Sweethope Loughs to Bellingham- 22 July 2023
Since April we have done quite a few long-distance journeys to get to the start of our routes but this time we are close to home on the western edge of Northumberland.
If you take a look at a map of Northumberland, Bellingham is not quite on the western edge of the county with only Kielder Forest separating the village from the Scottish border which is not much more than 15 miles away. Bellingham is quite a large village and you might wonder how this village has been able to prosper right on the edge of Northumberland.
However, go back to the 12th century and St Cuthberts Church was being built among the mainly farming community. The church is quite near St Cuthbert’s Well which was said to have been found and consecrated by St Cuthbert.
The well featured in a libellus, or little book, which was written by Reginald of Durham and is kept near Cuthbert’s shrine in Durham Cathedral. In the book, Reginald describes three miracles associated with the well, oddly enough they all concern one man called Sproich who was employed as a bridge-builder. In the first miracle, after Sproich’s daughter Eda stays away from the church to sew a dress on the feast day of St Lawrence, her left hand becomes paralysed, clutching the dress. She is miraculously cured by an apparition of St Cuthbert after drinking water from the well. In the second, on the occasion of Eda’s marriage, Sproich’s cow is seized in payment by a bailiff of the local lord and placed with another tenant. whose house is later struck by lightning. The cow is miraculously spared. In the third, a thief called Walter of Flanders and his accomplice, who have stolen Sproich’s axe, are fatally attacked by the head and the handle of the axe.
Quite an odd little collection of miracles but it might have been enough to secure a constant supply of pilgrims over the years who all followed the cult of St Cuthbert and were not averse to travelling many miles to visit the sites associated with St Cuthbert.
The village may have settled down over the next few hundred years but then in 1833, a large quantity of iron was found just outside the village at Hareshaw Linn. By 1848 the iron mine was exhausted but in that 15 years seventy coke ovens, twenty-four roasting kilns for calcining the iron ore and all the sheds, stables and stores were being worked and maintained by a huge workforce that needed to be fed, clothed and housed in and around Bellingham.
There was even a railway line and station at Bellingham, it arrived in 1861, a little too late for the iron works, but it served the village for nearly one hundred years and closed in October 1956. Since that date, Kielder Water and the surrounding forest has become a well-known tourist destination and as Bellingham is on the main route to Kielder it is still attracting a constant supply of visitors.
The three planned routes all start to the east of Bellingham. Both the 10-mile and 11.5-mile start just off the A696 on a minor road. Both routes go roughly the same way but the 11.5-mile route loops off to the north while the 10-mile route goes south to Ridsdale. The routes come back together again just to the east of Rede Bridge and then come into Bellingham along a footpath.
The 12-mile route starts further along the minor road and heads around the east side of Sweethope Loughs before going further west through Redesmouth and then follows a footpath beside the River North Tyne and comes into Bellingham from the south.
If you would like a walk close to home you can get in touch with the club on our Contact Page. You can also download the walk descriptions below and the GPS routes from here.
