Raisby

Low Raisby is a farm located about ½ mile south-east of Kelloe, in County Durham. To the south of this, and 1 mile east of Coxhoe is Raisby Hill Quarry, with Breedon Aggregates plant and Tarmac Coxhoe Asphalt Plant. Large-scale quarrying at Raisby Hill began in 1845.[1] The quarry came under the ownership of the Raisby Hill Limestone Company and Basic Works in 1881. Limestone was burned in kilns and mixed with sand to make mortar, and with water to make whitewash. Many of the older houses in Coxhoes were built with rough limestone blocks from the quarry. Raisby Hill Grassland is an area of SSSI; the magnesian limestone geology supports a population of the rare Durham Argus butterfly, Aricia artaxerxes salmacis.

A carucate of land in RAISBY (Raceby) was granted with Garmondsway to [Sherburn] hospital by Bishop Pudsey, who had purchased it from Baro, its first cultivator. This land was burdened with a rent-charge of 15s. to the lord of Great Kelloe, 5s. of which were released to the hospital by Alexander de Kellaw in the 13th century.

Extract from: The Victoria history of the county of Durham (1908), Volume 3, by William Page (1861-1934).