On Bedlington.uk Now...

Hi I wrote a message which has had 80 views about trying to contact people from Westridge County Secondary School 1967/8 so that would be Alan Coultas, Joe Lees, David Job, Tom Miller, Peter Tate, James Watson, Keith Bacon, Stuart Green, Janet Common, Carol Suthers, Mary Mathews Muriel Cutter there are others but my memory is a bit hazy since it is over 50 years ago, so if anybody knows these worthwhile citizens of Bedlington please inform them to contact this page. Keep well and hope to see a bunch of good people on the 14th September 2025 venue Red Lion time to be arranged. Yours steeped in nostalgia Malcolm G Allan.

First one: https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/fury-northumberland-line-station-delay-32011486?fbclid=IwY2xjawLZ-UBleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETBVRDlnYnl0NVZWekc1Y3NkAR7Dd-pkV5BoAwCDM8In2oJ-nZLVQwqdJn42ln4AuB9nl9nZgnDxcCOarlsbug_aem_pxynPYlhOs_k1bJAbfj1fg Follow up: So I’m getting a bit of flack about the comments I made in the press about the rail station situation here in Bedlington and the fact that this town has been overlooked for decades! Let’s just put it in perspective: Starting with the station, about 6-7 years ago I stood on the old platform with the then Government minister when the reopening of the lines was being discussed and he said with what we already had this was going to be the easiest station to get reopened! I was at one of the original presentations about reopening the rail line and we were told in no uncertain terms that if the costs couldn’t be brought down to around the £100M mark then it wouldn’t go ahead. They were currently about £160M at the time. The Bedlington station project was estimated at around £20M One of the reasons this was wanted, as stated, was it could open up about 10,000 new housing units. Also it would kick-start economic regeneration around these new stations. I’ve asked about this fantastic economic regeneration, which I think is a no brainer, and was told oh yes you are getting a café. Fast forward a few years and the cost is around £300M, so someone somewhere made that decision! Shades of HS2 here? The new station at Newsham goes £20M+ over budget and the Bedlington station gets moth balled for a year. Coincidence? We hear about structural problems and unexpected anomalies here is Bedlington, wasn’t there a comprehensive engineering assessment done when the contract was awarded? Are there penalty clauses in the contract? We now see further delays due to……………..errm we haven’t been told but I can guess! Parking is going to be an issue but the main car park which was envisioned at the planning application stage has been ‘put on hold’ for up to 10 years to assess the need for it. In my opinion it’s as if even when we get a new station they don’t want people to come and use it? Other places get 200+ new parking places, we get something like 20 odd including electric and disabled ones. Even just this quick overview, is anyone really going to say we have been treated in the same way other places have? And that’s before we get onto the Town centre debacle and the other multitude of examples………..

Despite the political spin, it's perfectly obvious why Rachel Reeves was in tears during the HoC debate on welfare payment reductions. The realisation had finally dawned that she has taken on the hopeless task of balancing the UK's books. Hopeless because even the easy low-hanging fruit can't be plucked. We are supposed to believe that "the adults are now in charge", but like most of the guff from the Labour propaganda machine, exactly the reverse is true. Everything they've done to allegedly improve the economy has actually made our situation worse. The international bond markets have taken notice, and a 1970s type Sterling crisis is looming. How long this will take is anyone's guess. Some economists say it will strike in 2026. But one thing is for sure: this hopeless government won't last out it's five year term, and it will ALL end in tears!

Hi I used to live in Bedlington now I live in Glastonbury Somerset, I am trying to arrange a meeting of friends and past school mates from 1968 Westridge County Secondary School as we are all getting on maybe to meet up at Red Lion on time arranged I hope everyone is well and thank you if you read this and leave a message. Thanks Malcolm G Allan.

Does one have to summit their enquiry by pigeon post. Technology is supposed to improve communications. Instant replies are what people expect.

Now define "Urgent" Sanderson is a good tap dancer....

Sounds as though they've hired 'the Donald'!

This was resolved just before todays meeting! Sense has prevailed!

I was almost unable to speak today at full council and this time it was passion not being forbidden to speak! I’m used to having a fight with the Administration to get anything for Bedlington, I hope today is the last time I have to have a go at the new bunch of councillors! The motion they put forward was badly constructed but there was one bit which I couldn’t contain myself about. If it had gone through then about 6 years of my time and efforts would be wasted with Bedlington losing millions of pound of funding. I couldn’t let that happen and so I had to say something: https://www.youtube.com/live/xi5sxPcTWWI?si=rWWEKF9yA76ksl0j&t=6171

"Fixing" something that isn't broken, yet! Some people just need to hide.

Full council meeting today and many people won’t be aware that all members have been told not to contact NCC officers directly. In fact we now have to submit any problems, concerns or suggestions we raise on behalf of residents to a generic email address which is supposed to be answered within 10 days. I don’t feel that allows me to do my ‘job’ properly on behalf of my residents! In fact I think it’s a retrograde step taken by who I don’t know. Now there might well be valid reasons behind this but as yet I haven’t been informed and even if my suspicions are correct then this really does interfere with the way I do this ‘job’. I have quite a few ‘issues’ which residents have been onto me about and I have expressed them directly to the responsible officers but it seems I haven’t had the normal relies which always used to be the case. I can only assume they have been told not to reply to any member questions either? This isn’t going to work and the Independent Group, which I’m now part of within NCC, is fighting this, what seems to me at least, to be an irrational decision! I like to get back to any of my residents who contact me as soon as possible with a reply to their concerns but this is seriously hampering that! There are other wholesale changes going through which again need to be challenged but the above is the main bone of contention for me!

Hi wow thank you so much for all of this. I would like to receive the documentation. I will get back in touch to try and sort what you say. I am not very technically saved! I do know the area as my Nanna and Grandad lived in Berwick and I spent every holiday there and I was born in Newcastle. Thank you again

Your great grandfather, James Scott, also worked as an agricultural labourer. In 1901 when Ralph gives his occupation as Farmer/butcher, James is working with his brothers on the farm as a labourer. In 1903 he is still in the area, presumably working at Westfield, when he marries. His children are born: Ralph at Springhill, just a stone's throw away from North Sunderland, Mary Jane is, in fact, born at Westfield and Henry at Elford - also a stone's throw away from North Sunderland. It's not clear if James was living at Westfield or elsewhere. The children may have been born at the homes of Mary Jane's relatives which was quite a common occurance. Mary Jane, your great grandmother, was from Norham, which is also on the map just south west of Berwick so she was a local lass. By 1911 James and his family have made the move from North Sunderland to Holborn about 11 miles south of Berwick on Tweed. It is here he becomes a farmer, working for himself at West Holborn. Lowick Beal. Address: Farm House, Holborn West. (See https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1156167 for map and better photo or ‘drive’ past on Google maps as I did). The farm is now a grade 2 listed building. If you’d like any of the documentation from which I’ve taken this info leave your e- post address in my mail box (move your marker over my ‘hat’ and choose ‘message’. It’s not wise to leave it here on site.

@Susan J-D Hi again! This may be long! I don’t know how well you know the area so I’ll start with a map which covers most of the places I’ll mention: Berwick, Seahouses, Bamburgh, Wooler, Lowick, Belford and Chathill. North Sunderland isn’t shown but it’s almost part of Seahouses. It’s not a huge area as you see. Your great grandfather James and his father, Ralph, didn’t jointly have a farm. They had 2 quite separate places and I can’t say if they owned or rented them. Ralph, who would be your 2x great grandfather, was an agricultural labourer at the age of 19 living with his widowed mother in New Bewick near Wooler. 10 years later, in 1871, he is married and living in the small village of North Sunderland, adjacent to Seahouses on the north east coast and is a butcher. He seems to live here for many years with the same neighbours and his children are all born here. In 1891 he gives his occupation as “Butcher & farmer” and he is now self-employed, so he has presumably taken over a farm – rented or bought. He employs his sons: George as his butcher’s assistant and Ralph jr – 13 years old - as a shepherd. Just where the farm is located isn’t clear from the documentation available other than that it is in North Sunderland, In 1911 the farm address is given as “Westfield, Chathill”, which is about 9 miles north of Alnwick and 3 miles inland from the North Sea coast between Seahouses and Bamburgh. I think it’s fair to presume that it is still the same farm. He now gives his occupation as “Farmer”only so he seems to have given up butchering – possibly to his son George. His sons, Ralph jr, & John, and daughter Annie work for him. As Annie is a dairy maid it may be a dairy farm. Ralph dies in 1913 and I can see that his son, Ralph jr. seems to take over the farm. In 1921 he is still single and running the farm together with his unmarried sister, Annie, as housekeeper. Today, Westfield is a B & B guest house.

Just to add my Great Grandfather died in Ashington in 1952 and my Great Grandmother Mary Jane Scott died in Ashington in 1964 they may have stayed at the farm until then but I am not sure

Hi, Thank you so much for this - it had gone into my spam I really appreciate this- do you have any information about the Farm in Lowick that you say he and his father owned this is fascinating. I will tell my cousin his mother and my mother played at "Home Farm" and I have pictures of our Grandfather John Derry Patterson there with my mother and aunt. John Derry Patterson came from Berwick and married my Grandmother Mary Jane Scott in Ashington and then they moved to Berwick. I have managed to download one picture out of several on the Northumberland Archives site and I will ring them on Wednesday to speak to them Thank you again for all your help. When I speak to Northumberland Archives I will pay for some photos when I can actually see some of them. Susan

Hi again @Susan J-D. It’s been a cold, wet weekend here which gave me time to have another look at your question. I still think that Coney Garth may be the home farm for Bothal Castle – which was originally the manor house before being granted the rights to call itself a castle. As a manor house under the feudal system, it would certainly have a home farm. As I said before, the home farm was usually close to the manor house and that would certainly make Coney Garth a respectable contender. However, I have to admit that I have been assuming that Coney Garth (marked red on the map) and Coneygarth Moor Farm (marked blue on the map) were the same thing. A more thorough rummage through the old maps has shown me that this was not the case. Coney Garth has been named on maps since at least 1805 and, while the small cluster of buildings to its east have appeared an equally long time, it is not until 1921 that the name Coneygarth Moor appears. Your great grandfather, James Scott, seems (according to the births of his sons James and Thomas John) to have moved the 40 or so miles from Lowick to Ashington at some point roughly between 1914 and 1921. Just where he moved to is difficult to say but certainly in 1921 he was living and working at Coneygarth Moor Farm in the Bothal Demesne and he was still there in 1939. He did not own the farm though, as you say, he was a farm owner prior to his move to Ashington – as was his father before him. James was, in 1921, a farm steward - a very respectable position - employed by the Ashington Coal Company who owned the farm – as well as the remaining seven largest farms in the area. All 8 farms were run by one farm manager; George Preston Graham, and he lived in one of the large houses on Woodbine Terrace (marked yellow on the map) just a stone’s throw from your great grandfather. At that time Ashington Coal Company was owned by the Portland family who lived at Bothal Castle (which is still owned and occupied by their descendants), so indirectly James was employed by the lord of the manor – the Duke of Portland. He, and his Ashington Coal Company, seem to have been good employers. They built many houses for workers in both the mines and on the farms and one purpose of the farms was, in fact, to supply food for the workers. They had a milk ration of 2 quarts a day and even the farm cats had a ration of 1 pint a day! If you have seen your great grandfather’s address given as “Home Farm” on any document then Home Farm would seem to be Coneygarth Moor Farm rather than Coney Garth. I find it surprising that Coneygarth Moor farm should be the home farm as it is considerably less in size than Coney Garth – which, having had a good look around the maps, seems to be by far the largest in the area as well as being located nearest to the manor house. Let us know how you get on at the Northumberland Archives!

I am trying to trace a relative who was a shop owner in Bedlington circa 1920s. His neice was Henrietta Sweeney. When her father died in 1st world war she was taken in by her step grandfather John Robinson. The shop owner disowned her as he didn't like her choice of spouse. Trying to compile family tree.