Bamburgh Castle

After breakfast, we drove the short distance to Bamburgh. The castle dominates the coastline and the village, sitting on the summit of a rocky outcrop over 40 metres above sea level. There has been a fortress where the castle now stands since AD 547. From early times until the Normans rebuilt the castle in stone, it was mostly a wooden structure.

The castle featured prominently in the Wars of the Roses and was badly damaged by cannon fire in 1464 when the Earl of Warwick besieged the place with 10,000 men and three huge guns. It was the first castle in England to be damaged by cannon fire, and soon afterwards, it began to fall into disrepair.

The building we see today is a combination of restoration by Lord Crewe, Bishop of Durham in the 18th century, and by the First Lord Armstrong of Cragside, the Victorian industrial magnate, in 1894. His descendants have carried on the work, and the castle remains in the Armstrong family.Read more