Agricultural History Review, Volume 70 Part 1 (2022), p. 147

This second volume completes the study of Howden Township and Liberty, which form a complex region involving competing and anomalous jurisdictions. Formerly one of the two liberties of the Bishop of Durham, it is examined along with Wallingfen, which in Roman times had formed part of an inlet of the Humber at the feet of the Wolds. Though not a part of Howdenshire it offered important resources to the surrounding townships. The rich pasture, fish, game, peats, rushes, reeds and turves of Wallingfen were managed by an elected body of gentry and yeomen outside either ecclesiastical or royal control. Distancing from the usual controls imposed by royal officials or clergy can be seen in other aspects of the East Riding of Yorkshire, and particularly in Hull where there was no proper legal quay for the accurate assessment of duties until the construction of the first enclosed dock, opened in 1778. Though it had no approved assay office, Hull had its own system of marking for silver and gold which persisted until the early eighteenth century without any external regulation.

Frequent inundations from the Ouse and the making of banks and dykes in response are recorded as early as 1274. In 1445–46 a staith was completed at Howdendyke revetted with stapled faggots and detailed records survive for the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. These staiths were a hazard to navigation and also affected the river’s behaviour; the tidal bore, known as the Aegir, associated with the equinoctial high tides was exaggerated wherever the river narrowed. The lead wave could reach a meter in height and resulted in the scouring of the banks at the bends in the river. Maintenance was expensive and repairs to the Wet Flood Staith in 1531 required no less than 80 oak trees, 600 timber piles, 4,000 brushwood faggots, and 800 corded bundles of thorn.

The Liberty of Howden was a detached estate of the Bishopric of Durham and the bishops officers eventually established their authority after various disputes with representatives of the crown during the thirteenth century. The area known as Bishopsoil provided some 4,000 acres of common land to the north of Howden township, and was enclosed in 1777.

There was a twice-yearly Bishop’s court and the remains of one court building survives next to Langley Gate, but the old Moot Hall was demolished in the early nineteenth century. The Bishop’s manor house survives and the parish church of St Peter, Howden Minster, is an impressive reminder of the power and influence of the see of Durham, though much reduced from its collegiate form. After the Reformation, and the return of royal authority to Howdenshire, the choir and chapter house fell into disrepair, though the latter was reroofed in 1984 to preserve the stonework.

The settlement of Howden apparently originated as a river landing on the lower Derwent and river transport via the Ouse was crucial to its existence, both for movement of goods and people. Until the middle of the nineteenth century most riverbank settlements had jetties and Howdendyke became a thriving river port. Road access was poor, and before 1800 it was necessary to use a ferry at Bubwith in order to reach the Wolds and Beverley while the Bishop’s manor controlled a ferry between Howdendyke and Hook. It was 1929 before the development of a modern highways system linked by bridges was achieved. A railway connection had, however, been established by the construction of the Hull-Selby railway in 1840. This encouraged the development of the Howden horse fairs in an area with some fame in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for horse-breeding.

Howden claimed a moment on the national stage in 1924 when the former Royal Naval Air Service airfield was acquired by the Airship Guarantee Company. Despite the successful flight, from Howden, of the R100 – designed by Barnes Wallis, inventor of the ‘bouncing bomb’ – the loss in 1929 of the R101 – an airship designed by a government team – resulted in the cancellation of the entire national airship programme.

The volume also includes Welton, Welton Soke, and Welton cum Melton, and is divided into sections describing landscape, settlement, land ownership, economic history, river defence and drainage, social and religious history, and local government.