Seaton Sluice Bottleworks

The Earsdon parish register for the 3rd November 1797 recorded the death of William Hempseed, a glassman of Seaton Sluice. The same registers had been recording the baptisms and burials of his eight children since 1764.

Seaton Sluice lies in the very south-east corner of Northumberland. It has a small harbour holding a few pleasure craft and can be described as a sleepy, picturesque coastal village. This was not always the case, however. Seaton Sluice was once the hub of thriving early-industrial activity.

So why was William living at Seaton Sluice? Where had his family originated from? What did a glassman do?

Seaton Sluice c1860 overlain on Modern Satellite Imagery (click to enlarge) 

The Royal Hartley Bottleworks was opened at Seaton Sluice in 1763 by the landholders, the entrepreneurial Delaval family. William Hempseed appeared listed as a resident of the area just one year after the opening. It can be presumed he was one of the first employees of the company. The websites of the Seaton Sluice and Old Hartley Local History Society and the records of the archaeological Sites and Monuments index on www.keystothepast.info give useful summaries as to the life and times of the Bottleworks.

Seaton Sluice was ideally situated to be a busy industrial centre. A natural harbour, established sea transport routes and the abundant supplies of sand, kelp, clay and cheap coal were available at this location. All the ingredients needed in the manufacture of glass. In 1764 the Delavals also carried out a major engineering feat in creating an artificial harbour, hewn out of solid rock, and known locally as "The Cut".

Crossing the modern bridge across the Seaton Burn south into Seaton Sluice you will be travelling right through the centre of the Bottleworks site, which was eventually demolished in 1897. Parliamentary permission was obtained for the use of twelve acres for the factory and accompanying village.

Rapid expansion meant that by 1777 the Bottleworks was the largest glass manufactory in England and produced in this year one million seven hundred and forty thousand bottles. Keystothepast.info states on the site there were:

...workers houses, market place and a brewery. A central warehouse was connected to the glass houses by an underground narrow gauge railway, reputed to be the first in the country to run on iron rails and was designed by George Stephenson. Further tunnels connected the glass houses to the river banks for slag tipping. Another tunnel ran from the warehouse to the harbour to transport bottles to ships.

Some of the tunnels still exist, but are rarely visited. They were used as air-raid shelters during the 39-45 war. It would appear that it was a self-sufficient community: most of the provisions needed could be purchased on site. The Delavals also provided a doctor for the workers, and their families', needs being paid for with a deduction from employees' wages. The self-contained community buildings became known by locals as "The City".

"Market Place"

Surviving  Bottleworks Tunnels

The Seaton Delaval and Old Hartley Local History Society state:

The first glass houses were 70 metres long, 15 metres wide and 11 metres to the roof. As expansion took place these were replaced by three round coned furnaces which were more efficient, and eventually six cones dominated the skyline. For administration purposes each cone was given a name; Gallagan; Bias; Charlotte; Hartley; Waterford and Success.

The large cones of the furnaces were something of a landmark to passing ships.

Glass is produced, at the simplest level, by heating sand and lime, with some other minor chemicals, to a very high temperature until a molten product is obtained. (Hence the furnaces.) This can then be shaped into various products.

There were various different types of worker employed in the Bottleworks: teizors, calkmen, ash shifters, fluxhown, pot makers, finishers, gatherers, and  blowers. So what was William Hempseed employed to do? The answer is at present I do not know. The Earsdon parish registers simply record him as a glassman.

What is recorded in the archives is that Thomas Delaval, the brother of Sir Francis Blake Delaval, returned from an expedition to Germany in 1763 with skilled glassmakers from Neinburg to teach the Bottleworks' employees their skills. Glassmaking was an established industry in some parts of England, but it was more advanced in our neighbouring european countries. Was William Hempseed given employment in the new venture as a complete novice or did he come with some experience in the glass making trade?

William was aged 55 at his death in 1797 which puts his birth year at around 1741-42. Tracing his life back through the Genealogical indexes we discover he was baptised at All Saints, Newcastle on 28th June 1741. His father's name was James and several entries relating to his family appear in the All Saints' registers during the following two decades. William married Catherine Ledger at Heworth, just a few miles south of Gateshead on the Tyne, on 27th March 1762. This was just prior to the family becoming residents of Seaton Sluice.

The records do not indicate the presence of many people with the surname Hempseed prior to 1741 on Tyneside. It is possible they were migrants. All Saints was at the east end of Newcastle beside the river and incorporated the Sandhill and the Sandgate areas. The latter was one of the poorest in 18th century Newcastle. This was the residence of the Keelman who formed a distinct and colourful community. "They were known as a close-knit group of aggressive, hard-drinking men. John Wesley, after visiting Newcastle, described them as much given to drunkenness and swearing" [Wikipedia]. The keels were vessels of narrow draught that were loaded with coal and then taken downstream to the larger collier boats where the cargo was offloaded to be transported by sea: a skilled operation. The colliers were unable to travel upstream as far as the Newcastle collieries: the river at this time was too shallow. According to the Keelman article on Wikipedia: "By 1700 there were 1,600 keelmen working on the Tyne in 400 keels. Not all were local: there was a significant number of Scottish keelmen who returned home in the winter when trade was slack." According to other sources many of these migrants were from the border area: descendants of the Border Reivers.

In the amount of time available to research this article it has been impossible to establish the exact occupation of the Hempseeds or where they originally came from. The parish records of this period simply do not give enough detail. However, a large grouping of Hempseeds did reside in the Perth area of Scotland in the early 18th century. There was also small-scale glassmaking manufactories established in Newcastle at that time. We have know way of knowing at present if William gained any experience there, however.

It would seem that with these initial investigations the Hempseeds of the early 18th century were unskilled, economic migrants to Northumberland. William took advantage of the new manufacturing technology moving into Seaton Sluice to learn a new trade. His early death at 55 though, could suggest he  was employed in one of the more dangerous and dirty jobs within the factory?

Flodden

As you will be aware September 9th 2013 is the 500th anniversary of the Battle of Flodden which was staged in North Northumberland, about eight miles from Wooler.

Flodden Battlefield and Memorial

And, you will have remembered that England were having a skirmish with France. The Scots had formed an alliance with France and so felt duty bound to cross the border into England and make a bit of a nuisance of themselves entering our Border castles without being asked. It was very rude of them. Then they camped out on an English hill, thousands of them, setting up guns and stuff facing South, under the leadership of their king James IV.

Flodden Display at Etal Castle

However, the English king, Henry VIII, had sent the very clever Earl of Surrey northwards with a smaller army to meet the Scots. Well, he didn't play by the rules, the sly old fox, and under cover of hills to the east of Flodden Field slipped round to the north of the battlefield taking the Scots by surprise. The Scots were less disciplined and had more antiquated weaponry than the English. The result was that approximately 10,000 Scots were killed, including the king and most of the nobility. Approximately 4,000 of the English army died. Game, set and match to the English. The battle had a devastating effect on Scotland.

Battlefield Interpretation Board (click to enlarge)

 You had remembered all that, of course? Me neither. This is not the most accurate and detailed description of Flodden events, but plenty has already been written on the subject. http://www.flodden1513.com/ would be a good starting point for more information. What the history books often don't cover in as much detail as the battle itself is the aftermath. This is what I wanted to explore. How do you dispose of 14,000 bodies including that of a monarch? What effect did it have on the residents of North Northumberland and how where they involved?

I purchased a guide book, written by Jane Lyell, from St Pauls Church in Branxton, a village only a short distance from the battlefield. She writes that the battle commenced at around 3-4pm and ended when the light faded at around 6.15pm. By this time the Scottish army had "ceased to exist" and King James IV was dead. That night the English camped out on the battlefield they had recently conquered. In the morning light the English started the process of looting the "richly-provided" Scottish camp for food and provisions. English supplies had been very low after their hasty and extended march North. The business of sorting through the dead bodies continued for the rest of the day.

Lord Dacre, the Warden of the English West March, found the body of King James IV, which had been stripped naked by looters. With help from the King's captured chamberlain the body was identified. According to Lyell, the King's body was wrapped in the remains of the Royal Standard and laid in Branxton Church. The church was restored in the mid 19th century but the chancel arch is still extant from the original medieval building. King James was then taken to Berwick for embalming, before being transported to London by horse and cart and buried in an unmarked grave at St Michaels, Cornhill. Or was he?

In April 2013 The Scotsman newspaper  http://www.scotsman.com/news/arts/bid-to-find-body-of-james-iv-at-flodden-1-2884762 carried a story about the Flodden 1513 ecomuseum project which involves a team of volunteers carrying out archaeological digs and searches in the archives relating to the battle. They are hoping to unearth new evidence to further understand the battle and the final whereabouts of King James, which they believe is not necessarily what the history books tell us. The work is ongoing.

The Border area by 1513 was a fairly lawless place. The inhabitants recognised a loyalty to their family surname, similar to the Highland clan system, above loyalty to the monarch and the law of the land. Raiding and stealing was the commonplace method of survival among the people who would be known as Border Reivers. Wardens were appointed on both sides of the English/Scottish border to uphold this unique Border law and try to maintain some kind of order, although sometimes they were actually the worst gangsters in the neighbourhood.

St Pauls Parish Church, Branxton

Lord Dacre was one such warden on the English side. His opposite Scottish warden was Lord Home. Both had raised a small fighting force of around 3000 men: followers and borderers. These detachments were the first involved in the battle. They withdrew to allow the infantry battle to take it's course, but when it became apparent that the Scots were suffering huge casualties Lord Home was urged to go to the aid King James' forces. This he refused to do. His motives have been the subject of speculation and debate to this day, but three years' later he was executed for treason. The day following the battle he reappeared on a hill overlooking the battlefield, but was quickly driven away by the English.

The English borderers were not happy with the spoils of war that they had accumulated on the battlefield. True to their reputation they broke from the army and indulged in some reiving, attacking the English camp and wagon train at Barmoor leaving behind them an unrecorded number of dead and injured among the non-combatants of the English force. The Bishop of Durham at the time recorded:

The Borderours did full ill and be falser than the Scottes and have doun more harm at this tyme to our foulkes than the Scottes dyd..... thay nevir lyghtyd from their horses, but when the bataylis was joynyd, they felle to ryfelyng and robbyng aswelle on our syde as the Scottes

The Borderers had put their own selfish interests ahead of the national interest. But without Dacre's men would the battle have been won?

Chivalry and loyalty, if it was ever alive, was not much in existence at Flodden. The Scots who had managed to survive the battlefield were now fleeing for their lives back to the border with English detachments in hot pursuit. However, it is said that they slaughtered "to a man" 500 french mercenaries who had been fighting on the Scottish (their own) side. The English also indiscriminately slaughtered and looted Scottish civilians who had followed the wagon train South and had found themselves on the wrong side of the English lines.

Robert White, Battle of Flodden, 1859

Robert White, writing in 1859, recorded that he had unearthed several human skulls in the churchyard, while laying a new path. Presumably time was taken to bury some of the men in a mass grave in consecrated ground. Were they the more highly-regarded men or just those that had happened to fall near the church at Branxton?

Flodden1513.com suggests that the church was used as temporary mortuary and hospital, although little written evidence exists of this, and of an oral tradition that the bodies of Scots nobles were retrieved from the battlefield and  repatriated by the nuns of Coldstream Abbey, who also tended to the wounded. It also suggests:

...locals, prisoners and the fighting men of the English army would have worked to clean the battlefield, burying the dead but at the same time stripping them of clothes, possessions and of anything valuable.

Very little archaeological work had taken place at Flodden until a few years ago when a team from the BBC "Two Men in a Trench" series carried out a brief investigation. Part of the work done was to excavate on the battlefield hoping to find graves of the combatants. It was expected that remains would be found, but this was not the case, despite quite large trenches having been cut by machine across the site. The location of the mass of the bodies still remains a mystery and any theory as to their disposal inconclusive.

George McDonald Fraser in his book "The Steel Bonnets" writes that the Border Reivers became more active in the period following the battle, because of the instability on the border and the Scots' weakness. The English did not follow up their victory, as was probably expected, with a conquest of Scotland.