Benwell Towers (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Benwell Castle; The Mitre Public House

In the civil parish of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
In the historic county of Northumberland.
Modern Authority of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
1974 county of Tyne and Wear.
Medieval County of Northumberland.

OS Map Grid Reference: NZ21186450
Latitude 54.97459° Longitude -1.67075°

Benwell Towers has been described as a certain Pele Tower.

There are no visible remains.

This is a Grade 2 listed building protected by law*.

Description

The earliest reference to a tower is in documents from 1538-39 where it is contained in a list of property lately belonging to the priors of Tynemouth. Both then and in the 1608 Survey of Crown Property it is described as the manor house. It has been suggested that "a gabled residence with projecting chimney stacks" was added to the south-west angle of the tower in the late medieval period, and that then, or earlier, the whole was enclosed by a courtyard. Antiquarian drawings show a plain oblong tower three storeys high with a crenellated papapet, but no medieval windows are visible. In the mid 18th century the house was largely rebuilt, but the house and tower were demolished in 1831, and replaced by the present Benwell Tower. (Tyne and Wear HER (Sitelines))

Sources of information, references and further reading

National Heritage List for England Listed Building number(s) 1186255
Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 25061.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 139.

Websites (Gatehouse is not responsible for the content of external websites.)
- Wikipedia entry
Books
- Dodds, John F., 1999, Bastions and Belligerents (Newcastle upon Tyne: Keepdate Publishing) p. 473-4
  Salter, Mike, 1997, The Castles and Tower Houses of Northumberland (Malvern: Folly Publications) p. 24
  Jackson, M.J.,1992, Castles of Northumbria (Carlisle) p. 157
  King, D.J.C., 1983, Castellarium Anglicanum (London: Kraus) Vol. 2 p. 345
  Graham, Frank, 1976, The Castles of Northumberland (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Frank Graham) p. 61
  Long, B., 1967, Castles of Northumberland (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) p. 62-3
  Pevsner, N., 1957, Buildings of England: Northumberland (London, Penguin) p. 88
  Dodds, M.H., (ed), 1930, Northumberland County History (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) Vol. 13 p. 215, 227-30
  Craster, H.H.E. (ed), 1907, Northumberland County History (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) Vol. 8 p. 102 online copy
  Gibson, W.S., 1846, The History of the Monastery of Tynemouth Vol. 1 p. 225
  Brand, J., 1789, History of Newcastle Vol. 1 p. 111
  Bourne, H., 1736, History of Newcastle p. 113
Periodical Articles
- Knowles, W.H., 1922, 'Benwell Tower, Newcastle' Archaeologia Aeliana (Ser3) Vol. 19 p. 88-98 online copy

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It is an offence to disturb a Scheduled Monument without consent. It is a destruction of everyone's heritage to remove archaeological evidence from ANY site without proper recording and reporting.
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The information on this web page may be derived from information compiled by and/or copyright of Historic England, County Historic Environment Records and other individuals and organisations. It may also contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence. All the sources given should be consulted to identify the original copyright holder and permission obtained from them before use of the information on this site for commercial purposes.
The author and compiler of Gatehouse does not receive any income from the site and funds it himself. The information within this site is provided freely for educational purposes only.

The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

Please help to make this as useful a resource as possible by contacting Gatehouse if you see errors, can add information or have suggestions for improvements in functality and design.
Help is acknowledged.

*The listed building may not be the actual medieval building, but a building on the site of, or incorporating fragments of, the described site.

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