Stainmore

For other uses of Stainmore see Stainmore (disambiguation)

Coordinates: 54°31′40″N 2°15′35″W / 54.527879°N 2.259772°W / 54.527879; -2.259772

Stainmore
Mousegill, with Great Knipe behind
Stainmore  Stainmore shown within Cumbria
Population	253 (2001)
OS grid reference	NY8314
Parish	Stainmore
District	Eden
Shire county	Cumbria
Region	North West
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	KIRKBY STEPHEN
Postcode district	CA17
Dialling code	01768
Police	Cumbria
Fire	Cumbria
Ambulance	North West
EU Parliament	North West England
UK Parliament	Penrith and The Border
List of places: UK • England • Cumbria

Stainmore is a civil parish in the Eden District of Cumbria, England, including the villages of North Stainmore and South Stainmore. It has a population of 253.^[1]

Geography

Stainmore is drained by the River Belah and the River Balder. It is crossed by the Roman road from Bowes to Brough, now part of the A66, and formerly by the Stainmore Railway. Each of these lines of communication has made use of the relatively low broad saddle between the higher hills to north and south which is commonly referred to as the Stainmore Gap. The summit of the former railway is around 420m above sea level, though the roads climb to slightly higher elevations.^[2] The Gap is coincident with the Stainmore Summit Fault which throws the relatively flat-lying Carboniferous rocks of the area down to the south.^[3] It acted as a conduit for Lake District-originated ice to pass eastwards during one or more glacial periods. There are several RIGS sites in the Stainmore area.

History

According to Roger of Wendover, it was where Eric Bloodaxe (d. 954), recently expelled from York, was betrayed and killed, an event which some historians believe to have taken place in a great battle. Ancient monuments include a Roman marching camp at Rey Cross (54°30′25″N 2°09′19″W / 54.5070°N 2.1552°W / 54.5070; -2.1552 (Rey Cross marching camp)), and the Rey Cross itself (54°30′21″N 2°08′55″W / 54.50579°N 2.14867°W / 54.50579; -2.14867 (Rey Cross)), also called Rere Cross (Scheduled monument, no. 32713).^[4]

References

1. ^ Office for National Statistics : Census 2001 : Parish Headcounts : Eden Retrieved 26 October 2010
2. ^ Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 scale Explorer map sheet OL19 Howgill Fells & Upper Eden Valley
3. ^ British Geological Survey 1:50,000 scale geological map sheet no 31 (England & Wales) Brough-under-Stainmore
4. ^ Rey Cross Roman Marching Camp

Further reading

• Collingwood, W.G. "Rey-Cross." Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian Archaeological Society series 2, 27 (1927): 1–10.
• Pearsall, W.H. The "Mosses" of the Stainmore district, Journal of Ecology, 1941
• Ramsden, D.M. From Stainmore to the Tees. Clapham, 1948.
• Richmond, I.A. and McIntyre, J. "The Roman marching camps at Reycross and Crackenthorpe." Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian Archaeological Society series 2, 34 (1934): 50–61.
• Robinson, P. Archaeology on the Stainmore Pass – the A66 Project. Barnard Castle, 1993.
• Vyner, B. (ed.). Stainmore. The Archaeology of a North Pennine Pass. Tees Archaeology Monographs 1. Hartlepool, 2001.