KNOW YOU PARISH

KIRKHAUGH

Dorothy Marshall

Picture Kirkhaugh as an open book with the crease between the pages running from south to north: forming the bed of the infant South Tyne River. The pages on either side are dotted with farms and barns and roughly squared by stone walls. Beyond the edges of the pages the fells stretch steeply upwards to meet the horizon; on the west side Whitley Common rises to meet Renwick Fell at Grey Nag, while on the east Ayle Common and Barhaugh Common meet Whitfield Moor at the beautiful secluded Whitfield Lough (Lake).

From Whitley Common the Gilderdale Burn flows down to join the Tyne at right angles, while a few hundred yards upstream Ayle Burn joins the Tyne at the ancient fortified farmhouse of Randalholme. The two burns mark not only the edge of the parish but also the boundary between the counties of Northumberland and Cumberland.

When I picture Kirkhaugh as an open book, neatly divided by the South Tyne, the pages always lie open to the sunshine but there was often stormy weather and snow. In 1947 the snow blew in level with the tops of the dykes, as we call the stone walls. Eventually we packed down a bicycle track at wall-top height running through the hamlet of Ayle and past the school  The school was closed for weeks as there was no coal for the fireplace and no way of transporting the coal to the school. The farmers were milking their cows and pouring the pails of milk down the drain as there were no collections by the milk-wagon. After several weeks a few men took two horses and a sled into Alston to buy flour and other supplies.

The heart of the parish is the Church of the Holy Paraclete lying very close to the Tyne on the east bank, where yellow monkey flowers cluster at the edges of the river and gorse grows on the bank between the river and the wall of the Churchyard. The Holy Paraclete is the Holy Spirit as embodied in the dove.   “Paraclete” is translated from the Greek “paracletos” which means “the one who stands along side you to help you”.  There is no other church in England bearing this dedication. The Church was designed by the rector, Octavius James, without the benefit of an architect in 1849 although it occupies a very ancient site and is mentioned in medieval writings. One guide book (surely not Pevsner?) describes the spire as "ridiculously thin". I prefer to describe it as "elegantly tapered". One wonders how a man of culture and vision such as Octavius James came to be living in a backwater like Kirkhaugh. The 1851 census shows him and his family at Clarghyll Hall about two miles away from the Church but across the Ayle Bum in Cumberland.

Sadly Kirkhaugh lost both her rector and her records in a fire at Clarghyll Hall in 1898. Many of us, descended from Kirkhaugh families, are stuck at a relatively early date as a result of this fire.

On an interior wall of the Church is a simple marble plaque commemorating the sons of the local families who served or died in World War One, The Churchyard is quiet and secluded. Last time I visited it a ewe was teaching her lambs to squeeze through gap so she could graze among the tombstones. My relatives lying there spent their lives among sheep and I think they would not begrudge the ewe a few choice mouthfuls of the grass sprouting from their final resting places. There is a story that a farm horse once clomped down the aisle during matins, I was not there and cannot vouch for the veracity of the tale. The railway line, opened in 1852, runs parallel to the Tyne on the west side. For several years local people fought successfully against the closure of the line arguing that it was their link with medical treatment, etc. when the roads were blocked with snow. Eventually the people lost the fight and in 1977 the line was closed and later the rails removed. Now a volunteer group has opened a stretch of narrow-gauge line and runs a train from Alston to Gilderdale as a tourist attraction, with plans to extend the run to Kirkhaugh in the near future.

Also parallel to the river and the railway on the west side is the A686 to Brampton. In the corner between the A686 and the Gilderdale Burn lies an ancient Roman Fort named Whitley Castle. The site occupies nine acres and the grass-covered ramparts can be clearly seen. John Wallis, famous Northumbrian historian and author of "The Natural History of Antiquities ofNorthumberland", was born 3rd December 1714 at Castle Nook, adjacent to Whitley Castle. Two Bronze Age barrows dating from 1000 B.C. were discovered near Kirkhaugh School. The barrows were excavated in 1935 and the artifacts are now displayed in the museum in Newcastle.

Randalhohne is an interesting example of an ancient pele tower. It contained its own well as a water supply for the farmers and their cattle when the Scots laid siege to the building. .Directly up the steep hillside from the Church is Kirkhaugh School, once crowded with the large families of the local farmers and miners, but down to one brother and sister in 1945 and eventually closed in 1949. One reason it lingered so long was that the county did not want to send her children to Cumbrian schools and it would have been a long drive to collect the few of us from the scattered farms around Ayle, Barhaugh and Underbank (by the Church) and take us through Alston, Cumberland, doubling back on the A686 to Knarsdale. Close to the A686 is the tiny but active Methodist Chapel. One of my memories is leaving the Chapel on a black, dark night after a special concert and supper to walk the two miles to Ayle. A group of us walked down the track under the railway arch, along a narrow path, across a footbridge over the river to the foot of a steep hill near the Church, where we had to strike upwards with no path to guide us. Here a blind man in our party took over - "Mind your feet, there are loose stones here" and "Careful here, it's very steep" and so he led us safely home through the blackness.

At one time there were several small coal mines in the area and a kiln on the Ayle Burn where lime was made to be spread on the acidic fields. There were many small holdings in the area with a few hens, at least one cow, one pig, many sheep and a vegetable garden. Over the years these have been amalgamated into a few large farms and many of the houses where our ancestors raised large families are now mere heaps of stones. However, at the north-east corner of the parish is a 19th century manor house which has recently been tastefully restored to its original elegance and opened as a visitors' centre. Barhaugh Hall was for many years the home of the Dryden family and boasted a folly and a ghost. "Old Redcap", the ghost, was reputed to have buried a stocking full of gold near the house but no-one has yet been successful in digging it up. "Haugh" in such names as Kirkhaugh and Barhaugh is pronounced "haff" and refers to a piece of flat alluvial land by the side of a river.

The deficiency in the Parish Registers can be overcome, for certain periods only, by using the Bishops Transcripts at Durham, which also feature, in transcribed form, at Newcastle Library. There is also J .V . Harrison's 'Kirkaugh Wills', published in three volumes of the 4th series of Archaelogia Aeliana, which helps to "cover the gaps" .and are held by The Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne which is the country’s oldest provincial antiquarian society, founded in 1813. “Kirkhaugh, Holy Paraclete: Records of baptisms 1760-1958, marriages 1761-1957 and burials 1760-1954 are available at the Northumberland record collection at Woodhorn. Microfilm copies of marriages for the period 1761-1837 can be seen at Tyne and Wear Archives Service. Bishops' Transcripts for the period 1760-1844 are deposited at Durham University Library Archives and Special Collections, Palace Green, Durham City. The International Genealogical Index (I.G.I.) includes baptisms 1760-1823 and marriages 1761-1876 for this parish, and Boyd's Marriage Index includes marriages 1760-1812. Transcripts of baptisms 1760-1824, marriages 1761-1824, burials 1760-1824 and of monumental inscriptions for Kirkhaugh are available at Newcastle Central Library, Local Studies Dept.” source Genuki

The Northumberland and Durham Family History society hold the following indices and transcripts. baptism 1813 – 1839, marriage 1761 – 1957, burial 1813 – 1839, Monumental Inscriptions pre 1851

On-line resources

An Historical, Topographical, and Descriptive View of the County of Northumberland by Eneas Mackenzie, page 320.

George Bell collection Marriages from the Kirkhaugh Registers (1761-1837) http://genuki.cs.ncl.ac.uk/Transcriptions/NBL/KHG.html