SOME time ago, I was chatting to an author who lived in the Home Counties and I happened to mention the links between Charles Dickens and the north-east of England.

She then surprised me by saying she knew of no such links so I told her about his association with Barnard Castle, Bowes, Greta Bridge, York, Malton, Whitby and Mulgrave Castle.

As I recounted his experiences in this part of the world and how they had inspired some of his greatest works, I knew she was sceptical – she had always associated Dickens with Victorian London, its back streets and dense fogs.

I am sure she is not alone in this lack of wider knowledge, so I thought I would give the topic a brief airing in this week’s column.

Together with Hablot K Browne, the illustrator of his books, Dickens travelled from London to Greta Bridge by coach, the journey taking two whole days. It was a severe winter and they arrived at Greta Bridge near Barnard Castle around 11pm on January 31, 1838.

Earlier, at about 8pm, it had started to snow and he wrote of crossing a wild heath where there was no vestige of a track. It was a long, cold and tiring journey.

He wrote: “We reached a bare place with a house standing alone in the midst of a dreary moor which the guard informed us was Greta Bridge. It was fearfully cold and there were no outward signs of anyone being up at the house. But to our great joy we discovered a comfortable room with drawn curtains and a most blazing fire. In half an hour, they gave us a smoking supper and a bottle of mulled port.”

He was later to write that this inn, The George, was the very best in which he had stayed and he immortalised it in his Christmas Story when it became The Holly Tree. The following morning, after a hearty breakfast, the pair set off for Barnard Castle about four miles away where they were to stay at the King’s Head in the Market Place.

Dickens was able to find inspiration in almost any situation, for close to the King’s Head at Amen Corner just below the market cross was Master Humphrey’s clock-making business.

Dickens used this real name in his tale of Master Humphrey’s Clock.

Thomas Humphrey was born in 1787 and in 1806 had become apprenticed to Robert Thwaites, a clockmaker.

After working for another clockmaker at Chester-le-Street, Humphrey returned to establish his own business in Barnard Castle.

He couldn’t have asked for better publicity than to feature in the work of this popular author. But Dickens was clearly upon a mission because in his pocket he had a letter written by his friend Charles Smithson (pictured above), who was a solicitor with offices in Chancery Lane, Malton.

It was a letter of introduction in which he adopted a false name because his intention was to visit the infamous school known as Shaw’s Academy in nearby Bowes. Its headmaster, William Shaw, had been convicted of negligence against some boys in his care but most others were well treated with some even going home for holidays.

Dickens must have read about the trial some years earlier and set off to research the story for a novel, the storyline of which had been agreed in advance with his publisher. However, Mr Shaw had discovered Dickens’ plans and so, when the author arrived, Mr Shaw showed him in at one door, led him straight through the school, and quickly out by another exit.

Dickens was far from pleased by this brusque reception and so wrote his story about Nicholas Nickleby and the fictional Dotheboys Hall whose headmaster was called Wackford Squeers.

Readers were quick to link fact and fiction, especially as Wackford Squeers had the same initials as William Shaw, and both were blind in one eye. The resultant bad publicity caused parents to withdraw their children from Shaw’s Academy and it closed.

Dickens’ links with Malton come through his friendship with Smithson.

Dickens often visited the area, once travelling to Whitby by train, but it was Smithson’s office (which can still be seen) that provided the inspiration for A Christmas Carol.

The office became the countinghouse of the miser Ebeneezer Scrooge and his long-suffering clerk, Bob Cratchit.

Dickens had many other associations with Malton, including his brother Henry who was chief engineer on the York-Scarborough railway and he visited many places in the town. They included the Talbot Hotel, and also the old theatre in Saville Street where he gave a reading.

The bells of the ancient St Leonard’s Church, then Anglican but now restored to the Roman Catholics, were those mentioned in A Christmas Carol.

IF some people do not know that Dickens had many associations with this region, then it is equally surprising that ten per cent of adults in Britain cannot identify a sheep.

For those of us who live and work in our splendid countryside, such an admission sounds unbelievable.

However, if I add that 83 per cent of people quizzed in a recent survey could not identify a bluebell and 44 per cent could not identify an oak tree, then the wider truth revealed by such a survey begins to emerge.

12 per cent of adults quizzed also thought a red deer stag was a reindeer.

It all makes very sad reading.

I believe the survey was conducted by the University of Surrey but the results were published in the Yorkshire Post of March 30 this year.

Another conclusion was that a high percentage of those questioned considered the British countryside to be boring. Clearly it will be boring to those who know nothing about it, but we must accept that some people do not wish to learn about anything other than their personal little world.

It might be suggested that a knowledge of our countryside, its inhabitants and its history might be usefully taught at school but the counter claim might be – what value is there in learning how to identify a thrush, a grasshopper, a rowan or a celandine? Or to harvest crops?

From my own experience, a shocking number appear quite ignorant of rural matters – I’ve encountered many who do not know the difference between a National Park and a municipal park and others who have no idea why so many of our abbeys stand in ruins or why it is necessary to shut farm gates while rambling and not let dogs run free among sheep and lambs.

One possible explanation for such widespread ignorance may be that many of us are taking our holidays overseas instead of exploring the delights of our own countryside.

Perhaps we are dumbing down, making it easier to recognise an elephant or a giraffe rather than, say, a weasel or a stoat.

In his article about Goathland and Heartbeat (D&S Times, March 27) Harry Mead rightly commented upon the fact that tourists go to Goathland to see the Aidensfield Garage or the Aidensfield Stores, but are not interested in the history or topography of that delightful area.

I wonder how many Heartbeat visitors have visited the Mallyan Spout water fall, the Roman Road on Wheeldale Moor or the wonderful hamlet of Beckhole? Or seen any other parts of the North York Moors?

It reminds me of a woman tourist I overheard in Helmsley say to her friend, “I always buy a local postcard so I know where I’ve been.”

ACORRESPONDENT from Whinney Hill, near Stockton, writes to tell me he saw a swallow following him while harrowing a newly manured field. The date was March 25 and he tells me this is the earliest he has seen a swallow in that area.

Swallows can arrive in March but it is usually further south where they can find insects for food, and I would think such a sighting as far north as Stockton is unusually early.

I would think his newly-manured field would generate quite a lot of insects.

And today as I was writing these notes, our bird feeder was visited by a spectacular brambling in his finest plumage. Quite a handsome sight.