The Blackbird Inn: From Bastle to Pub

The Blackbird Inn is one of Ponteland’s finest and oldest buildings. Its story stretches back more than seven centuries, beginning not as an inn at all. If you stand in front of the building, you can see that the left-hand side, now with the tall chimney breast in front, is clearly older than the right-hand side.

The earliest structure on the site was probably raised in the 13th or 14th century — a bastle or pele tower built by the Lord of the Manor for both residence and defence. It stood within a landscape of conflict, and Ponteland itself was significant enough to host a peace treaty between the Kings of England and Scotland in 1244. Those uneasy truces were often short-lived, and in 1388 Scottish raiders, making their way back to Scotland after a raid into England set fire to the tower along with the rest of the village, leaving it in ruins.

The property lay partly derelict for centuries until, around 1597 when it was incorporated as part of a new manor house built by Mark Errington, a local landowner. Marc left his mark on the buildings inscribing his initials on the lintel over the doorway to the main entrance and on the mantlepiece of a large Tudor fireplace on the upper storey.

The Errington family held it for about two hundred years, and the new building incorporated fragments of the medieval structure — thick stone walls, vaulted chambers, and a staircase cut deep into the fabric of the old tower.

The Errington’s were on the wrong side of history. They were strong Roman Catholics during the Civil Wars and the subsequent Jacobean rebellions, loosing much of their wealth and power as a consequence of this.

By the early nineteenth century, the once-grand house had lost its residential purpose. Records from 1828 suggest that part of the building was already being used as licensed premises, marking the birth of what would become the Blackbird Inn. Even then, visitors could see the scars of the old fortification amid the everyday life of an English public house.

In the 1890’s, Ponteland became a favourite excursion destination for day-trippers from Tyneside wishing to escape the dirt and grime of the city and the Blackbird was one of the many businesses in Ponteland which catered to them. An advertisement from 1892 boasted, “First-class Wines Spirits, &c., Bass’s and other noted Ales. Teas, Dinners &c. provided. Capital Stabling and Cycling Accommodation”.

Unfortunately, the medieval part of the building at this time was falling into ruin. The “Capital Stabling” was in the vaulted ground floor of the old tower which was becoming dilapidated. A writer recalling the tower part of the building in his youth described it as “very groggy”.

In 1935, the pub and tower were restored by the brewery Robert Deuchar Ltd. During the work, builders uncovered remarkable traces of its medieval and Tudor past: a hidden fireplace, sections of the original tower, and even remnants of a stone vault. The brewery started marketing the pub as “Ye Olde Blackbird Inn”.

The twentieth and twenty-first centuries brought further restorations and changes in ownership, but always with respect for the building’s layered past. In the 1950’s it hosted an official tea for visiting Norwegian Travel Agents, hoping to take advantage of the early days of international tourism.

At the beginning of the 1960’s the pub became associated with a new “tradition”, the running of an annual wheelbarrow race to raise money for a children’s sports fund, which after 65 years is now really a tradition.

There was a major fire in 1991 which almost destroyed the building but after restoration, it was able to open for business again later that year.

In 2010 the pub underwent a major refurbishment and reopened under new management, now serving as both a welcoming local and a destination gastropub. The latest custodians, Northumberland Pub Company, have continued to celebrate its heritage while ensuring it thrives as a modern establishment.

Today, the Blackbird Inn is a Grade II listed building — a living monument to centuries of Northumberland history. Beneath its oak beams and beside its roaring fires, visitors are quite literally surrounded by the past: the stone vaults of a medieval fortress, the hearths of a Tudor manor, and the warmth of a centuries-old inn that still stands at the heart of Ponteland.