A short distance from Rothley Castle, on land which was once part of the Wallington Hall estate near Morpeth, is a sham fort known today as Codger Fort. It was built as an eye-catcher by Sir Walter Calverley Blackett in around 1770 as part of a programme of improvements at Rothley.
Rothley Castle (featured here last week, see link below if you missed it) was erected in 1746-47, and the landscape was further embellished with the creation of Rothley Lake in the 1760s. Sir Walter took delivery of a boat to sail on the lake in 1768, and at around the same date he was planning an adjoining piece of water to be known as Rothley Low Lake, with a sham fort on high ground above it.
This ornament was to be erected on the rocky outcrop called ‘Cadjah Crag’, high above the two lakes (to thwart researchers Cadjah is also recorded as Codjah, Codger, Codgy and Cadgey before Codger became the accepted name in the 19th century). The ‘intended fort’ was discussed in a letter in March 1770, when Sir Walter’s instructions were that no work should begin until Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown’s plan for the head of the new lake had been executed in the summer of that year. In 1772 five brass cannon were delivered to the folly which were to be fired in celebration when work on the lake was complete.
A drawing for the fort survives in the collection at Wallington Hall, dated September 1769. It is attributed to Thomas Wright of Durham (1711-1786) and shows that a tower was originally planned to complete the fort, but does not appear to have been executed.
The historian William Hutchinson described the ‘stupendous cliff’, which he called ‘Codgey Crag’, in his A View of Northumberland published in 1778, but having already failed to appreciate nearby Rothley Castle, he dismissed the fort as just ‘another uncouth ornament’.
In around 1860 the surveyors working on the 1st edition Ordnance Survey map were noting significant landmarks for inclusion on the maps. Part of their work involved ascertaining the history of such structures, and they were told that ‘Codger Castle’ had been ‘erected at the period of the Scotch Rebellion of 1745 to scare the Enemy’. Whilst the Jacobite uprising had indeed caused concern at Wallington, the fort was built principally as an ornament some 25 years later (although with Northumberland’s history of border skirmishes a visible deterrent to any future invaders from the north may have been a secondary consideration).
In August 1893 a Sunday school party was ‘marched’ to the folly ‘where a repast of milk and buns was served’. Decades later the Flâneuse too picnicked on the spot during a Girl Guide hike, and went home desperate to learn more about it. That passion for follies endures.
The grade II listed folly is in the care of the National Trust, but it is not on a public right of way. It is best viewed when travelling south towards Rothley on the B6342.
You can find the post on Rothley Castle here https://thefollyflaneuse.com/rothley-castle-rothley-northumberland/
Wallington Hall’s website is here https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/north-east/wallington
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