In 1670 William Maude, traditionally the founder of the Sunderland Quakers, and Richard Willson bought ground in "the Pan field" for use as a burying place for the Quakers. It was a more convenient site for them than the one then in use at West Boldon. It is clearly marked "Friends' Old Burial Ground" on the 1st edition Ordnance Survey plan (c.1860), and lay on the north side of High Street, behind or next to the probable site of the first meeting house. The Quakers left this house, and presumably the burying ground, in 1822. Corder, probably writing in the 1930s, said, "Quite recently sanction was obtained to disinter the bodies in the graveyard and hand the site over to the same firm (Alderson & Co.) to extend their premises". It is not clear just what happened at this time since, in 1991, on the removal of a concrete slab before roadworks, more bodies were found and duly removed. Wooden coffins and coffin handles were reported on this occasion.

A Quaker Meeting House was established in Sunderland around the mid-17th century, probably by William Maude who had come from Wakefield to set up as a draper. The house lay on the north side of High Street, and survived until 1688 when it was destroyed in a riot, not being rebuilt until 1718. The Quakers finally left these premises in 1822 when they were sold to be rebuilt as shops. A burying place was opened to the rear, the north-east side, of the house.

In c.1820 coins of Constantine I (306-337 A.D.) were found during building excavations near the south end of Villiers Street, apparently by Dr. Collingwood jun. of Sunderland, who reported the discovery to the Newcastle Society of Antiquaries. The exact provenance and present location of the finds are unknown.

A donation was made to the Newcastle Society of Antiquaries' Museum in 1898 by Dr. G. Alder Blumer (Utica, U.S.A.), of a small Roman coin 'discovered about 25 years ago' when St. Peter's Church, Monkwearmouth, underwent restoration. It went into the possession of the donor's father, Dr. Blumer of Monkwearmouth, who was churchwarden at the time. It is of the Constantine period, of the Trier mint, inscribed around the verge of the obverse side CONSTANTINOPOLIS.

A Roman silver spoon with a short hooked handle was found near Sunderland, with its damaged bowl inscribed "...NE VIVAS" (likely to have read "BENE VIVAS" when the spoon was perfect). The exact provenance and present location of the Roman silver spoon is unclear, but it is not in Sunderland Museum.

A hammer head of polished Scotch granite dredged from the Wear. Once kept in the castle of Newcastle, it presumably became part of the collection of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle, but is not in the Museum of Antiquities.

A bronze, three-ribbed, socketed axe, said to be 3.5 inches long, was "found with some others and an odd piece of cast brass at Weremouth near Sunderland by the sea side...," i.e. it was perhaps part of a hoard. It came into the collection of Dr. Christopher Hunter, the Durham antiquary, where it was seen and drawn by William Stukeley in 1725. Though the object is now lost, his note and drawing survive in his Iter Boreale, in the Bodleian Library, Oxford

A very worn axe-head, in grey-buff fine-grained micaceous sandstone, with hour-glass perforation was found on Roker Beach, Sunderland, in 1974. The diameter of the axe-head is 28 mm, its max. length, width 95 mm and thickness 55 mm. Whether the find was retained by Sunderland Museum, where its details were recorded, is unknown.

A first brass coin of Nero (54-68 A.D.) was found in a brickyard near Sunderland in 1861. Neither the precise location of the brickyard in which it was found, nor the present location of the coin are known. The original source appears to have ben a contemporary newspaper report.

The earliest known reference is c.1360, in a report on the possessions of the deceased Alexander Hilton, when "le Forth, Grindon and Clowcroft" were held by the service of one knight's fee. Ford remained part of the Hilton estates until 1750. Because the township included the south end of the Hylton ferry and a section of river bank, it became heavily industrialized in the 19th century, and part is better known as South Hylton. If there was a village, as one would suppose, its site is unknown but there are a number of possibilities: High Ford, at the junction of Grindon Lane and Hylton Road, Low Ford, and Ford Hall and grounds between Hylton Road and Westmoor Road.