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September 15, 2013

Wallsend – St Luke

I caught the metro to Wallsend – where the station notices are in Latin as well as English. St Luke’s is on Station Road, visible from the platform – NZ300663. I was there for a DAC meeting on 25 July. If you type it into google, you find a St Luke’s Wallsend in New South Wales – perhaps southernvicar could blog it! Our St Luke’s was built by Oliver & Leeson 1885-7, western vestries ten years later, tower, chancel and Lady Chapel by Oliver, Leeson & Wood 1906. There’s a modern hall, well an old hall with modern work –...
Categories Newcastle upon Tyne/Railway History/World War 1 Comments: 2
May 31, 2013

Kirknewton – St Gregory the Great

My blog is becoming a useful resource – “have you got a photo of ..?” The Josephine Butler window at Kirknewton. Answer: No. Being a helpful bunny I dropped Julie at work and headed north … a long way north. I had never been left off the A697 and up the B6351 beside the River Glen. It is rather lovely – though the weather was lousy. I drove through the small village, and parked next door to the huge Village Hall – locked – closed school, and open church. NT914302. I walked in through the front of the churchyard...
Categories Evetts' windows/Northumberland/Railway History Comments: 0
May 27, 2013

Norham – St Cuthbert

A gorgeous sunny day (17 May 2013), so we drove to Berwick for coffee. Then we drove west (could hardly drive east …) and crossed the Tweed at  The Union Bridge, Horncliffe. We visited Chain Bridge Honey Farm – www.chainbridgehoney.co.uk – for a superb lunch in their bus cafe and a look round their excellent displays. Well worth a visit. The bridge itself was built by Captain Samuel Brown in 1820, and has its own blog http://unionchainbridge.blogspot.co.uk (their postings are even more erratic than mine!). It is supposedly the oldest suspension bridge in the world still used by road traffic. Then...
Categories Northumberland/Railway History/World War 1 Comments: 0
May 16, 2013

Simonburn – St Mungo (inside)

Simonburn church – NY871736 – and the benefice website is www.humshaughbenefice.org.uk. Having entered through the Lych Gate, I walked into the porch. A Saxon cross shaft and other Saxon stones. As you entered the church and look east it is long (and full of Coffee Club people). On the left we have memorials to members of the Allgood family, to the right members of the Ridley family. One memorial is to George Guy Hunter Allgood who was accidentally killed at Allahabad, India, in 1890 – it is one thing to die in action, but in an accident … so sad....
Categories Northumberland/Railway History Comments: 2
May 8, 2013

Whittingham – St Bartholomew

Yes, I know it’s May, but I never finished writing up our morning out in March. As we drove from Bolton Chapel, we passed the old station – a gorgeous building; photos and details at http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/w/whittingham/index.shtml. You can have a guided tour at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bc9Y7VO2ej4. I am having an evening of railway films on Saturday (actually, 3 pm and 7.30 pm) commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Beeching Report. This station closed to passengers in 1930, 33 years earlier than Beeching! St Batholomew’s church is on the top road in Whittingham village, at NU066120. The name means “The home of Hwita’s people”...
Categories Northumberland/Railway History Comments: 2
December 27, 2012

Whittonstall – St Philip and St James

A reminder that you can keep up to date with the life of a busy parish church at www.pontelandstmary.co.uk – lots of good photos of the delights of Christmas. We had over a thousand people through the door on Christmas Eve/Christmas Day – to say nothing of several hundred in the days leading up to it. My photo of Wharlton church in the snow was the Christmas cover picture on the Diocesan website – www.newcastle.anglican.org. On Boxing Day I wanted a ride on the Tanfield Railway – Julie came too on the understanding that afterwards we would go on to...
Categories Northumberland/Railway History Comments: 4
September 26, 2012

Ingram – St Michael and All Angels

The first Saturday of the autumn was a beautiful day. After a summer of wet weddings, Alison and Matthew had a wonderful afternoon. Once I had finished we drove north and ended up having coffee at The Breeze in Wooler – http://www.breatheglendale.com/Breeze.html. As we went in I said “look darling, that shop down there must be a second hand book shop, there are boxes of books outside”; by the time we came out the boxes had gone and the shop was shut. I was least popular husband. In the other direction there is a newsagent, with some books for sale....
Categories Northumberland/Railway History/World War 1 Comments: 2
August 19, 2012

Happy Birthday Me

Last October, when I walked from the South Tynedale Railway Station down to Kirkhaugh church – and then dashed back so as not to miss the train – I wondered if it might be a good venue to celebrate my birthday in 2012. A Big Birthday – one of those with a 0 at the end (50 …). “The years between fifty and seventy are the hardest. You are always being asked to do things, and yet you are not decrepit enough to turn them down”, T.S. Eliot (apparently). The day after I was born Eleanor and Peter were...
Categories Cumbria/Northumberland/Railway History Comments: 0
July 12, 2012

Nenthead – St John

After lunch at Alston I left the engine driver and headed down the A689 to Nenthead, also in Cumbria. The afternoon was grotty and I didn’t see Nenthead at its best. It is England’s highest village at 1,500 feet, and has been a major centre for lead and silver mining. The London Lead Company was formed by Quakers in 1704, and they recognised the moral responsibility they had to their workers. It is probably the first purpose-built industrial village in England and laid the foundations for today’s social welfare system. The Quakers built decent housing, a school (compulsory schooling for all...
Categories Cumbria/Outside Northumberland/Railway History Comments: 3
July 12, 2012

Garrigill – St John

It is a wet, horrid summer and seems to have been grotty for the last few months. On Thursday 31 May Gareth was driving at Alston, so I went too. After one train ride down their new extension, I went for a drive.  These lovely buttercup meadows are on the very narrow road along the slopes of Alston Moor – round about NY705428. Garrigill, although in the Diocese of Newcastle, is in Cumbria – so my Pevsner is no good. Typing “St John’s Garrigill” into google, the first hit is “St John’s heated swimming pool”, the highest heated swimming...
Categories Cumbria/Outside Northumberland/Railway History/World War 1 Comments: 5