Unearthing Coldstream Priory's Secrets

The Berwick Advertiser reports that from 22 to 25 August, the Flodden 1513 project is conducting an archaeological dig to unearth the history of Coldstream Priory, Coldstream, Berwickshire.

Canmore says 'St Mary's Priory of Cistercian Nuns, founded between 1136 and 1166. The last prioress had demitted office by 12th May, 1588, and the nunnery was secularised in 1621', however other websites give slightly later foundation dates.
Its prioress, Isabella Hoppringle is said to have provided information about the Scottish invasion force crossing the river at Coldstream on 22 August 1513. She may have acted as an informal conduit between the Scottish and English crowns and that she led her nuns to retrieve Scottish noblemen that fell at Flodden. In 1515, she gave refuge to Margaret Tudor, sister of king Henry VIII of England, and her second husband and son (the future king James V).

Much more Coldstream Priory history.

Flodden Lectures

With the 500th. anniversary of the Battle of Flodden fast approaching (9th. September) much is happening to mark the occasion. For more information on these events and for more details and background on the battle itself  and on the Flodden 1513 Ecomuseum see - http://www.flodden1513.com/index.php/site/events

Members might be interested in two talks being given by Paul Brough, archivist at the Heritage Hub at Hawick on 11th. of  September one in Coldstream in the afternoon and the same talk in Eyemouth in the evening. Details below;

Come and Visit Us at Bygone Borderlands This Weekend (18 & 19 May)

This weekend, 18 and 19 May, there’s a local and family history weekend organised by Berwick Record Office celebrating the heritage of the Scottish and English Borders and commemorating the battle of Flodden in 1513. 

The weekend event is called Bygone Borderlands and takes place in the Guildhall, Berwick on Tweed, England. 

On Saturday it runs from 10am to 4pm and on Sunday from 11am to 4pm. 

This is a very popular event with displays about the history of North Northumberland and the Scottish Borders, talks and exhibitors. 

Saturday’s talks are: 

• 10.15    An Introduction to the Battle of Flodden     Chris Burgess
• 11.00    Rebuilding Berwick’s Town Hall – recent discoveries    Jim Herbert 
• 12.00    A Glimpse into the Archives at Paxton House     Martha Andrews and Chris Pawson
• 1.00    Wilson’s Tales of the Borders : Berwick’s Forgotten Heritage. The Tales; The Man and their historic context    Andrew Ayre
• 2.00    James IV – who was he?     Matthew Rooke 
• 3.00    Family History Resources in the Berwick Record Office and the Heritage Hub at Hawick    Linda Bankier and Paul Brough

Sunday’s talks are: 

• 11.15    An Introduction to the Battle of Flodden     Chris Burgess
• 12.00    Women and the Battle of Flodden    Clive Hallam Baker
• 1.00      Berwick’s  Medieval Walls    Jim Herbert
• 2.00      Mauchlineware and Flodden    Jane Bowen
• 3.00      The Alnwick Muster Roll, February 1514    Chris Hunwick, Archivist to the Duke of Northumberland

There'll be an archaeological tour of the jail area of the Town Hall, led by Jim Herbert at 12 noon on Saturday and 2pm on Sunday.

 Exhibitors include:

• Borders Family History Society
• Glendale Local History Society 
• Lowick Heritage Group 
• Northumberland and Durham Family History Society 
• Norham and Ladykirk Local History Society 
• Old Parish of Bamburgh

Entry is free and tasty refreshments will be available.

Bygone Borderlands 2013

The weekend after we host the 24th Annual SAFHS Conference and Family History and Local History Fair on
11 May 2013 in Galashiels, Scotland; Berwick Record Office  are holding their annual event, Bygone Borderlands, on 18 and 19 May 2013 in the Guildhall, Berwick on Tweed, England.

This is a very popular event with displays about the history of North Northumberland and the Scottish Borders, talks and exhibitors.

The talks include

• Introduction to the Battle of Flodden
• Women and the Battle of Flodden
• Berwick’s Medieval Walls
• History of the Guildhall

Exhibitors include

• Borders Family History Society
• Glendale Local History Society
• Lowick Heritage Group
• Norham and Ladykirk Local History Society
• Old Parish of Bamburgh

Entry is free and tasty refreshments will be available.

Opening hours are Saturday, 10am to 4pm and Sunday. 11am to 4pm.

More information from Linda Bankier on 01289 301865.

Remember, this is the weekend after our conference.

Online booking for our conference has closed.

 

Borders Archaeological Society

 

 

Members in the Berwick area may well be interested in a series of monthly talks and meetings of Borders Archaeological Society.

 

The next of these is on Monday 3rd. September when Dr. Christopher Bowles, Archaeological Officer of Scottish Borders Council will be giving a talk entitled;

"Opening a creaky door: Partnership working and revitalising our heritage in the Scottish Borders".

The new Ecomuseum currently being established to mark the 500th. anniversary of the Battle of Flodden will no doubt feature.

 

All meetings are in the Parish Centre (adjacent the Parish Church) Wallace Green Berwick.

 

Admission for non Archaeology Society members is £2

More Cataloguing of Flodden Finds

Another fun day, today, cataloguing finds from fieldwalking fields (part of the Flodden 500 project) around Flodden, the previous cataloguing finds day being St Patrick's Day.

We have, I think, finished field 18, and made a start on field 19.

There was less of interest to me today, musket balls, some buckled lead sheet, a clay marble, bits of 19th century window glass, fragments of clay tobacco pipes, bits of glass bottles, two pins, medieval pottery and some coins – a couple of just recognisable Charles II copper Scottish turners (also known as bodles) worth two pence each.

The young lady sitting next to me asked me about a corroded coin and I suggested she brush it, not really expecting that would do much good. How wrong I was, very quickly Britannia was recognisable with a blank exergue. As it was penny sized, I knew it must be 1806 or 1807. After some more brushing, George III's head was visible, and the date, 1806, was just discernible. Perhaps she's an archaeologist or a numismatist in the making.

Alnwick Castle Archives and the Earls of Northumberland

Alnwick Castle Archives and the Earls of Northumberland
is the title of the talk at the annual general meeting of Friends of Berwick & District Museum and Archives.

Lord Joicey will give an update on Flodden and then the speaker is Chris Hunwick, Archivist at Alnwick Castle.

It takes place on Friday 23 March at 7.00 pm at Berwick Parish Centre, The Parade, Berwick-upon-Tweed, TD15 1DF, England. Map. It's next to Holy Trinity Church. Entrance is through the churchyard. The suggested car parking is in the car park next to the churchyard.

Everyone is welcome. Admission free.

Coldingham Monumental Inscriptions has been published. More information.

Read our Kith & Kin column every week in the Border Telegraph and Peeblesshire News newspapers.

Cataloguing Finds from Flodden 500 Fieldwalking

Flodden 500 is a project that supports lots of other projects and activities working towards the commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the Battle of Flodden, which took place on 9th September 1513. Part of this project has been to examine the archaeology of the supposed battlefield and the surrounding fields; comprising digs, metal-detecting and fieldwalking. More information about the Flodden 500 project including pictures and descriptions of the finds.

I spent a very interesting St Patrick’s Day (17th March) identifying and cataloguing objects that had been found while fieldwalking.

The sorting and cataloguing session was held in Etal village hall in Northumberland.

There were about 15 people there including two archaeologists, Jenny Vaughan and John Nolan, to help us when we were mystified. I was one of the least experienced volunteers so it was useful to get an introduction to different types of pottery – Roman, Medieval, 17th century, 18th century, and later.

Sometime last summer, field 18 was divided into 100 square metre squares, and the fieldwalkers had picked up everything that looked interesting and bagged it – one bag per square with the square’s reference on the bag.

Our task was to identify each artefact in the bag and write its description on a record sheet, later to be entered into a computer. It sounds more daunting than it was.

Everyone is very friendly and happy to help identify things. A lot of the material that I handled was bits of 18th and 19th century pottery and a few bits of miscellaneous medieval pottery. I would like to think that my expertise with coins helped others.

I also had musket balls, a fragment of lead bullet, some buckled lead sheet, part of a bronze leg of a yetling (a cooking vessel on three legs that stands over a fire), a clay marble, bits of 19th century window glass, fragments of clay tobacco pipes, small bronze and pewter buttons, bits of glass bottles, part of the ramrod holder for a muzzle-loaded gun, polishing stones in sandstone and quartz, a flint microlith (a small bit of waste from stone age tool manufacture), a bit of lead used to repair a pottery vessel, some wire, a medieval pin, a possibly Romano-British tile, and some coins – mostly George III and Victorian halfpennies, but also a Charles I or Charles II copper Scottish twopence.

Most of these artefacts have nothing to do with a battlefield but everything to do with what people used the fields for; perhaps much of it for dealing with waste.

There was tea and coffee to drink and very nice biscuits. I learned a lot, handled some very interesting things, and I’m looking forward to the next sorting and cataloguing day. I just hope that I’ve correctly identified the things that I handled.

Although few people have traced their family history back to that period, the artefacts found provide a wealth of interesting information on our ancestors’ lives, and we feel that it is so important that we’ve started a new Flodden 1513 forum, to which anyone can contribute.


Read our Kith & Kin column every week in the Border Telegraph and Peeblesshire News newspapers.

Bygone Borderlands at Berwick - Programme of Talks

As reported in our previous blogs, Bygone Borderlands - Family and Local History Weekend and Bygone Borderlands - Flodden 500 Projects, the unmissable event this coming weekend (14th and 15th May) is Bygone Borderlands at the Guildhall, in Berwick Upon Tweed, England, TD15 1BN.

The programme of talks was published today, and it looks very interesting.


Saturday 14th May 2011

• 11.00    Tracing my Family History – Celtic Origins and what price DNA? A 'rare' surname & a few costly mistakes ! : Donald McIllhagga
• 12.00    Brewing in Ford in the 18th century : Peter Maule
• 1.00    Murky Mires – an investigation of Spades Mire and the medieval defensive ditches of Berwick : Jim Herbert
• 2.00    Detective Research – the Heritage Hub and its resources for Scottish Borders Local and Family History : Rachel Hosker
• 3.00    The Bondagers – What did they wear ? : Dinah Iredale

Sunday 15th May 2011

• 11.00    Flodden 500 – meeting of those interested in researching Flodden : led by Chris Burgess and Chris Bowles
• 12.00    Eleanor Weatherley’s Diary – a recently discovered diary written by a Belford farmer’s daughter, giving a glimpse into everyday life in North Northumberland in 1804 : Joan Wright
• 1.00    Flodden – a brief archaeological history : Chris Burgess
• 2.00    Following in Henry’s Footsteps ( Dr Henry Richardson in Australia) : Jane Bowen
• 3.00    The Trials and Tribulations of Berwick as a Border Poor Law Union : Linda Bankier

We have a stall there, both days, with a variety of members present.
We'll be glad to help you with your family history problems and queries.

See you there !

Bygone Borderlands

The latest information from Chris Bowles the Scottish Borders Archaeology Officer about Bygone Borderland (see 04/04/11):

Bygone Borderlands: Berwick Town Hall - Saturday 14th and Sunday 15th May 2011

This will include various displays and talks on the subject of history and heritage in the borders area.

I would also like to invite you to attend (or send a representative) to a meeting/discussion during Bygone Borderlands on the various aspects of the History Projects surrounding the Flodden 500 project and how your members might get involved. This meeting will be held in the council chamber on:

Sunday 15th May - 11am - we will be discussing

· The Flodden 500 Archaeology Project

· The Flodden 500 History Project

· The potential for a related Scottish Borders focussed history project looking at which Borderers went to battle, where they came from and if they ever came back

· The potential for a related archaeology project aimed at locating camps, muster points and the movements of the Scottish army after the battle in 1513

Sunday 15th May - 1pm - we will also be giving a short review of the archaeological results to date.

Both Saturday and Sunday there will also be a standing display including artefacts recovered from the site.

Chris Bowles the Scottish Borders Council Archaeology Officer circulated this note this morning.

The Bygone Berwick weekend will take place between the 14th and 15th of May, and as part of this the Heritage and Research group of the Flodden 500 project will be presenting an exciting opportunity to help us gain a full understanding of one of this region's key historical events: the Battle of Flodden. As many of you know, 2013 marks the 500th anniversary of the Battle of Flodden. Archaeological investigation and historical research is on-going in Northumberland as part of the Flodden 500 project, and we are hoping to bring to life a similar project in the Scottish Borders region.

At Bygone Berwick, we will be discussing, and hopefully encouraging some of you to take part in:

• The Flodden 500 Archaeology Project
• The Flodden 500 History Project
• The potential for a related Scottish Borders focussed history project looking at which Borderers went to battle, where they came from and if they ever came back
• The potential for a related archaeology project aimed at locating camps, muster points and the movements of the Scottish army after the battle in 1513

If you are interested, simply turn up on the 15 May from 11 - 12 at the Guildhall in Berwick (Council Chambers) for a discussion of the on-going research and our hopes for a Scottish project.

Recording Gravestone Inscriptions at Stobo Kirk

A small team met at Stobo Kirk on Saturday 8th May to record the Monumental Inscriptions in the churchyard.  It was a very cold day but we managed to record all of the older stones in front of the kirk.  We met again on Sunday afternoon, a much warmer and very beautiful Spring day. Recording of the newer stones behind the church was completed and all stones were photographed. 
There are several very interesting  symbolic stones which are still in excellent condition, a testament to the skills of the 18th century stonemasons.  Stones include those of William Hogg, brother of James Hogg, the Ettrick shepherd.
The church is one of the oldest in the Borders, sitting in the Tweed valley to the west of Peebles.  Interesting features in the church include the jougs, still hanging at the front door, the most public of places for public repentance, or civil punishment.  There are grooves cut into the stone walls at the front door, reputedly carved by archers, sharpening their arrows in readiness for their archery practice following the battle of Flodden.
Stobo kirk is situated in the village of Stobo on the B712 off the A92 (signposted Broughton) approximately 6 miles south west of Peebles. See this map for directions.
If you are in the area, Stobo kirk is worth a visit.

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