History

Woods where the site of Wood Hall is located

Traffic on the A1 was congested as I drove slowly to Darrington - a village south west of Leeds and about twenty five miles north of Sheffield. Then I was off the busy road and heading east along byways to the ancient village of Womersley. It was an area I had not walked in before - what I call virgin territory.

Map study at home showed me that there had once been a moated medieval manor house called Wood Hall - a mile and a half north of Womersley. I planned to plod there along farm tracks and that's what happened.

As half expected, the woods that have grown up on the manor house site have become almost impenetrable. Not many walkers go there and beyond it there are spoil heaps connected with former coal mining activity in the area with the addition of waste from remaining power stations.

I had almost given up locating something of interest but then, through the perimeter fence, something caught my eye and I scrambled in. It was the archaeological remains of  Wood Hall's  stone gatehouse and a wooden structure that I did not fully understand but I know that in past decades the hollow would have been filled with water. 

Later I learnt that in the 1990s, the site had been investigated by archaeologists from The University of York. They had made several interesting discoveries and documented work that led to a clearer picture of how Wood Hall would have appeared, evolved and functioned threough the centuries.

I took photos of Grade I listed St Martin's Church in Womersley. A stone effigy of a knight of yore lay supine in the north aisle. He was very probably Sir Adam de Newmarch who, in the late thirteenth century went off to fight the muslim "saracens" in The Holy Land. Many wealthy English nobles did the same and there are indeed many recumbent stone effigies of knights in English country churches. Sir Adam was certainly not alone but it makes me wonder why? Why did they up sticks and travel to distant lands to wage religious wars, leaving their homes and loved ones far behind? What was it truly all about?

I drove on to a small and rather unattractive village called Cridling Stubbs. The best part about that village is its name. It sounds like a nineteenth century artist who specialised in painting farm animals or a certain blogger with an exasperating right wing perspective on current affairs.

Then back to Darrington where I parked Butch on Church Lane close to another lovely old church - St Luke's. In the village shop, I treated myself to a sausage roll and a can of "Costa" coffee before aiming Butch back to Sheffield. 

Again the Friday traffic crawled sluggishly along the A1 but all was fine on the M18, the M1 and The Sheffield Parkway. I was home in time to make a nice tea for her ladyship and I - smoked gammon with pineapple, grilled tomatoes, dauphinoise potatoes and a medley of green vegetables followed by little Belgian chocolate cheesecakes that I had picked up in "Aldi".

Cow Lane, Womersley