Penrith derives its name, originally Pen-rhydd; “the red hill,” from Beacon Hill, 937 feet high, under whose shelter this place of narrow and huddled streets lies. The Beacon Hill was in the old days a protection to the surrounding country, for from its crest flared those warning flames that advised many a mile of threatened Westmoreland of the approach of the invading Scots.
But although Penrith is sheltered by its great godfather hill, it was never at any time effectually protected against the invader. Carlisle, eighteen miles away to the north, was its great bulwark, and if that fortified city fell, or were cleverly avoided, then the case of Penrith was sorry indeed, as in the notable instance of 1345, when the Scots, numbering 26,000 men, came pouring across the Border, and burnt the town and many neighbouring villages; taking prisoners with them, on their return, as many hale and hearty men as they could find, to be sold as slaves to the highest bidders. Such was life on the Borders in the fourteenth century, and, reading these things, we are inclined to agree with Taylor the “Water-poet’s” conclusion:
Whoso then did in the Borders dwell
Lived little happier than those in Hell.
The next year, the remaining inhabitants of Penrith, graciously permitted by the King to protect themselves, built a communal castle, and each townsman, so far as was possible to him, rebuilt his own dwelling-house in a strong and defensible way. Hence the grim, thick-walled houses that even now line many of the narrow streets.
That the Castle was at least once rebuilt seems certain. One of these rebuildings was that by Richard, Duke of Gloucester, who, before he became that inimical character of history, Richard the Third, was Governor of these marches, and resided here in every circumstance of magnificence. Now the place is a ruin, a condition it owes to the Penrith people themselves, who early in the time of Queen Elizabeth considered they had a more pressing need for a prison than for a fortress, and accordingly with thirty loads of stone, erected a very secure, if not very comfortable, gaol. At the same period, Robert Bartram, a merchant of the town, built himself a house from the same materials; and there it stands to this day in the churchyard, inscribed “R. B., 1563.”
There is thus nothing pictorial in the bare, roofless red walls of the Castle. It has little, or no story, and stands in the unromantic neighbourhood of the railway station, in a lofty situation on a hilltop above the town.
THE “GLOUCESTER ARMS”
The Duke of Gloucester, although he rebuilt the Castle, is chiefly associated with a much more sheltered situation, in the town itself. There were intervals between the acts of even Richard the Third’s melodrama, when, turning from battle, and from compassing the death of his relatives, he sought repose and refreshment, and he found them here in what must have been the exceedingly comfortable quarters of what was once Dockwray Hall, an ancient building that stands in the square called Great Dockwray, and is now, in memory of him, the “Gloucester Arms” inn.