Tag: Horse troughs

Building family foundations

One of the buildings on the Hanging Stones Walk in Rosedale that Nick Harland helped to construct (that’s my friend Dave in the window, looking down at his confused dog Frank).
Andrew Goldsworthy gave Nick Harland this signed book with a hand-drawn picture of the Hanging Stones

 

I’ve been contacted by readers Ian and Catherine Wilson who had a great titbit about middle names. They wrote: “We would like to add an important advantage to ancestors having maiden names as middle names. When doing family history research the inclusion of a maiden name has often helped to confirm a link.”

I had never thought about that aspect before. They add: “McLaren is an ancestral name that is extremely common in Perthshire not helped by William passing through the generations. Thankfully one generation included Sorley as a middle name and it unlocked our research.”

It makes me think of all the hard work put in by my dad’s brother, Charles Walker, who spent huge amounts of time compiling our family tree. His side of the family had the common name of Walker, and my mum’s side had the even more common Smith. Trying to trace the correct members to create an accurate family tree was extremely tricky, especially when there were first names that were very popular among families of the North York Moors with the same surname. There were dozens of Johns, Henrys and Williams, and Mary’s, Hannahs and Helens too. Uncle Charles’ job was made slightly easier because some of the descendants were given maternal maiden names for middle names. My mum’s eldest brother, was Henry Harland Smith after his paternal grandmother, and her second brother was John Lacy Smith, from his mum’s maiden name. The name Lacy was passed down the next two generations to Henry’s son Richard, and on to his son Charles.

I don’t think this tradition was followed on my dad’s side of the family though, and tracing the Walker line did prove tricky as Uncle Charles wrote back in 2004: “I have a number of possible Walkers living around Lingdale/Skinningrove/Hinderwell. Can Peter remember any names of brothers/sisters of our Grandfather Walker?” He then lists a number of names of possible ancestors. Clearly, trying to sort out who was who was quite the task.

Funnily enough, I was contacted not long ago by Nick Harland, and we discussed whether we might be related through my mum’s side. As mentioned above, her paternal grandmother was a Harland – Edith Richardson Harland. Edith’s parents were William and Ann Harland, and as you might have guessed from Edith’s middle name, Ann’s maiden name was Richardson. Are you keeping up? This is just one tiny segment of our family tree, and I can imagine how mind-boggling it must be when you go down the rabbit hole of trying to piece it all together.

Nick and I didn’t know off the top of our heads if we were related, but that was not the reason he was getting in touch. He wrote: “My father Dennis Harland has often spoken about your dad over the years and I when I first started work, Mary Walker (my dad’s mother) often got me to do little jobs for her as she lived opposite the Glaisdale Institute…my dad’s parents used to live in Brinkburn, the house above where Mary used to live, opposite the institute.”

Nick has a link to the Andrew Goldsworthy ‘Hanging Stones Walk’ in Rosedale about which I wrote a couple of years ago. “All the ten Andy Goldsworthy projects which have been put together have been done with the help of our building firm,” he said.

The Hanging Stones Walk is an amazing feat of creativity, engineering and construction so I am hoping some time to chat more to Nick so he can explain how they did what they did. It is really an art project, rather than simply a walk, and is sponsored by the Ross Foundation (an organisation that supports initiatives related to art, community, sport, music and education) which commissioned sculptor Andrew Goldsworthy, famous for his spectacular pieces of land art. He transformed tumbling down agricultural buildings into amazing pieces that blend seamlessly into their moorland surroundings.

Nick finished by saying: “Another thing you touched on a while ago was about making stone troughs. I make a lot of stone troughs, up to five foot long. There is an easy way and a hard way but it is good fun seeing one completed.”

I think if Nick and I meet, we will have an awful lot to talk about!

Do you have opinions, memories or ideas to share with me? Get in touch with me using the ‘Contact’ button on the top right.

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 19th and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 17th Dec 2025

Do you know your boundaries?

The second carved stone that is on my regular walking route. Are these drilled holes marking where it was meant to be split, as described by Andy Brown? Could it be a boundary marker, as suggested by Beryl Richardson?

Mike Broadley’s stone trough that has been in his garden for more than 70 years

When I first started writing about stone troughs back in April I had no idea that these seemingly overlooked lumps of rock would lead to so many memories and stories coming in from readers, some of you with direct knowledge of the history and processes involved in making them.

Andy Brown got in touch with the following: “Early in my career I was taught how to cut large sandstone blocks for building work by the stonemason at Shipley Quarries near Barnard Castle. Sandstone is known as a freestone as it can (fairly) easily be split and shaped both along and across its bedding plane (the layers in which sedimentary rocks are deposited). Small blocks can be split using hammers and chisels by chasing a groove all around where you intend to split the stone and gradually widening this out into a crack. Feathers and wedges are used to split larger blocks by hammering them into a series of holes drilled along where the block is to be split. The blocks are then further worked with hammer and chisel into the desired shape and finish.”

Feathers and wedges are tools used to help shape and split stones. A recent trough-related column of mine mentioned a carved stone that I passed regularly but to which I had previously paid no attention. It was about two and a half feet long, one and a half wide and about a foot deep, but the basin part (if indeed it had been intended to be a trough) had not been hollowed out. It seemed too big to have been a stone intended for a building, so I wondered how it got there, when was it placed there and why was it left unfinished.

Andy answers the question as to how it may have been transported: “Skilled quarrymen and masons could ‘walk’ sizeable stone blocks by pivoting them on their point of balance, but for large blocks, rollers or sledges would be used to transport short distances. For transporting longer distances both fixed and portable windlasses (winches) would be used to load and offload large blocks into sturdy carts…I imagine your trough is a drinking trough for cattle or horses and would be filled by bucket or positioned by a pump.”

Mike Broadley has had a stone trough in his garden for as long as he can remember: “On reading your column about stone troughs I thought I would tell you about one in our front garden. It is still in situ, and I have been here for 70 years. It was fed by a hand pump from a well under the lawn. The pump has long gone but the lead pipe that supplied it is still present, sealed off at ground level. The well is one of a chain linking the houses either side of us in High Ellington village and I think they date back to the time before water mains…I can remember the pump being used when the mains were off.”

Beryl Richardson had another theory about my stone: “The measurements suggest it could be part of an ancient gate post or boundary marker. Some similar to this are on the North York Moors and relate to the boundaries between landowners’ estates. Each stone mason would have their own ‘signature’ marking. My late father from Loftus spent many days looking for these boundary stones which he then included in his local history talks to various groups and students…My dad’s name was John Robert Verrill Carter but was known by everyone as Bob Carter. He was a friend of Tom Leonard who started the museum at Skinningrove and he also knew your father’s column’s predecessor Major Jack Fairfax Blakeborough.”

Beryls’ comments prompted me to return to the stone to see if I could spot a signature, but it was covered with ivy and I couldn’t make anything out. What I did spot, though, was another stone nearby, slightly hidden by a tree. It was smaller and had holes drilled into it, possibly indicating a line along which the intention was to split it (as described by Andy above). Maybe Beryl is right and these stones were deliberately placed there many moons ago to mark the boundary of a local estate now long gone.

I wonder if we will ever know?

Do you have opinions, memories or ideas to share with me? Get in touch with me using the ‘Contact’ button on the top right.

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 27th and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 25th June 2025