Tynemouth, Spanish Battery

HER Number:
136

District:
N Tyneside

Site Name:
Tynemouth, Spanish Battery

Place:
Tynemouth

Map Sheet:
NZ36NE

Class:
Defence

Site Type: Broad:
Battery

Site Type: Specific:
Coastal Battery

General Period:
Post Medieval

Specific Period:
C16

Form of Evidence:
Earthwork

Description:
This title includes all post-Dissolution defences outside Tynemouth Castle. In Period 1, 1545, it comprised an outwork in front of the gate-house, a battery on the low promontory to the south of the castle, and walls connecting the new battery with the priory". In Period 2, 1643, the fortifications were repaired -"low stone walls, which formed the Spanish battery, were raised by the addition of a brick superstructure furnishing casemates for guns". In 1705-7 it is recorded that in fromt of the castle lay a regular hornwork with a 12 feet wide ditch, an old decayed fort (Spanish Battery) and nearby Spanish batteries to the east and west. In Period 3, in the 18th century, the plan of the fort appears to have been changed. It had been mostly destroyed by the mid-19th century, however. Later it was refortified with a modern coastal battery, but cleared again in the 1960s.

Easting:
373

Northing:
691

Grid Reference:
NZ373691

Lats/Lons:

Sources:
<< HER 136 >> John Rook, 1827, Plan of North Shields and Tynemouth, 657/1- Northumberland Records Office H.A. Adamson, 1896, Tynemouth Castle after the Dissolution of the Monastery, Archaeologia Aeliana, 2, XVIII, pp. 62, 78-9, and opp. p. 76 H.E. Savage, 1898, Abbess Hilda's First Religious House, Archaeologia Aeliana, 2, XIX, opp. p. 68 H.H.E. Craster, 1907, Northumberland County History, VIII, opp. p. 148, 157-8, 184 Photo, North Shields Library Local Studies, 1939 Spanish Battery 5.2.25 (1939); 12.3.25, 30-39 (1962) G. Jobey, 1967, A Note on the Spanish Battery, Archaeologia Aeliana, 4, XLV, pp. 96-99 Clifford's Fort, Vol. 1, Historical Information -Historic Environment Record H.M. Colvin, et al. 1982, The History of the King's Works Vol. IV (1485-1660) Part II, pp. 682-88 E. Mackenzie, 1825, Northumberland 94209, II, between pp. 436 and 437, dated 1886 Aerial Photograph, N. McCord, 1963, Tynemouth: Spanish Battery, vii.1959; G.014558.26-28 Museum of Antiquities University of Newcastle Collection Aerial Photograph, N. McCord, 1963, Tynemouth: Spanish Battery, 3.ix or 25.x.1963; G.029455.20 -Museum of Antiquities University of Newcastle Collection D.H. Clarke & A. Rudd, 1989, The Defences of Tyneside Spanish Battery, Tynemouth, Fortress Study Group Conference D. Clarke & A. Rudd, 1989,Tyneside in the Breech Loading Era Fortress, No. 3, pp 33-42; English Heritage, 2008, Hadrian's Wall National Mapping Programme, 1399146; Aerial Photographs RAF 58/C/3/5122 14-APR-1949; ASUD, 2010, Land near 6 Old Coastguard Cottages, Spanish Battery, Tynemouth - archaeological assessment