Test your knowledge of North East England with our ninth North East England history quiz.

1. What is the name of the North East street pictured below?

2. What was the nationality and name of the sailor and privateer who bombed the Northumbrian village of Alnmouth with a cannon ball from his passing ship on September 23, 1779?

3. Where would you find a sculpture of a male and female called ‘The Couple’ standing on a platform out in the middle of the sea watched over by a much smaller but otherwise identical couple on the shore?

4. Where might you find the ghost of Archie Armstrong?

5. What was the name of the ship that struck one of the Farne Islands on the morning of 7th September 1838 and resulted in the famous rescue involving the heroic lighthouse keeper’s daughter, Grace Darling?

6. Broad and Trinity in Newcastle; Church, Low and Middle in Chester-le-Street; Castle and Wear in Bishop Auckland; Castle in Durham and Church in Whickham are all examples of what?

7. Originally from County Durham but principally associated with North Northumberland, what were the Culley Brothers, Matthew and George (born 1730 and 1734) noted for?

8. Name the famous furniture designer born at Stockton-on-Tees in 1751 who shares a family name with a North East village near the A19?

9. By what name is the Battle of Branxton (1513) better known?

10. Which picturesque North East village was laid out by Louisa, the Marchioness of Waterford?

11. In the courtyard of which Newcastle quayside institution will you find a former almshouse of 1787 and an anchor from the Spanish Armada of 1588?

12. Which North East town was the birthplace of Frank Williams of Formula One racing fame?

13. Which famous North East battle took place in Redesdale, Northumberland in 1388 and involved the Northumberland Percys and the Douglas family of Scotland?

14. Who composed the North East song Keep Your Feet Still Geordie Hinny?

15. What was the name and occupation of the Akenside from whom Newcastle’s Akenside Hill takes its name?

16. Where in the North East would you find the picturesque Trafalgar Square situated around a green with a plaque commemorating 76 local sailors who served at the Battle of Trafalgar?

17. Which battle fought near the Roman Wall a few miles north of Hexham persuaded the victorious Northumbrian king, Oswald to convert to Christianity and who were the opponents in the battle?

18. Name the Swalwell-born composer who reputedly wrote the tune to Auld Lang Syne?

19. Where might you have once found an eighteenth century military defensive instalment called the Black Cat battery?

20. What is significant about Ellington in terms of North East coal mining and what was the nickname with which the mine was associated?

21. Which two North East rivers are separated by the sandy Cambois beach?

22. With which North East colliery village would you have associated Richard Haswell’s fictional character ‘Geordie Broon?

23. Where would you find Javel Groupe?

24. Who was the renowned journalist born at Embleton in North Northumberland and what was his eventual fate?

25. Which American comedian indirectly takes his name from a Northumbrian ballad that commemorates a Cheviot hunt and the Battle of Otterburn?

26. What ancient site can you find in the middle of a field with great surrounding views near the village of Duddo in north Northumberland?

27. White-washed farm-houses in Teesdale usually signify that they are part of which landed estate?

28. Which Newcastle street was historically associated with the distinctive keelmen fraternity who transported coal to ships on the Tyne using their boats called keels?

29. What is Sting’s real name?

30. Name the five rivers found in Tyne and Wear?

31. Name the ten rivers found in the historic county of Durham and the three rivers that it acquired  from the North Riding of Yorkshire in the 1970s following boundary changes?

32. What is the name of the famous character created by the Hartlepool cartoonist Reg Smythe (1917-1998)?

33. Until 1836 what was unusual about the districts of Bedlingtonshire, Norhamshire and Islandshire in Northumberland?

34. Born and brought up in Teesdale near Barnard Castle, name the explorer and renewable energy champion who was the first man to walk to both poles?

35. Which prominent North East family were closely associated with Streatlam near Barnard Castle and Gibside near Gateshead?

36. Which North East village was known as ‘Little Moscow‘ from its communist sympathies and a street called Marx and Lenin Terrace?

37. Shiremoor in North Tyneside was named from which historic North East district or ‘shire’?

38. What was the name of the German industrialist who was the first mayor and first MP for Middlesbrough?

39. What famous Roman fort is located at Chesterholm in Northumberland?

40. Where would you find Killingworth Billy and what is it?

Answers below

 

Answers

1. Sandhill, a quayside street, Newcastle upon Tyne
2. John Paul Jones. He was American.
3. Newbiggin-by-the-Sea.
4. Haughton Castle, Northumberland.
5. The Forfarshire.
6. They are all ‘Chares’.
7. Farmers who bred the Border Leicester sheep.
8. Thomas Sheraton.
9. Flodden Field.
10. Ford village, Northumberland.
11. Trinity House.
12. South Shields.
13. Otterburn.
14. Joe Wilson.
15. Mark Akenside. He was a poet.
16. Sunderland.
17. Heavenfield. King Oswald fought against the Welsh.
18. William Shield.
19. Sunderland.
20. Ellington was the region’s last colliery. The mine was known as ‘The Big E’.
21. The River Wansbeck and River Blyth.
22. Backworth.
23. Newcastle quayside.
24. W.T. Stead. He died on board the Titanic.
25. Chevy Chase.
26. Duddo standing stones, a small stone circle.
27. Raby.
28. Sandgate.
29. Gordon Sumner.
30. Rivers Tyne, Derwent, Team, Don and Wear.
31. Rivers Tyne, Derwent, Team, Don, Wear, Tees, Browney, Deerness, Gaunless and Skerne. The River Balder, River Lune and River Greta were moved into Durham from Yorkshire.
32. Andy Capp.
33. They were part of County Durham (The County Palatine of Durham).
34. Robert Swan.
35. The Bowes family.
36. Chopwell.
37. Tynemouthshire.
38. Henry Bolckow.
39. Vindolanda.
40. It’s a locomotive found at the Stephenson Railway Museum, North Shields.