Tradition says that as they were passing over Crosby Fell a shepherd was met with. He was brought to the King, and questioned respecting the locality, and even acted as guide to the army over the moors. His name was Thwaytes, a family then numerous in Crosby. A rustic obelisk has been erected to commemorate the event, and a more vivid description of the place cannot be given than the following, extracted from a provincial paper published at the time.
"This place is one of the most solitary and dreary that can well be imagined, surrounded on all sides by an unenclosed heath; and, since the formation of the road over Shap Fells, seldom seen except by the shepherd or the sportsman. However, it must be recollected, that, though now so still and silent, it was once the great thoroughfare from Scotland through Lancashire, to the metropolis of England. To the solitary passer-by, who now can only hear the sighing of the breeze among the heather, or the bleating of a sheep, it may not be uninteresting to reflect on the noise and clamour that must have prevailed here on the day in question when the neighing of horses, the clang of arms and the shouting of men on a hasty march, (for Cromwell and his victorious army were not far behind), must have made a medley of sounds that can be better imagined than described."
On one side of the obelisk is the following inscription:—
HERE, AT BLACK DUB
THE SOURCE OF THE LYVENNET
CHARLES II
REGALED HIS ARMY ON THEIR MARCH
FROM SCOTLAND
AUGUST 8TH, A.D. 1651.
This obelisk was renewed in 1861 at the expense of Mr. Gibson, and besides the inscription on the lateral sides are bas-reliefs, on one side of a crown, for which Charles was ardently striving; on the other side is a lion, which unfortunately came in his way and overthrew his hopes at the battle of Worcester. It has been further commemorated in a poem, "The Lyvennet," by A. Whitehead, and also by Mr. T. Bland, who has sculptured "The Lyvennet Vase," on which the King, dismounted, is receiving a drink from the hands of the presiding goddess of the stream.