Editing Seaham (section)

== History ==

The original village of Seaham has all but vanished; it lay between [[St Mary's Church, Seaham|St Mary's Church]] and [[Seaham Hall]] (i.e. somewhat to the north of the current town centre).<ref>Pevsner, N., ''The Buildings of England: County Durham'', Penguin Books, London, 1953/1983.</ref> The parish church, St Mary the Virgin, has a late 7th century. The Anglian [[nave]] resembles the [[Escomb Church|church]] at [[Escomb]] in many respects.<ref name="CoE">{{Cite web |first=Peter F |last=Ryder |url=http://www.durham.anglican.org/userfiles/file/Durham%20Website/Diocese%20and%20Admin/Care%20of%20Churches/Archaeological%20Assessments/Seaham.pdf |work=The Diocese of Durham |title=Detailed description and history of the Church of St Mary the Virgin, Seaham}}</ref>

Until the early years of the 19th century, Seaham was a small rural agricultural farming community whose only claim to fame was that the local landowner's daughter, [[Anne Isabella Milbanke]], was married at Seaham Hall to [[Lord Byron]], on 2 January 1815.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://durhamheritagecoast.org/our-story/history/people-from-the-past/|title=People from the past|website=Heritage Coast}}</ref>
Byron began writing his ''Hebrew Melodies'' at Seaham and they were published in April 1815.
It would seem that Byron was bored in wintry Seaham, though the sea enthralled him.
As he wrote in a letter to a friend:
{{cquote|Upon this dreary coast we have nothing but county meetings and shipwrecks; and I have this day dined upon fish, which probably dined upon the crews of several colliers lost in the late gales. But I saw the sea once more in all the glories of surf and foam.}}

The marriage was short-lived, producing as its only child the [[mathematician]] [[Ada Lovelace]], but it was long enough to have been a drain on the Milbanke estate. The area's fortunes changed when the Milbankes sold out in 1821 to the [[Charles William Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry|3rd Marquess of Londonderry]],<ref>{{cite book |title=The Londonderrys A Family Portrait|last=Hyde |first=H Montgomery |publisher=Hamish Hamilton|date=1979}}</ref> who built a harbour, in 1828, to facilitate transport of goods from locally encouraged industries (the first coal mine was begun in 1845). However, this harbour later proved inadequate to deal with the millions of tonnes of coal and the [[Charles Stewart Vane-Tempest-Stewart, 6th Marquess of Londonderry|6th Marquess]] commissioned engineers [[Patrick Meik]] and [[Charles Meik]] to reclaim land and extend and deepen the dock. It was officially opened in 1905. The harbour is of particular interest because it consists of a series of interconnecting locks, rather than the more typical two wall construction.

As early as 1823, the 3rd Marquess had approached the architect [[John Dobson (architect)|John Dobson]] with a view to his drawing up plans for a town to be built around the harbour. Dobson did so, but the planned approach foundered for lack of funds, and the town instead grew in a more piecemeal fashion.<ref name="STC">{{cite web |title=Seaham Harbour 1828 - 1851 |url=https://www.seaham.gov.uk/index.php/seaham-harbour-1828-1851 |website=Seaham Town Council |access-date=30 June 2021}}</ref> To begin with, the town was itself called Seaham Harbour (to differentiate it from the ancient village); in time, though, the settlement as a whole came to be known as Seaham.

In 1853 John Candlish built the Londonderry Bottleworks in the town. It was the largest glass bottle works in Britain and survived until 1921. Candlish went on to become mayor and, in 1868, Liberal MP for [[Sunderland (UK Parliament constituency)|Sunderland]]. Waste glass from the bottleworks was dumped at sea and is now washed up as glass pebbles, known as [[sea glass]], on local beaches.<ref>{{Cite web |last= |first= |date=11 February 2010 |title=Candish's Londonderry Bottleworks (Built 1853 - Demolished 1921) - Seaham (seah0195) |url=http://ppparchive.durham.gov.uk/photos/picviewer.asp?next=2129 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111014214707/http://ppparchive.durham.gov.uk/photos/picviewer.asp?next=2129 |archive-date=14 October 2011 |access-date=2 June 2022 |website=Durham County Council}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=The Bottleworks history |url=https://east-durham.co.uk/the-bottleworks-history/ |access-date=2 June 2022 |website=East Durham History |language=en-GB}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Rushby |first=Kevin |date=2 June 2022 |title=Spooky shipwrecks and singing sands: 10 of the UK’s weirdest beaches |url=https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2022/jun/02/beaches-uk-britain-weirdest-sands-coast-shoreline |access-date=2 June 2022 |website=The Guardian |language=en}}</ref>

In 1928, production started at the last town colliery to be opened, Vane Tempest. By 1992, however, all three pits ([[Dawdon#Dawdon Colliery|Dawdon Colliery]], Vane Tempest Colliery and [[Seaham Colliery]]&nbsp;– known locally as "the Knack") had closed, a process accelerated by the [[1984–1985 United Kingdom miners' strike|British miners' strike]]. The pit closures hit the local economy extremely hard.

Seaham Colliery suffered an underground explosion in 1880 which resulted in the loss of over 160 lives,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://durhamrecordsonline.com/library/seaham-colliery-disaster-of-1880/|title=Seaham Colliery Disaster of 1880 &#124; Durham Records Online Library}}</ref> including surface workers and rescuers.

Many local families were affected by the tragic loss of eight men and one boy in the 'Seaham Lifeboat Disaster', when the [[RNLI]] [[Lifeboat (rescue)|lifeboat]], the ''George Elmy'', foundered on 17 November 1962. To commemorate the event, the new coast road was named George Elmy Lifeboat Way.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.seaham.org.uk/georgeelmy/ |title=The George Elmey Lifeboat Lifeboat Restoration Project - Remember the Heroes |work=Seaham.org.uk |date=17 November 1962 |access-date=28 June 2014}}</ref>