Otterburn is a small village in

Northumberland Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey. It is bordered by land on ...

, England, northwest of

Newcastle upon Tyne Newcastle upon Tyne ( RP: , ), or simply Newcastle, is a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. The city is located on the River Tyne's northern bank and forms the largest part of the Tyneside built-up area. Newcastle is ...

on the banks of the

River Rede The Rede is a river in Northumberland, England. The river rises on Carter Fell on the Anglo-Scottish border feeding Catcleugh Reservoir and joins the River North Tyne below the village of Redesmouth. The Rede is one of only two rivers in the ...

, near the confluence of the Otter Burn, from which the village derives its name. It lies within the

Cheviot Hills The Cheviot Hills (), or sometimes The Cheviots, are a range of uplands straddling the Anglo-Scottish border between Northumberland and the Scottish Borders. The English section is within the Northumberland National Park. The range includes T ...

about from the Scottish

border Borders are usually defined as geographical boundaries, imposed either by features such as oceans and terrain, or by political entities such as governments, sovereign states, federated states, and other subnational entities. Political borders c ...

. The parish of Otterburn is at the heart of

Redesdale Redesdale is a valley in western Northumberland, England. It is formed by the River Rede, which rises in the Cheviots and flows down to join the North Tyne at Redesmouth. Redesdale is traversed by the A68 trunk road, which enters Scotland vi ...

, a Northumbrian upland valley.

History

The name simply means otter stream, a stream frequented by otters (

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, Anglo ...

+ ). Otterburn was the site of a major battle in 1388 between English and Scottish armies. The engagement, in which the Scots took Sir Henry Percy captive, is the subject of the English '' Ballad of Chevy Chase'' and the Scots ballad ''Otterburn''. The battle of Otterburn ended in an English rout. Despite

James Douglas, 2nd Earl of Douglas Sir James Douglas, 2nd Earl of Douglas and Mar (c. 1358 – 5 or 19 August 1388) was an influential and powerful magnate in the Kingdom of Scotland. Early life He was the eldest son and heir of William Douglas, 1st Earl of Douglas and Marga ...

being killed, Percy was captured and over a thousand of the English were taken, left dead on the field or slain as they fled. The dead were carried to Elsdon church, from Otterburn, where they were buried. The modern village grew up around a coaching inn and Otterburn Tower. It was enlarged in the 1950s with the addition of Brierley Gardens, a council estate which was expanded in the 1970s. The village further expanded in the 1990s and 2000s with the new housing development on former farm land at Willow Green.

Governance

Otterburn is in the

parliamentary A parliamentary system, or parliamentarian democracy, is a system of democracy, democratic government, governance of a sovereign state, state (or subordinate entity) where the Executive (government), executive derives its democratic legitimacy ...

constituency of

Hexham Hexham ( ) is a market town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in Northumberland, England, on the south bank of the River Tyne, formed by the confluence of the North Tyne and the South Tyne at Warden, Northumberland, Warden nearby, and ...

Guy Opperman Guy Thomas Opperman (born 18 May 1965) is a British politician serving as Minister of State for Employment since October 2022. He served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Pensions and Financial Inclusion at the Department for Wor ...

of the

Conservative Party The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right. Political parties called The Conservative P ...

is the

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...

. Prior to

Brexit Brexit (; a portmanteau of "British exit") was the withdrawal of the United Kingdom (UK) from the European Union (EU) at 23:00 GMT on 31 January 2020 (00:00 1 February 2020 CET).The UK also left the European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC or ...

, for the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...

its residents voted to elect MEP's for the

North East England North East England is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. The region has three current administrative levels below the region level in the region; combined authority, unitary authorit ...

constituency. For

Local Government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-loca ...

purposes it belongs to

Northumberland County Council Northumberland County Council is a unitary authority in North East England. The population of the non-metropolitan unitary authority at the 2011 census was 316,028. History It was formed in 1889 as the council for the administrative county of N ...

unitary authority A unitary authority is a local authority responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are usually performed by a higher level of sub-national government or the national governmen ...

Economy

Today, the village is close to the

Otterburn Training Area The Otterburn Army Training Estate is a military training area near Otterburn, Northumberland, in northern England. It is owned by the UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) and operated by Landmarc on contract from the MoD's Defence Infrastructure O ...

, one of the UK's largest army training ranges at approximately . The village also has an independent general grocery shop, two hotels and Otterburn Mill, an 18th-century woollen mill containing a small museum, outdoor shop and cafe.

Landmarks

* Otterburn Hall, now a hotel, is a Neo-Elizabethan structure, built in 1870 for Lord James Douglas, and which is now currently shut. * St John the Evangelist's Church, Otterburn * Otterburn Mill is now a retail outlet and cafe. * Otterburn Tower, changed name to Otterburn Castle, now a hotel, was built in 1830 incorporating part of an eighteenth-century house, which itself may have incorporated the thirteenth-century tower house which originally stood on the site.Otterburn Tower
/ref> * The "Percy Cross" stands within a small plantation, half a mile north of the village. Near this spot, on an August evening in 1388, an English army of 8,000 men followed Sir Henry Percy into battle against the Scots, led by

References

External links

* http://www.parish-council.com/Otterburn/index.asp Villages in Northumberland Civil parishes in Northumberland {{Northumberland-geo-stub