CHAPTER IV.
NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE.
“Her dusky hair in many a tangle clings
About her, and her looks, though stern and cold,
Grow tender with the dreams of by-gone days.”
—W.W. Tomlinson.
The outward signs of “by-gone days,” in the Newcastle of to-day, with the one notable exception of the Castle, must be diligently sought out amongst the overwhelming mass of what is often called “rampant modernity,” of which the town to-day chiefly consists. The modernity, however, is not all bad, as this favourite phrase would imply; much of it is doubtless regrettable and a very little of it perhaps inevitable; but no one will deny either the modernity or the beauty of Grey Street, one of the finest streets in any English town; or the fine appearance of Grainger Street, Blackett Street, Eldon Square, or any other of the stately thoroughfares with which Grainger and Dobson enriched the town within the last eighty years—no one, that is, who has learned to “lift his eyes to the sky-line in passing along a thoroughfare” instead of keeping them firmly fixed at the level of shop windows.
The grim old building which, when it was new, gave its name to the town, is one for which no search needs to be made; its blackened and time worn walls are seen from the train windows by every traveller who enters the city from the south. So near is it to the railway, that in the ultra-utilitarian days of sixty or seventy years ago, it narrowly escaped the ignoble fate of being used as a signal-cabin. It was rescued, however, by the Society of Antiquaries, and carefully preserved by them—more fortunate in this respect than the castle of Berwick, for the platform of Berwick railway station actually stands on the spot once occupied by the Great Hall of the Castle.
The site of the New Castle, on a part of the river bank which slopes steeply down to the Tyne, had been occupied centuries before by a Roman fort, constructed by order of the Emperor Hadrian, who visited Britain A.D. 120. He also constructed a bridge over the Tyne at this spot, fort and bridge receiving the name of Pons AElii, after the Emperor (Publius AElius Hadrianus). This became the second station on the Great Wall erected by Hadrian’s orders along the line of forts which Agricola had raised forty years before. This station shared the fate of others on the abandonment of Britain by its powerful conquerors, who had now for more than two hundred years been its no less powerful friends and protectors. Pons AElii fell into ruins; but so advantageous a site could not long be overlooked, and we read of a Saxon settlement there, apparently that of a religious community, from which fact it was known as Monkchester. All the records of this period seem to have perished, for we hear nothing of the settlement during the Danish invasions; but a Saxon town of some kind was evidently in existence at the time of the Conquest, though in 1073 three monks from the south who came to York, and, obtaining a guide to “Muneche-cester,” sought for some religious house in that settlement, could find none, and were prevailed upon by the first Norman Bishop of Durham, Walcher, to stay at Jarrow. The years from 1069 to 1080 were evil years for Northumberland, for at the first-named date the Conqueror devastated the North, and left neither village nor farm unscathed; and, as the desolated land was beginning to recover again, Odo of Bayeux and Robert of Normandy relentlessly laid it waste once more, partly in revenge for the murder of Bishop Walcher at Gateshead, and partly to punish Malcolm of Scotland for his invasion of Norman territory.
It was on his return from this expedition, which had penetrated as far north as Falkirk, that Robert, by his father’s orders, raised a stronghold on the Tyne on the site of the old Roman fort, in the year 1080. His brother, William Rufus, erected a much stronger and better one, the Keep of which, re-built by Henry II., stands to-day dark and grim, looking out over river and town, as it has stood since the Red King ruled the land, and, like his father, the Conqueror, found it desirable to have a stronghold at this northern point of his turbulent realm, around which a town might grow up in safety.
The roof and battlements of the Keep are modern, but the rest of it—the walls, 12 to 18 feet thick; the dismal dungeon, or guard chamber, with iron rings and fetters still fastened to the walls and central pillar; the beautiful little chapel, with its finely-ornamented arches; the little chambers in the thickness of the walls; the well, 94 feet deep, sunk through the solid masonry into the rock beneath; the arrow slits in the walls; the stones in the roof scored with frequent bolts from the besiegers’ crossbows, one of which bolts is firmly embedded in the wall opposite one of the narrow windows; the ancient weapons and armour—all these breathe of the days when the Red King’s castle took its part in the doings of our hardy ancestors in those stormy times in which they lived and fought.
The last time the old Keep was called upon to act as fortress and refuge in time of war was in Stuart days, after the ten weeks siege of Newcastle by the Scottish General Leslie, Earl of Leven, in 1644, when brave “Governor Marley” and his friends held out in the castle for a few days longer, after the town was taken. In memory of this stout defence and long resistance King Charles gave to the town its motto—Fortiter defendit triumphans, which Bates gives as having originally been Fortiter defendendo triumphat—“She glories in her brave defence.”
Two of the original fireplaces still remain in the Castle, and there are besides many objects of great interest which have been bestowed there from time to time for safe keeping; and many more are to be seen at the Black Gate, formerly the chief entrance to the Castle Hall and its surroundings. The Great Hall of the Castle, in which John Baliol did homage to Edward I. for the crown of Scotland, stood on the spot now covered by the Moot Hall. The Black Gate, the lower part of which is the oldest part of the building, which has many times been altered and repaired, is now used as a museum. There were nearly a dozen rooms in it, and not so many years ago the Corporation of Newcastle let these out in tenements, until this building also was rescued from degradation by the Newcastle Society of Antiquaries, who took down most of the dividing walls, and converted it into a museum. Here may be seen stored many sculptured stones, altars, and statues, which have been brought from the various Roman stations in the north.
Around the walls of one room are to be seen facsimiles of the famous Bayeux tapestry; there is also a model of the Castle as originally built, and there are many more exhibits and loans of the very greatest interest.