John Scott Brown was a ‘low-bred’ man with a chip on his shoulder. The violent assault he committed gives an idea of life in 1878. Cumbrian Characters usually tries to be impartial, not to judge p...Read More
The Strands Inn and Screes Inn were built in 18th century and both retain many original features, with log fires and wooden beams throughout… (they) are perfectly positioned to explore the natural b...Read More
Joseph Studholme – a Carlisle surveyor and land agent – got a fairly brief mention in this post about William Robinson Martindale & Port Carlisle: His will doesn’t tell us a great deal more ...Read More
The photos I took at Beacon Edge Cemetery, Penrith, last summer, were pretty random. Just a handful or so between the chapel and my great-great-grandparents’ (side-by-side) graves. Some of them turn...Read More
Seathwaite is a small hamlet in Borrowdale valley, in the Lake District (1991 population 152 people). It’s hard to imagine anywhere less likely to be a hotbed of violence, but Seathwaite has two dub...Read More
William Robinson Martindale isn’t buried at St Cuthbert’s, Carlisle, but he is ‘name-checked’ on a gravestone. Which is how I came to take a photo of the latter and write a blog piece on the f...Read More
Kendal town clock has told the time on the town hall since 1861. But it had a predecessor. By 1837, the previous town clock (with a wooden face) had been marking time for 70 years. It was atop the old...Read More
Abraham Greenhow: the man who delivered the mail. Continuing a look into the lives of just a few of the thousands of people buried at Beacon Edge Cemetery, Penrith: Abraham Jacques Greenhow was baptis...Read More
The Platinum Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II was celebrated from June 2-5, 2022. In June 1832, there were jubilee celebrations of a different kind – they marked a move to make Parliamentary elections ...Read More
Wicked Jimmy’s ghost : James Lowther, the first Earl of Lonsdale, was feared and hated in life. And like all heavy-duty villains, those feelings didn’t end when he died, aged 66, in 1802. His name...Read More