On 7th March 1644 the Scottish troops were based on Humbledon Hill. Their magazine at Sunderland provided powder, musket balls and eight 12-pound cannonballs to Humbledon Hill. On seeing the royalist troops marching from Penshaw Hill (HER 10881) towards the town, the Scots left the hill and a skirmish took place at Offerton. On 9th March seven Scottish regiments crossed the Wear. On 12 March the Scottish army split, marching towards Durham, Hartlepool and South Shields. Two regiments were left in Sunderland. Here Catholic prisoners and captives from other Civil War skirmishes were held.

On the 6th March 1644 the Scots cavalry were encamed on Penshaw Hill observing the Royalist forces as they crossed the Wear in pursuit of the Scots forces at Sunderland, prior to the later Battle of Boldon. After a skirmish in the fields nearby, the Scots fell back to Humbleton Hill while the Marquis regrouped his army at Hastings Hill. Further skirmishes occurred on the afternoon of the 7th until the Royalist withdrew to the fields around Penshaw village. The following day the Scots cavalry, reinforced by musketeers launched another skirmish, but a sudden worsening of the weather allowed the Royalists to retreat to Durham.

There is a documentary reference relating to the delivery of herrings to Darlington, probably from Sunderland in 1183 {1}. In the fourteenth century Durham Priory regularly bought fish supplies from Sunderland. Accounts of 1307-8 record purchases of salt fish, eels and haddock and accounts of 1333-4 record an order of five loads of whiting. The priory rented a stable from William Rakwood in 1441-2 for use as a 'fish house'. In 1536-7 John Cotysforth was the priory's fishbuyer at Sunderland. From the late fifteenth to the second decade of the sixteenth century the priory bought herring and salmon from Sunderland [and Newcastle and Shields] {2}. The River Wear fisheries formed part of the bishop's rights and were leased to local people. At the river mouth salmon were caught by stell fishing (stakes fixed in the river) off Coney Warren north-east of the town moor. The Hedworth family of Southwick fixed a net here in the fourteenth century {3}. West of the stell there was net fishing in an area called the Sayne (a seine net hung vertically in the water) {4}. There were also a number of yares (semi circular enclosures of stones or stakes and wattle) in the Wear. In 1321 Prestyare and Milnyare are mentioned, others were Ebyare, Bradyare, Owensyare and Marlesyare {5}. In 1440 Bishop Robert Neville appointed a commission to remove a number of yares which were a hazard to shipping. The Hedworths sold their right to fish for salmon off Coney Warren to George Grey in 1630. Various yares were lost due to passing colliers and keels and ballast quays.

There is an air raid shelter at the school.

Ran by Tucker's. Operated from the 1770s to the 1950s.

The Barras family were yeomen farmers who became wealthy in the eighteenth century from revenues from wayleaves. John Barras established a brewing company and by 1799 he was advertising for a new business partner. John Barras Jnr took over the business and in 1821 abandoned wine and spirit making to concentrate on beer brewing with John Russel as Barras & Co. John Barras Jnr lived at Farnacres Hall, a mansion house with pleasure grounds. In 1848, Charles Reed, who had married into the Barras family became involved in the brewery. He leased it from the Barras Trust from 1861. In 1882 the trust was wound up and the brewery site was sold to the North Eastern Railway Co. Charles Reed took over most of the associated public houses and moved into the vacant Tyne Brewery at Newcastle.

Richard Bell ran this brewery in 1790 and 1795. Baillie's directory of 1801 lists this as the property of Matthew Bell Esq. & Co. The address is also given as St. Mary's Street and North Shore. It was called Bell's Brewery in 1811. In 1821 and 1824 it was ran by Bells, Brown & Co, and from 1831 to 1844 by Bells, Dixon & Co. In 1847 the occupiers were Bells, Robson & Co. The brewery closed in 1868 when the company moved to larger premises in Bath Lane.

William Nixon was the first named brewer here. He died in 1793 and the business continued under his parter Hugh Spencer as Spencer & Nixon. Towards the end of the eighteenth century Matthew Plummer took over. He left brewing in 1813 to follow his other interests including coal, a West India merchant, ship and insurance broker and partner in the Northumberland Flax Mills and St. Lawrence Bottleworks. Thomas Spencer and James Stawpert took over the Sun Brewery. By 1815 the partnership had changed to Thomas Spencer and Thomas Bell, later Thomas Spencer alone. In 1819 the brewery included a double malting, cooperage, counting house, workmen's house and stables. By the early 1820s Thomas and Charles Spencer ran the business.

A directory of 1778 lists a Mrs Reed as common brewer in Armorer's Chare. In 1780 the premises of Mary Reed were described as 'a good dwelling house' with other buildings equipped with 'fixed coppers, backs and cellars, granaries, horsemill and stabling'. In 1787 the business was occupied by Thomas Burdon & Co. The address was given as Peacock Entry. In Baillie's directory of 1801 the property of Messrs Burdon & [John] Rayne was listed at Custom House Entry. In 1812 Thomas Burdon ran the company alone. He was knighted in 1816 and died in 1826. The brewery was put up for auction in 1827 consisting of a brewhouse, three cellars, a stable, three offices and a malting. In Broad Garth there was another malting, a bond cellar, spirit cellar, cooper's shop, loft and drayman's house. 18 public houses were also offered for sale.

In 1800 R.S. Richardson & Co. ran the newly finished Ouseburn Brewery. Its lease was up for sale in 1802 (R.S. Richardson Jnr wanted to retire to the countryside) when it was described as 'particularly constructed for working with few hands and most eligibly situated for disposing of small beer, yeast and grains'. It was offered for sale again in 1807, a 'brewery and malting with all utensils complete, under one roof, with large dry yard walled round'. The Richardson's lease finally ran out in 1816 and the building was advertised as 'formerly occupied as brewery and malting'. James Harvey & Co. (James Harvey, Robert Etherington and Edward Walton) later ran an Ouseburn Brewery. The company disbanded in 1831 but Etherington and Walton continued with the business. A Robert Etherington was also known to have brewed at a New Road Brewery.