When checking some of the unlisted boxes that will be included in the new catalogue I found this message from myself from 1984! No excuse this time….
Transporting the prisoner to Edinburgh
The box is full of a mixture of records – mainly Quarter Sessions papers – and among them was this little note from the Town Clerk about transporting a captured French Prisoner to Edinburgh. There is no date on the document but the watermark on the paper is 1804 – that means it must have been written after that date but, intriguingly, close to the battle of Trafalgar and the events that led up to it.
Rescued by the Smack Britannia
It is a draft letter to the Provost of the City of Edinburgh which is why it is undated and unsent. It tells us that
“A short time ago Persons who had been found unboard a British Vessel which had been captured by a Privateer belonging to the Enemy and recaptured by the Smack Britannia of thes Port and some other Vessels belonging to Leith and Berwick were landed here from the Britannia. One of them appeared to be an American, having since offered to serve in His Majesties Fleet was sent forward to Leith to be put on board one of His Majesties Ships there, the other I now take the liberty to send to Edinburgh for the purpose of being lodged among the other Prisoners of War at that place and I have to request that your Lordship will be pleased to give the proper Directions for his being received on his arrival – He will go by the Edinburgh Waggon tomorrow morning and will arrive in Edinburgh on..“
The smack Britannia is listed in Fuller’s History of Berwick (1799) and belonged to the Old Shipping Company. The Berwick smacks that navigated between Berwick and London, he says, are universally admitted to exceed that of any other in the known world for “safety and expedition”.
Would you like to volunteer?
We do not intend to employ a Press Gang but if you are interesting in joining us as a volunteer we will be holding a couple of short introductory sessions at the Berwick Archives (in Berwick upon Tweed Library in Walkergate) on Saturday 23rd March and Tuesday 26th March at 2 pm. You’ll have a chance to see what we are doing and see if any of the tasks suit you. You can email us on ttar@northumberland.gov.uk if interested in attending or for more information about the project.
Old Berwick Bridge has recently re-opened after essential repairs and a further £250,000 has been allocated for maintenance during 2019/2020. It is a well-used crossing of the Tweed, popular with visitors and locals alike and it has a very well documented history – including a record of all the names of the people who built it and what it cost.
Increase in costs for tide work
The old bridge has linked both sides of the Tweed at Berwick for about 380 years. According to Fuller’s History of Berwick work ended on the 24 October 1634 having taken “twenty-four years four months and four days”. The construction was a major feat of engineering – working around tides and the powerful surges of the river. Although at times convoluted, both the King and the Guild saw the building of permanent crossing of the Tweed at Berwick as a crucial investment and symbolic too.
Supplies of building materials for Berwick Bridge, 1613
The building of a stone bridge over the Tweed at Berwick marked the end of hostilities with Scotland on the accession of James VI of Scotland to the English throne in 1603. Berwick had been, for centuries, a town at war. From 1482 to 1601 it had a Governor appointed by the Crown and was occupied by a large garrison. The crown paid for repairs to the castle, the fortifications and the old wooden bridge (which was often washed away in floods) as it was a strategic military base.
Summary bridge accounts 1612-1613 (H1/1)
The Earl of Dunbar – George Home – who held a series of royal appointments in Scotland and England under James I/VI had been granted the fortifications of Berwick when the garrison was disbanded. He was instrumental in making the case for the building of a stone bridge, proposing how it should be funded and appointing, for life, the bridge surveyor and designer, James Burrell. Home’s funding scheme gave way to other arrangements but Burrell stayed the course.
Particular payments for work beginning the 11 May 1622
The “particular accounts” for the building of the bridge from 1611-1635 (H1/1-4) survive in the borough archives – volumes that Fuller cites extensively in his History of Berwick. The other side to the story is found in records held at The National Archives (such as The Exchequer Pipe Rolls – declared accounts for the building of Berwick Bridge ref: E 351/3585) as this was a crown enterprise. Indeed, the bridge building accounts held in the Berwick Archives might not be so”particular” had they – and the works – not been routinely audited by royal inspectors. These included the Bishop of Durham and the poet Fulke Greville in his role as Chancellor of the Exchequer (Source: The History of the Kings Works Vol IV (part II), Colvin et al pp.774-775, HMSO 1982).
Payment to Foulke Reynards Master of the good ship the “Boweringe of Stavering” for freight of oak trees, coal, oakum, holly wood, rope and steel from Newcastle to Berwick, to John Wylde the pilot from Newcastle to Berwick and to Henry Scott and his “fellowes for their pains and their bote” in helping the ship up Berwick River, 1614
The accounts describe materials used at different points in the construction, the use of oak from the royal estate at Chopwell near Blaydon, the freight of coal, oyster shells and stone by sea, and the people – men, women and boys (all named) – who built the bridge.
Timber from Chopwell Woods, 1613
The accounts for subsequent repairs by Guild and the Town Council are also held by the Berwick Records Office to 1835 as Bridge Account volumes, later as part of the annual reporting of accounts.
Today the bridge is the smallest of the three that span the Tweed at Berwick but in it’s day it would have made a significant impact on the landscape. It was clearly a source of civic pride as funds were routinely levied on the burgesses for it’s upkeep – in addition to the Crown costs of around £13,000 which is the equivalent of about £1.5 million today.
Illustration depicting the bridge about 1799 from Fuller’s History of Berwick
It’s a popular belief that the older the record the more interesting it is – but records from any era can contain unique information that conjures up the times in which they were written.
Last week, as I was looking through some of the Urban Sanitary Authority records, I came across a rather plain notebook [Reference LB 27/2]. This outwardly prosaic book begins with detailed, handwritten water usage charts and is described in the Archives handlist as “An analysis of water supplies 1899-1944 (also contains an Old Bridge road traffic census of 1922)”. This is an accurate description of a large part of the book but, on inspection, it contains much more. It is a fascinating Day Book – a bit like Project Managers diary – that draws you into the mind of the writer with every turn of the page.
Traffic Census on the old bridge, Berwick-upon-Tweed 1922
The Urban Sanitary Authority was the product of a series of Public Health Acts in the first half of the nineteenth century that were passed to control and combat deadly diseases such as Cholera. Many of the statutory duties of the Urban Sanitary Authority eventually passed to the Town Council as clean streets, good housing and plentiful, pure water became the standard measures of civilization.
The Council Buildings on Wallace Green that were originally converted for the Urban Sanitary Authority
The Tweed is tidal and its water saline so Berwick, throughout its history (and as the records testify), was reliant on wells for its water supply. Ensuring water was fit to drink was a common concern. On establishing the Urban Sanitary Authority responsibility fell upon the Borough Surveyor and the Inspector of Nuisances to identify or create healthy water sources and to ensure that they were kept free of contaminants.
Excavation tables, 1914
When I began to leaf through the pages of this volume I quickly noticed the writer was a skilled draughtsman who also liked to record informal notes about the works being undertaken. I had the sense that this was someone who took pride in and enjoyed his work. As a result, I wanted to know more about him. His technical drawings have an accomplished artistry that put me in mind of Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks. It’s pure speculation, but the first comprehensive translation of those Notebooks was by Richter in 1888. I wondered if the Borough Surveyor might have seen them as a young man and felt he was part of a long line of inventors and engineers. Archives can be dangerously thought provoking!
Notes on the Spa Well, Spittal whose source had changed course in 1919
The notebook is almost entirely the work of Robert Dickinson, Borough Surveyor from 1890-1929. There is an oil painting of him (seated at a desk with a notebook) by the artist Frank Watson Wood in Berwick Town Hall .
Settling wells at Bondington, Castle Terrace
He was a local boy, a son of Robert Dickinson, a boot and shoemaker from Tweedmouth, and his Scottish wife Lillias. I found the family in the 1871 census living in Marygate. In 1881 the family had moved to 26 Castlegate. Robert was 19 and is described as a Town Surveyors Assistant – already pursuing his future career. He is Town Surveyor in 1891 and living with his wife, Margaret, at 46 Ravensdowne. Ten years later, a widower, he lives at 6 Wallace Green – opposite the Urban Sanitary Authority buildings. His colleague, the Inspector of Nuisances, also lived in the same street! Robert was there still in 1911, seems to have retired about 1930 and died, in Berwick in 1951 aged 89.
Drainage at 20 Hide Hill
The book is mainly concerned with the works he commissioned or managed (some examples are included above) but he peppers it with facts prompted by curiosity or conversations. This includes a note that the specification for works was altered to preserve a Hart’s Tongue Fern found growing on the ramparts. He takes care to write down the botanical name of the fern – Scotopendrium Vulgaro – as given to him by Captain Norman.
Harts Tongue Fern protected
Robert also copies extracts from academic journals on geology, colleagues findings from surveys and estimations and a list and planting plan of the roses outside the Urban Sanitary Authority buildings in Wallace Green. He makes a sketch of the timber structure underneath the plaster finish in his office and makes notes on an the removal of an old dolphin recovered from the river.
Rose planting scheme, 1921
He is also interested in people – keeping lists of workmen employed and information about the introduction of the old age pension. He makes notes on those working in the Surveyors office – including some who joined up to fight in the Great War. The effects of war on prices, labour supply and so on are also recorded.
Thomas Evans – employment, wages and war record
Cover of a Wartime leaflet on the price of smithy work in the Berwick area
War Savings Shell erected near Scotsgate, 1920
This volume shows that a record has many layers – the information it contains, the person who created it, why they created it and why it was retained. A full description of content and context is essential when it is catalogued to make it available for the widest range of research.
Register of workmen
It would be fascinating to compare five centuries of civil engineering in Berwick and there is plenty in the collection to research this aspect of Berwick’s history. Robert Dickinson is just one in a long line of inspectors, surveyors and workmen striving to ensure Berwick functioned as a prosperous and healthy place. The Guild, through their Works Committee, carried out many improvements before the Urban Sanitary Authority existed. This last drawing refers to an old dolphin that was removed in the time of Robert Dickinson. Much earlier records also refer to the protection of the Quay and old Bridge by the placement and replacement of such defensive structures in the river.
Remnants of former Berwick Bridge, 1905
Robert’s work is also recorded in a series of records that were part of the Urban Sanitary Authority collection (summarized in the 1978 Handlist – E 1-30). Intriguingly, in volume E 7/1, there is a typescript report on road widening in 1912 at the junction of Chapel Street and Walkergate. It is signed by Robert Dickinson and it refers to the reconstruction of the Rose and Thistle Public House. If it is where we think it is (the present Cobbled Yard Hotel) – I am sitting opposite it as I write. More about that in a later post perhaps!
