of a mile 50 public-houses could be counted, many of which were dens of infamy. There were also dance houses and coffee-houses innumerable throughout its entire length, and here were bakers, block and mast makers, ropemakers, coopers, and clothes dealers, vigorously plying their trades. Two great attractions in the street were the criginal Wooden Dolly, and the great figure of a Highlander in full dress, a box in one hand, as if in the act of taking a pinch of snuff. The Highlander stood at the shop door of Michael Spencer.
The road from the Low Street to Christ Church was up the Causey Bank and Church Way. The Church Stairs, which branch off, was so termed because it was the genteel road to the church.
In an old map of 1763, the New Quay is shown to be covered with houses, and these were cleared to make room for the present Quay, which was the principal thoroughfare to the Bull Ring, where bulls were baited in the 18th century. In June, 1820, at which time workmen were laying gas-pipes in the Bull Ring,
They came across a large flat stone in which was embedded an iron bolt and ring, a relic of the days when this cruel sport was carried on in this little town of ours. The Bull Ring was also the coaching centre for the town, and the main station for coaches between Shields and Newcastle. The route was via Coach Lane, hence its name, passing the Quakers’ Meeting- house, which has long since disappeared, and the burying ground, which still remains, laid out as an open space, also the Old Toll Gate which stood beside Hawkey’s Lane; afterwards this gate was removed to the Borough Boundary at Fir Trees (the gate-house is still standing). It took the coach two hours in creeping to Newcastle at a cost of half a crown.
Unprepossessing as the town may appear, it has charms which endeared it to a local poet-he called it “Canny Shields.”
“What darkly, distant see I yonder,
O’er the hedges, ditches, fields?
Whence the busy hum, I wonder?
Wonder not ’tis Canny Shields.”
Giddy topmasts, thick as rushes,
Crowds of boats, and dirty keels;
Ballast-hills, like gooseberry bushes,
Altogether—Canny Shields.”
FERRY SERVICES.
The Royal Assent was given to an Act for establishing a ferry service between North and South Shields in June, 1829, and the service commenced in July, 1830. Previous to this, flat-bottomed ferry boats and sculler boats had been used for the carriage of passengers, goods and horses, between the towns, and in stormy weather the passage was a very risky one.
Two years later, Tynemouth was constituted a Parliamentary Borough under the great Reform Act of 1832, and returns one member to Parliament.
TYNEMOUTH.
On November 1st, 1849, Tynemouth was granted a charter of incorporation and became a municipal borough. A general holiday was proclaimed to celebrate this event. Ships in the river were decorated, and a grand display of fireworks took place in Dockwray Square, including the burning of tar barrels, a large crowd assembling at St. David’s Mount at the foot of Howard Street.
The first Mayor was Captain Linskill, of the Dragoon Guards, and the first alderman was elected on November 9th, and the ladies of Tynemouth presented the Mayor and Corporation of the Borough with a handsome gold chain on November 9th, 1850. Mr. Thomas Carr Lietch was the first Town Clerk, and both of these gentlemen were a tower of strength to the town agitation to Parliament for river reform. Mr. Lietch was the third son of the Rev. William Lietch, who in the early part of the last century established a private school in Albion Road. He died at Hylton Lodge September 26th, 1876.
THE TYNEMOUTH ARMS.
The three crowns which are shown on the shield of the Arms of Tynemouth Borough may be said to represent the three kings that were buried in the Tynemouth Priory. They were King Osred of Northumberland, St. Oswin, who was born on The Lawe, South Shields, and Malcolm Canmore, King of Scotland, who was slain at the Battle of Alnwick. Above the shield is a ship, and on one side of the shield a miner, on the other side a sailor, and at the base of the Arms a motto:-
MESSIS AB ALTIS.
(Our harvest is from the deep.)
For a fuller account of the origin of the Borough Arms see the framed article by Mr. J. W. Cockburn at the Public Library.
His Grace, Algernon the Good, known as the Sailor Duke, in October, 1856, opened the Sailors’ Home, which he had built and endowed entirely at his own cost. It was the first of its kind in Europe, and the forerunner of such institutions now to be found all over the world. He also gave instructions for the erection of St. Peter’s Church, for the use of sailors and their families.
THE FISHING INDUSTRY.
An enterprise of great importance in the early seventies was the establishment of the Fish Quay by the Tynemouth Corporation. They constructed a jetty close to the Low Lighthouse, and, soon after, built a timber wharf along the length on Union Quay. Years afterwards the Quay had to be extended both eastward and westward, taking in nearly the whole of Sand End, to meet the needs of increasing business and to accommodate steam crafts.
I can recall the Sand End as it was in my boyhood days, when the sands were clean and wholesome. Here the wives and sweethearts would assemble to wave their goodbyes and throw kisses to their sailor folk passing down the river to sea on their voyages to distant parts. Each ship was hailed by the “Look-out Man” through his speaking-trumpet, requiring the name and destination of the vessel for official record. All vastly different from what it is today. Indeed, the Sand End and the Low Lights were the pleasure grounds of Shields. There were bathing-machines and stalls in the summer time, and the place was like a fair ground. At the water’s edge you could see the womenfolk, young and old alike, enveloped from head to foot in heavy blue serge gowns, bobbing up and down in the waves that broke on the shore. In this vicinity was Dodgin’s Shipyard, where wood and iron ships were built, but now the Fish Quay, with its bustling traffic, has swallowed it all up.
BARGE DAY.
I remember on Ascension Day, which we lads called Barge Day, how the civic survey of the river Tyne, from Hedwin Streams, above Ryton, to Spar Hawk, at Tynemouth, was regarded as a very serious obligation to be discharged in defence of the maintenance of the rights of Newcastle Corporation.
Barge Day was a gay event, and was known in later years as a “Corporation Picnic.” The townspeople would flock to the river banks to witness the very imposing procession on the river, comprising the Mayoral Barge, which led the way, and the barges of the Trinity House, accompanied by a flotilla of other brightly decorated crafts, which called at the Sand End to throw out pennies and oranges.
MEMORABLE NOTES.
We have seen the passing of the steamers of the Tyne General Ferry Company and the discontinuance of the primitive methods of supplying pilots from cobles. That improvement came when the Pilot Board put into service the pilot cutter Protector, which came to so tragic an end during the days of the Great War, on New Year’s Eve of 1916, when ten Tyne pilots, four apprentices and five members of the crew were lost.
The old Mission Ship that was stationed on the south side of the river near the direct ferry landing, was a floating church; she was at one time H.M. gun brig Diamond, and served in the Crimean War. Later she was re-named the Joseph Straker, until 1885, when the Seamen’s Mission Church at Mill Dam was erected.
And the Castor, an old wooden man-of-war of Nelson’s days, used as a training ship for men of the Royal Naval Reserve, which was berthed in Peggy’s Hole. She had been anchored in the Tyne from 1860, and departed from the river on December 22nd, 1895, being towed to Sheerness.
And the old time keelmen have all but passed away. A keelman was a personage of some importance in industrial life; another link with the Tyne’s early commercial days is almost snapped.
Also the Wellesley Training Ship, the most picturesque ship then in the Tyne. Originally she was H.M.S. Boscawen, a flag-ship on the West African Coast, and was numbered among the last of the wooden line of battleships on the Admiralty List. James Hall, and his supporters, founded the Wellesley as an institute for the reception of 300 boys from poverty and want to educate them for our mercantile fleet. On March 11th, 1914, the old ship took fire and burned furiously, many of the boys on board being rescued under thrilling circumstances. The ship sank at her moorings, and was raised and consigned to the ship-breakers.
Among the old industries carried on at the Low Lights was the pipemakers, whose works were at the top of the Pipe Makers’ Stairs, immediately behind the old gasometer.
Storey’s Hall stood on the ground now occupied by Messrs. Hastie’s store. On the site of the present St. Andrew’s Mission Church once stood a chain and anchor works owned by Tyzack. There was also a tannery in operation at the foot of the Tanners’ Bank, on the ground now occupied by the Electricity Works; and other lapsed industries included a pottery, a brewery, nail making by hand, barrel making, steam tug making and salt pans.
CLIFFORD’S FORT.
In 1672, Clifford’s Fort was erected, during the reign of Charles II., to protect Shields Harbour from attack by the Dutch. It was fortified with thirty culverins and ten demi-culverins, with its 31-pounder guns sticking out through the embrasures, and making a well-known landmark on the Tyne. It has history of stirring events during the period of the great Napoleonic invasion scare, when it was necessary to have soldiers and guns placed around Britain’s coast for defensive purposes. Close to the Fort was a waggon way running from Cullercoats Pit to a staith, and coal was there shipped for exportation. At one time the river lapped the foot of the Fort walls before the building of the Fish Quay.
The Motor Lifeboat is kept in readiness near this spot.
MILBURNE PLACE.
About the year 1690, the land on the cliff top above the Bull Ring became known as Milburne Place, as it belonged to George Milburne, a great man in the coal, lime, and salt trades of his day. (The extraction of salt from the sea water, by the way, was one of the oldest industries of Shields until it became obsolete).
In 1750, the land of Milburne Place immediately facing the river, now known as Front Street, was sold for building plots to the aristocrats of Shields and was built into a splendid row of mansions, which commanded a beautiful outlook on the river. The gentry came by sculler-boats from their offices and places of business to the steps reaching down to the shore, while the street itself was a promenade and fashionable visiting place for the ladies and gentlemen of Dockwray Square and South Preston.
In the centre stands the old Bethel Chapel, erected by a body of Methodists, and at that time being the only Methodist Chapel in the borough. John Wesley visited North Shields for the first time on Sunday, June 24th, 1759, and, standing on the flight of stone steps that reach from the street to the front door of the Chapel, preached to a large crowd of people. There was a black oak chair in the Bethel Chapel which was used by John Wesley. It now bears an inscription plate and occupies a place of honour in the pulpit of the Wesley Church, Coach Lane. During a period of a great religious revival in the district, a Scotsman, the Rev. Alex. Kilham, a preacher, and a secessionist from the Wesleyan Methodist, was the inspiring head of the first split from the great Methodist Church of the Wesleys in North Shields. He advocated the Church rights of the Methodists and the union of ministers and lay representatives in Church courts, and the Methodist New Connexion was formed in 1797, when the Bethel Chapel became the head of a new circuit that included South Shields, Sunderland, and Jarrow. A few years ago Smith’s Dock Co., Ltd., bought the Chapel for £1,500, and the few faithful members transferrred their activities to the Dene Street Church, as both Churches were incorporated into the United Methodist Church in 1907.
The closing services in the old chapel were held on June 26th, 1921, the preachers being Mr. James Gibson in the morning, and the Rev. W. Toppin, of Salem Church, in the evening.
Today the mansions that surrounded the Bethel are but a congested slum. The houses still stand, but their glory has departed, and the environment and conditions are not what they were half a century ago.
The land at the foot of the bank on which Front Street is built, at one time was occupied by Laing’s Dock, which was bought by William Smith & Co., of St. Peter’s. As a result of this firm’s industrial enterprise, the dock has steadily extended, and has taken in the older parts of the west end of the riverside thoroughfare known as Dotwick Street, and to-day, as Smith’s Dock Company, Limited, holds a foremost place in the ship-repairing world.
BALLAST HILL.
At the west end of Front Street once stood a prominent land-mark known as the Ballast Hill, composed of an accumulation of sand from every shore in Europe. This hill overlooked the Tyne, and commanded a magnificent view for miles in every direction.
From the summit down to the river was a railway, exceedingly steep. The ballast was taken out of the ships by cranes, put into waggons, and drawn by steam to the top of the hill. On the top of the Ballast Hill there stood a gun known as the “One O’clock Gun,” which was first fired on August 18th, 1863, by direct wire from Greenwich at 1 p.m., and this continued each day to enable the captains on the river to set their chronometers, until August 31st, 1905, when it was fired for the last time. At that time the Ballast Hill was razed and moved for the making of Whitehill Point Staiths by the Tyne Commissioners.
Further west still, two streams once united and entered the Tyne through Coble Dene, then a wooded ravine affording a pleasant rural retreat, but made into the Albert Edward Dock and opened in August, 1884, by the Prince and Princess of Wales (afterwards King Edward VII. and Queen Alexandra).
The time came eventually when Free Trade on the Tyne had to be acknowledged by Newcastle, and Tynemouth rapidly developed with the establishment of the Tyne Improvement Commissioners.
North Shields, from being an old seaport, has become of vital importance to the trade of the river, for within the County Borough of Tynemouth there are situated the Shields Engineering and Dry Dock Company, Limited, Baird’s Engineering and Dry Dock Company, Limited, Smith’s Dock Company, Limited, Albert Edward Dock, Commissioners’ Staiths, and Northumberland Dock, all of which contributed important steps in the development of the town.
“THE SHIELDS DAILY NEWS.”
The Shields Daily News, which is printed and published in North Shields, serves the Borough of Tynemouth, Whitley Bay, Monkseaton, Howdon, Wallsend, Ashington, and surrounding districts. The paper first saw the light of day on August 22nd, 1864, and celebrated its Jubilee a few years ago.
It was founded by Messrs. Whitecross & Yorke, who had previously been connected with the Daily Gazette at South Shields. Mr. Augustine Yorke was indeed the first publisher of the Gazette in 1849, having previously been in business in South Shields. In the following year, 1850, Mr. Richard Whitecross, who had been trained in the Commercial Department of the Scotsman at Edinburgh, was appointed Manager of the Gazette, and the two men were responsible for the Commercial side of the paper, until the summer of 1864. Both men left the Gazette to establish in partnership the Shields Daily News at North Shields.
After the death of Messrs. Whitecross & Yorke, the Daily News passed into the hands of Mr. David Balleny, a nephew of Mr. Whitecross, who carried it on until his death in 1909. Mr. Balleny was assisted by his elder daughter, Miss E. R. Balleny, a cultured writer, who was deeply interested in Social affairs.
Shortly after the death of Mr. Balleny the Shields Daily News became the property of The Northern Press Ltd., proprietors of the Shields Daily Gazette, South Shields; the Blyth News Ashington Post, and the Alnwick and County Gazette and Guardian. The policy of the firm has been to extend the area of the paper’s influence beyond the Borough of Tynemouth, and its interests have been developed in Whitley Bay, Blyth, and Ashington, where branch offices have been opened, and also in Wallsend. In order to facilitate this, new Premises were acquired in Nile Street, and opened about Christmas, 1921, and new plant, built by the Northern Press Engineering Co., Ltd., was installed. It may be stated briefly that the plant consists of a two-roll printing machine, which can produce a four-page paper at a speed of 60,000 per hour-delivering them folded and counted. The mechanical composing plant was doubled, and the Creed Telegraph plant for receiving news direct by private wire from London was installed, greatly enhancing the efficiency of the news service.
ELECTRICITY UNDERTAKING.
The Tynemouth Corporation Electricity Works were started in the year 1901. The Corporation were fortunate in initiating the Undertaking themselves, so that they did not have to purchase it at a later date from a Company. At first the Works were controlled by the Trade and Commerce Committee, of which the Chairman was the late Alderman George Armstrong, who took a prominent part in the early stages of the Undertaking.
When the Electricity Undertaking began to operate it was put under the control of the Electricity Committee, of which the first Chairman was the late Alderman R. Irvin. The Undertaking owes much to his business capacity and insight, and he took an active interest in its welfare until his death. therefore fitting that the present Chairman of the Electricity Undertaking should be Mr. Councillor R. Irvin, the son of Alderman Irvin, under whose energetic Chairmanship the department continues to make most gratifying progress.
At first the chief business of the Electricity Works was the supply of current for lighting purposes, and also to the Tynemouth and Tyneside Traction Companies, but it soon became evident that there was a large opening for power, as Smiths Docks, the Shields Engineering Co., Peter Brown and Co., and many other factories made demands on the Undertaking for current to run their Works. In these circumstances, in the year 1996, the Corporation decided to accept a favourable offer for Bulk Supply from the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Electric Supply Co., and Tynemouth was thus one of the first Stations in the country to take its current from a large Power Station, a system which the Government has now decided to enforce throughout the Nation generally.
The supply of current at first was restricted to the centre part of the area, but in later years the supply has been extended to the outlying districts, such as East Howdon, Percy Main, Balkwell, etc.
The Direct Current system is quite unsuited for supplying large quantities of current over large areas, and in the year 1921, to meet changed conditions, the Corporation began to change over from Direct Current to the Alternating Current supply, which change is now nearly completed. In this respect Tynemouth also showed itself well abreast of the times, as the Alternating Current system is coming into general use all over the country.
The financial results from the Electricity Works have been entirely satisfactory. The department has never had any assistance from the rates, but on the contrary has contributed to them, cut of profits, the sum of £14,500. The accounts for the year ending 1926 show that out of a capital expenditure of £186,534, no less than £107,249 has been redeemed, while in addition the sum of £7,892 has been expended out of revenue on capital account. The heavy cost of changing over Direct Current to Alternating Current supply has also been paid out of revenue.
The Corporation has recently undertaken the wiring of houses on Deferred Payment System, and this has proved a great success.
Having completed its first quarter of a century successfully, the Tynemouth Corporation Electricity Works is now entering on a further stage in its career, and it is interesting to note that the rate of progress promises to be much greater in the future than at any time in the past.
THE ROMANCE OF AN OLD SHIELDS FIRM.
The story of the career of Mr. Dennis Hill-the founder of the great firm of D. Hill, Carter & Co., Ltd. is one of the romances of the drapery trade. After serving his apprenticeship to the wool-combing industry, he left Fox Liddiard (near Worcester), the village of his birth, and came to North Shields in 1825.
Bell Street (a section of the Low Street) where Mr. Hill opened a tiny shop at the mature age of 21, was then the main business thoroughfare. Badly paved, ill lit, thronged from morning till night with a cosmopolitan crowd of sailors and others connected with maritime affairs, Bell Street demanded of a man who sought to establish a business there, a strong frame and an active mind.
Mr. Hill had these endowments. And soon his keen intellect foresaw that if he meant to develop his business, he must move to a neighbourhood with greater possibilities of expansion. In 1828 he moved up the bank to Union Street, where he took the premises now occupied by the lower half of the firm’s Men’s and Boys’ Wear department. His business expanding, he opened larger premises at the corner of Howard Street and Union Street, and when these were burnt to the ground in 1861, he rebuilt, in a more imposing style, this portion of the premises as they appear to-day.
For a number of years, Mr. Hill, his wife, and family lived in the rooms above the shop until the necessity for increased accommodation for the unmarried male assistants of his staff, who “lived in,” compelled him to move with his rapidly increasing family to Dene House, near Tynemouth.
The age in which Mr. Hill built up his trade was characterised by a greater intimacy between customer and trader than is possible today; Mr. Hill took full advantage of this; his customers were his friends; he shared in their joys and sorrows. And, very shrewdly, he paid great attention to the children of his customers. There are still people among the older inhabitants of the borough who can picture Mr. Hill, a sugar-coated biscuit in hand, soothing the distress of a crying babe, or amusing restless child by dangling in front of it a string of empty cotton reels.
Mr. Hill was a man of great originality. “Come to me for your wools,” he used to say,” and I’ll roll them into balls for you.” People used to come from far and near to see him or his wife make up the balls of wool, and soon he had the largest wool trade in the district, a distinction which the firm still enjoys. He also originated the use of metal advertising discs for dis- tribution, principally among sailors. By this means and his interests in shipping (he owned several vessels) he built up one of the largest maritime outfitting trades in the North of England. “Quality first” and “A good article at a fair price,” were his slogans; and so faithfully did he act up to them that “If you want anything good, get it at Hill’s” has been a phrase familiar to three generations of Shields people.
After the death of Mr. Dennis Hill on August 31st, 1876, the business continued to expand through the energy and capacity of his son, Mr. Alfred Henry Hill. He admitted as partners Mr. Forrest and Mr. Liddle, and altered the style of the firm to D. Hill & Co. He gradually absorbed several large shops in Union Street, and in 1898 acquired the businesses of Messrs. Carter & Co., of Stockton-on-Tees, and Mr. George Stephenson, of West Hartlepool. The combine then became known as D. Hill, Carter & Co., Ltd.—General Drapers, Out-fitters and Furnishers—with Mr. Alfred H. Hill as chairman and managing director. His son, the present chairman and financial director, Mr. Alfred Ernest Hill, B.A., J.P., Mayor of the Borough 1924-25 and 1926-27, is highly esteemed and respected by all classes. He is ably helped in the conduct of the business by the present managing director, Mr. George S. Wood, to whose untiring energy over a period of 46 years’ service, the firm owes a great deal of its present prosperity.
It is worthy of note that long service with the firm is a characteristic feature. Some nine or ten of the employees have records of 45 years’ service, and there are a good number with records of thirty years.
In concluding, I am all too well aware that this history of our town is very incomplete. But one must not forget that the history of North Shields, comprising some 500 to 600 years, would naturally occupy a volume of considerable dimensions, I do not profess to be capable of such an undertaking. I have compressed many important facts into as small a compass as possible in the hope that many will gain enlightenment concerning the struggles and trials of North Shields.
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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.
Jane Harvey
From ‘The Castle of Tynemouth. A Tale’ (1806)
Photograph: Lee Stoneman
Photograph: 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.
Jane Harvey
From ‘The Castle of Tynemouth. A Tale’ (1806)
