The remains of the Monastery of St. Bees, about four miles south
of Whitehaven, stand in a low situation, with marshy lands to the
east, and on the west exposed to storms from the Irish Channel.
In respect to this religious foundation, Tanner says, "Bega, an
holy woman from Ireland is said to have founded, about the year
650, a small monastery in Copeland, where afterwards a church was
built in memory of her. This religious house being destroyed by the
Danes, was restored by William, brother to Ranulph de Meschines,
Earl of Cumberland, in the time of King Henry I., and made a cell
for a prior and six Benedictine monks, to the Abbey of St. Mary,
York."
The earliest documents connected with this place call it
_Kirkby-Begogh_, the market town of St. Bega; and _St. Bee_, or
_St. Bees_, the Saint's house or houses, names given to it _after_
the Irish Saint resided there.
St. Bega is said to have been the daughter of an Irish king, "who
was a Christian, and an earnest man, to boot." He wished to marry
his daughter to a Norwegian prince; but she, having determined
to be a nun, ran away from her father's house, and joining some
strange sailors, took ship, and sailed to the coast of Cumberland.
The accounts given of the first foundation of the nunnery of
St. Bees are very contradictory, the common version being the
traditionary account in Mr. Sandford's MS., namely, that the extent
of the territories was originally designated by a preternatural
fall of snow, through the prayers of the Saint, on the eve of St.
John's or Midsummer day. From this MS. it would appear that a
ship, containing a lady abbess and her sisters, being "driven in
by stormy weather at Whitehaven," the abbess applied for relief to
the lady of Egremont, who, taking compassion on her destitution,
obtained of her lord a dwelling place for them, "at the now St.
Bees;" where they "sewed and spinned, and wrought carpets and other
work and lived very godly lives, as got them much love." It goes on
to say that the lady of Egremont, at the request of the abbess,
spoke to her lord to give them some land "to lay up treasure in
heaven," and that "he laughed and said he would give them as much
as snow fell upon the next morning, being Midsummer day; and on the
morrow as he looked out of his castle window, all was white with
snow for three miles together. And thereupon builded this St. Bees
Abbie, and gave all those lands was snowen unto it, and the town
and haven of Whitehaven, &c."
The "Life of Sancta Bega," however, a latin chronicle of the Middle
Ages, in which are recorded the acts of the Saint, gives the Snow
Miracle somewhat differently, and places it many years after the
death of the mild recluse, in the time of Ranulph de Meschines. The
monkish historian relates that certain persons had instilled into
the ears of that nobleman, that the monks had unduly extended their
possessions. A dispute arose on this subject, for the settlement of
which, by the prayers of the religious, "invoking most earnestly
the intercession of their advocate the blessed Bega," the whole
land became white with snow, except the territories of the church
which stood forth dry.
It is certain that the name of _Sancta Bega_ is inseparably
connected with the Snow Miracle; but the anachronism which refers
the former of the accounts just given to the period of William de
Meschines would seem to show that the narrator has mixed up the
circumstances attending its foundation in the middle of the seventh
century with its restoration in the twelfth; for, says Denton, "the
said Lord William de Meschines seated himself at Egremont, where
he built a castle upon a sharp topped hill, and thereupon called
the same _Egremont_." This writer elsewhere says, "The bounders of
William Meschines aforesaid, which he gave the priory are in these
words: 'Totam terram et vis totum feodum inter has divisas, viz. a
pede de Whit of Haven ad Kekel, et per Kekel donec cadit in Eyre
et per Eyre quousque in mare.' Kekel runneth off from Whillymore
by Cleator and Egremont, and so into Eyne; at Egremont Eyre is the
foot of Eyne, which falleth out of Eynerdale."
The monkish version of the legend, therefore, refers to William
de Meschines, as the Lord of Egremont, and to the lands which
were given by him at the restoration of the Priory in the twelfth
century: whilst that related by Sandford alludes to some other
powerful chief, who, in the life time of the Saint in the seventh
century had his seat at Egremont, which, as has been stated
elsewhere, "was probably a place of strength during the Heptarchy,
and in the time of the Danes."
It might almost seem as if some such legend as that of the Snow
Miracle were necessary to account for the singular form of this
extensive and populous parish: which includes the large and
opulent town of Whitehaven; the five chapelries of Hensingham,
Ennerdale, Eskdale, Wastdale-Head, and Nether-Wastdale; and the
townships of St. Bees, Ennerdale, Ennerdale High End, Eskdale and
Wastdale, Hensingham, Kinneyside, Lowside-Quarter, Nether-Wastdale,
Preston-Quarter, Rottington, Sandwith, Weddicar, and Whitehaven.
It extends ten miles along the coast, and reaches far inland, so
that some of its chapelries are ten and fourteen miles from the
mother-church.
In the monkish chronicle of the Life and Miracles of Sancta Bega
occurs the following passage:--
"A certain celebration had come round by annual revolution which
the men of that land use to solemnise by a most holy Sabbath on
the eve of Pentecost, on account of certain tokens of the sanctity
of the holy virgin then found there, which they commemorate, and
they honor her church by visiting it with offerings of prayers and
oblations."[4]
In allusion to which, Mr. Tomlinson the editor and translator of
the MS. observes that "this is another of those marks of dependence
of the surrounding chapelries which formerly existed; a mark the
more interesting because to this day some traces of it remain.
Communicants still annually resort to the church of St. Bees at the
festival of Easter from considerable distances; and the village
presents an unusual appearance from their influx; and at the church
the eucharist is administered as early as eight in the morning,
in addition to the celebration of it at the usual time. There can
be no doubt but that Whitsuntide, and perhaps Christmas, as well
as Easter, were formerly seasons when the church of St. Bees was
resorted to by numbers who appeared within it at no other time,
save perhaps at the burial of their friends. The great festivals
of the church appear in the middle ages to have been considered
by the English as peculiarly auspicious for the solemnization of
marriages. At these seasons then, from concurring causes, the
long-drawn solemn processions of priests and people would be
chiefly seen, and then also, the accustomed oblations of the latter
to the mother church of St. Bees would be discharged."
As to the "town and haven of Whitehaven" included in the gift to
"St. Bees Abbie," its eligibility as a fishing ground, when the
tides ran nearer the meadows than at present, would doubtless
attract the attention of the monks of St. Bees; and the fact of
its being denominated _Whittofthaven_, _Quitofthaven_, _Wythoven_,
_Whyttothaven_, _Whitten_, &c., in the register of St. Bees and
other ancient records, evidently shows that it is a place of
greater antiquity than has generally been ascribed to it; and some
fragments of tradition, still extant, seem to countenance this
opinion.
Denton (MS.) speaking of Whitehaven or White-Toft Haven, says
"It was belonging to St. Beghs of antient time, for the Abbot
of York, in Edward I.'s time was impleaded for wreck, and his
liberties there, by the King, which he claimed from the foundation,
to be confirmed by Richard Lucy, in King John's time, to his
predecessors."
That Whitehaven was anciently a place of resort for shipping
appears from some particulars respecting it mentioned in those
remarkable Irish documents, called the _Annals of the Four
Masters_, much of which was written at the Abbey of Monesterboice,
in the county of Louth--nearly opposite, on the Irish shore. In the
account of the domestic habits and manufactures of the Irish, it
is stated that their _coracles_, or _Wicker Boats_, their Noggins,
and other domestic utensils, were made of wood called _Wythe_ or
_Withey_, brought from the opposite shore of _Baruch_ (i.e. rocky
coast) and that a small colony was placed there for the purpose
of collecting this wood. That Barach mouth, or Barrow mouth, and
Barrow mouth wood is the same as that alluded to by the Four
Masters, is evident from the legend of St. Bega, which places it
in the same locality; and that the colony of Celts resided in the
neighbourhood of the now _Celts_, or _Kell's Pit_, in the same
locality also, is manifest from the name. About the year 930, it
appears that one of the Irish princes or chiefs, accompanied an
expedition to this place for wood (for that a great portion of
the site of the present town and the neighbouring heights were
formerly covered with forest trees there can be no doubt) and that
the inhabitants who were met at _Whitten_, or _Wittenagemote_, fell
upon and look the chief and several of the accompanying expedition
prisoners from a jealousy of their sanctuary being invaded. Many
of the Irish utensils were imported hither, particularly the
_noggin_, or small water pail, which was made of closely woven
wickerwork, and covered inside with skin, having a projecting
handle for the purpose of dipping into a river or well. The same
article, in its primitive shape, though made of a different
material, called a _geggin_, is still used by some of the farmers
in that neighbourhood. When _Adam de Harris_ gave lands at Bransty
Beck to the church of Holm Cultram, he also gave privilege to the
monks to cut wood for making geggins or noggins.
From an old history of the county of Durham, Whitehaven appears
to have been a resort for shipping in the tenth century; and when
the Nevills of Raby were called upon to furnish their quota of
men to accompany Henry in his expedition to Ireland in 1172, they
were brought to _Wythop-haven_, or _Witten-haven_, and transported
thence in ships to the Irish coast. When Edward was advancing
against Scotland, in the fourteenth century, he found a ship
belonging to this place, in which he sent a cargo of oats, to be
ground by the monks of St. Bees.
In nearly all histories of Cumberland, the name of Whitehaven has
been attributed either to some imaginary whiteness of the rocks
on the east side of the harbour, or to the cognomen of an old
fisherman who resided there about the year 1566, at which time the
town is said to have had only six houses. In 1633 it consisted of
only nine thatched cottages. Sir Christopher Lowther, second son
of Sir John Lowther, purchased Whitehaven and the lands lying in
its neighbourhood, and built a mansion on the west end of the haven
at the foot of a rock. He died in 1644, and was succeeded by his
son, Sir John Lowther, who erected a new mansion on the site of the
present castle, described by Mr. Denton, in 1688, as a "stately
new pile of building, called the Flatt," and having conceived the
project of working the coal mines, and improving the harbour, he
obtained from Charles the Second, about the year 1666, a grant
of all the "derelict land at this place," which yet remained in
the crown; and in 1678, all the lands for two miles northward,
between high and low water mark, the latter grant containing about
150 acres. Sir John having thus laid the foundation of the future
importance of Whitehaven, commenced his great work, and lived to
see a small obscure village grow up into a thriving and populous
town.
There is a traditionary account of the existence of an ancient ruin
where the castle stands (probably Druidical; or, where at a later
period, the Whitten, or Wittenagemote, was held) the remains of
which were broken up about the year 1628. Respecting these real or
imaginary stones it has been related, that the inhabitants believed
them to be enchanted warriors, and gave them the appellation
of "_Dread Ring_, or _Circle_," and occasionally "_Corpse
Circle_"--corrupted into the word _Corkickle_, the name which the
locality now bears.
A reminiscence of the old mansion of the Lowthers is preserved by
the road which skirts the precincts of the castle. This is still
called, by the older townspeople, the Flatt Walk.