Wrekenton is an area of the Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead

Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead

The Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead is a metropolitan borough of Tyne and Wear, in North East England. It is named after its largest town, Gateshead, but also spans the towns of Rowlands Gill, Whickham, Blaydon and Ryton; suburban areas include Felling, Pelaw, Dunston and Low Fell.It is bordered...

, in Tyne and Wear

Tyne and Wear

Tyne and Wear is a metropolitan county in north east England around the mouths of the Rivers Tyne and Wear. It came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, that was formerly a separate village.

Wrekenton is probably best known to passers by as the location of a large branch of the Co-op

The Co-operative Group

The Co-operative Group Ltd. is a United Kingdom consumer cooperative with a diverse range of business interests. It is co-operatively run and owned by its members. It is the largest organisation of this type in the world, with over 5.5 million members, who all have a say in how the business is...

 supermarket. It is served by the B1296 which used to be a route of the Great North Road.

It is bordered to the North by Beacon Lough to the West by Harlow Green and to the South by Eighton Banks. A large part of Wrekenton is a large council estate known as Springwell Estate

Springwell Estate

Springwell Estate is a council estate located to the southeast of Wrekenton in Gateshead, England.The area is near the local shops and transport links for easy access to Gateshead and Newcastle.The area is mainly ex-council houses of two and three bedrooms....

. This is distinct from Springwell village

Springwell village

Springwell Village is, as the name suggests, a village in Tyneside. Although the postal address is Gateshead, the village lies in the Washington West ward of the City of Sunderland. It has one church, two shops and one local pub. In the surrounding areas are an equestrian centre and farmland...

 which is located a few hundred metres across the border into the City of Sunderland

City of Sunderland

The City of Sunderland is a local government district of Tyne and Wear, in North East England, with the status of a city and metropolitan borough...

.

Name

The antiquarian, the Rev. John Hodgson, claimed to have named the village. He wrote, "After the enclosure of the common (in 1822), Mr Watson, of Warburton Place, Carrhill, founded a considerable village at this place, which, at my suggestion, he called Wrekenton." This name was chosen because Wrekenton and Eighton Banks were divided by the remains of the Wrekendyke Roman road.

Roman Roads

Wrekenton is believed to have been the meeting point of two Roman roads, Cade's Road

Cade's Road

Cade's Road is a postulated Roman Road in north-east England. It is named after John Cade of Durham, an 18th century antiquarian who in 1785 proposed its existence and possible course from the Humber Estuary northwards to the River Tyne, a distance of about a hundred miles...

, which ran all the way from the Humber

Humber

The Humber is a large tidal estuary on the east coast of Northern England. It is formed at Trent Falls, Faxfleet, by the confluence of the tidal River Ouse and the tidal River Trent. From here to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between the East Riding of Yorkshire on the north bank...

, via York

Eboracum

Eboracum was a fort and city in Roman Britain. The settlement evolved into York, located in North Yorkshire, England.-Etymology:The first known recorded mention of Eboracum by name is dated circa 95-104 AD and is an address containing the Latin form of the settlement's name, "Eburaci", on a wooden...

 to Newcastle

Pons Aelius

Pons Aelius or Newcastle Roman Fort was an auxiliary castra and small Roman settlement on Hadrian's Wall in the Roman province of Britannia Inferior...

 and the Wrekendyke which branched away to the north-east passing close to Jarrow

Jarrow

Jarrow is a town in Tyne and Wear, England, located on the River Tyne, with a population of 27,526. From the middle of the 19th century until 1935, Jarrow was a centre for shipbuilding, and was the starting point of the Jarrow March against unemployment in 1936.-Foundation:The Angles re-occupied...

 and ending at the Roman fort and harbour of Arbeia

Arbeia

Arbeia was a large Roman fort in South Shields, Tyne & Wear, England, now ruined, and which has been partially reconstructed. It was first excavated in the 1870s and all modern building on the site were cleared in the 1970s. It is managed by Tyne and Wear Museums as Arbeia Roman Fort and Museum.-...

, at South Shields

South Shields

South Shields is a coastal town in Tyne and Wear, England, located at the mouth of the River Tyne to Tyne Dock, and about downstream from Newcastle upon Tyne...

. It has even been conjectured that a Roman fort existed on the local golf course at Wrekenton but no evidence for this has been found.

Old Durham Road

Old Durham Road was the main route between Durham and Newcastle until 1827, when a better road was built to the west of it on lower ground and called Durham Road. Old Durham Road climbed the steep bank, known as Long Bank to Wrekenton and from there headed north to Beacon Lough before dropping down the steep bank into Gateshead. The mail coach used to pass along this road and one of the stopping places for the coach was the ’Coach and Horses’, an inn that still exists today. Other equally old public houses in Wrekenton, dating from the nineteenth century, are the ’Seven Stars’ and the ’Ship’.

Nineteenth-century Wrekenton

In the 1860s, Wrekenton was still a very small village with about two hundred dwellings. It remained so for a further seventy years until slum clearance in Gateshead resulted in many new houses being built in Wrekenton to accommodate the previous slum-dwellers. The main industries of the area surrounding the village during the nineteenth century were coalmining, quarrying, brickmaking and agriculture.