Disused rail-lines as public rights of way 14.

The above photo. shows a section of Hall Garth Park in Hornsea, a fine municipal park incorporating a tree-lined avenue, a moated medieval site (near the church which stands just outside the Park) as well as ample benches and up-to-date young person’s activity facilities. This particular view shows a section of the northern edge of the Park where large Edwardian properties ( I haven’t checked the authenticity of this statement) back onto the Park, this reminiscent of the housing around the edge of Pearson Park, Hull although here the properties front onto the Park and are mostly older than those around Hall Garth Park. This is relevant to the current theme as some of the period houses would have been built for Hull-based business-persons who were able to commute each working day on the Hull-Hornsea railway.

From Sutton (s.p.b.) the rail-line passed north-east through an area traditionally known as ‘Sutton Without’, outside the village, now mostly housing estates but the route of the rail-line still walkable. Sutton village stands on a low range of ‘hills’, 25 feet above the surrounding land, this being an explanation for the original siting of a settlement here as settlers would have had the high land for arable and the surrounding lower/wetter land for summer pasture as well as reeds, fish, water-fowl and, possibly, turf.

Beyond Sutton Without the line crossed Holderness Drain (for reference to H. D. previously see set of blogs under the heading of Green Corridors, few weeks ago). Next to the Drain stands the site of an early medieval motte-and -bailey castle. Although apparently an unlikely setting for such these sort of sites are relatively common and would have had wooden structures on top of the mound but the site was never progressed to a stone-built fortification and outer bailey, as happened at Lincoln and Castle Rising, Norfolk for example. Other examples of a similar site to the one next to Holderness Drain may be seen at Barrow-on-Humber and Skipsea.

(to be continued)