Susan, a former historian, is intrigued by the gaps and has been trying to find time over the last ten years to look into the story. We have copies of some interesting maps, prints, photographs and documents, but this is only the beginning! We are making progress and will be glad to share what we know if you are interested.
As a former watermill, Dilston is also an interesting early industrial site with its own mill race tunnel and Jan can give an engineer's point of view if that's more to your taste.
Below we give a few hints about some of the pieces of the puzzle in the story.
Romans and Anglo-Saxons:
Riverbed post-holes and dams: the theories of Raymond Selkirk
A horizonal mill in the Tyne: archaeological excavations
Medieval Times:
A substantial bridge and important road
Widows and orphans-some surviving documents
Rebellion and Disorder:
James Radcliffe, the tragic Earl of Derwentwater and the Jacobite Rebellions
Border Reivers:
The wild west in the Middle March; vendettas and sheep and cattle rustling
Greenwich Hospital Estates:
Distant Masters, Receivers and Visitations:
Surveys, Maps and Mill Accounts
Walton and Foster and the Mill Race Project of 1808
John Grey of Dilston: the Caretaker Master of the 19th century
The Sale of the Century in 1874:
The Allendale Estate takes over--local landowners and later tenants
We buy an old mill in 1989:
B and B begins in 1994.