Bill's Walks

The Southern Hills Above Lanchester

Distance: 12.5 miles
Start: Car park on Lanchester Valley Railway Walk, Newbiggin Lane, Lanchester
Map : OS Explorer Map 307 – Consett & Derwent Reservoir

Click to view start position on Google Maps

This walk of 12 miles complements the Northern Hills above Lanchester walk which is of a similar distance. For those who enjoy a really long walk they can be put together to give a marathon type distance such as those enjoyed by members of the Long Distance Walkers Association (LDWA). This fine organisation with an excellent newsletter have challenge walks throughout the country, including County Durham and full details of them can be found on their website. Neither of the two routes passes the Roman Fort of Longovicium as regretably there is no public footpath from Lanchester, although a footpath used on this route does pass quite close near Middlewood Farm passed towards the end of the walk.

Lanchester is an attractive village situated in the valley of the Smallhope Burn which rises in the hills to the west above Knitsley. It is not in the Browney Valley as many think but parts of this valley are explored during this walk. Lanchester has an impressive history with the Roman Fort of Longovicium only about half a mile to the south-west on the Satley road and the village is skirted by Dere Street which passed the fort before continuing on to the fort of Ebchester and beyond. Dere Street went from York to Scotland and the fort here was probably established after the Romans had retreated back to the Forth/Clyde line where they built the Antonine Wall. The Roman meaning of Lanchester means long town incidentally. For strangers to the area the village deserves some of your time to wander around with pride of place going to the Norman church of All Saints on the far side of the bypass. Nickolaus Pevsner descibes it as one of the most rewarding parish churches in the county. It was built in the 12th Century utilising the very convenient source of building stone of the nearby fort, but in addition the church chancel was rebuilt in the 13th Century and contains some excellent stone zig-zag markings which can also be observed in Durham Cathedral and other Norman buildings. The other churches, both the Methodist with its sensitive addition and the early 20th Century Roman Catholic church also add to the quality of the buidings of Lanchester, as does the branch Library which in the past has served many purposes including that of a workhouse.

Lanchester All Saints Church

We start the walk at the car park on Newbiggin Road on the site of the former Lanchester Valley Railway. The function of this line was to provide a good route for iron ore to reach the expanding steelworks of Consett, Prior to the opening of this line the ore had reached Consett on a circuitous route of the old Stockton and Darlington railway via Crook and then by the Waskerley line (now a fine walkway) to reach Consett after passing over Hownsgill. It also served to transport coal from the mines in the area particularly from Bearpark and Langley Park although there were also smaller pits at Malton and Lanchester. The line opened in 1862, a famous year in Tyneside folklore, as that was the year when on the 4th of June that everyone went along the Scotswood Road to the Blaydon Races! The line was never a success for passenger traffic and indeed Lanchester station closed in 1939 to passengers although it did open for passengers for specials such as the Durham Miners Gala. The last Gala train ran on 17/7/1954. There were four stations on the line at Lanchester, Malton, Langley Park and Bearpark (which was known as Aldin Grange until 1927).

Leaving the carpark in a southerly direction we reach, almost immediately after leaving the village we reach a small wood of just over 3 hectares called Doras Wood which is owned by the Woodland Trust. A group from Lanchester help to look after this wood and other places hereabouts with conservation work. Leaving the railway line we walk alongside the burn and arrive at Watersmeet where the River Browney and the Smallhope Burn meet. This, in the past was a good place to see little owls but recently none have been seen. However the whole of this area is good for many common species and in winter fieldfare and redwing can be found. In summer there are plenty of skylarks in the fields alongside the track although sadly this species is declining nationally, along with the thrushes which also inhabit this valley. Continuing along the river bank after a further half a mile you will reach Malton Picnic Park where an area of massive industrial damage has been restored by Durham County Council.

Here we cross the river into a small collection of houses that are all that is left of Malton Colliery village. Note the War memorial at the end of the terrace of houses. At the end of the terrace we take the footpath in a south-east direction towards Biggen Farm and pass through a Nature Reserve ran by the Durham Wildlife Trust. On leaving Biggen Farm we take the lane to the right crossing the minor road to Esh and arrivie at Quebec village. Esh down the road has a good footpath scheme developed some years ago in the Parish Paths Project which also provided maps of all the footpaths in the village. The name is a corruption of Ash.

At Quebec we are on the route of Dere Street for a shortwhile (more on this later) and opposite Greenland Road at the junction we pick up the track leading to Heugh which is actually Dere Street. At the end of the second field on the right we head south with views to the left of Esh Winning and the Deerness Valley. In less thah quarter of a mile we turn right heading broadly west to Rowley Farm and arrive at Hedleyhill Lane at a bend in the road. Just before Rowley Farm there are three ditched and banked enclosures which run on an east to west axis. Next to the one on the west on the OS map it is marked as part of the moat which surrounded the site. The middle one is thought to have been a chapel whilst the western is thought to have been the residence. The site was granted by the famous Bishop Pudsey to William de Howden in the late 12th Century. He was an important clerk in the diocese. The site changed hands to William de Raw and on his death was acquired by the Nevilles. The site was abandoned in the 17th Century. Note that in earlier times all the land appears to have been owned by the Normans.

In the past further up Hedleyhill road was a pub called The Fir Tree which was known throughout the area as Hogans after the family that owned it. This was quite a common practice as pubs stayed in family ownership for many years but this is very rare now. Just before the road on the left to Waterhouses (known to some as Moffattland) we turn right to Bells House on a good track and a few yards from the farm we head steeply down to the right (north) to Low Row after crossing the road. We now proceed uphill to North Ravensbush Wood. It is best to be here in late spring as this wood is a superb place for bluebells and rarely visited being on a minor footpath. At the top of the wood we go west, crossing four fields to arrive at Cornsay village (not to be confused with Cornsay Colliery village two miles to the east). The views across to Hedleyhope fell are very fine. The village green here makes an excellent rest stop with its quirky old well.

The Browney Valley from a point just east of Cornsay village.

We leave Cornsay to the north descending steeply down Cornsay Lane, and then take the footpath on the right after the bend in the road at GR148441. The footpath contours round the field before going downhill to the road opposite Ragpath Side Farm. Recently this farm was used for a dry stone walling competition. We now head right (east) for a short distance on the road and then take a footpath on the left which soon rejoins a very minor road at Ragpathside Plantation. We continue along the road ignoring the first path on the left to Throstle Nest Farm (Thrushes Farm) and turn into the access road for Colepike Mill crossing the River Browney.

Colepike Mill was a fulling mill. Fulling (known as waulking in Scotland) is a process in the making of woollen cloth where the wool is pounded to remove dirt and oils etc and to make it thicker, This was originally done by stamping on it when it was covered in urine, hence the term walking to describe fulling. This system was replaced by power from water mills which carried out the process mechanically. Fulling Mills in Wales were known as pandy and this crops up in many Welsh place names. After thickening the wool was stretched on tenters fixed by tenterhooks and this led to the well known expression still in use today. Finally the material could be bleached by stretching it out and leaving it to action from sun and water, but the discovery of chlorine made this process redundant. The OS map indicates bleach green here so it is a safe assumption that bleaching was carried out. It is worth noting that fulling was started by the Arabs arriving in Spain in the 12th Century before reaching Britain.

From Colepike Mill we go north heading up to Middlewood Farm and note that the direction changes in the third field after leaving the mill. Here it crosses diagonally across the field instead of the field edge and directly across the next two fields to the farm. This farm goes back to the enclosure days and also took advantage of the supply of stone just down the road at the fort. It is now a short distance to the Satley road. We walk left for a short distance and take the road to the right to Upper Houses Farm which is the HQ for Lanchester Dairies. This is passed to reach one of the many Newbiggins to be found in the north. Here the old farm has been converted into housing and it is good to see that the gingang has been retained in the development. We now turn right towards Lanchester and after about 100 yards take the footpath on the left which drops onto the Lanchester walkway which is followed for one mile back to the start.

Further Information on Dere Street
Dere Street has been mentioned more than once in this walk description and overall l tend to feel that this Roman Road from York to the Forth valley is neglected. No doubt that this is probably due to the fact that much of it is still used and it is in rare places that the original road can be seen. Perhaps the best place to see the original track is on the Scottish side of the border coming from Chew Green which is at the head of the Coquet valley and walking down from the border to Towfoot and onwards towards Jedburgh where you can really feel the presence of the past in isolated country. This part of Dere Street is used for the Alternative Pennine Way path from Ashbourne in Derbyshire to Jedburgh. However on this walk you are walking on a track for a short distance at Quebec and the line of the road can be seen from Grenwell Farm at GR163458 leading up to the fort across the fields. In 2000 Durham County Council produced a useful leaflet on Dere Street which described the route and gave brief details of the forts on the route in our region, starting at Catterick and including Piercebridge (once in Durham), Binchester where part of the surface of Dere Street can be seen, Lanchester and Ebchester as well as mentioning further forts to the north such as Corbridge and Rochester. Dere Street was built circa AD80 and the original forts were timber built. The remains you see today were built of stone about 200 years later.

A good book to read for further information on the Roman occupation is “Roman England” by John Burke whilst on a more local note the books by Raymond Selkirk propose some very interesting theories which are backed up by facts in some cases. “The Piercebridge Formula” (1983), “On the Trail of the Legions” (1995) and “Chester-le-Street and Its Place in History” (2000).