East House

East House

East House which is situated in St. Ives Road was one of theearliest houses in the village. It is believed to have been first owned by a member of the Dunn family prior to to building “Ty Cerrig” (the old Vicarage). Subsequently the home of Mr. Foreman (an early Vet) it next housed the McWilliams family where Mrs. McWilliams ran a prvate school. Later it was divided into three seperate dwellings. When demolished the site provided the entrance to St. Ives Gardens.

On-Line History of Leadgate and one Old Building – A House History

Ever wondered who lived where you live now, perhaps having stumbled on an old bottle while digging the garden or carrying out some house renovation? I did and having carried out some relatively straight-forward research and like many others am now firmly hooked on local history.

While not in the same league as much more knowledgeable colleagues I provide what follows as a very personal, first-hand account of an old house, one out of many in one of our villages. Since moving here searching out who lived here, when and why the house was built and by who has given me hours of pleasure and not a little pain. Read it and see what you think and if you know more, please tell me.

Clifton House was built on what is now St Ives Road here in Leadgate, some time prior to 1856, adjacent to a large building simply numbered “719” on the first ever OS Map of 1861. “719” was of course the Old East House, demolished in 1982.

Maps are fascinating things, presenting snap-shots at different points in time. Other buildings are shown on St Ives Road and just around the corner into Watling Street, notably the Coach and Horses and what was until relatively recently Susan and Johns’ Fruit and Veg shop (OS No 718), now flats with an uncertain future. Another building (OS No 720) is also on the old turnpike road on the left toward the Drovers. Otherwise St Ives Road, unlike the remainder of Leadgate especially to the West where the “squares” had been built, was totally undeveloped at this point in its history.

So what you might say? Clifton House has no real significance to anyone other than me and besides what are we talking about here – East House or Clifton House? I live in one and have “acquired”, as so many did before me, a part of the other. Were it not for this fact and the fact that I needed to know more, for all sorts of reasons, this little bit of research would mean nothing. Add to this a lucky circumstance that I was furnished with all of its legal documents by a thoughtful solicitor, it would remain to me, as it will be to most, inconsequential and irrelevant, simply a place to live.

Unlike the East House, which was the building numbered 719; Clifton House is not shown on the first Ordinance Survey of 1861 though a Deed of Conveyance for the property exists dated 27th November 1858. This question fired my imagination and led to the first question of many, only some of which I could and can yet answer.

I now know that the Nicholson family built the house, on a green-field site immediately to the West of the old East House that by then had become a Public House just off the Wolsingham and Newcastle Turnpike Road. The A N Other referred to in the first Deed of Conveyance was one Mr Thomas Heatherington, while the other was the Reverend G J Dunn. Both I now learn were members of notable Leadgate families. The Heatheringtons, though not on the same scale as the Dunns, were clearly prominent: their family burial plot is immediately adjacent to the St Ives Church entrance, a dead give-away (no pun intended) to the social standing of families in Victorian times and this led to a sort of graveyard survey, something carried out earlier by Tommy Young and other local history enthusiasts. This led to more unanswered questions and so on. Incidentally, it also led me to become the Verger of this particular church as I try to put something back into the community which has now, finally I think, accepted me.

I needed somewhere to collect and assemble this information. Significantly, I also noted other names reoccurring throughout the relatively short history of the village manifest in the various deeds of conveyance and various abstracts. I also now know that many of those living in Leadgate, at least some of those who’s ancestors lived in my house, didn’t know or don’t care! Why should they? Others however either had or have developed a keen interest and were only too willing to help. This helped me, as a novice historian and newcomer to Leadgate, to fit in and get to know more.

Still however, like the opening paragraphs to any book, a dry fact of no consequence, singularly uninteresting and unimportant to the person preoccupied with the living rather than the dead. At best objects of passing interest, a casual conversation over a pint! Indeed, we rarely have the time or inclination to ask questions on things like old maps, things unearthed while gardening or names brought up in casual conversation. I know that until recently I didn’t. But in the process of living in my old house for the first time after a life of moving house every couple of years and being preoccupied with ‘important’ matters I am, for the first time, alive to an aspect of my own life which positively enriches my enjoyment, which costs nothing and gives me a sense of belonging. This may and probably is a sad indictment on me and how much time I have on my hands. But – it’s fun and keeps me out of trouble!

How was a religious man involved with a Pub? Who and what were the Trustees referred to? What did the house and indeed the village look like? Who put that enormous piece of beautifully dressed stone in the ground just below my fork while gardening that jolted my spine and led to weeks of pain and misery?

When did the house catch fire, why is the roof irregular and who last smoked that old clay pipe that was uncovered the other day? Why are there traces of wallpaper on the walls on the attic above the kitchen when it should be an outside wall? Where did the two rooms above the kitchen therefore go to and when? Who was Mrs Close? What are those numbers on the OS Map and what do they mean? Are there any earlier maps? And so on. Questions that all have answers, some available simply by listening and others available by a little judicious detective work, as much a part of my future as my past and important at least to me..

Living in a village that is so obviously beaten up, either on the verge of recovery or terminal decline I can observe, quietly, how we behave toward each other and speculate how little we may have changed over a few thousand years. How decisions get taken and conversations translated into something far removed from what we meant to say. But enough of this preamble; I needed help then and still need help now to turn what I think I know into “published” fact and I ask you to read on, wade through the dry facts that start this work and get beyond them as quickly as possible.

This is about my adopted village of Leadgate and mainly concerns your memories and your knowledge. I ask you to lend me these so that I can give back something in return, if only a running commentary of how the excavations on the site of the old East House have progressed. Some people cycling or walking by during the four or so years that I spent toiling on my house will have noticed the eccentric old guy digging in all weathers, sieving soil in proper time-team fashion and smiling with delight over some old artifact. That was me and of course I am, at least I believe, quite sane!

If you can answer any of the questions posed, correct some of my mistakes or simply engage me in preferably friendly conversation I would be eternally grateful! The “Website” on which this document is mounted is a “labour of love” but I also need to earn my living. I hope it will grow and furnish me, as it might you, with opportunities to do both. It is about sharing – thoughts, ideas and experiences – communicating more effectively, handling “information” which is dynamic more adequately than sometimes is possible by word alone.

David Shields

The Beginning and a Social Comment as Well as a Solution to One Problem

The first available legal deed shows that Mr Thomas Heatherington and the Reverend Dunn sold the land on which Clifton House was built to Mr Joseph Nicholson and his Trustees at a price of £50 and 5 Shillings. £37 and 13s went to Thomas Heatherington with the balance of £12 and 12 shillings going to the Reverend Dunn.

The parcel of land consisted of the Reverend Dunn’s strip of land measuring 75 feet by 10’, which gave the builder, Joseph Nicholson access to what was described as “Clifton House and adjoining Cottage and Cow Byre”. The buildings themselves were erected on the land sold by Mr Thomas Heatherington, which measured 32’ 9” adjacent to the road, by 82’ sloping to the Pontop and South Shields Railway where it was 25’ 5” wide.

It has always been a puzzle as to how something so grandly described as a “House” and an adjoining cottage, as well as a cow byre, could be build within such a small area. What did it look like? Was it once at a different level to the present?

The puzzle is being slowly resolved by a combination of judicious digging (both literal and metaphorical) which has established with reasonable certainty that the buildings ran North to South at a tangent to the road facing back toward the centre of Leadgate.

The physical evidence for this rests in the construction of the main dwelling house which has survived despite subsequent alteration elsewhere, that has load-bearing walls running East to West, the surviving walls of the adjoining cottage (now buried at a depth of 1 meters discovered below the lawn) and the cow byre that has survived intact albeit as a workshop/garage.

What remains of the main dwelling house would not be recognizable to Joseph Nicholson and his Trustees (of which more later). It is likely that the sheer demand for land between the East House and the village centre along the Wolsingham and Newcastle Turnpike (that has become St Ives Road) between 1856 and 1895, when the next Ordinance Survey was published, meant that what may have originally been open space very quickly became occupied by dwellings in the form of a continuous terrace. Moreover, family circumstances changed relatively rapidly during the same period to the extent that by 1895 the original house itself had been partitioned, with one part occupied by a surviving relative and the other let out to a tenant. This line of research was even in itself a fascinating insight into the family lives and social values which then prevailed. It would make a wonderful period play!

In 1820 the village itself would not have been a picture. It was functional place in which dwellings were exactly that. Places in which people sheltered and survived to work. By 1856 the houses were set out as befits the social conscience of the time in squares with centrally-located water pumps and middens, with schools provided by the powers-that-be and places of worship, all dependent upon those that ordered such things. The working man, for such was the order of things, provided an income while the wife kept the home in some semblance of order in which the large families could reach maturity before joining the workforce. All humdrum. There were fights, pub brawling, children died of infectious diseases and either learned at school or not, depending upon their personalities and upbringing. Became workers or ventured out into the world as soldiers and sailors. Life went on. The village grew; people lived and died. Not radically different from today in fact.

Parks were installed, new pubs, a tennis court even. Allotments were provided amidst the grime and scarred landscape, and gave back to the workers a sense of their origins as well as the opportunity to take leisure. Amidst all this houses were built, were added to or fell into decay and became the sources of future wonder, as is the site of the old East House to me now

By 1895 Clifton House had changed hands. What is fascinating to me is that the Deeds of Conveyance, Abstracts and Probates both prior and subsequent to this date have survived intact. They chronicle this period of industrial and economic growth, wealth and prosperity before an equally long period of economic decline and stagnation. Some of what is written down here is pure speculation but it is underpinned by best available evidence. And I can add to this over what remains of my life, if I have the help of others.

So, Was the Reverend Dunn (and who were the People in the Documents)?

The Trustees that Joseph Nicholson represented paid the Reverend Dunn £12 and 12 shillings, in those days a tidy sum. However, it may be significant that the Deed of Conveyance is retrospective and shows that by the time money changed hands, the buildings had been built. However, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The table below shows who owned the house, from when, what money changed hands and to whom. Later tables describe in more detail the occupants, their tenure and circumstances. The tables are then amplified further with notes. Finally, the following narratives attempt to paint a more interesting picture of what actually took place, why the house changed hands and who were the principal beneficiaries.

Date From To Amount

27 November
1858
Rev G J Dunn &
Thomas Heatherington
Joseph Nicholson
£12-12-0
£37-13-0
Note 1.
By all accounts the Dunn family was a prominent local landowner. The above transaction was more complex than described and involved two members of the Dunn family. Firstly, the younger brother, Reverend Dunn resident at Brooms had to be sold the land by his elder brother, by all accounts a shrewd businessman though none the less a gentleman, William Dunn who was then resident in Newcastle. This in itself involved a regularization of the tenancy agreement between Mr Thomas Heatherington, who was the tenant of the Inn and the outright owner of that other part of the land parcel sold. This then was the Reverend Dunn’s connection with the Inn. His family leased the land and East House to Mr Charles Allan for use as an Inn

What is also clear from this transaction is that Joseph Nicholson did not act purely as a builder but was effectively a property speculator. Indeed, most of the Nicholson family were engaged in the building trade, some as skaters, and were then largely resident in Leadgate, though having their origins in Shiney Row. The house was built prior to the land sale being effected, which in itself would be odd, were it not for the place of the Derwent Mutual Building Society then becoming active. In effect, the Nicholson family built the property for profit and may have been engaged in building other properties along the turnpike. Thus, a further document shows Joseph Nicholson indenturing the newly constructed dwelling house and the property on 2nd December 1858 to the Derwent Benefit Building Society for the sum of £240-0-00, 1 week after purchasing the land formally. By 17th January 1867 he had paid his dues and the house passed completely into the owner ship of the Nicholson family. As an aside, it is interesting to note that of the 4 trustees of the society, one was named Mathew Heatherington. Some relation to Thomas perhaps?

Joseph Nicholson left a widow, Margaret when he died on 2 June 1864 intestate at the age of 59 years. Although his will automatically went to probate his widow continued to reside in Clifton House and retained rights to the stable until she too died in July 1867, although having to pay an annual rent of £16-0-00 to the estate. The other dwelling house was rented to a Mr Pattinson at the annual rent of £7-16-00. Later documents scrutinized indicate that Mr Pattison may in fact have been Margaret’s son. The legal profession carefully chronicled all known facts to ensure correct eventual payment of death duties. These eventually became lodged with the house deeds. And here we have a wonderful insight into the lives of the Nicholson family, perhaps typical of the time, worth comment.

Date From To Amount
26 April 1867 Thomas Nicholson William, George & Charles Nicholson £335-0-00
The offspring of Joseph and Margaret Nicholson (nee Margaret Hedley)
Name Born Died Note
Mary Nicholson 26 May 1827 –
William Nicholson 28 Sep 1828 28 Apr 1829
Ann Nicholson 16 Jan 1830 –
Thomas Nicholson 15 Dec 1831 –
Jane Nicholson 11 Jun 1833 21 Jun 1834
Joseph Nicholson 6 Jan 1835
Margaret Nicholson 3 Jun 1836 29 Jul 1836
William Nicholson 10 Dec 1837
Margaret Nicholson 13 Jan 1839
Robert Hedley Nicholson 19 Mar 1840
George Nicholson 21 Mar 1842
Charles Nicholson 2 Mar 1844
Hedley Nicholson 15 Apr 1846
Elizabeth Nicholson 21 Jul 1850
Date From To Amount
5 Nov 1870 Nicholson Brothers William Todd £350-0-00
Thomas Nicholson clearly inherited the whole of his father’s estate, which was not inconsiderable and included Clifton House, following the death of his father. Legal papers show that Joseph’s lifetime of work as a builder and sometime speculator had created a considerable estate by his death The estate included a total of 6 houses, leased out to various people, including the Marchioness of Londonderry.

Settlement of an estate this size was a lengthy business. For example on 15th December 1866 one Ann Carr, a widow, provided a solemn declaration that she was the sister-in-law of Joseph and therefore the sister of Margaret Hedley, whom Joseph had married, at Penshaw Parish Church, on 7 February 1827. Both were under the age of 21 requiring the consent of their respective parents. Thomas was the eldest surviving male heir, one of 14 children born to Joseph and Margaret between 26 May 1827 (3 months after marriage) and 21 July 1850. He had an elder sister, Margaret, and a brother christened William who was born on 28th September 1828 but who died on 28 April 1829 (2 other children of the 14 shared the same fate. Ann Carr’s solemn declaration was crucial to Thomas’s inheritance though the deeds show that Thomas did not survive his father by long. Indeed, had her own husband lived beyond the age of 40 years, he would have come into the inheritance, as would Joseph’s elder sister Margaret who died at the age of 60 just prior to her brother. In any event, when all the wrangling was eventually done, Thomas became the sole beneficiary.

In the interim period while probate was settled Joseph Carr, one of the original trustees, became the owner on behalf of the Derwent Building Society

It may have been expected that Thomas would act generously. He did not in the first instance either through ignorance or lack of forethought. In passing on Clifton House to his younger brothers he did so by deed of sale, not as a gift. Moreover, the 3 brothers not only then had to accept that their widowed mother Margaret would continue to occupy the principal dwelling house and therefore fore-go the annual rental of £16-0-00, but also the other was occupied under leasehold by Mr Pattinson at an annual rent of £7-16-00.
To top the lot, the brothers also had to remortgage the properties to the tune of £300-0-00 on 30th April 1867, agreeing to monthly installments of £3-9-6 over 10 years. Sound familiar? By then the Derwent Mutual Benefit Society had been taken over by the Auckland Union Permanent Benefit Building Society. Sound familiar?

As a part of the legal process it was common in those days for widows to be treated as Margaret was i.e. to benefit from the estate only in her own lifetime. By the time of Margaret’s death in July 1866, the younger brothers had already remortgaged the properties. The mortgage was paid off in full by 3 November 1870

When the Nicholson Brothers, William Charles and George sold the properties to William Todd on 5 November 1870 and redeemed their mortgage, the houses were then freed from all let or hindrance. Save one. In the deed of conveyance it was specifically expressed that should William Todd’s death precede his wife’s, she should not be entitled to continue to reside there rent-free or draw rent from other tenants. Is this perhaps an indication that they themselves felt aggrieved about their own situation? None of the brothers had been able to live in Clifton House while their mother was a sitting tenant, while the same was true of the adjacent tenant of the adjoining dwelling house, Mr Pattison.
Will of William Todd, lodged 5 November 1870
Date From To Amount
5 Nov 1870 William Todd Edward, John, Jane & Bessie and to his widow, Tirzah Anne as well as son-in-law William Todd House sale proceeds on death.
Therefore, in 1870, Clifton House did not pass totally out of the Nicholson family. There was clearly a strong family connection between the Nicholsons and the Todds. However, who occupied the other part of the property adjoining Clifton House is uncertain. It is almost certain that Tirzah Ann lived in Clifton House until her death on 15th December 1891. On 16th March 1878 William Todd died and his will was not proven until 14 May 1878. His son, Edward should have been one of the principle beneficiaries but declined to accept his father’s will, perhaps because he had in mind to right a past wrong and pay the Nicholson brothers the future value of the property. Subsequently, William Nicholson, with the agreement of Edward, was able to substitute his brother George in the will with equal rights. Therefore by 1892, 2 of the surviving Nicholson brothers once more came into ownership of the property but only on paper. They then immediately sold the properties back to Edward Todd at the price of £800. Thus finally by 1892 the properties passed completely into the hands of the Todd family. Moreover, with the death of William Todd’s widow, the full intent of Joseph Nicholson’s estate became realized. All his family had realized some benefit from his large estate, including all his younger brothers, directly, as well as his younger sisters indirectly by a process of inter-marriage with the Todd family. How much of the latter was contrived and how much an accident of circumstances is unknown. However, one can judge that old Joseph was a shrewd character and some of his capacity for securing an advantage was also inherited by his brother William. It is also interesting to speculate on the true identify of the tenant put in place by Joseph’s widow.

All of the twists and turns of the Nicholson’s had an impact on the original house plans of Clifton House. Quite clearly if old Joseph had ever intended that the original buildings that he erected would remain a single large house he was mistaken. As early as 1870, the properties referred to a “Clifton House, adjoining cottage and stables” had ceased to be used as a single family dwelling and became effectively two separate dwellings, albeit one let out to a preferred tenant for family profit. This also appears to have been a preferred method of creating and accumulating wealth of all the prominent Leadgate families of the time. Indeed, exploration of census records of the time shows that most of Leadgate rested in the hands of a series of recurring family names, of which Todd and Nicholson were but two. This is certainly true of both the St Ives and Durham Roads, essentially the oldest private houses in the village and it is interesting that later census records of the mid 20th century show exactly the same, albeit by that time many of the properties had fallen into decay.

From 1892 to 1959 the properties remained effectively partitioned and in the hands of Edward Todd’s direct descendants. The following table describes the remaining transactions concerned with the houses up to the present.

Date From To Amount
12 Feb 24 John Rae Todd Edward Ridley £436
18 Feb 60 Sarah Ethel Johnson Cecil Tilney £300
26 Jan 65 Henry William McWilliams Cecil Tilney £10 (Land)
10 Feb 65 Cecil & Margaret Tilney David Gregson £3000
17 Jul 67 David Allan Gregson Robert Palmer £2850
23 Apr 68 Robert Palmer (Deceased) Margaret Close Probate
28 May 84 Margaret Close Frederick D Close Gift
22 Feb 85 Frederick D Close Julia Donaghy £15000
31 Jul 87 Julia Donaghy Barbara Donaghy £23000
14 Sep 88 Barbara Donaghy Peter Fox £29950
17 Sep 99 Peter & Susan Fox Helen Shields £57000

Uncovering the Old East House