Pilgrim Street Gate

This gate in the Town Wall was part the defences of Newcastle built in 1280. It stood at the north end of Pilgrim Street and was one of the main entrances to Newcastle in Medieval times. The tower was crenellated (built with battlements) with two storeys; with an upper room over a rib-vaulted passage, with a barbican on the north side. In 1827 Eneas Mackenzie wrote: "This gate was a remarkably strong, clumsy, and gloomy building, and, after the defence of the walls became unnecessary, a very great nuisance; the arch being so low as both to obstruct the passage of waggons, and the free circulation of the air into the town. In 1716, it was repaired and beautified by the Joiners' Company, whose hall was above the gate; and in 1771, convenient foot-passages were opened out on each side: but in 1802, the whole fabric was demolished. The workmen, on this occasion, found a cannon-ball in the wall, about a yard below the battlement of the old gate, which weighed more than 22 lb. Allowing for waste, this had probably been a 24 pounder, fired during the siege of the town in 1644, when this gate was so gallantly defended. The whole of the town wall between Newgate and Pilgrim Street has just been pulled down, and the stones employed in forming the common sewer for Blackett Street."