Walney Island

An Introduction to the Island

What follows is taken from Tim Dean's (see end of article) book, The Natural history of Walney Island, published by Faust Publications of Burnley, 1990.

Walney is one of England's largest islands. Lying in the south-west corner of Cumbria and sandwiched between Morecambe Bay and the Duddon Estuary this sand and shingle ribbon of in island is exceptionally rich in natural history having recorded for example over 450 species of flowering plants, over 400 species of moths and butterflies and over 250 bird species. At either end of the island are nationally important nature reserves, both administered by the Cumbria Wildlife Trust: the south end known for its prolific breeding colony of gulls and eiders, its wader and wildfowl flocks, its migrating birds including some exciting crowd-pulling rarities, and its shingle and gravel community flora; the north end recognised for its superb dune, saltmarsh, dune-slack and shingle plants and its stronghold of amphibians.

Walney Island, with its southern tip representing the most southerly part of Cumbria, is by far the largest of a group of low islands lying off the southwest corner of English Lakeland, which is known as Furness. Of the other islands, Barrow and Ramsey are virtually unrecognisable as such, having been swallowed up in the Vickers and dockyard complex; Foulney and Roa are connected to mainland Britain by causeways; and both Sheep and Piel are also accessible by foot and adventurous vehicles at low tide.

Sixteen kilometres in length and no more than 1,500 metres wide, Walney, lying on a north-northwest and south-southeast axis, forms a barrier against the westerly gales from the Irish Sea, giving protection to the port of Barrow-in-Furness. The island was formed during the recession of the last glaciation, and as the ice melted, depositions of rock, clay and sand were left behind. Exposures of the red boulder clay can be seen along the west shore of the island, a region which is being constantly eroded. Beneath this boulder clay, the island is composed almost entirely of three Mercian mudstones, Hambleton, Singleton and Kirkham.

The forces of erosion that act on the western shore can be seen at work daily. The combination of wave action and westerly winds has had a considerable effect upon tbe island over the centuries, and recent land-infilling operations at Thorneynook Lane and Honeypot Lane have been effected in order to combat the breaching of the island, which happened last in February 1983. Studies by Phillips and Rollinson (1971) have shown that a great deal of the south end of the island has been eroded away and subsequently deposited on the spit at South Walney. Even the construction of groynes and placement of breakwaters has not stopped the continual erosion, and within the last 250 years, Walney has been narrowed by as much as 300 metres in parts. Wind erosion compounds the problem, and the dunes at either end of the island have been formed by this process.

The topography of the eastern side of Walney has been formed in a different manner. The bays and salt marshes are the result of the combined action of the ebb and flow of the tides and the slow seepage of water off the land. Altitude and cliffs are at a premium on Walney, but Hare Hill at the southern end combines both, albeit a heady 16 metres (above mean sea-level) of boulder clay and a face that in recent years held a Sand Martin colony. Yet Hare Hill is dwarfed by Walney's 'Everest', Beacon Brow at 23 metres, just east of the Coastguard Station.

Walney is now essentially a suburb of Barrow-in-Furness. There are upwards of 11,000 people on the island and the great increase has occurred since the 19th. century. The community of Vickerstown was established to house the shipyard workers and since then, residential and council estates have sprung up around the 'marine garden city'. Prior to the growth of Barrow-in-Furness, which so complements the growth of Walney, the island was made up of the townships of North Scale and Biggar village, each consisting of some 16 tenements, and an additional four tenements at North End and eight at South End, the total population exceeding no more than 300 people. The rapid change in Walney's demographic history can be linked with the arrival of Vickers and the opening of Jubilee Bridge in 1908.

Evidence in the form of pottery, middens and tool artefacts, has been found on the island which indicates that Walney had been populated since the retreat of the last glaciation. The west shore has yielded middens composed of various shellfish, and the presumption is that hunters and gatherers, using flint nodules, which are common on the beaches, subsisted on the shellfish that were exposed at low tides. Barnes (1968) suggests that the "thinness of the midden deposits suggests a series of seasonal camps, not prolonged habitation". Trough Head and Central Drive have yielded Mesolithic microliths, perhaps more than 5,000 years old, while the aforementioned locality and North Walney have given up pottery and arrowheads from the Neolithic and Bronze Ages. It is probable that these peoples made use of the seabird colonies.

There is little evidence that the Roman occupation of Britain touched the island, but surely some Latins must have visited on their way by sea from Chester (Deva) to Ravenglass (Glannaventa)? The finding by J. Jackson of a gaming board crudely scored on a flat pebble, may indicate that South Walney was used or visited by Roman mariners.

Definite traces of the Norse influence can be found in some of the island's place names, notably Biggar (barley field: "bygg", "gar") and Earnse (Eagle island: infering the presence of Ernes otherwise known as Sea.Eagles). Trescathric (1984) is of the opinion that the Norsemen arrived in the area during the late 9th. century and were probably civil war refugees from settlements in Ireland and the Isle of Man.

With the coming of the Normans and the Domesday Book in the late 11th. century, the Manor of Hougon, which contained much of Furness, also controlled Hougenai (Walney). Trescathric (1984) begins his book with an entertaining study of the many and various names that the island has been blessed with; Hveneay (the island of bent grass); Vognay (Killer Whale or grampus island); Wagenay (island of quicksands); Gwaun's island; Hougenai 1086; Wagneia 1127; Wannegai 1246; Waghenay 1336; Wawenay 1404; Waynow 1537; Wauay 1577. Trescathric considers Wagenay the most credible: the least plausible, Thomas West's "the walled island", a combination of 'wall' and 'eau', literally a wall in the water (1774).

Agriculture became increasingly important on the island as can be seen from the ledgers and documents of Furness Abbey. During the 12th. century, the Manor of Hougun, was given to the Abbey of Savigny and as such, remained in their control until 1536 and Henry VIll's 'Dissolution of the Monasteries'. The village of North Scale and the settlements at North End and South End are first listed in an inventory of 1247, while Biggar, referred to as a grange, is mentioned in 1292. Trescathric (1984) considers the South End to have been farmed by Lay Bretheren. Perhaps this accounts for the herbalists' paradise at South Walney, and may well account for the abundance of Henbane (Hyoscyamus niger), a friend to the monks in more ways than one, having medicinal, narcotic and hallucinogenic properties.

The ridge and furrow lines that can still be seen in some of the Walney fields, are a legacy of medieval times. However, the increase in wool prices in the late 15th. century, meant that some arable land was turned over to sheep pasture.

With the dissolution of the monasteries, the control that Furness Abbey had exerted over the island vanished. St. Mary's church was built towards the end of the 16th. century and as Trescathric (1984) remarks, "spiritual comfort was needed" when the plague took the lives of approximately 120 people in 1631, almost half the island's population. This was not the only misfortune that befell the island in this period for in 1644, during the Civil War, a group of Royalists burnt down all but two houses in North Scale. Eight years later, the Quaker, George Fox, visited Walney and was set upon by "forty men with staves, clubs and fishing poles". A fuller account of this episode can be found in Barnes (1968).

In 1872, the island hecame part of the Borough of Barrow-in-Furness, and though not immediately changing the parochial existence of the islanders, one can sense that change was not far around the corner. Barrow's rapid development in the late 19th. century and its subsequent increase in population has had far-reaching consequences. Initially, Barrow workers saw the island and Biggar Bank in particular, as a 'lung' to resort to after the working week, and the locality's popularity was increased with the introduction of a regular ferry service. There were even grandiose plans to make Walney into a large holiday resort, and similar schemes have been promoted since, most notably in the years immediately before and after the Second World War. Alderman Ellison favoured a layout akin to Blackpool, with a pleasure park at the south end, entertainment and sporting facilities between Biggar Bank and Earnse Point, and residential buildings in the sand dunes at the north end.

The island as an industrial centre was also not dismissed. The search for coal in the late 19th. century, resulted in the discovery of salt just south of Biggar village. Production began in 1897: brine was brought to the surface and pumped to reservoirs and filter beds at Hillock Whins. An evaporating plant, with six chimneys and 24 pans, was constructed at the south end and there were even plans for 40 houses with streets and shops. However, no more than a few cottages were built, and pressure from the Cheshire salt interests, caused the closure of the plant in 1909. Commercially, the sand and gravel industry has been far more successful. Extraction has occurred, certainly since the 1870s, when the pier at South Walney was built in order to carry the minerals by flat-bottomed barges and coasters to Preston and Liverpool. Production was probably at its height post Second World War with the rebuilding of the Liverpool docks, and more recently, with the construction of the Trident complex in Barrow. Additionally, McLung's gravel works operated at North Walney into the early 1970s.

The arrival of Vickers in Barrow brought an end to the conservative life of the island. The company needed housing for its skilled workmen, brought into the area from Scotland and the Northeast: hence Vickerstown. From a population of a few hundred in the late 189Os, by 1902 there were over 3,000, and the building of a bridge was only a few years away.

In 1990 Tim Dean had been the warden of South Walney Nature Reserve since September 1979 having spent the previous four years as a special school teacher in Wolverhampton. Partially educated in Birmingham, Glasgow, Kettering and London, somehow he obtained a degree in history and a teaching certificate before embarking on a series of careers involving amusement parks, forestry, painting and decorating and shelf filling. Now in the autumn of his years he lectures regularly in the Northwest and leads bird watching groups in Cumbria. He is married to Julia, the finest violinist in the county, has a goose named Bunter, supports the 'Poppies' and listens a great deal to Joni Mitchell. His ambitions are to see 300 bird species in Cumbria and open the batting for Cumberland - both equally impossible