Ravensworth is a village and civil parish in the Holmedale valley, within the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, England. It is approximately north-west of

Richmond Richmond most often refers to: * Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States * Richmond, London, a part of London * Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England * Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada * Richmond, California, ...

and from

Darlington Darlington is a market town in the Borough of Darlington, County Durham, England. The River Skerne flows through the town; it is a tributary of the River Tees. The Tees itself flows south of the town. In the 19th century, Darlington underwen ...

. The parish has a population of 255, according to the 2011 census. Ravensworth was historically situated in the

North Riding of Yorkshire The North Riding of Yorkshire is a subdivision of Yorkshire, England, alongside York, the East Riding and West Riding. The riding's highest point is at Mickle Fell with 2,585 ft (788 metres). From the Restoration it was used as ...

, but has been a part of North Yorkshire since 1974 as a result of the Local Government Act of 1972. The village has ancient origins, dating back to the time of Viking settlements. In it are the remains of the 14th century, Grade-1-listed Ravensworth Castle, the ancestral home of the FitzHugh family. After the FitzHugh line came to an end, the castle was abandoned. Beginning in the mid-16th century, it began to be dismantled, but the gatehouse remains almost wholly intact. There are a number of listed buildings situated around the village green, mostly dating from the eighteenth century. Many of them were constructed using raw materials from the castle. Today, Ravensworth is primarily a

commuter village A commuter town is a populated area that is primarily residential rather than commercial or industrial. Routine travel from home to work and back is called commuting, which is where the term comes from. A commuter town may be called by many o ...

, and the historically important

agricultural Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating Plant, plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of Sedentism, sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of Domestication, domesticated species created food ...

sector now employs only a small number of people. Historically, stone mining was important to the local economy. Although it died out in the twentieth century, a sandstone quarry was recently opened just outside the village. Today, the village has a primary school, and a large village green. The village public house is currently closed), and the Methodist chapel closed in 2019. Ravensworth is most frequently mentioned in the media as the home of the former international

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

Ian Botham Ian Terence Botham, Baron Botham, (born 24 November 1955) is an English cricket commentator, member of the House of Lords, a former cricketer who has been chairman of Durham County Cricket Club since 2017 and charity fundraiser. Hailed as one ...

. The village is also known regionally for the

Ravensworth Nurseries Ravensworth Nurseries Ltd, (historically trading as Bradbrook & Hannah) is an English horticultural business and garden centre located in Ravensworth, North Yorkshire. It supplies garden centres and retailers across the United Kingdom as well a ...

horticultural business.

History

Etymology

The name of the village derives from the given name of Hrafn, the founder of the settlement.Written by an established historian, David Simpson
North East Place Name Meanings P to S
/ref> Originally called Ravenswath, "wath" was the Old Norse word meaning " ford" and would suggest that the Holme Beck that passes through the village was forded in Viking times. Hrafn was a Norse word meaning "

raven A raven is any of several larger-bodied bird species of the genus ''Corvus''. These species do not form a single taxonomic group within the genus. There is no consistent distinction between "crows" and "ravens", common names which are assigned t ...

", so the village was literally the ford of Raven. Its name and spelling has varied over the years: in the 11th century it was ''Raveneswet'', ''Rasueswaht'' in the 12th century, ''Raveneswade'' in 1201, ''Ravenswath'' from the 13th to 16th centuries, and afterwards beginning to settle on ''Ravensworth''.

Early settlement

The earliest archaeological find in the Ravensworth area is a coin from the early Roman period. There has also been a number of finds from the Anglo Saxon era. The Lord of the Manor in 1066 was Thorfin, who also held the manor of

Didderston Didderston (Medieval Latin: ''Dirdreston'', also referred to in Late Latin as ''Vilfaraesdun,'' Old English: ''Ƿilfaresdún''), was a medieval manor located in Melsonby Parish, North Yorkshire, United Kingdom. It was recorded in Domesday as Dirdre ...

. The Lord of the Manor owned the surrounding demesnes, and the villagers were tenants of his land. The village is documented in ''the Domesday Book of 1086'' as having 21 households, which was then quite large for a settlement. There was also a church and a priest. By this time, Alan Rufus had allocated the lands to his relative Bodin of

Middleham Middleham is an English market town and civil parish in the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire. It lies in Wensleydale in the Yorkshire Dales, on the south side of the valley, upstream from the junction of the River Ure and River Cover. ...

. Bodin later relinquished his lands in order to become a monk, and the estate was passed to his brother, Bardolph, from whom the FitzHugh line is descended. Bardolph's son,

Akarius Fitz Bardolph Akarius Fitz Bardolph, Lord of Ravensworth, was the son of Bardolph, Lord of Ravensworth, an 11th-century nobleman living in Richmondshire, the area encompassing the Ure, Tees and Swale valleys in northern England. He was a sub-feudatory of Ala ...

, donated lands for a monastery which were later to become

Jervaulx Abbey Jervaulx Abbey in East Witton, 14 miles north-west of the city of Ripon, was one of the great Cistercian abbeys of Yorkshire, England, dedicated to St Mary in 1156. It is a Grade I listed building. The place name ''Jervaulx'' is first atteste ...

. A fortress was built during the reign of Henry II as the ancestral home of the Fitzhugh family, who purchased the land from the nuns of Marrick Priory. The fortress would have offered protection to the local population during Scottish raids from north of the border.

King John King John may refer to: Rulers * John, King of England (1166–1216) * John I of Jerusalem (c. 1170–1237) * John Balliol, King of Scotland (c. 1249–1314) * John I of France (15–20 November 1316) * John II of France (1319–1364) * John I o ...

was entertained there in 1201. The Fitzhughs were appointed

baron Baron is a rank of nobility or title of honour, often hereditary, in various European countries, either current or historical. The female equivalent is baroness. Typically, the title denotes an aristocrat who ranks higher than a lord or knig ...

s on 15 May 1321. Ralph de Greystoke, 3rd Baron Greystoke, was born in the castle, home of his uncle Henry, Lord Fitzhugh, on 18 October 1353. Henry FitzHugh, 3rd Baron FitzHugh was appointed Lord Chamberlain of the Household by

Henry V Henry V may refer to: People * Henry V, Duke of Bavaria (died 1026) * Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor (1081/86–1125) * Henry V, Duke of Carinthia (died 1161) * Henry V, Count Palatine of the Rhine (c. 1173–1227) * Henry V, Count of Luxembourg (121 ...

. Henry Fitzhugh built the now Grade I listed Ravensworth Castle in 1391 on the site of a previous fortress from the 11th century, and also received licence to enclose 200 acres of land around the castle to make a park. Robert FitzHugh became Bishop of London in 1431. After the end of the Fitzhugh male line in 1513, ownership of the castle and estate was passed through the female line to Sir Thomas Parr. Following his death, it passed to his son, a minor, William Parr, 1st Marquess of Northampton by which time it was ruined, largely as a result of being quarried for local building materials. It passed to the Crown Estate in 1571 after Parr died without issue. The castle began to be pulled down in the middle of the 16th century, shortly after the visitation by the antiquarian John Leland, however almost the entirety of the gatehouse remains intact. In 1629 the estate was conferred from the Crown to Edward Ditchfield. In 1633 it was sold to the Robinson family, who later sold it to Sir Thomas Wharton in 1676. It then passed to Wharton's son Hon Philip Wharton, before passing through his in-laws to

Robert Byerley Robert Byerley (1660–1714), of Middridge Grange, Heighington, County Durham, and Goldsborough, Yorkshire, was an English soldier and Tory politician who sat in the English House of Commons, English and House of Commons of Great Britain, Br ...

of Goldsborough Hall. By 1779 the estate belonged to the Legard Baronets.

Ancient parish

Ravensworth was historically the largest settlement in the

ancient parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority. ...

of Kirkby Ravensworth. The ancient parish encompassed an area of 15,000 acres, including Ravensworth itself, as well as the townships of Dalton, Gayles, Kirby Hill (or Kirby-on-the-Hill), New Forest, Newsham and Whashton. All of these places became separate civil parishes in 1866. The parish church since 1397 has been the ''Church of St Peter & St Felix'' in Kirby Hill, situated about one mile (1.6 km) from Ravensworth; it is believed to have been built on the site of a much earlier Saxon church. The cleric and historian

John Dakyn John Dakyn DCL (1497 – November 9, 1558) was an English cleric and historian. He was archdeacon of the East Riding of Yorkshire and a noted chronicler of the Pilgrimage of Grace. In his early life Dakyn was chancellor to the Bishop of Bath ...

was

rector Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to: Style or title *Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations *Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...

of the parish from 1554 until his death four years later. In 1556 he established the Kirby Ravensworth Free Grammar School (free from external control rather than free at the point of use) and an

almshouse An almshouse (also known as a bede-house, poorhouse, or hospital) was charitable housing provided to people in a particular community, especially during the medieval era. They were often targeted at the poor of a locality, at those from certain ...

, and his benefaction continues to fund charitable causes for the parishioners.

Village history

The Bay Horse Inn , Ravensworth - geograph

The

anchoress In Christianity, an anchorite or anchoret (female: anchoress) is someone who, for religious reasons, withdraws from secular society so as to be able to lead an intensely prayer-oriented, ascetic, or Eucharist-focused life. While anchorites are ...

Margaret Kirkby Margaret Kirkby (possibly 1322John Leland, and many others since, have described Ravensworth as a "pretty" village. There were a number of skirmishes in the area during the Civil War, and the region was a Royalist stronghold. As with many English villages, much of the housing stock consists of Grade II listed buildings, dating from the mid to late 17th century onwards. The poet Cuthbert Shaw was born in the village in 1738–9. The astronomer

William Lax William is a masculine given name of Norman French origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conques ...

was born in the village in 1761, producing ''A Method of finding the latitude by means of two altitudes of the sun'' there in 1799. There were Inclosure Acts passed for the common fields in 1772–3 and 1776–7. In 1773, Samuel Hieronymus Grimm made several sketches around the village. The publisher Effingham Wilson was born in the village in 1785. In 1793, a gold penny dating from around 1257 during the reign of Henry III, was found in a field in Ravensworth; at the time it was one of only two known to exist, and as of 2011 only eight are known to exist.Illustrations of the literary history of the eighteenth century ..., Volume 1 By John Nichols, p459

Nineteenth century

Walter Scott referenced the village in "'' Rokeby''" (1813), an epic poem set in the area. The artist

J. M. W. Turner Joseph Mallord William Turner (23 April 177519 December 1851), known in his time as William Turner, was an English Romantic painter, printmaker and watercolourist. He is known for his expressive colouring, imaginative landscapes and turbulen ...

made several sketches of the castle on 13 July 1816. The Wesleyan chapel was built in 1822 and is the oldest chapel in the Richmond circuit. From 1834, the parish was placed within the Poor Law Union of Richmond. A national school was built in 1841. The blacksmith's shop has been situated at the same site since 1841. In 1843 the parish was described as being almost entirely agricultural. ''The Bay Horse Inn'' public house dates as far back as at least 1857 (it claims a date of 1725), and its stone door case is 17th century or earlier, almost certainly built using material from the castle. In 1859 "good freestone" was being quarried in the village, although a short-lived copper mine had been discontinued; the father of Christopher Cradock was lord of the manor, and the village was described as "exceedingly neat". According to the 1881 and 1891

Censuses A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses incl ...

, agriculture and mining were the main industries. In the late nineteenth century, Speight noted the great longevity of many of the parishioners, owing to the space and pure air.

Twentieth century

The parish lost 23 men in the First World War and 5 in the Second World War. The roll of honour is held in the parish church. John Scott Bainbridge is additionally remembered in the First World War memorial at Barnard Castle School (then the North Eastern County School). The Kirby Hill grammar school closed in 1957, having operated for almost 400 years. The school educated the

Archbishop of Canterbury The archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and a principal leader of the Church of England, the ceremonial head of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. The current archbishop is Justi ...

Matthew Hutton and the antiquarian

James Raine James Raine (1791–1858) was an English antiquarian and topographer. A Church of England clergyman from the 1810s, he held a variety of positions, including librarian to the dean and chapter of Durham and rector of Meldon in Northumberland ...

as well as the aforementioned Shaw and Lax. In 1967 the new primary school building was opened. In 1974, the village became a component of North Yorkshire, having previously been situated in the North Riding of Yorkshire. The village's 15th century cruck house was dismantled in the late 1970s and reconstructed at the Richmondshire Museum. The land on which it stood was used to build the Mill Close housing estate in 1977. The former school premises became a village hall in 1987. The Post Office closed down in the mid-1990s. The former

England cricketer The England cricket team represents England and Wales in international cricket. Since 1997, it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club (the MCC) since 1903. Engla ...

has lived in the village since 1990, and in 2020 became Lord Botham of Ravensworth. His 17th century

farmhouse FarmHouse (FH) is a social Fraternities and sororities in North America, fraternity founded at the University of Missouri on April 15, 1905. It became a national organization in 1921. Today FarmHouse has 33 active chapters and four associate ch ...

situated on a 30-acre estate is his "most treasured possession" and Botham has commented that, "we like our Yorkshire home too much ever to leave it". Local and national media refer to him ironically as "The Squire of Ravensworth". He regularly hosts the England cricket team at his home. His son Liam Botham has a house in the farmhouse grounds. The village featured in the national media in November 2011 after Emma Sayle's dog went missing from the residence.

Governance

Ravensworth is now in the local government district of Richmondshire, within the county of North Yorkshire.

Rishi Sunak Rishi Sunak (; born 12 May 1980) is a British politician who has served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party since October 2022. He previously held two Cabinet of ...

, who represents the

Richmond (Yorks) Richmond (Yorks) is a constituency in North Yorkshire represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since May 2015 by Rishi Sunak, the current Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and leader of the Conservative Party. Constituency ...

UK Parliamentary constituency, is currently the MP. In the Anglican church it is within the deanery of Richmond, the archdeaconry of Richmond and the

diocese of Ripon and Leeds The Diocese of Ripon (Diocese of Ripon and Leeds from 1999 until 2014) was a former Church of England diocese, part of the Province of York. Immediately prior to its dissolution, it covered an area in western and northern Yorkshire as well as ...

Geography

The village is situated from London. It is from the

county town In the United Kingdom and Ireland, a county town is the most important town or city in a county. It is usually the location of administrative or judicial functions within a county and the place where the county's members of Parliament are elect ...

of Northallerton. The closest settlements are Kirby Hill, Dalton and Gayles. Other local villages are Newsham, East Layton,

West Layton West Layton is a village and civil parish in the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, England, close to the border with County Durham and a few miles west of Darlington. History The village is mentioned in the Domesday Book as belonging ...

, Gilling West and Hartforth. Ravensworth is 119 metres above sea level. The village is situated on a slight knoll to the south of the Holme Beck (sometimes known in the past as Ravensworth Beck or Gilling Beck), a minor tributary of the River Swale in an area known as the Holme valley or Holmedale. The valley was created by the Teesdale glacier during the last ice age. According to '' The Independent'' the village is "good walking country...surrounded by open countryside overlooked by hills and moorland." Holme Beck attracts kingfishers, dippers and grey herons. The marshland around the castle is home to moorhens, coots, Eurasian oystercatchers,

Eurasian curlew The Eurasian curlew or common curlew (''Numenius arquata'') is a very large wader in the family Scolopacidae. It is one of the most widespread of the curlews, breeding across temperate Europe and Asia. In Europe, this species is often referred t ...

s and wintering duck such as teal and goldeneye. The ruins attract

mallard The mallard () or wild duck (''Anas platyrhynchos'') is a dabbling duck that breeds throughout the temperate and subtropical Americas, Eurasia, and North Africa, and has been introduced to New Zealand, Australia, Peru, Brazil, Uruguay, Arge ...

s, snipe and tawny owls. The soil is

loam Loam (in geology and soil science) is soil composed mostly of sand (particle size > ), silt (particle size > ), and a smaller amount of clay (particle size < ). By weight, its mineral composition is about 40–40–20% concentration of sand–sil ...

and the

subsoil Subsoil is the layer of soil under the topsoil on the surface of the ground. Like topsoil, it is composed of a variable mixture of small particles such as sand, silt and clay, but with a much lower percentage of organic matter and humus, and it ...

Yoredale Series The Yoredale Series, in geology, is a now obsolete term for a local phase of the Carboniferous rocks of the north of England, ranging in age from the Asbian Substage to the Yeadonian Substage. The term Yoredale Group is nowadays applied to the ...

. Most of the land around the village is

arable farmland Arable land (from the la, arabilis, "able to be ploughed") is any land capable of being ploughed and used to grow crops.''Oxford English Dictionary'', "arable, ''adj''. and ''n.''" Oxford University Press (Oxford), 2013. Alternatively, for th ...

, but animals such as horses and cows are reared as well. Sheep graze on the more rugged sides of the valley. Crops grown include wheat, barley and

oil seed rape Rapeseed (''Brassica napus ''subsp.'' napus''), also known as rape, or oilseed rape, is a bright-yellow flowering member of the family Brassicaceae (mustard or cabbage family), cultivated mainly for its oil-rich seed, which naturally contains a ...

. The houses are generally built of sandstone and have distinctive "Yorkshire" roofs, a mix of soft red pantiles and slate. The village is described as "picturesque".Daily Post (Liverpool) 12 January 2002, Saturday HIS SPORTING LIFE; PEOPLE, p2-3 The old Roman road of Dere Street formerly skirted the north-eastern outskirts of the parish and provides much of the northern boundary of the parish. Usually the Pennines protect the North-East from rainfall, which tends to come from the west. Weather data is collected on a minute by minute basis by a

Met Office The Meteorological Office, abbreviated as the Met Office, is the United Kingdom's national weather service. It is an executive agency and trading fund of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and is led by CEO Penelope E ...

weather station at Ravensworth Nurseries. On 2 December 2010, a temperature of -20.0 degrees Celsius was reported for Ravensworth by the Met Office; this was the first time -20.0 had been recorded in England since January 1987. In September 2012, Ravensworth made national news when MeteoGroup reported that the village had received the largest amount of rainfall in the country, 130.8 mm, (5.16 inches) between 1 am on the 23rd and 8 am on the 25th, which was thrice the average total for the month.

Demography

Approximately 20 per cent of the villagers are of pensioner age, 20 per cent are under 18 and the remaining 60 per cent are of working age. The majority of villagers are commuters, with only around 20 people employed within the village itself, mostly in agriculture. Many people commute to the local

market towns A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regular market; this distinguished it from a village or city. In Britain, small rural ...

, Barnard Castle, Northallerton and

, but some travel further afield to the larger conurbations of Tyneside, Teesside and Leeds. Property prices in the ward are higher than the average for England. There were no recorded crimes in the village in 2009–2010; this is representative of almost every year. The average weekly household income for the ward is £600, higher than the Yorkshire and the Humber average. There are 10 people claiming Jobseeker's Allowance. The population is at the same level as it was in 1850; although the housing stock has expanded, the average number of residents per house has decreased.

Economy

(sometimes trading as "Bradbrook & Hannah") is one of Yorkshire's most successful horticultural businesses. Founded in 1966, it supplies garden centres and retailers across the United Kingdom as well as its own on-site sales. In 1996 they erected the world's largest

hanging basket A hanging basket is a suspended container used for growing decorative plants. Typically they are hung from buildings, where garden space is at a premium, and from street furniture for environmental enhancement. They may also be suspended from fre ...

.The Northern Echo 17 June 1996 THIS WILL TAKE SOME WATERING, p1 The basket weighed five tons, was 23 feet across and 9 feet high and contained 1,000 plants of 100 different varieties. By 2006, the business had a £1.8 million annual turnover, six

acre The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism. Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to: Places United States * Imperial, California * Imperial, Missouri * Imp ...

s of glasshouses and employed around 35 people.

Amenities

Ravensworth contains a Church of England primary school which had 68 pupils in 2010, a village hall, a Methodist chapel (which closed in 2019) and a public house, described as "cosy". The public house, ''The Bay Horse Inn'' is currently closed awaiting a new tenant. A Church of England church situated at Kirby Hill, a large garden centre, a local

farm shop A farm shop, or "farm stand" in the United States, is a type of retail outlet which usually sells produce directly from a farm. Some farm shops also resell related goods such as locally produced groceries, foods, drinks and delicatessen products. ...

, a 5-acre caravan park and a further three public houses are all within an approximately one mile radius, although only ''The Bay Horse Inn'' is situated in the village proper. The "broad ndpleasant" village green is substantial, at 17 acres, and most of the one hundred or so dwellings in the village are situated around it. The green hosts the stone base of a 15th-century cross or obelisk. There was previously village quoits club that operated during the summer, however this is currently in abeyance. The area falls within the television reception area of ITV Tyne Tees. Newspaper coverage is provided by the Darlington-based ''

Northern Echo ''The Northern Echo'' is a regional daily morning newspaper based in the town of Darlington in North East England, serving mainly southern County Durham and northern Yorkshire. The paper covers national as well as regional news. In 2007, its the ...

'', which has a North Yorkshire edition, and ''The Teesdale Mercury'' based in Barnard Castle. Water is supplied by Yorkshire Water. The water is the area is classified as

hard Hard may refer to: * Hardness, resistance of physical materials to deformation or fracture * Hard water, water with high mineral content Arts and entertainment * ''Hard'' (TV series), a French TV series * Hard (band), a Hungarian hard rock super ...

, owing to the large amount of limestone in the area, and derives from a

spring Spring(s) may refer to: Common uses * Spring (season), a season of the year * Spring (device), a mechanical device that stores energy * Spring (hydrology), a natural source of water * Spring (mathematics), a geometric surface in the shape of a ...

/ borehole source. The village is within the boundaries of the annual

fox hunting Fox hunting is an activity involving the tracking, chase and, if caught, the killing of a fox, traditionally a red fox, by trained foxhounds or other scent hounds. A group of unarmed followers, led by a "master of foxhounds" (or "master of ho ...

event, the Zetland Hunt.The Zetland Hunt North Yorkshire County Durham Foxhounds Fox Hunting
/ref>

Transport

Ravensworth is situated near to the A66 and is 5 miles from the

Scotch Corner Scotch Corner is a Junction (road), junction of the A1(M) motorway, A1(M) and A66 road, A66 Trunk road#United Kingdom, trunk roads near Richmond, North Yorkshire, Richmond in North Yorkshire, England. It has been described as "the modern gate ...

junction on the

A1(M) motorway A1(M) is the designation given to a series of four separate controlled-access highway, motorway sections in England. Each section is an upgrade to a section of the A1 road (Great Britain), A1, a major north–south road which connects Greate ...

. Its nearest railway station is

Darlington railway station Darlington railway station is on the East Coast Main Line in the United Kingdom, serving the town of Darlington, County Durham. It is north of and on the main line it is situated between to the south and to the north. Its three-letter st ...

, away. Bus services which operate throughout the day connect the village to the nearby towns of Richmond and Barnard Castle. The village is situated close to the Yorkshire Dales

national park A national park is a nature park, natural park in use for conservation (ethic), conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state dec ...

, and is also only one hour from the

North York Moors The North York Moors is an upland area in north-eastern Yorkshire, England. It contains one of the largest expanses of Calluna, heather moorland in the United Kingdom. The area was designated as a national parks of England and Wales, National P ...

and the

Lake District The Lake District, also known as the Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous for its lakes, forests, and mountains (or ''fells''), and its associations with William Wordswor ...

national parks. Newcastle and York are one hour's drive away, and Leeds is just over one hour away. A bus service runs between Barnard Castle and Richmond (and vice versa) and runs several times a day on weekdays; it is operated by Hodgson's Buses of Barnard Castle.

References

External links

Ravensworth village website

Ravensworth families recorded in the 1861 and 1891 censuses

The Northern Echo's profile of the village
{{authority control Villages in North Yorkshire Civil parishes in North Yorkshire Richmondshire