:00:06. > :00:12.I'm Stuart Maconie and like thousands of other people I'm
:00:12. > :00:15.passionate about the Lake District. But a part of Cumbria that's just
:00:15. > :00:22.as fascinating but not as well known is this - the Furness
:00:22. > :00:26.known is this - the Furness peninsular. With Barrow-in-Furness
:00:26. > :00:28.at its tip and surrounded on three sides by water with mountains along
:00:28. > :00:33.the top, the peninsula is geographically cut off from the
:00:33. > :00:40.rest of the country. It's not the kind of place you'd stumble across
:00:40. > :00:45.by accident or pass through on your way to somewhere else. But as we'll
:00:45. > :00:48.see there's more to this peninsula than the famous shipyard behind me.
:00:48. > :00:51.It may not enjoy the tourism the lake district but people have been
:00:51. > :00:55.coming here for centuries by land and sea all contributing to the
:00:55. > :01:05.history of Furness - a great British story. --Lake District
:01:05. > :01:22.
:01:22. > :01:28.Furness was named by the Vikings. 'Ness' meaning headland, so
:01:28. > :01:33.literally this is the far headland. And there are plenty more Viking
:01:33. > :01:37.names around. Biggar, Barrow, Ormsgill. But the Norsemen left
:01:37. > :01:39.more than just a linguistic heritage. Under this very rock,
:01:39. > :01:42.last summer, an amateur treasure hunter armed with a metal detector
:01:42. > :01:46.uncovered some rather spectacular evidence of Viking settlement in
:01:46. > :01:50.the 10th century. And this is the treasure that was found in the
:01:50. > :01:54.field. Sabine, can you tell me what's here? We have a really mixed
:01:54. > :01:57.bag as you can tell. We have coins and ingots and even a bracelet.
:01:57. > :02:07.This shows that it is definitely a Viking hoard and one of the coins
:02:07. > :02:15.is from thousands of miles away. It's an arabicdirrum. It's a
:02:15. > :02:20.beautiful coin and in really lovely condition. The shows what great
:02:20. > :02:30.traders the Vikings were. They had massive trading links. Of course,
:02:30. > :02:34.
:02:34. > :02:37.we think that the Vikings are the reason why we have Russia. There's
:02:37. > :02:44.a popular image of Vikings being Pillagers but they were more
:02:44. > :02:49.cultured and cultivated than that? Absolutely. They were probably
:02:49. > :02:52.settled here and had farms here. And that was one of the reasons why
:02:52. > :02:56.we've not found a great town. Maybe they were just staying in
:02:57. > :03:03.countryside dwellings. But perhaps they were still doing elements of
:03:03. > :03:07.raiding and trading. We don't really know as we don't have any
:03:07. > :03:10.documentary evidence of that area. So hoards like this give us a lot
:03:10. > :03:15.of information. So is this quite exciting for you? Oh, yes, really
:03:15. > :03:18.exciting. We're delighted. We've been waiting for this for a long
:03:18. > :03:28.time and we're delighted it's come and it really shines a spotlight on
:03:28. > :03:29.
:03:29. > :03:32.the whole area. After the Vikings came another invasion of sorts. In
:03:32. > :03:34.1127, Norman monks came and built this beautiful abbey here in this
:03:34. > :03:43.remote part of the Furness peninsula The Abbey grew into one
:03:43. > :03:45.of the richest and most powerful organisations in the country.
:03:45. > :03:52.Controlling the peninsula, the monks were adept businessmen and
:03:52. > :03:56.landowners. What would day to day life for monks have been like? What
:03:56. > :04:01.would it have entailed, I mean prayer obviously? Seven times a day
:04:01. > :04:11.for prayer, in the church and the lay brethren that supported them.
:04:11. > :04:14.
:04:14. > :04:16.Quiet contemplation, obviously. But a work ethic as well, getting on
:04:16. > :04:19.with things that needed doing, whether it's manuscript production
:04:19. > :04:22.or whether it's working in the gardens and caring for the sick. So
:04:22. > :04:29.there's an active life for the monk within. For the Abbey without
:04:29. > :04:32.there's a whole economy to run. Would there have been a fairly big
:04:32. > :04:35.community? Do we know how many people would have been here, how
:04:35. > :04:39.many monks? We know when it's dissolved by Henry the eighth,
:04:39. > :04:42.there was only 28 monks left, which is kind of a shrinking number, I
:04:42. > :04:45.suspected its peak you're probably not looking at much more than a
:04:45. > :04:48.hundred. It waxes and wanes during the 14th century with the famine
:04:48. > :04:51.and black plague. It's dipping and they never really recovered from
:04:51. > :04:54.that in all honesty. I'm slightly staggered, Kevin, by that figure,
:04:54. > :04:57.about a hundred, cause I would look around here and think about
:04:57. > :05:07.thousands of people would live here? Yeah it's a big place isn't
:05:07. > :05:10.
:05:10. > :05:13.it for just a few pretty privileged people who society gains. So we're
:05:13. > :05:16.really talking about a small group of powerful people, and one who
:05:16. > :05:19.eventually get their, if I can mix up all my historical eras, meet
:05:19. > :05:22.their Waterloo with Henry VIII? Does that put paid to them
:05:22. > :05:25.completely?' Yes. The impact on Furness in 1537 is closure, is
:05:25. > :05:27.stripping of the lead and any other valuable things for the kings
:05:27. > :05:33.resources. And what about the monks, scattered to the four winds?
:05:33. > :05:36.Furness fights, Furness has always been independent. It tries to fight
:05:36. > :05:39.suppression but in the end has to give up. But they'll have got
:05:39. > :05:42.everything out. They'll have got their plate and their silver and
:05:42. > :05:45.their manuscripts. They'll have moved it out and set themselves up.
:05:45. > :05:49.They'll have known where they were going. Historians will now be able
:05:49. > :05:51.to find out even more about the lifestyle of the Monks following a
:05:51. > :05:53.really exciting discovery. When carrying out some repairs to the
:05:54. > :05:57.Abbey's presbytery, they unearthed a previously undiscovered grave of
:05:57. > :05:59.an Abbot who'd been buried with his bronze crozier. We expected the
:05:59. > :06:03.19th century antiquarians to have stripped the lot but they missed
:06:03. > :06:06.one. Imagine the wooden staff coming off and you've got it rising
:06:06. > :06:16.up curling round this rather beautiful detailed head here. It
:06:16. > :06:21.
:06:21. > :06:24.looks like a dog, probably a dog serpent. And then we've got St
:06:24. > :06:26.Michael the archangel slaying the dragon here with a sword in his
:06:27. > :06:29.right hand just inset into the Croziers hook. It's a particularly,
:06:29. > :06:35.well, unexpected, rare, extraordinary find. And, again,
:06:36. > :06:42.opulent. Tells you a little bit about how rich an establishment
:06:42. > :06:47.this must have been. Found with the abbot's skeleton, what does that
:06:47. > :06:50.tell us about him and the lifestyle here? He seems to have been a
:06:50. > :06:53.fairly portly chap, he's obviously lived quite well. He's about 40 or
:06:54. > :06:56.50 years old when he dies, he'd got a bit of arthritis, a bit of
:06:56. > :06:59.diabetes setting in, but otherwise his bones are actually pretty
:06:59. > :07:02.healthy, he's done pretty well. he himself, his bones are now all
:07:02. > :07:05.over the place being analysed? bones are scattered around the
:07:05. > :07:12.known universe, being analysed by all sorts of people. We hope to get
:07:12. > :07:15.a date on him, from the radiocarbon. We hope to analyse his teeth and
:07:15. > :07:18.find out where he might have come from and we hope to look at him
:07:18. > :07:22.compared to his brethren that were also excavated, to see, you know,
:07:22. > :07:25.what the difference is in health, stature was. So the monks of
:07:25. > :07:35.Furness Abbey may have been long since forced out but they have left
:07:35. > :07:43.
:07:43. > :07:46.these wonderful ruins to remember Just over a hundred years after the
:07:46. > :07:52.dissolution of Furness Abbey, a new religious movement was founded in
:07:52. > :07:55.more modest surroundings a short distance away. It was here at
:07:55. > :07:57.Swarthmoor Hall near Ulverston that Judge Thomas Fell and his wife
:07:57. > :08:07.Margaret received a strange and unconventional visitor, who was to
:08:07. > :08:13.
:08:13. > :08:20.change their lives, and the lives George Fox hailed from
:08:20. > :08:22.Leicestershire. In the 17th century the charismatic firebrand travelled
:08:23. > :08:25.the country preaching a controversial message that God is
:08:26. > :08:29.within us all and we have need for priests or organised religion.
:08:29. > :08:32.Having had a vision at the top of Pendle Hill in Lancashire, George
:08:33. > :08:41.Fox made his way to Swarthmoor Hall where he would go on to found the
:08:41. > :08:44.Quaker movement with the help of the people of the Furness peninsula.
:08:45. > :08:50.What he knows about Swarthmoor Hall is it is the home of a judge,
:08:50. > :08:54.Thomas Fell, and his wife Margaret. They are sincere Puritans. Judge
:08:54. > :09:02.Fell is quite a bigwig, he's a lawyer, he's a friend of Cromwell's,
:09:02. > :09:07.a former MP. And he uses this house, Judge Fell, as a sort of open house
:09:08. > :09:11.for travelling Puritan preachers. So it's natural, I think, that Fox
:09:11. > :09:16.would have made his way here. the Fells taking a great risk in
:09:16. > :09:25.sheltering and protecting Fox? Was it seen as a very scandalous thing
:09:25. > :09:27.to do? After the execution of the King in 1649 there's this huge,
:09:27. > :09:30.almost desperate search for truth in religion and creating a Godly
:09:30. > :09:36.country. That's what people are trying to do. So at that time,
:09:36. > :09:38.Quakerism is one of a whole range of different possibilities. Yes, it
:09:38. > :09:41.is threatening at the very beginning and it's threatening
:09:41. > :09:48.because it challenges the status quo and it challenges the status
:09:48. > :09:58.quo socially, religiously, politically. So to that extent they
:09:58. > :09:59.
:09:59. > :10:01.are taking a risk. George Fox travelled extensively but always
:10:01. > :10:05.returned to his base at Swarthmoor and following Judge Fell's death,
:10:05. > :10:08.he married his widow Margaret, who is seen as the mother of the Quaker
:10:08. > :10:10.movement. And three hundred and sixty years after George Fox first
:10:10. > :10:20.arrived here, Swarthmoor still hosts Quaker meetings which are
:10:20. > :10:21.
:10:21. > :10:24.held in silence. So you come into the Quaker meeting, you try to drop
:10:24. > :10:29.the cares of the world, as it were, concentrate on things of the spirit.
:10:29. > :10:36.If somebody feels moved to speak they can stand up and speak.
:10:36. > :10:44.There's no separate clergy, there's no fixed liturgy. It's using the
:10:44. > :10:54.silence as a way of worship. personal experience is all we need
:10:54. > :11:09.
:11:10. > :11:13.I thought I knew Cumbria pretty well. I do spend a lot of time here
:11:13. > :11:16.and yet I had no idea that a major world religion was founded here
:11:16. > :11:19.just a few miles outside Ulverston. I also had no experience until this
:11:19. > :11:21.morning of a Quaker meeting, and far from finding it odd or
:11:22. > :11:31.uncomfortable or self-conscious, it seemed both quiet and reflective
:11:32. > :11:36.
:11:36. > :11:46.and the most natural thing in the We don't normally associate Cumbria
:11:46. > :11:48.
:11:48. > :11:51.with heavy industry. We may have a picturesque Beatrix Potter notion
:11:51. > :11:54.of gambolling lambs, the odd ruminative cow. In fact, these
:11:54. > :12:02.beautiful Cumbrian hills are rich in the mineral deposits which
:12:02. > :12:07.transformed the Cumbrian peninsula. The Burlington Quarry is one of the
:12:07. > :12:13.deepest man-made holes in Europe. As you can see, people are still
:12:13. > :12:20.working here. But demand really peaked during the housing boom of
:12:20. > :12:23.the Victorian era. The blue slate was needed for roofing tiles. This
:12:23. > :12:26.land, which was rich in slate and iron ore and copper, was owned by
:12:26. > :12:31.the Duke of Devonshire. He needed a way of transporting these valuable
:12:31. > :12:41.minerals to the docks at Barrow. So, in 1846, he built the Furness
:12:41. > :13:00.
:13:00. > :13:06.What started as a hobby for father and son Geoff and Marc Dobson has
:13:06. > :13:10.now become a cottage industry. They make and sell models of the Furness
:13:10. > :13:13.Railway all over the world from their workshop in Geoff's garage.
:13:13. > :13:17.So this is a scale model of the Furness Railway. When the original
:13:18. > :13:23.railway came, what kind of impact did it have on this area? Massive.
:13:23. > :13:25.It can't be underestimated. It was the area. If it wasn't for the
:13:25. > :13:29.railway, the mines wouldn't have taken off. If the mines hadn't
:13:29. > :13:33.taken off, there wouldn't then be steel mills. If there wasn't any
:13:33. > :13:37.steel mills, there wouldn't be a shipyard. I think you've got to
:13:37. > :13:45.transport yourself back. Pre- railway, the only way they got iron
:13:45. > :13:50.ore or anything out of the minerals was on a horse. Or on a sledge.
:13:50. > :13:56.Dragged along the road and the road wouldn't be surfaced. We didn't
:13:56. > :14:00.have the surface roads we take for granted. So the railway linked the
:14:00. > :14:10.peninsula in with the country? It became less of an isolated spot in
:14:10. > :14:11.
:14:11. > :14:18.general? Very much so. There has always been that isolation. So the
:14:18. > :14:23.railway link to the peninsula and it became less isolated? Very much
:14:24. > :14:27.so. If you look at the far line, there's 2 NE hopper wagons. Over
:14:27. > :14:36.80% of the coal and coke that came to the steelworks came from the
:14:36. > :14:43.North East in those. And who buys what you make here? There's lots of
:14:43. > :14:46.enthusiasts all over the country. In fact, we've got export orders to
:14:46. > :14:54.Canada, America, Australia, New Zealand. Ex-pats who want to build
:14:54. > :14:58.what we have in front of you. thought they would be very keen on
:14:58. > :15:02.this. Yes. So, initially, I'm thinking you weren't as keen on
:15:02. > :15:09.model railways as your dad? No. I wanted a Scalextric, but I never
:15:09. > :15:14.got one until last year. My wife got me one for Christmas. Is it
:15:14. > :15:24.good? Very good. I've got two Mini Coopers at long last.
:15:24. > :15:31.
:15:31. > :15:36.The Furness Railway is still running. I'm going to retrace the
:15:36. > :15:46.journey of copper, slate and iron ore. It would've went from Kirkby
:15:46. > :15:47.
:15:47. > :15:51.in Furness down to Barrow-in- Furness. The train hugs the West
:15:51. > :16:01.Coast of Cumbria. It really is one of the most scenic railway journeys
:16:01. > :16:05.in the country. Just across the sands from the Furness Railway in
:16:05. > :16:08.Millom, there lived a poet called Norman Nicholson. His verse is
:16:09. > :16:17.steeped in the landscape and industry of this part of the world.
:16:17. > :16:21.I'd like to read a poem. It's When the sea's to the west.
:16:21. > :16:24.The evenings are one dazzle. You can find no sign of water.
:16:24. > :16:28.Sun upflows the horizon. Waves of Shine.
:16:28. > :16:31.Heave, crest, fracture. Explode on the shore.
:16:31. > :16:41.The wide day burns. In the incandescent mantle of the
:16:41. > :16:57.
:16:58. > :17:02.It is impossible to overestimate the importance of the railways on
:17:02. > :17:07.the peninsula. The Duke of Devonshire hired James Ramsden to
:17:07. > :17:10.oversee the running of them. And together with the metallurgist
:17:10. > :17:14.Henry Schneider, these three became the founding fathers. They
:17:14. > :17:24.transformed this sleepy backwater into a boomtown. Britain's very own
:17:24. > :17:27.Chicago. With the railways now linking the peninsula with the rest
:17:27. > :17:31.of the country, the three men could bring in smelting coke and build
:17:31. > :17:36.their own iron and steel works. And while they had steel, why not build
:17:36. > :17:44.some ships? And thus, waves of people from all across the land
:17:44. > :17:48.were attracted to the booming town. They were coming from places you
:17:48. > :17:54.wouldn't expect. There was a great influx from Cornwall. The tin
:17:54. > :18:00.miners came up. Staffordshire iron workers came. Irish navvies to
:18:00. > :18:05.build the docks. And then, when the shipbuilding came, a lot of people
:18:05. > :18:08.came down from Glasgow. So it was from all over the country. I guess
:18:08. > :18:15.that made for a lively mix of people. It must have caused
:18:16. > :18:21.problems? It did, because they were mainly young men in their teens,
:18:22. > :18:31.twenties and thirties. Young men in the late 19th century are pretty
:18:32. > :18:32.
:18:32. > :18:41.much like young men are today. So it was pretty lively. Bez measures
:18:41. > :18:46.were taken by the city fathers to subdue the gentleman workers. For
:18:46. > :18:50.example, in 1867, they built a flax and jute works. It was to try to
:18:50. > :18:53.bring wives and children in to work in the flax and jute works. This
:18:53. > :18:56.also had an ulterior motive, of course, of keeping money in the
:18:56. > :18:59.town. Because these itinerant workers were sending money back to
:18:59. > :19:03.Belfast or Glasgow and Staffordshire. And the money was
:19:03. > :19:06.exiting the town and they wanted to keep it in the town. So it had a
:19:06. > :19:11.dual effect of subduing the male workforce and keeping the money in
:19:11. > :19:13.the town. In the 1860s and 1870s, Barrow would have resembled one
:19:13. > :19:20.massive construction site as the town's founding fathers built homes
:19:20. > :19:23.for the new workers. If people think this is reminiscent of
:19:23. > :19:30.Glaswegian tenement buildings, that's not a coincidence? Not a
:19:30. > :19:32.coincidence at all. The shipyard started in 1871. They were trying
:19:32. > :19:36.to encourage experienced shipbuilders to move to Barrow.
:19:36. > :19:45.They were from Scotland So they brought in architects who had built
:19:45. > :19:48.the tenements and Glasgow to build peace -- to build the East. --
:19:48. > :19:55.these. The railways may have transformed Barrow from a sleepy
:19:55. > :19:58.rural backwater to an industrial boomtown. But it was shipbuilding
:19:58. > :20:01.that put Barrow on the international map at a time when
:20:01. > :20:05.Britain was the most powerful trading nation in the world. The
:20:05. > :20:08.first ship out of the yard was the Duke of Devonshire. And the yard
:20:08. > :20:15.continued to build ships up until the First World War. At one stage,
:20:15. > :20:18.it employed a staggering 30,000 people. After the war, "the yard",
:20:18. > :20:21.as it's always been known, started building civilian as well as naval
:20:21. > :20:25.vessels. Launch days would be occasions of great pride and
:20:25. > :20:35.excitement. Children would be given the day off school. And there would
:20:35. > :20:38.
:20:38. > :20:45.usually be a royal on hand to name the ship. I name this ship Oriana.
:20:45. > :20:49.May God bless her and all who sail in her. In 1960, the Oriana was
:20:49. > :20:53.launched. It was one of the world's fastest and most recognisable ocean
:20:53. > :20:57.liners. It had a voyage time to Australia of three weeks instead of
:20:57. > :21:01.four. She was kitted out in ultra- modern style. Every detail has been
:21:01. > :21:11.designed by teams of architects and co-ordinated by a design team of
:21:11. > :21:14.perfect harmony. Here is they own television station. Closed circuit
:21:14. > :21:20.television throughout the voyage, net work programmes when the ship
:21:20. > :21:28.is in port. You have a choice of evening entertainment. The lush,
:21:28. > :21:34.plush cinema, or television in Ewing lounges and some cabins. --
:21:34. > :21:38.viewing lounges. The shipyard is still going strong. These days, it
:21:38. > :21:42.specialises in a rather different kind of boat - the submarine. It's
:21:42. > :21:44.incredible to think that the first submarines were built here in 1886.
:21:44. > :21:49.And the first Royal Navy submersibles were built here in
:21:49. > :21:58.1901. In 1960, Dreadnought - Britain's first ever nuclear-
:21:58. > :22:05.powered submarine - was launched here by The Queen. I name this ship
:22:05. > :22:11.grit not -- Dreadnought. Make God bless her and all who sail in her.
:22:11. > :22:14.CHEERING. Submarines, like Ambush of the astute class, are still
:22:14. > :22:18.built here in the great dock hall which bears the Duke of
:22:18. > :22:26.Devonshire's name. And there's still great pride in the
:22:26. > :22:33.achievements of the town. Joe Murphy has spent his entire working
:22:33. > :22:39.life as a welder at the yard. He came here as a boy of 15. When I
:22:39. > :22:45.was an apprentice, the Valiant was on one side. There would be a
:22:46. > :22:51.thousand-ton tanker. The British admiral on the other. On the big
:22:51. > :22:57.slip. We used to diversify and do all sorts of things like that. But
:22:57. > :23:02.mostly now, we concentrate on submarines. Prior to this, what
:23:03. > :23:06.would this have been? Outside on the berth, on all weathers. The
:23:06. > :23:12.tide would have been underneath you. A canvas to get behind while you
:23:12. > :23:18.were welding. And equally, you used to get inside the boat. It would be
:23:18. > :23:25.like a steel fridge. And cold inside. And look at this facility
:23:25. > :23:35.now. It's fantastic. Is it a source of pride that the Furness
:23:35. > :23:37.
:23:37. > :23:43.Peninsular is known all over the Yes. Everybody's proud of this spot.
:23:43. > :23:47.It's given me a good living. I have a son in here now. He's the fifth
:23:47. > :23:51.generation. That's five families that have been brought up on it.
:23:51. > :23:55.Can you imagine Barrow without a shipyard? Not at all. This is the
:23:56. > :24:05.lifeblood of this town. And we all depend on it. Hopefully, we'll be
:24:06. > :24:10.
:24:10. > :24:13.But the nature of the Yard's work hasn't been without controversy. In
:24:13. > :24:18.the 1980s, America and The Soviet Union were engaged in a nuclear
:24:18. > :24:21.arms race. Plans for Britain's Trident nuclear submarines, which
:24:21. > :24:24.were to be built in Barrow, were strongly opposed by The Campaign
:24:24. > :24:27.for Nuclear Disarmament. They held their national rally in Barrow in
:24:28. > :24:35.1984. Among the protesters were local activists Kate Blanshard and
:24:36. > :24:45.Norman Hill. I remember being absolutely amazed by the number of
:24:46. > :24:46.
:24:46. > :24:52.people. The car park down at Craven Park there. It was full. There were
:24:52. > :24:58.hundreds of people on the bridge. There was a die-in on the bridge
:24:58. > :25:03.where everyone lay down on the bridge. It was symbolic to show
:25:03. > :25:13.what would happen if a nuclear bomb went off. It would cause mass death
:25:13. > :25:15.
:25:15. > :25:20.and devastation. These are some of your badges? That was the classics
:25:20. > :25:26.Login, protest and survive, referencing the Government's
:25:26. > :25:34.campaign of Protect and survive, what to do it in a nuclear war.
:25:34. > :25:41.Hide under the nuclear table? other people from that era, I will
:25:41. > :25:51.not dive for Thatcher. And vegetarians against it. -- will not
:25:51. > :25:55.
:25:55. > :26:02.die. There was a broad coalition. Yes. What was the mood for people
:26:02. > :26:08.who did not support this? The Tory slogan was Trident means jobs. So
:26:08. > :26:18.people were going round repeating this parrot fashion. It was a good
:26:18. > :26:23.
:26:23. > :26:26.slogan. But we put our alternative view. We said, if Barrow puts all
:26:26. > :26:33.its eggs in one business, this removes all the opportunities for
:26:33. > :26:42.surface ship building. Civilian ship building. Yes. So there's a
:26:42. > :26:49.danger there. After this project, what are you going to be left with?
:26:49. > :26:52.The CND supporters, the shipyard workers. All have a part to play
:26:52. > :26:57.and a voice to be heard in a people's history, which is my
:26:58. > :27:05.favourite kind of history. And folk music, which I often like, often
:27:05. > :27:15.tell these kinds of stories and history through song. One's music
:27:15. > :27:54.
:27:54. > :28:04.all -- one person's music often # The simple life is all we knew #
:28:04. > :28:05.
:28:05. > :28:11.Before the ashes came falling... # The Furness will never be some
:28:11. > :28:18.people's idea of a perfect tourist destination. But the bleak and
:28:18. > :28:22.bracing beauty. The complex and sometimes turbulent history. And
:28:22. > :28:25.the way in which waves of people have made their mark here between