Sunderland, Tyne and Wear
Created | Updated Dec 17, 2002
The City
The Beginning
At the mouth of the river Wear, 272 miles from London, 135 miles from Edinburgh and 13 miles from Durham, lies Sunderland, of which the recorded history dates back to the year 674 1 and the building of St Peter's Church and monastery on the land to the north of the river. It's founder, Benedict Biscop, was soon granted more land to the south, land separated by, or 'sundered' 2 by the river. Although the monastery was deystroyed, first by the Vikings, then again by the Scots in 1070, the port of Wearmouth, and the sundered lands of Monkwearmouth on the north bank and Bishopwearmouth to the south, would eventually become the City of Sunderland 3.
Boom
Growth came from the three industries of glassmaking, coalmining and shipbuilding. Glassmaking began in the monastery and is the only one of the three to survive today in the form of The National Glass Centre. Coal had been mined in the area since Roman times but started to boom, along with shipbuilding in the 13th century.
A little further to the north, Royalist Newcastle had benefited from a royal charter, which until the civil war, had given it an advantage over its competitors in shipbuilding and the export of coal. On the side of Parliament, Sunderland acted as a naval base and took full advantage of the capture of its nearby rival in 1644. Had Sunderland sided with the Royalists, Crommwell's supply of coal would have virtually dried up and the civil war might have ended differently. The growth of shipbuilding continued and by the 1830's there were almost as many ships built on the Wear as in all of the other ports in the country combined. Sunderland had become the world's largest shipbuilding town.
Bust
100 years later however, the shipbuilding had all but ceased and one third of the town's population were unemployed. World War II brought business back to the shipyards, but the industrial importance of the area brought heavy bombing and although the bombed housing would be rebuilt, the shipbuilding industry continued to decline. In 1840 there were 65 shipyards on the Wear, by the end of the 1980's there were none.
Coalmining too was on the decline and 1994 saw the closure of Wearmouth Colliery, once the start of a six mile journey to the coal face below the North Sea. Despite the closure of the pit, the site itself would continue to play a part in Sunderland's history. Standing only a few hundred yards from St Peter's, the site was chosen for the building of the Stadium of Light, home of Sunderland AFC.
D'yer knaa? 4
- Kate Adie has not only reported from some of the most dangerous places in the world, but was also born in Sunderland.
- Sunderland born inventor Joseph Swan demonstrated his electric light bulb in Fawcett Street on January 19th 1879. Edison's version was demonstrated in December 1879.
- The most famous bunch of bananas in Britain were sold in Sunderland.
