South Hylton, Iron Works

South Hylton Iron Works, with sidings and a link to the North Eastern Railway, Painshaw Branch (HER 2659). The site was originally occupied by a forge which appears on the first edition Ordnance Survey of 1861. Whellan's directory of 1856 lists Walton and Usher as Iron Founders at South Hylton Iron Works. By 1857 Ward's directory lists three proprietors, Walton, Reay and Usher. Mr Usher built himself a fine house at Hylton Bank, a house worthy of a wealthy industrialist. The site was known locally as "Reay and Usher's Forge". In 1931 the site was taken over by T.S. Foster as a forge and ironworks. By 1939 the old buildings had largely been cleared. In the twentieth century the site was taken over by Harry Marsh Engineering Works. The main surviving building is a 1920s brick warehouse. There is an extant section of stone wall (13.3m long and 5.1m high with a stone-lined gully to the north which once fed two reservoirs south of the railway) forming the western boundary of the site. Of more than one phase, with the remnants of some sort of arched flue and corbels which would have supported an internal floor. Built of different coloured sandstone blocks with twentieth century brick additions.A subsequent watching brief revealed the north-west wall as a single course of sandstone blocks. The north-east front is shown on maps as open, entered by railway lines. Indeed no return wall was found at this point.