Milecastle 56 (Walton) was a

milecastle A milecastle was a small fort (fortlet), a rectangular fortification built during the period of the Roman Empire. They were placed at intervals of approximately one Roman mile along several major frontiers, for example Hadrian's Wall in Great Bri ...

Hadrian's Wall Hadrian's Wall ( la, Vallum Aelium), also known as the Roman Wall, Picts' Wall, or ''Vallum Hadriani'' in Latin, is a former defensive fortification of the Roman province of Britannia, begun in AD 122 in the reign of the Emperor Hadrian. R ...

().

Description

Milecastle 56 is thought to lie northeast of the former inn (the Centurion Inn) at

Walton, Cumbria Walton is a village and civil parish in the far north of Cumbria, England.Stay England. (2010Walton Retrieved 1 March 2012 It is located from Carlisle, Cumbria, CarlisleBulman, S. (2007Bulmer's History & Directory of Cumberland, 1901 Retrieved ...

. The general course of Hadrian's Wall passes under the village of Walton, and Milecastle 56 is wholly obliterated. Slight marks of the milecastle were said to be detectable in 1858, but a survey conducted in 1900 found no trace.

Associated turrets

Each milecastle on Hadrian's Wall had two associated

turret Turret may refer to: * Turret (architecture), a small tower that projects above the wall of a building * Gun turret, a mechanism of a projectile-firing weapon * Objective turret, an indexable holder of multiple lenses in an optical microscope * Mi ...

structures. These turrets were positioned approximately one-third and two-thirds of a

Roman mile The mile, sometimes the international mile or statute mile to distinguish it from other miles, is a British imperial unit and United States customary unit of distance; both are based on the older English unit of length equal to 5,280 Engli ...

to the west of the Milecastle, and would probably have been manned by part of the milecastle's garrison. The turrets associated with Milecastle 56 are known as Turret 56A and Turret 56B.

Turret 56A

Turret 56A (Sandyside) () is thought to lie just to the east of Sandysike farm. It has never been located on the ground and its approximate position has been calculated from neighbouring structures on Hadrian's Wall. There was a failed attempt to find it in 1933. In the woodland on the east and west sides of Sandysike, Hadrian's Wall is visible as an earth covered bank, 5.6 metres wide and up to 0.5 metres high. Nearby is a Roman altar built into an outbuilding of Sandysike farm, 0.7 metres above ground level.

Turret 56B

Turret 56B (Cambeck) () is situated about 140 metres east of the Cam Beck on a river terrace. It was located in 1933 and measured 6.2 metres across. It projected 0.8 metres in front of the line of Hadrian's Wall, and is assumed to have originally belonged to the Turf Wall. There are no traces of the turret visible above ground. The site of the Roman fort at Castlesteads (''

Camboglanna Camboglanna (with the modern name of Castlesteads) was a Roman fort. It was the twelfth fort on Hadrian's Wall counting from the east, between Banna (Birdoswald) to the east and Uxelodunum ( Stanwix) to the west. It was almost west of Birdoswa ...

'') is situated 440 metres south of Turret 56B.

References

{{Milecastles 56 Roman sites in Cumbria