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Bishop Auckland
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Bishop Auckland is a market town and civil parish in County Durham in North East England. It is located about northwest of Darlington and southwest of Durham City at the confluence of the River Wear with its tributary the River Gaunless. According to the 2001 census, Bishop Auckland has a population of 24,392.
Much of the town's early history surrounds the Bishops of Durham and the establishment of a hunting lodge, which later became the main residence of the Bishop of Durham.
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Encyclopedia
Bishop Auckland is a market town and civil parish in County Durham in North East England. It is located about northwest of Darlington and southwest of Durham City at the confluence of the River Wear with its tributary the River Gaunless. According to the 2001 census, Bishop Auckland has a population of 24,392.
Much of the town's early history surrounds the Bishops of Durham and the establishment of a hunting lodge, which later became the main residence of the Bishop of Durham. This link with the Bishops of Durham is reflected in the first part of the town's name.
During the Industrial Revolution, the town grew rapidly as coal mining took hold as an important industry. The subsequent decline of the coal mining industry in the late twentieth century has been blamed for a fall in the town's fortunes in other sectors. Today, the largest sector of employment in the town is manufacturing.
The town currently has a two tier local government, however, this is expected to be replaced by a single unitary authority on 2009-04-01. Bishop Auckland is located in the Bishop Auckland parliamentary constituency. The town has a town-twinning with the French town of Ivry-sur-Seine.
History
The first part of the name, "Bishop", refers to the town being the residence of the Bishop of Durham. However, the derivation of "Auckland" is less clear. One suggestion is that it is derived from "Alclit" or "Alcleat". This could be Celtic in origin referring to its position close to what is today known as the River Gaunless, or from it being extra land granted to the Bishop of Durham by King Canute in around 1020. A further suggestion is that "Oakland", has been used to refer to the presence of forests.
The earliest known reference to Bishop Auckland itself is in 1020 as a gift; King Canute gave it to the Bishop of Durham as a Bishop's borough. However, a village almost certainly existed on the town's present site long before this, with there being a church in South Church from as early as Saxon times. Furthermore, the Romans had a look-out post where Auckland Castle is sited today and a 10 acre (0.04 kmē) fort at nearby Binchester. There is also evidence of possible Iron Age settlements around the town, together with finds of Bronze Age, Neolithic and Mesolithic artefacts.
Much of the town's earliest history surrounds its links with the Bishops of Durham. In 1083, monks were sent from Durham Cathedral to establish a collegiate church, and in around 1183 Bishop Pudsey established a manor house in the town. Bishop Bek, who preferred the town as his main residence over Durham Castle due to its proximity to hunting grounds, later converted the manor house into a castle.
After the dis-establishment of the Church of England, at the end of the first civil war, Auckland Castle was sold to Sir Arthur Hazelrig, who demolished much of the castle, including the chapel, and built a mansion. After the restoration of the monarchy, the new Bishop of Durham, John Cosin, in turn demolished Hazelrig's mansion and rebuilt the castle converting the banqueting hall into the chapel that stands today.
By 1801, the town had a population of 1861. At the end of the eighteenth century the town had no notable roads other than the Roman road and little trade beyond weaving. Although, coal mining existed, it was limited by the lack of an easy way to transport coal away from the area. All this changed with the arrival railways in the early nineteenth century, which allowed large scale coal mining. The railways allowed coal to be mined, and then transported to the coast before being put onto ships to London and even abroad.
By 1851 the population of the town had more than doubled to 5112. A great proportion of the population working in ironworks and collieries. By 1891, the population had doubled again. In the second half of the nineteenth century there were typically around 60 collieries in the area open at any one time. By the turn of the twentieth century 16,000 people were employed in the mining industry in the area.
The town also became an important centre for rail, with large amounts of minerals such as coal, limestone and ironstone mined in the surrounding area passing through the town on the way to the coast. In the neighbouring town of Shildon large numbers were employed in the railways, were a railway engine works were established.
By the early years of the twentieth century coal mining started to go into decline as coal reserves started to become exhausted. By the end of the 1920s unemployment had hit 27% and the population too had started to decline, as colliery employment had halved compared with ten years previously. With the onset of the Great Depression unemployment rose to 60% in 1932 before easing back to 36% in 1937. The Second World War offered a temporary reprieve for the coal industry, however, after the war the decline continued. The last deep colliery in the area closed in 1968, although the much more mechanised, and less labour intensive, surface level opencast mining did continue.
Equally, the railways that had also supported the area were also scaled back, ultimately culminating in the closure of Shildon's Wagon works in 1984 which resulted in the loss of thousands of jobs.
Governance
From 1894 to 1974, the town was governed by the Bishop Auckland Urban District council within the administrative county of Durham. The Urban District was scrapped under the Local Government Act 1972 and replaced by a two tier district and county council system. Under the system Bishop Auckland was governed by Wear Valley District Council at the district level and Durham County Council at the county level.
A third tier was added at the May 2007 local elections when a new town council was established. After the elections, the council elected Barbara Laurie as the town's first mayor.
Under proposals approved by the government on 2007-07-25, Durham County Council and Wear Valley District Council will be replaced on 2009-04-01 by a single unitary authority serving the whole of County Durham.
The town is a part of the Bishop Auckland parliamentary constituency, and is currently represented at Westminster by Helen Goodman MP (Labour). The town is in the North East England European Parliament constituency.
The town is located in the South Area of the Durham Constabulary, and served by the County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service and North East Ambulance Service.
Bishop Auckland is twinned with the French town of Ivry-sur-Seine, whilst the wider Wear Valley district is twinned with Bad Oeynhausen in Germany.
Geography
Bishop Auckland is located at (British national grid reference system: ) on the Durham coalfield at the confluence of the River Wear with its tributary the River Gaunless. The River Gaunless was given its name by Norsemen in whose tongue it means useless. It is believed that this derives from the river's inability to power a mill, sustain fish or create fertile floodplains. The town nestles in the rivers' valley about above sea level. Besides this the town is all but is surrounded on all sides by hills ranging in height from around above sea level to over above sea level.
Bishop Auckland is located about northwest of Darlington and southwest of Durham City. The town is served by Bishop Auckland railway station, which marks the point where the Tees Valley Line becomes the Weardale Railway. The town is not served directly by any motorways.
Notable wards include Cockton Hill, Woodhouse Close, and Henknowle. Additionally, once neighbouring villages such as South Church, Tindale Crescent, St Helen Auckland, and West Auckland now more or less merge seamlessly into the town.
Neighbouring settlements.| |
Climate
The nearest Met Office weather station to Bishop Auckland is located north-east of Bishop Auckland in Durham. The following local figures were gathered at this weather station between 1971 and 2000.
Like the rest of the United Kingdom, Bishop Auckland has a temperate climate. At the average annual rainfall is lower than the national average of . Equally there are only around 121.3 days where more than of rain falls compared with a national average of 154.4 days. The area sees on average 1374.6 hours of sunshine per year, compared with a national average of 1125.0 hours. There is an air frost on 52 days compared with a national average of 55.6 days. Average daily maximum and minimum temperatures are and compared with a national averages of and respectively.
Demography
| Bishop Auckland Compared |
|---|
| UK Census 2001 | Bishop Auckland | County Durham | England and Wales | | Total population | 24,392 | 493,484 | 52,041,916 | | Foreign born | 1.5% | 2.0% | 8.9% | | Buddhist | 0.2% | 0.1% | 0.3% | | Christian | 84.8% | 83.5% | 71.7% | | Hindu | 0.2% | 0.1% | 1.1% | | Muslim | 0.2% | 0.2% | 3.0% | | No religion | 7.3% | 9.3% | 14.8% | | Over 65 years old | 17.2% | 16.7% | 15.46% | | Unemployed | 5.0% | 4.8% | 4.3% |
According to the 2001 census, Bishop Auckland has a population of 24,392, living in 10,336 dwellings. Of these dwellings, around 44% are terraced houses, 33% semi-detached houses, and 17% detached houses. As shown in the graph, the distribution of ages in Bishop Auckland was broadly in-line with that of County Durham and England and Wales, although there is a slightly smaller proportion of people between 20 and 24 years old.
Compared with the national average, the town's population performs poorly with regards to qualifications. At 31.9%, the proportion of the town's population with no qualifications is significantly higher than the national average of 23.2% and 29.1%. Similarly, only 13.8% have a degree level qualification (or higher) compared with the national average of 21.1%.
84.8% of the town's population identify themselves as Christian, compared with a national average of 71.7%. There are below averages numbers identifying themselves as belonging to other religion. The people of the town are also more likely to be religious than the national average with only 7.3% stating they had no religion compared with the national average of 14.8%.
At 1.5% of the population, the town has a below average population of foreign born individuals, compared with a national average of 8.9%.
Economy
Traditionally the town's economy was based heavily on coal mining. However, with the decline of the Durham coalfield, manufacturing has been left as the largest sector of employment in the town, accounting for 24.6% of the town's employment.
The town also traditionally had a strong retail sector, as one of the county's main population centre's shoppers were attracted from smaller settlements on the Durham coalfield for miles around. However, the affect of the decline in the coal mining industry has been felt in the retail sector. Together with competition from local shopping malls such as the MetroCentre in Gateshead, the decline in the mining industry has been blamed for a downturn in the fortunes of retailers, with commentators lamenting the number of down market stores and charity shops in the town centre. In response, numerous initiatives to regenerate the town centre have been proposed including the launch of the Bishop Auckland Town Centre Forum, and the 2006 regeneration master plan drawn up by Red Box Group, which was sponsored by Wear Valley District Council and the regional development agency One NorthEast.
Notable employers in the town include Ebac, which is headquartered in the town and employs 350 people.
The chart and table summarise unadjusted gross value added (GVA) in millions of pounds sterling for County Durham across three industries at current basic prices from 1995 to 2004.
| | Gross Value Added (GVA) (Ģm) |
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| 1995 | 2000 | 2004 |
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| Agriculture, hunting and forestry | 45 | 33 | 48 | | Industry, including energy and construction | 1751 | 1827 | 1784 | | Service activities | 2282 | 2869 | 3455 | | Total | 4078 | 4729 | 5288 | | UK | 640416 | 840979 | 1044165 |
Landmarks
The town has a number of Grade I listed buildings. The grounds of Auckland Castle alone contain seven such structures. Additionally Escomb Saxon Church, St Andrew's parish church, St Helen's church, West Auckland Manor House, the East Deanery and the 14th century Bishop Skirlaw bridge are all Grade I listed. Other notable buildings include the town hall, a Victorian railway viaduct and Binchester Roman fort.
Auckland Castle
Auckland Castle (often known locally as The Bishop's palace), has been the official residence of the Bishop of Durham since 1832. However, its history goes back much earlier, being established as a hunting lodge for the Prince Bishops of Durham. The castle is surrounded by of parkland, which was originally used by the Bishops for hunting and is today open to the public. The castle and its grounds contain seven Grade I listed structures.
The castle's long dining room is home to 12 of the 13 17th century portraits of Jacob and his 12 sons painted by Francisco de Zurbarán, which were saved by Bishop Trevor in 1756. Trevor was unable to secure the 13th, Benjamin, so commissioned Arthur Pond to produce a copy, which hangs alongside the 12 other originals.
Auckland Castle also provides the setting for Lewis Carroll's story "A Legend of Scotland".
Binchester Roman Fort
The route of the Roman road Dere Street passes straight through the middle of the town on its way to the nearby Roman Fort at Binchester. Binchester Roman Fort, or Vinovia as it was known to the Romans, has the best preserved example of a Roman military bath house hypocaust in the country. Bishop Auckland's main shopping street, Newgate Street, together with Cockton Hill Road and Watling Road faithfully follow the route of Dere Street. Note that Watling Road should not be confused with the Roman road Watling Street, which is in the South of England.
Town Hall
The Town Hall is a "Gothic style" Victorian Building overlooking the town's market place and is Grade II* listed. After being abandoned and then condemned for demolition in the 1980s, the town hall was fully restored in the early 1990s. It now houses the town's main public library, a theatre, an art gallery, tourist information centre and a café-bar.
Newton Cap viaduct
The town also has a Grade II listed Victorian railway viaduct crossing the River Wear. The viaduct provides views of the surrounding countryside below as well as Auckland Castle, the Bishop's Park and the Town Hall on approaching the town from the Viaduct. It was originally built in 1857 to carry the Bishop Auckland to Durham City railway line across the River Wear and the Newton Cap Bank that leads down to the river. The railway closed in 1968 and the viaduct fell into a period of disuse and was at one point threatened with demolition. However, in 1995 the viaduct was converted to take road traffic relieving the fourteenth century single lane, Grade I listed, Bishop Skirlaw bridge that sits in the valley below it.
Escomb Saxon church
The nearby village of Escomb is home to a complete Anglo-Saxon church. It is believed the church was built between the years 670 and 690. Much of the stone used to construct the church came from the nearby Roman fort at Binchester, with some stones having Roman markings on them. The church is a Grade I listed structure.
St Andrew's Church
St Andrew's church located in the adjoining village of South Church is the largest church in County Durham and a Grade I listed building. The church was built by Augustine monks in the thirteenth century and acted as a collegiate church.
Transport
The town has links with the birth of the railways, with the original 1825 route of the Stockton and Darlington Railway passing through West Auckland and Timothy Hackworth, a well-known locomotive builder, built steam locomotives in the neighbouring town of Shildon.
Today, Bishop Auckland railway station still provides passenger services being located at the end of the Tees Valley Line. Although, the station is also at one end of the Weardale Railway, no services on this line currently come as far as Bishop Auckland. The town centre had a large railway goods yard until the 1972. Freight traffic ceased to use the line between completely in 1993 when Blue Circle cement stopped using the line to transport cement from its works in Eastgate.
The nearest airport to the town is Durham Tees Valley Airport at around drive South-East of Bishop Auckland. The nearest motorway junction is Junction 60 of the A1(M), which is around away.
The town has a bus station with a number of bus-routes serving the town. Following the withdrawal of the Go-Ahead Group from the town on 2006-04-08, most of these services are provided by Arriva. However, a number of smaller firms such as Weardale buses also serve the town.
Education
The town itself has three secondary schools - St John's RC Comprehensive School, The Bishop Barrington School and King James I Community College. The town also has a college, Bishop Auckland College serving the Further Education and Higher Education fields. Both Bishop Barrington and King James schools have long histories being founded in 1810 by Bishop Barrington and in 1604 on the orders of King James I respectively.
As illustrated in the graph, in 2008 both St John's RC Comprehensive School and The Bishop Barrington School both exceeded both the national average and Durham LEA average for the proportion of students achieving five or more GCSEs (including Maths and English) at grades A* to C. However, only St John's has exceeded both of these consistently in recent years. Although traditionally the town's Grammar school, King James I now trails in third place on this statistic.
However, in the government's Level 2 CVA (Contextual Value Added) statistic, which attempts to measure how much a school improves students between the end of National Curriculum Key Stage 2 and the end of Key Stage 4, compared with how much other schools in the country improve students with similar circumstances, King James with 1048.5 points performs better than both St John's (1014.2 points), Barrington (1033.6 points) and the LEA average of 1014.7 points.
At A-Level none of the towns sixth form centres reach the national average of 739.8 A-Level points per student and only St John's, with an average 696.3 points, beats the LEA average of 657.6 points. In comparison, Bishop Auckland College has an average A-Level score of 468.5 points and King James came last in the LEA with an average points score of 441.7. The Bishop Barrington School no longer has its own sixth form, with the school being a feeder for Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College in Darlington. The average A-Level points score at Queen Elizabeth being 865.2. In terms of "Level 3 CVA" all 3 sixth form centres in the town fall short of the base-line score of 1000, with St John's scoring 995.7, Bishop Auckland College 990.5 and King James 989.8. In comparison, Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College has a Level 3 CVA score of 1013.1.
The needs of those with special educational needs are served by Evergreen Primary.
Schools in the town serving primary age education are detailed in the table below.
| School | Results | Website |
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| Cockton Hill Infant | | http://www.cocktonhill-inf.durham.sch.uk/ | | Cockton Hill Junior | | http://www.cocktonhilljuniors.co.uk/ | | Copeland Road Primary | | http://www.copelandroad.durham.sch.uk/ | | Etherley Lane Primary | | http://atschool.eduweb.co.uk/elane.durham/ | | Oakley Cross Primary | | http://atschool.eduweb.co.uk/oakleyx.durham/ | | St Andrew's Primary | | | http://st-andrews-pri.itss-durham.org.uk/ | | St Anne's CofE Primary | |
http://www.st-annes-pri.durham.sch.uk/ | | St Helen Auckland Community Primary | | - | | St Wilfrid's RC Primary | | http://www.st-wilfrids.durham.sch.uk/ | | Woodhouse Close Infant | | - | | Woodhouse Close Junior | | - |
Public services
Healthcare
As is the case with the rest of the UK, the population of the town are served by the National Health Service (NHS). The town has its own NHS hospital, Bishop Auckland General Hospital. The current Bishop Auckland General Hospital has 286 beds and since opening in 2002 has become a centre specialising in routine surgery. The hospital also has a doctor led Accident and Emergency department.
The new hospital was a PFI project and was announced by the Labour government in the summer of 1997. It replaced the old Bishop Auckland General Hospital which had been housed in the town's workhouse buildings and temporary huts constructed during world war II.
Other local hospitals include Darlington Memorial Hospital and University Hospital of North Durham, which has replaced Durham Dryburn and was announced on the same day as the new Bishop Auckland General. All three of these hospitals are run by County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust, which provides secondary health care services in the area. The local ambulance service is North East Ambulance Service.
Utilities
Bishop Auckland's water and sewerage is managed by Northumbrian Water. Water supply comes from Burnhope Reservoir via the Wear Valley Water treatment works at Wearhead. The present treatment works replaced old works on the site of the present one and another one closer to the town at Tunstall Reservoir. Contrary to popular belief the town does not receive water from Kielder Reservoir. Although water from Kielder is pumped into the River Wear, via the Tyne-Tees tunnel, upstream at Frosterley, this water is not extracted from the river until it reaches Chester-le-Street. Equally, although water can be extracted from the tunnel into Waskerley Reservoir, which in turn supplies Tunstall Reservoir, Tunstall water treatment works were replaced in 2004.
The electricity Distribution Network Operator for the area is, the CE Electric owned, NEDL (Northern Electric Distribution Limited). There are no power stations in the town.
Sports
Bishop Auckland is famous for its amateur football team, Bishop Auckland AFC, which won the FA Amateur Cup 10 times in the Trophy's 80 year history, having appeared in the Final on 18 occasions.
Bishop Auckland Football Club also helped out Manchester United after the Munich Air Crash in 1958 by donating three of their players, Derek Lewin, Bob Hardisty and Warren Bradley. In return in 1996, Manchester United played a friendly against Bishop Auckland to help raise money when the club was threatened with bankruptcy after a member of a rival team sued over an injury. In 2007 Manchester United donated floodlights to Bishop Auckland Football Club, which the club hopes to use in their proposed new ground.
The adjacent village of West Auckland is notable for having been home to the first team to win the Football World Cup. Its team of local coal miners won the cup in the Easter of 1909 and again in 1911, defeating the mighty Juventus in the final. This story was portrayed in the 1982 television movie "The World Cup - A Captain's Tale" made by Tyne Tees Television and starring Denis Waterman. The cup, the Sir Thomas Lipton Trophy, itself was stolen from West Auckland Town F.C. in 1994 and a replica now resides in West Auckland working men's club.
Notable people
Stan Laurel of the comedy duo Laurel and Hardy lived in the town during his childhood attending the town's Grammar School, King James 1st. His parents owned the now demolished Eden Theatre, which was located at the junction of Newgate Street and South Church Road. In 2007, a Wetherspoons pub opened in the town named after Stan, and in August 2008, a statue of Stan Laurel was unveiled on the site that his parent's theatre once occupied.
One of the UK's most prolific serial killers, Mary Ann Cotton, lived in the nearby village of West Auckland. She was hanged at Durham Jail in 1873 for the murder of her stepson. However, it is believed that she could have been responsible for the deaths of at least 18 others.
Roland Boys Bradford, who during World War I was awarded the Victoria Cross for bravery on 1916-10-01, and became Brigadier General, on 1917-11-10 at the age of 25 making him the youngest General in the British Army, was born in the nearby village of Witton Park.
Politician, Sir Anthony Eden, who was Prime Minister of the UK between 1955 and 1957, was born in Bishop Auckland. As was, Sir Peter Soulsby, the current MP for Leicester South, and Mansfield MP Alan Meale.
Jeremiah Dixon, Astronomer and Surveyor of the Mason-Dixon Line, footballer Charlie Wayman who played for Newcastle United, Middlesbrough FC, and Southampton FC, Actor Christopher Hancock, who played Charlie Cotton in EastEnders, Middlesbrough F.C. goalkeeper Ross Turnbull, Town planner Thomas Wilfred Sharp, architect William Atkinson, scientific instrument maker John Bird, botanist Robert Kaye Greville and Craig Raine, the poet and critic were also all born in Bishop Auckland. Actor John Reed, was born and spent his childhood in the nearby village of Close House.
In addition to Stan Laurel, the theologian and catholic priest Frederick William Faber, nineteenth century industrialist William George Armstrong, linguist Harold Orton, seventeenth century politician James Craggs the Elder and astronomer Thomas Wright were all educated at the town's grammar school.
See also
Bibliography
External links
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