Coldstream formerly Lennel

 

Parish No 733 Coldstream is located within the County of Berwickshire which is now known as the Scottish Borders.  Coldstream lies at an important crossing on the River Tweed approximately 14 miles south west of Berwick-upon-Tweed.  For a map showing the location of Coldstream please click here.

 

Coldstream was originally named Lennel or Leinhall until 1716.

 

The Church of Hirsel which is thought to have been built in the 10th Century, although it was possibly built earlier than this was sited near to Hirsel House.  The Church of Hirsel is the earliest known church in Coldstream Parish and was known for many years as Granton Church.

 

Until 1718 Lennel Church was the Parish Church of the area.  The ruins of Lennel Church are in the Parish Graveyard which lies close to the banks of the River Tweed.

 

The first church in the town of Coldstream was the Priory.  The Priory was located at the east end of the Market Square, however nothing remains of the Priory today.  It was used as the church for the Priory and for those living in the town of Coldstream.

 

Over the years the population of Lennel drifted to Coldstream.  In 1705 the first Parish Church in Coldstream was built.  This Church was built on the site of the present Church which is in the middle of the High Street.

 

Coldstream is best known for its association with the Coldstream Guards which is the second oldest regiment of foot guards.  The Coldstream Guards were not raised however, in the town of Coldstream but by General Monck in 1650.  The Guards at the time consisted of two units of troops which had been formed to fight the Scottish Presbyterians.  In 1659 General Monck established his headquarters at Coldstream after leaving Cromwell’s Army to follow Charles II.  The troops remained loyal to General Monck rather than to Cromwell and went on to capture Newcastle for Charles II.  The Coldstream Guards’ House which is where the headquarters were in Market Square is now a Museum.

 

The second week in August is Coldstream Civic Week when the Battle of Flodden is remembered.  During the week, games are held and horseman parade through the streets and go on several ride outs.  There is a Memorial Service held at Flodden near Branxton where the last medieval battle fought on English soil took place.  After the Battle was over and thousands of Scots lay dead it is said that the Coldstream Abbess ordered many of the Scots nobility to be carried back to the Priory where they were buried.

 

"COLDSTREAM, a parish, containing a post and market town of the same name, on the southern border of Berwickshire. It is bounded on the east and south by the river Tweed, which divides it from England; and on other sides by the parishes of Eccles, Swinton, and Ladykirk ... The ancient name of the parish was Lennel or Leinhall; and the ruins of Lennel church stand on the north bank of the Tweed, 1 1/2 mile distant from Coldstream. Eastward from this church, there was formerly a vilage called Lennel, which was so entirely destroyed in the Border wars, that the site of it is not now known. According to Chalmers, the parish of Leinhall appears in charters as early as the year 1147 ... In 1716 a new parish-church was built at the village of Coldstream, and the designation of the parish was afterwards taken from the kirk-town."

 

from the Imperial Gazetteer of Scotland, edited by John Marius Wilson, 1868.

 

Church History

 

Coldstream Priory

 

The 3rd Earl of Dunbar, Gospatrick founded the Cistercian Priory of St Mary of Coldstream and Whithou.  Richard, Bishop of St Andrews confirmed the foundation gift.  It is thought that Whithou is probably the name of the site in Coldstream where the Priory was established.  In the same year the Earl and his wife Derder gave to the nunnery Hirsel Church and 25 to 40 hectares of Hirsel land, along with half of Lennel Parish and land at Birgham.  By the end of the 12th Century the Priory also held the Churches of Lennel and Bassendean.  Between 1256 and 1296 there were both nuns and monks at the Priory along with masters of the Priory.  The first mention of one of the nuns by name was in 1240, when the Sherriff of Northumberland Sir John Plessey, promised to pay 40 shillings per year towards the upkeep of his daughter Joan while she remained at the Priory as a nun.  The Priory Church was dedicated by David de Bernham on 6 October 1248 two days after the sister convent at Eccles was dedicated.

 

In 1296 Edward I invaded Scotland.  His army set up camp around Coldstream and the Priory.  The garden and orchard were damaged by the troops who camped there.  The Master of Priory, Walter, and six of the monks claimed compensation; it must have come as a surprise when Edward ordered payment to be made.  The amount given to the Priory by way of compensation included a sum for the loss of revenue from the orchard.  The orchard was still in existence in 1877 when the surviving kinds of apples were listed by Hardy.  In 1296 the Oaths of Fealty to Edward I were signed in Berwick, the Prioress did not sign the Oaths, but the Master of the Priory did.  In 1315 the nuns were sent to other convents ‘because of war and destruction of their property by the Scots’.  In 1472 Simprim was awarded to the Convent by James III confirming the charter his father had granted in 1459.

 

In 1515 Queen Margaret the widow if James IV, killed at nearby Flodden in 1513 came to the Convent at Coldstream with her second husband the Earl of Angus and her three year old infant son, who would be the future James V.  Isabella Hoppringell, the Prioress of Coldstream, befriended them.  In return for her friendship Margaret, as sister of Henry VIII wrote to Lord Dacre, seeking his protection for the Convent.  Lord Dacre, who was the warden of the English Eastern Marches, promised to protect or at least not to harm the Convent, providing that the Convent did not support those doing damage to the King, and did not accommodate any Scots men of War.  In 1509 the Prioress obtained permission under a Royal Letter Patent of James IV to traffic with the English in war and in peace and to receive as many as 12 Englishmen in her house at one time.  Ultimately the treachery of the Prioress did the Priory no good, as it was ‘utterly destroyed’ by Henry’s Army under the Earl of Hertford in 1545, although she did not live to see its destruction.

 

In 1538 there were 11 nuns and when the Prioress died.  Elizabeth Hoppringell was then elected Prioress by the other nuns.  The last Prioress died between 1583 and 1588.  The Priory Church was rebuilt after its destruction in 1545.  The Priory was secularised and demolished in 1621 by its post-Reformation owner, Sir John Hamilton of Trabrown, who was the third son of the Earl of Haddington.

 

Hirsel Church

 

The 3rd Earl of Dunbar and his wife Derder, gave a foundation gift to the Priory of Coldstream.  The gift included one carucate of the land of Hirsel and ‘the church of that vill’.  The gifts were confirmed by their son, 4th Earl of Dunbar Waldeve.  On 31 July 1246 David de Bernham dedicated the church of Hirsel. 

 

The minister of the Parish recorded in 1627 that ‘as for chaplainaries we know none to be within our said parish, but ther has bein of old neir to the Hirsill ather chapel or kirk quhair of there is only restond ane kirk yaird’.  The record shows that at this time the Church at Hirsel no longer stood, but the graveyard was still there and may have been used for the occasional burial.

 

Lennel Church

 

Lennel lies about half a mile to the north east of Coldstream.  Lennel Church is in Coldstream cemetery and the old town of Lennel was located to the east.  Over the years the people of Lennel moved to Coldstream.  There was once a Manor at Lennel which included the Church of Lennel.  The parish and church of Lenell were replaced by Coldstream in 1718.

 

In 1704 Lennel Church was said to be in disrepair and unable to accommodate a congregation.  It was decided to build a new church in Coldstream.    The eastern part of the Parish of Lennel would be the most affected by the move as they would have the furthest to travel to the new Church where as everyone else would be closer by in the new town of Coldstream.  Due to this there was much resistance from the villagers of the eastern end of Parish to the move to the area of Coldstream.  When the new church was ready to be roofed the old church was being repaired.  The new church in Coldstream was completed in 1705 however Coldstream did not become the Parish until 1718.  The remains of Lennel Church sit in the cemetery about one mile from Coldstream just to the west of the present day hamlet of Lennel. 

 

Coldstream Parish Church

 

The first parish church in Coldstream was built on the site of the present church in 1705 although it was 1718 before the Church was officially selected as the Parish Church.  By 1732 the church bell was being misused.  In 1736 the roof of the church had to be replaced and shutters were fitted to the outside of the windows.

 

Population

 

1755

1493

 

1831

2897

 

1871

 

1801

2269

 

1841

 

 

1881

2560

1811

2384

 

1851

 

 

1891

 

1821

2801

 

1861

2823

 

1901

 

 

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