Category: Northumberland

We continued down the main road to Cornhill and parked at the back of St Helen’s church – NT858394. Another by our old friend Ignatius Bonomi, dated 1840, and Pevsner says it incorporates masonry from the preceding church of 1751 – makes you wonder why the previous church only last 89 years. the chancel was added in 1866. Not a particularly stunning church (sorry Cornhillians).

Our Coffee Club had their annual outing, and this year I was able to go. We had an excellent lunch at the Battlesteads Hotel in Wark – http://www.battlesteads.com – and then drove up the valley. I went through the village, which is a collection of late C18 early C19 cottages around the green – their daffodils are still flowering, mine died off a week ago. There is a tea shop which looks worth a visit. I went past the church and found a parking space – if I had gone further I would have reached the Castle, probably built by...

It was a grey December day when I last went to Stamfordham. On Tuesday 7 May 2013 I went again to an evening by John Grundy and Peter Ryder. Both were Historic Buildings Inspectors in the days long before English Heritage and we have them to thank for a lot of work on the Northumberland Pevsner. John now has a good time on TV, and Peter is an archaeologist. He has spent some time looking closely at St Mary’s, and presented his findings to a full church. They believe that the church has good Saxon roots, very early Saxon.  There...

  A few miles north of Edlingham lies Bolton Chapel – we followed the wonderful metal signs (the one photographed is just opposite the church). Grid ref = NU106137. If you look carefully at this friendly noticeboard you will see it tells you to ring the bell for access. Bolton Chapel is a chapel of ease to Edlingham, and they’re now in a group based on Whittingham. In 1855 a burial cist containing an urn was found on the north side of the church which, along with the circular enclosure, suggests that this may have been a sacred pre-Christian...

On Monday 4 March we used a nice sunny morning to drive north to Barter Books at Alnwick. Several pounds lighter – but with some nice books – we went for a drive. Edlingham first. I last came here two years ago, slightly later in the year when the daffodils were out. Today the snowdrops were looking lovely. (There are lovely snowdrops in Ponteland too).  

I had a meeting here – it is a long way north up the A1, onto the Berwick OS map NU164202. Pevsner gives the church two lines: “1862 by James Deason of London for the Duke of Northumberland. Small but good quality church in E.E. style”. Entering the churchyard on the north side, having parked on the road through the hamlet, I passed the war memorial, and was surprised to see that the only WW2 name is that of a woman.                   Inside the church is another memorial plaque to the...