South Shields Leasing

Did You Know?

South Shields is a coastal town in the North East of England at the mouth of the River Tyne, about 3.7 miles downstream from Newcastle upon Tyne. Historically part of County Durham, it became part of Tyne and Wear in 1974.

South Shields has an Anglo-Saxon or medieval name referring to ‘Scheles’ – temporary fisherman’s huts, sheds or shelters on the south side of the Tyne.

Anciently, the town was the site of a Roman fort and a Saxon monastery but the name South Shields is not recorded until 1228 when the place is called ‘the Sheales upon the South’. It is then recorded as ‘Shelis’ in 1296, as ‘Suthshelis’ in 1313.

In 1489, a Lionel Bell of South Shields obtained a 60 year lease from the Prior of Durham for making salt near St Hilda’s church. Here he built two large salt pans where sea water was heated with vast quantities of coal to produce salt. These were the earliest known salt pans in South Shields.

As well as salt, the export of coal had become an important industry at South Shields by the early 1600s, with a fee paid to Newcastle of course. Glassmaking and chemical manufacturing became important in the late 1600s and early 1700s. Fishing was another older established industry concentrated to the east of the church with salt making dominating to the west.

In the field of chemicals, an alum works was established in 1720 by Cookson whose successors were involved in making glue and sulphate of soda at the site. The works was later converted into a soapworks and then a glass works.

For centuries the whole tidal stretch of the Tyne was regarded as the port of Newcastle and it was not until 1848 that North and South Shields came to be officially recognised as separate ports.

The National Trust-owned Souter Lighthouse on the Leas cliff tops in South Shields was the first lighthouse in the world designed and built to be powered by electricity. It was opened in 1871, decommissioned in 1988, and acquired by the National Trust, who opened it to the public in 1990.

South Shields has also become the home of the South Tyneside Magic Festival, an annual event created by Martin Duffy, and supported by the local council, The Custom House Theatre, the local magic shop Magic Box, and numerous local and national independent investors.