An Ancestral Journey

Your travel guide for a trip to our ancestral lands

Home Page Return to the Home Page of the Farndale Family Website

The Farndale Story The story of one family’s journey through two thousand years of British History

The Farndale Lineages The 84 family lines into which the family is divided. Meet the whole family and how the wider family is related

The Farndale Directory Members of the historical family ordered by date of birth

Themes Links to other pages with historical research and related material

Related Family Stories The story of the Bakers of Highfields, the Chapmans, and other related families

The Time Traveller’s Journey through North Yorkshire The History of the North York Moors, Ryedale, York, Cleveland and beyond

The places to visit to experience the Farndale Story first hand

Like so many of the Farndale forebears, you might be inspired to take a journey in their footsteps. This page will point you in the right direction. If direct descendants of the family are planning a trip, email me on rcfarndale@hotmail.com, and I’ll happily help.

The ancient routes across the moors Exploring the ancient tracks and roads across the moors around Farndale

A journey through our family story will focus on the North York Moors and the areas to the north and south. Here are some of the main places that are associated with our history.

Map 1 – The principal locations for a tour of the area associated with the Farndale Story

To help you find the most efficient route through the Farndale lands, you can see the geographical layout of some of the places where you can rediscover the family story at first hand in the schematic map below. The places in green text are possible stopping points if you find yourself around the North York Moors. The places in blue text are links to further information about particular places within the area. Click on the links to get more information and the green links will help you with your trip.

Coatham

Not to Scale

North

Kirkleatham

Wilton

Saltburn by the Sea

Smugglers

NORTH SEA

CLEVELAND

Cats Nab

Huntcliff

Skinningrove

Skelton Old Church

Skelton

Brotton Brotton Old Churchyard

Carlin How

Alum

Loftus

Boosbeck

Kilton

Ironstone Mining

Liverton

Guisborough

Kilton Mine

Moorsholm

Roseberry Topping

Tidkinhow

Freebrough Hill

Great Ayton Great Ayton Mill

James Cook

Stokesley

Whitby

Danby

Egton

Synod of Whitby

St Mary’s church and Abbey

NORTH

YORK

MOORS

Middle Head

Lion Inn, Blakey Moor

Farndale Rim The Roman Arm Purse

The ancient routes across the moors

Farndale

Spaunton Moor The place of wild beasts and men who live like wild beasts

Bransdale

Low Mill Farndale Drive

Lastingham

Dalby Forest

Hutton-le-Hole

Rievaulx Abbey

Kirkdale Minster The Sundial Kirkdale Cave

Old Pickering Forest

Scarborough

Ryedale Windy Pits

Beadlam

Kirkbymoorside Orm Gamalson

Star Carr

Helmsley

Pickering Castle Pickering Pickering Church

Roulston Scar

VALE

OF

PICKERING

Ampleforth

Coxwold

Gilling East

Hovingham

Yearsley

Malton

Sheriff Hutton Sheriff Hutton Church The Nevilles

10 km Aldborough Isurium Brigantum

Battle of Stamford Bridge

Eboracum Eoforwic Jorvik Alcuin

York The Shambles

Jorvik Museum

Campsall	Robin Hood
Doncaster Doncaster Minster
Loversall

Map 2 – Schematic interactive map of principal locations to experience the Farndale Story first hand

A Possible Two Day trip

The interactive map should help you to plan a trip that suits you best, over a single day or more. For those after a little more guidance, here is a possible trip over two days.

Day 1 – Our Ancient and Medieval History

The best starting point is the Farndale Rim, from where you can find a suitable vantage point looking over the dale from Blakey Ridge. You should first take in the Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age history of this region. You can look across to Horn Nab, the site of Bronze Age archaeology and the Arm Purse dropped by a Roman soldier in about the second century CE. Take in the shape of the dale and let your imagination fill it with a dense forest of alders and other native trees, which is how it looked for eons of time. Then imagine some limited clearance by monks in to twelfth century before more substantial clearance for agriculture in the thirteenth century. You might catch a glimpse of Edmund the Hermit, watching warily from behind a tree. This is the place from which to contemplate the Cradle of the family story and the Primeval Swamp of our deep history.

You can then drive down into Farndale and imagine the clearing of the dale in the thirteenth century, and the industry and agriculture focused around two watermills. Here you will immerse yourself in the world of our earliest ancestors. Buy some lunch in the Farndale store, and you might come away with a shopping bag with your name on it.

After exploring Farndale you should drive into Hutton le Hole and then turn left to follow the moorland road across the southern reach of Spaunton moor to Lastingham to visit the site of Cedd’s monastery at the Anglo-Saxon frontier with the wilderness of wild beasts and men who live like wild beasts. Visit the wonderful old church and descend into the crypt, to find yourself transported back in time by 1,500 years. As you return along the road to Hutton le Hole the fields to your south were the site of early Roman rural settlements.

Now drive south into Kirkbymoorside, the centre of the estate of Chirchebi, described in the Domesday Book, the place where the Game of Thrones played out between the House Mowbray and the House Stuteville. Notice the small hamlet at Keldholme where the priory had interests in Farndale in the thirteenth century. Continue along the A170 on the Helmsley road and after about 1 kilometre turn off on the lane to the north of the road to the exquisite church of Kirkdale. Park in the car park. You might first walk back along to road to the Kirkdale Cave, about 500 metres from the car park. Here you will look up at a portal which will transport you back 130,000 years to an interglacial period when hippopotami and elephants roamed these lands. Now return to the Anglo Saxon church itself. As you pass through the metal gate, you will come to a porch and above the door you will see the Sundial erected in about 1055 by Orm Gamalson, under which our ancestors passed a millennium ago, contemplating time as you do now. Walk round the outside of the church, looking for three Anglo-Saxon crosses embedded into the walls, and then go inside, to look at Anglo -Saxon artefacts from the eight century and afterwards. This was probably the centre of our world for many centuries before the Norman Conquest and you can read more about its significance in the Introduction to Kirkdale, Anglo-Saxon Kirkdale, and Anglo-Saxon Scandinavian Kirkdale and its place in the Farndale Story in Anglo Saxon Kirkdale and Scandinavian Kirkdale.

Now continue along the road, passing the site of the Roman Villa at Beadlam (which you might visit one day, organised on limited days by English Heritage to enter the world of our Roman history) to Helmsley. Again you might enjoy a visit to the castle at Helmsley on another trip. For now, take the B1257 northwest from Helmsley and next visit Rievaulx Abbey, the abbey with extensive interests in the lands of Farndale, and in whose cartulary the name Farndale first appeared in 1154.

If you still have time, you might also fit in a trip to Pickering, to visit Pickering Castle, another English Heritage site, where you will find the court building where our fourteenth century ancestors were tried for poaching offences. Before you leave don’t miss the medieval murals at Pickering Church. Pickering is part of the lands of the Lancastrian House, and the first place Henry IV headed to when he landed to seize the throne from Richard II, and our initial family allegiance in the competition which later became the Wars of the Roses might surprise you. On another day, with more time, a drive through Dalby Forest takes you into the forest world of our poaching ancestors.

You are unlikely to have time to visit Sheriff Hutton, domain of the House Neville and Richard of Gloucester’s Northern Interests, in the same day, but if you can fit it into a longer schedule, it is a place at the heart of our family interest in the Wars of the Roses. It was the home of Richard Farndale, the veteran who fought in the armies of Richard II, Henry IV and Henry V. In Sheriff Hutton Church you will come face to face with the House Neville, and the effigy of the young son of Richard III. This is the place to consider our family’s part in medieval warfare.

A little further south from Sheriff Hutton is the site of the Battle of Stamford Bridge, where Harold defeated his brother Tostig and Harold Hardrada of Norway in 1066, a prelude to his defeat by William the Conqueror only days afterwards.

There are many places to stay, but a dramatic option is the Lion Inn on Blakey Ridge, which is en route to the locations for Day 2, and a place which overlooks Farndale.

Day 2 – Our agricultural and industrial heritage

A good starting point for Day 2 is Kirkleatham, where the family first came when Nicholas and Agnes Farndale and their family first settled there. At the excellent and free Kirkleatham Museum you will find exhibits which help to reflect the family story, including a display of the Anglo-Saxon burial at Street Houses, near a family home at Carlin How. If you’ve not yet had breakfast, try the café at the Walled Garden. Walk to the church in the village and you could take a short trip to the church at Wilton, which may have been the location of the family’s first home.

Now drive into Skelton and visit Skelton Old Church. You may be descended from John Andrew, King of the Smugglers, and Martin Farndale, who married his granddaughter, who are both buried to your right immediately after you pass through the white metal gate. Go inside the church and you will find yourself in a church rebuilt in the eighteenth century but which reflects the world into which the Farndale family arrived. This is also the heart of the lands of the House Brus, from whom the Scottish Kings descend, the junior line of the House to the Yorkshire de Brus line!

Now drive on to Kilton, the home of our family for over 250 years. Consider the genealogy of the Kilton 1 Line, and the story of the Farmers of Kilton. This was the home of those from whom all the modern family descend in some way. Find your own link to the folk of Kilton. John Farndale wrote extensively about Kilton and the surrounding area. Kilton Hall is roughly located at the site of the small, bustling hamlet that once stood here. The ruins of Kilton Castle are in the woods and difficult to access. You might be able to walk to the ruins of the Kilton Mine. The family probably first settled on the hills to the north around Craggs, but were also associated with Stank House and then Kilton Hall Farm. This is the world of old Johnny Farndale, Old Farndale of Kilton; William Farndale, a farmer and merchant; John Farndale, the author; Matthew Farndale, who emigrated to Australia; Martin Farndale, who farmed at Kilton Hall Farm; John George Farndale, who wrote home from the Crimean War and settled in Ontario; Charles Farndale, who was a central figure in the community; and George Farndale and Grace Farndale, the last Farndales at Kilton. It is the place of which John Farndale wrote No place can equal Kilton for its loveliness. However this is also the place from which to consider the family’s transition to the changes brought by the Industrial Revolution.

From Kilton drive a short distance towards Brotton to visit Brotton Old Churchyard where you will find generations of our ancestors all resting in the same place.

Next I suggest you drive to Saltburn by the Sea where at Cats Nab you can experience the family’s connection with the Smugglers of the east coast and the Alum House of Johnny Farndale and then head up to Huntcliff to look back over Old Saltburn to the new Victorian town of Saltburn-by-the-Sea.

For those closer to my immediate family, the farmhouse at Tidkinhow is now a holiday let. It is also worth a trip to Great Ayton and Great Ayton Mill, the home of many generations of the family.

Further days for more depth to the story

To extend the trip, or to do it in stages, there are other journeys which will take you to the heart of the Farndale Story.

Whitby is the scene of extensive family connection, where the groundbreaking Synod of Whitby was held. Here you can explore our family links with James Cook and look back over the port from St Mary’s church and the Abbey. Many of the Whitby Farndales were buried in Dracula’s graveyard at St Mary’s. Connect with the maritime adventurers, Giles Farndale, John Farndale and John Christopher Farndale Senior and his sons.

York is the place of Roman Eboracum, Anglo-Saxon Eoforwic and Scandinavian Jorvik, brought to life at the Jorvik Museum. It is the world of Alcuin. The Shambles was the workplace of John Farndale, the fourteenth century butcher. York is the place of our Merchants ancestors in the fourteenth century. Don’t miss the Roman architecture below the cathedral in the Crypt, the excellent Yorkshire Museum, and a walk around the walls.

You could also follow the Pathfinders to Danby and Egton.

It is worth a trip to the Roman administrative town at Isurium Brigantum or Aldborough, but you will need to book a slot with English Heritage.

A separate trip to Doncaster will take you to Doncaster Minster, home of the Vicar of Doncaster who had land at Loversall and our later ancestors at Campsall, in Barnsdale Forest, the original home of Robin Hood.

You could also travel further back in time into our archaeological deep history by visiting Star Carr and then the Rotunda museum at Scarborough, with the bones from the Kirkdale Cave and some artefacts from Star Carr. You could also take in the Bronze Age Ryedale Windy Pits (though most are difficult to access and need permission) and the Iron Age Hill Fort at Roulston Scar. If you decide to put on your walking boots and hike around the rim above Farndale, send me an email to rcfarndale@hotmail.com, and I’ll point out the many prehistoric sites to take in.

Bon voyage.