Where tourists seldom tread, part 4: five UK towns with hidden histories
Weird that they don’t mention Twerton. Cracker of a little parish church there after all.
Where tourists seldom tread, part 4: five UK towns with hidden histories
Weird that they don’t mention Twerton. Cracker of a little parish church there after all.
Also weird they talk of Penrith without mentioning the teashops where people go to quaff the finest wines available to humanity?
You’ll note that they are all in The North. So that lets out Twerton right away. It’s a bit of a shocker though to see the effete lefties of The Grauniad celebrating Northern industrial grit & grime.
@TG…
It’s probably not dissimilar to the “good old days” when The Gentry paid to go and watch the inmates of “Bedlam” Hospital.
I’ve only been to Wigan and Burton, both of which are great. Wiganers are a particularly jolly bunch.
Can’t believe they have closed the (excellent) brewery museum in Burton! Fucking Canadians.
Penrith, Workington, Whitehaven, Maryport: I am the only one here to have visited all these places?
Workington used to be my preferred location for the UK Supreme Court but has now been replaced by the peak of The Merrick in Galloway. From there, in Scotland, you can also see England, Wales, and Norn Iron. That really should be a requirement for the SC, don’t you think?
Other possibilities would be the top of Snowdon and (I guess) the top of somewhere in the Lake District. Scafell, Helvellyn, Skiddaw? I remember them all, vaguely, but which gives you a view to Norn Iron and Wales?
Sadly, no mention of the town in which Robert de Brus, son of the first Robert de Brus, is interred; where the town’s land based artillery battled with German battleships in WW1; where, it is said, the fishermen hung a monkey as a French spy; helped make the steel used in building Sydney Harbour bridge and, most importantly, where Brian Clough started his managerial career. My home town.
Penseivat – No mention of Peter Mandelson on your list – intentional ommission?
dearieme – Whitehaven? I hope they have statues to Dr King and Mary Seacole there.
‘where, it is said, the fishermen hung a monkey as a French spy’
Thank you Penseivat. Those fishermen obviously think like me.
And also *elected* a monkey as executive mayor.
dearieme: I’m thinking Gruinard Island, or failing that, Soay so they can piss off the sheep instead of us.
The Pools is my natal town, too, though I grew up in Lancashire.
TMB,
It’s said that, when the War Criminal told Mandy he would be parachuted into Hartlepool as the Labour candidate, he had to have someone show him, on a map, where it was. Unfortunately, despite the guacamole/mushy peas incident, he was still elected, then no one ever saw him again. They should never have taken down that gibbet.
jgh,
Hang’us the monkey won a second term as mayor. Couldn’t have been that bad.
Ah, I’m a Geordie but I have the fondest of fond memories of Hartlepool. Judy Young where are you now half a century later? Is the Red Admiral still there?
I am surprised that there have been no demands that Whitehaven be levelled to the ground. It was after all a major port for all the rum and tobacco imports back in the good old days.I was near there for 35+ years before coming out here to NZ.