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Berwick
Quay Walls The astute of you who knew the original plan will have noted that this is not Bosnia. A combination of British Airways and a family crisis prompted a trip in an alternative direction and without aeroplane assistance. Bosnia is apparently recovering well from the Balkans War, but that trip will have to wait for another day and Berwick looked as though it was fairing reasonably well in the aftermath of the Crimean War and the peace treaty of 1996. Yes, that’s correct………….. Berwick is finally at peace with the Russians, after an administrative slip when the Treaty of Paris was signed in 1856. In 1502 Berwick was given special status as a town “of” the English kingdom and not “in” it. When Queen Victoria signed the declaration of war on Russia in 1853, she did so in the name of Great Britain, Ireland, Berwick upon Tweed and the British Dominions beyond the Sea. Berwick was omitted from the words of the peace treaty, leaving the prospect of the hordes from east in fur hats and helicopter gunships appearing off Tweedmouth at any moment…………little did those guys in the Kiev bar realise just how far the Russian threat could spread in modern
times!
Berwick’s story is one of conflict. It’s strategic position on the border has led to it changing hands on no fewer than 14 times between England and Scotland up to 1482 and whilst it is of the Kingdom of England, it’s football team continue to ply their trade in the lower reaches of the Scottish leagues. If in town on matchday, negotiate your way between The Grove and The Harrow -you might have some difficulty just following the crowds. The legacy of the conflict for a modern day traveller are some pretty impressive and almost intact town walls and artillery bastions, that were largely completed in Elizabethan times. The walls can be circumnavigated in an hour or so, with some vistas out to sea and across the Tweed and plenty of historical information boards to keep you up to speed with the surroundings. The only conflict to be noted these days is likely to be around the over zealous parking restrictions around the town centre.
The town centre itself is pleasant enough without any must see sights and focuses on the Town Hall at the end of Marygate. The upper end of town has that run down
feeling with discount stores seemingly taking over the manor and the lower end of the town where the old commercial centre seems to have been with banks and estate agents has a detached feeling from the main activity further up the hill.
Matchstalk men, matchstalk cats and dogs also abound in and around Berwick and Tweedmouth. It came as somewhat of a surprise that L S Lowry favoured spending time in the town and at one point, allegedly considered purchasing the Lion House on the walls as an abode. The paintings that everybody associates with Lowry are the childlike figures in the industrial cityscapes of Salford, but apparently he was fond of taking up residence at the Castle Hotel and churning out works depicting scenes of the town, the walls and the River Tweed. There is a Lowry walk to help you digest the various painting locations.
The most striking feature of Berwick, other than the walls, are the bridges spanning the Tweed and the ages. There are two stone bridges - the old and the new - which are dwarfed by the 1850 railway bridge and the new bypass road on the A1 opened in 1984.
Flodden Battlefield Monument
..............just outside the village of Branxton We left along the Tweed valley and continued the historical theme with a walk around the battlefield at Flodden. As with the Lowry discovery, the field at Flodden on the edge of the village of Branxton came as a bit of a surprise. The destruction of the Scottish Army at the Battle of Flodden (1513) is not exactly promoted in the consciousness in the same way as other epic struggles with the near neighbours at Bannockburn, Culloden or Hampden and the like…………….perhaps a feature film would help………….. Anyway, another attempt to secure the English throne floundered in the mud on a windswept Northumbrian hillside and thousands were slaughtered.
There is a danger in this part of the world that you become “castled-out”, if that is the right expression…………..there are just so many. Norham Castle is not as spectacular as those on the coast, but that is relative given it’s position high over the Tweed. It was once described as the most dangerous place in the country, given it's location almost on the border and number of attempts by the Scots to capture the castle. They finally got their hands on it a few weeks before Flodden, but their defeat
Berwick
...........view towards Pier Road on the battlefield meant their tenure was brief. The RAF provided a thundering backdrop, as a training jet zoomed in low along the river and banked high over the castle…………… alas the camera was not fast enough on the draw…………..good job we’d left Berwick and it wasn’t a Russian fighter!
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