button to main menu  Gents Mag 1825 part 1 p.516
button introduction
button list, 2nd qtr 19th century
button previous page
Gentleman's Magazine 1825 part 1 p.516
Compendium of County History. - Westmorland.
from the estuary of the Kent up the river Betha; making this the only seaport town in the county.
Of MORLAND Dr. Brown, author of the 'Essay on the Characteristics,' was Vicar.
NEWBIGGIN HALL stands in a wooded sequestered vale. It is a low unique building, with a poetical inscription over its front door. - The church is small and contains but little remarkable. In one of the windows is a monk with a pastoral staff. - Upon the rocks, at a place called Craw-dun-dale, were formerly found characters and inscriptions, now obliterated and mouldered away. Camden mentions one or two, but Burn doubts their authenticity.
OLD HUTTON Free School has a library of several hundred volumes, established in 1767 by Dr. Bray and associates.
Near PENDRAGON Castle is a well which commemorates a piece of history respecting Uter Pendragon. It is said the treacherous Saxons who dared not face him in the field, flung poison into the well. He drank of this his favourite spring, and with a hundred of his courtiers fell victim to the Saxon villany.
One of the customs at RAVENSTONEDALE is very peculiar. If any tenant being of the age sixteen die, not having a child born in wedlock, and without a will attested by at least 4 tenants of the manor, his estate escheats to the lord. The Earl of Lonsdale offered to enfranchise the tenants, but such was their attachment to ancient customs as to refuse the offer.
RERECROSS on Stanemore is the boundary between Westmorland and Yorkshire. Only a fragment of it now remains. At the neighbouring turnpike house is a cylindrical stone with COH . V. probably a Roman miliary.
Of SHAP Abbey became tenants at the dissolution, the Hoggerd family, ancestors of the inimitable HOGARTH.
At SIZERGH Hall are several excellent portraits, and the tapestry and carvings are exceedingly curious.
At Spying How, TROUTBECK, there was a large heap of stones called the Raise, which contained a kistvaen full of men's bones, and another called Woundal Raise , supposed British sepulchres.
ULLSWATER or Ousemere, when the day is uniformly overcast, and the air perfectly still, like many other lakes, has its surface dappled with a smooth oily appearance, which is called a Keld.
Of the Pearson's of WHINFELL, the learned Dr. John Pearson, Bishop of Chester, was descended. - The forest was famous for its prodigious oaks, one of them nearly 300 years old. The hart's-horn tree which grew by the way-side near Hornby Hall had its name from a pair of horns hung up in it about 1333 or 1334, after a memorable chase. The stag was started by a grey-hound, and after chasing it to a considerable distance and back again, the stag vaulted the park paling, but instantly died. The dog, in attempting to clear it, fell backwards and expired. One of these horns were broken out of the tree in 1648, and the other in 1658. On the East side of the park is Julian's tower, celebrated for being the residence of the mistress of Roger de Clifford, temp. Edw. III.
WINANDERMERE is the greatest standing water in England. On Longholme Island is a remarkable echo. - Rayrigg Hall is said to resemble Ferney, the seat of Voltaire on the Lake of Geneva. - The church contains monuments and inscriptions to the Philipsons of Calgarth and other eminent families in the neighbourhood. Its chancel window belonged to Furness Abbey. It consists of seven compartments, representing the Crucifixion in the 3d, 4th, and 5th. In the 2d is St. George; in the 6th, St. Catharine, and in the 7th, two mitred abbots and two monks. The colouring is very fine.
At WINTON Free Grammar School the author of Burn's Justice, &c. was educated. - One of the rooms of the Hall is hung with very beautiful tapestry; and amongst the pictures is a fine one of the late Countess of Desmond.
Upon WRYNOSE HILL are placed the Shire-stones, in a triangle a foot from each other, where Westmorland, Cumberland, and Lancashire, meet in a point.
S.T.
button also see Tymms
gazetteer links
button -- Hart Horn Tree
button -- "Julian's Tower" -- Julian Bower
button -- Milnthorpe
button -- Morland
button -- Newbiggin Hall
button -- Old Hutton CofE Primary School
button -- Pendragon Castle
button -- Ravenstonedale
button -- Rayrigg Hall
button -- "Rerecross" -- Rey Cross
button -- "Craw Dun Dale" -- (roman site, Crowdundle)
button -- Shap Abbey
button -- Sizergh Castle
button -- Spying How
button -- St Edmund's Church
button -- St Martin's Church
button -- Three Shire Stones
button -- Ullswater
button -- Westmorland
button -- Whinfell Forest
button -- Whinfell Park
button -- "Winandermere" -- Windermere lake
button -- Winton Hall
button -- Winton School
button to main menu Lakes Guides menu.