Reports

South Tyneside Meeting October 2002 "Marsden, the Lost Village" by Sybil Reeder A Report by Margaret Stafford

As it happens we could have done with some mulled wine as it's quite a chilly night but it was fortunate that tonight's meeting coincided with the dire England match - by contrast we enjoyed a very interesting talk and slide show from Sybil Reeder entitled " Marsden, the lost village".

The slides reminded some of times past and gave others a completely new view of what was once a thriving village, now almost completely disappeared.

124 years ago a village was created around Whitburn colliery, miners came from all over the country to live in the 9 streets, 136 houses which contained 600 inhabitants.

Some houses were 2 up 2 down, some were smaller single storey buildings of 2 rooms, some were 2 down with 1 larger room upstairs. There were gardens or allotments. The village was self-contained and had a church, chapel, a Co-op store, a grocer's, a butcher's, a draper's, a Miners' Institute and eventually a school. By 1968 the mine had closed and the village disappeared almost entirely.

The houses, as well as being too small for modern tastes, had also moved too close to the edge of the eroding cliffs. One man claimed he could fish in the sea from his bedroom window!! Those who wanted to remain in the area were moved to Whitburn where there remains a thriving community of ex-Marsden families.

The Post office's front room doubled as a doctor's surgery and a dentist's. The barber (female at one stage) came on her motor-bike once a week.

There was a bowling green, 4 tennis courts, a cricket pitch and a very successful football team. Successful at home at least where visiting teams took time to adjust to the pitch which sloped to the sea. If it looked like an away win was in the offing someone was dispatched to set the fog-horn off!!

The chapel is still there, now in the charge of the Christian Fellowship, the church, St Andrew's, built partly by public subscription (1s a brick!) has been pulled down. There was also the Tin Church. The Primitive Methodist chapel became the Sunday school, with its own stage, when the second chapel was built on the Coast Road.

Souter lighthouse had been built 6 years before the mine was sunk and the 6 cottages for the lighthouse men, although cheek by jowl with Marsden Village, were seen as a separate community.

Interestingly there was no pub in Marsden Village though as someone pointed out there was one within staggering distance! The village was a temperance village. Marsden hall on the coast road (still there though it can't be seen from the road) was the residence of the agent for the 4 local collieries.

The Institute had a reading room, billiard hall and splendid library. The Co-op had an upper floor for dancing and Sybil showed us one slide which revealed a very damaged roof. In World war 1 there was an underground fort in the village with a large gun which, because there was no invasion, was never fired. When it was to be dismantled it was decided to fire it just once. It would have done more damage to the locals than to any invading Germans as windows broke, ceilings collapsed and the Co-op roof gained a gaping hole!

The school was built in 1882 - there were lots of children in the village (we speculated this was due to no television and no pubs!) - and Sybil showed a lovely shot of the school decorated for Armistice day - with the coal trucks running immediately behind. Before 1882 children had to walk the 2 miles to school in Whitburn.

Another shot showed another group of children, this time in the 1926 General Strike, being fed (twice per day) at the Whitburn Institute.

The village had a large blacksmith's workshop covering the 4 collieries. Without a resident doctor the St John's Ambulance played a vital part in village life. There was a lovely slide of the miners with their banner en route to that year's miners' gala - motto of Marsden, "firm as a rock we stand" - no-one would have fore-seen the decline of Marsden rock itself.

The railway ran from the colliery to Westoe lane in South Shields where the colliery head offices were situated and where the only telephone was sited so villagers had to go there to call for the doctor in an emergency and treatment was carried out in the waiting room of the station! Prescriptions were sent out to the village on the train - the Marsden rattler.

Between Westoe and Marsden stations was Marsden Halt, a request stop so any passenger had to warn the guard who would warn the engineer that the train needed to stop at the Halt. The station was so small that if the train was pulling several carriages it would have to stop twice! There were 1st and 3rd class carriages and the return fare for the former was 9d, with 6d for the 3rd class. The Coast Road was not built until the 1930s so the train was the main means of transport.

In the 1930s the pit baths were built though some still preferred their tin bath in the downstairs room which was the cooking, dining and eating area as well.

In 1968 the mine closed and the railway line closed and there was a very poignant slide of a packed Marsden rattler (with cleaned up coal trucks pressed into service) taking rail enthusiasts along the line for the last time.

The Chapel and the houses behind are still there but are really a part of Whitburn and these houses were used by the managers rather than the miners.

There were 2 other industries in Marsden. There was a very large paper mill right on the edge of the coast. It produced 300 tonnes of paper per week, mainly newsprint for the whole country until a disastrous fire in 1911 which raged for 5 days. Markets were lost and not regained and production turned to wall paper but was not very successful and the plant closed in 1933. Part of it was taken over by the blacksmiths.

Then there was/is the quarry. Magnesian limestone had been quarried for hundreds of years, used for example in the building of St Andrew's church in Roker and Whitburn Mill. The Mill is the oldest one in the area, built in 1798. No longer a working mill it was a sea mark and was converted into a cattle shed which ensured its survival. It became an observation post during the war and then declined again until 10 years ago when South Tyneside council carried out a very successful restoration with the sails being replaced again last year after gale damage. The mill is opened once a year in June during heritage week and is well worth a visit - it also has a stair case rather than ladders so access is easier than in working mills!

Stone was burned in lime-kilns for fertiliser which was exported. The process also had a peculiar by-product as it was believed the fumes from the burning lime could cure whooping cough and many a local ailing infant was taken to stand outside the kilns and breathe in the fumes! The kilns are now preserved as an industrial Monument but no burning takes place so the theory cannot be tested out!

There was also a short-lived holiday camp built in the 1930s for the city children of Sunderland and Newcastle to enjoy a week of fresh invigorating air. During World war 1 there had been a tented army camp in the same area.

Then we had some fascinating shots of the grotto and Marsden Rock. One of the most noticeable things was how high the cliffs were then and how much erosion has taken place. Originally a cave blasted out of the rock, the grotto was developed by Peter Allen and became a home, then a pub, then a restaurant bearing the name Tam O'Shanter in its early days. There was a ball room and 15 rooms tunneled out of the rock as well as a path to the top of the cliff.

Most people would have arrived by boat or perhaps by cart and there is a lovely shot of 140 years ago showing how people dressed up to parade on the beach-hats for the ladies and stockings and white collars for the children obtaining refreshments from the grotto.

What is also odd for those who know the area today is the absence of sea-birds. Sybil told us they are a recent addition with fulmars arriving in 1926, a few kittiwakes in 1930 (now the population is estimated at 3,000), the herring gulls were evacuees during the war - looking for peace and quiet and the cormorants were post war.

Peter Allen also channeled out a path to the top of Marsden Rock, huge by comparison to today's survivor and people paid to climb to the top and picnic on the soft grass now gone due to the huge numbers of birds. Tea dances were held up there ( I was stone cold sober at this point I promise!) and in 1903 there is a newspaper illustration of members of combined church choirs (men in top hats!) having a service on the top of the rock.

The final shot was of the beach 50 years ago - packed out, with Marsden village in the background and Marsden Rock dominating the scene. Now the village has gone, the beach is much quieter and the Rock greatly changed.

All in all an evening of nostalgia and there is hope of a book to follow - a book of memories of Marsden. If you have any to contribute, let me know and I will put you in touch with Sybil.