History of South Shields

The earliest inhabitants of the area were the Brigantes, a strong and fiercely independent Briton tribe however there is no evidence to suggest they built a settlement where the present day town now stands.

The Brythonic word 'Caer' meaning a fortified place or seat of royal power, 'Urfa' is suggested to be a simple corruption of 'Vide Infra' the Aramaic name for the Roman stronghold.

[1] (broken link) A large Roman fort has been excavated in South Shields on the Lawe Top, overlooking the River Tyne; it has been the setting for an investigation by the Channel 4 archaeological television programme Time Team.

Arbeia, meaning "place of the Arabs" (one of the garrisons being the Tigris Boatmen from modern day Iraq), was intended as the maritime supply fort for Hadrian's Wall, and contains the only permanent stone-built granaries yet found in Britain.

A Roman gatehouse and barracks have been reconstructed on their original foundations, while a museum holds artefacts such as an altarpiece to a previously unknown god, and a Roman-era gravestone set up by a native Palmyrene to his freedwoman and wife, a Briton of the Catuvellauni tribe.

Britain in the 6th century is often considered a confused and violent place, the Romans taking their laws, gods and legions with them, when they left.

The site today is in the very town centre of South Shields and is named St. Hilda's Church[3] although the original Anglo-Saxon building is but a remnant under the present Norman nave.

St. Hilda's was one of many monastic institutions along the coast of north east England including Jarrow, where the Venerable Bede lived and worked.

However the Vikings or Danes weren't just raiders; they created settlements, brought new customs, laws and Gods, effectively controlling all of northern England.

On account of the complaints of the burgesses of Newcastle upon Tyne, an order was made in 1258, stipulating that no ships should be laden or unladen at Shields, and that no shoars or quays should be built there.

Salt panning along the Tyne began in 1499 and achieved major importance; Daniel Defoe speaks of the clouds of smoke being visible for miles, while a witness in 1743 mentions two hundred boiling-pans.

[5] Following the Reform Act 1832, championed by Lord Grey and the Whigs, County Durham was able to return two members for two divisions, and the boroughs of Gateshead and South Shields acquired representation.

Shafts could collapse at any time and before the safety lamp was invented in 1815 naked flames carried by miners to light their way could ignite gas underground causing explosions and many deaths.

South Shields' place at the mouth of the Tyne with shifting and unpredictable sand bars and channels into the river meant that ships frequently ran aground.

[6] South Shields-born Charles Palmer opened his shipyard in 1851 at Jarrow, at first building wooden ships and then moving onto iron.

From the late 1980s to 2008 it possessed the nationally unique combined public observatory and planetarium,[9] which has provided education and entertainment for twenty thousand children a year.

The Rattler pub on the seafront is named after the passenger service run primarily for miners by the HCC between Westoe Lane Station and Whitburn Colliery, using a motley collection of second-hand rolling stock, which gave a very rough ride and resulted in its rather unflattering nickname.

In World War II, South Shields suffered well over 200 air raid alerts and 156 people were killed.

There was a memorial to them in the form of a cobbled Union Flag on the ground of the market square, however, this was removed as part of an overhaul of the town centre in the late 1990s.

The celebrated artist L S Lowry spent frequent periods at the Seaburn Hotel in Sunderland, and painted a number of works in South Shields.

Service industries, including tourism and retail, play an increasing role in the economic make-up of the town and indeed across the wider area.