Pontefract Castle The Hairy Builder

Want to know about British history? You'd better get your hands dirty!

Don't bury your head in a guidebook, ask a brickie!

A chippie...

or a roofer.

Ever since I were a boy, I've had a passion for our past, so...

I'm going to apprentice meself

to the oldest masonry company in the country.

Mastering their crafts and scraping away the secrets

of Blighty's poshest piles.

From castles to cathedrals,

music halls to mansions,

palaces to public schools.

These aren't just buildings,

they're keys to opening up our past and bring it back to life.

Today I'm in Pontefract, West Yorkshire,

helping to safeguard an ancient relic that's been through the wars,

literally, for the past thousand years.

Pontefract Castle.

I'll be doing some long overdue gardening...

This place hasn't been weeded since the Civil War.

-Nobody has been down here since the 17th century?

-No, nobody.

..finding out the answers to some difficult questions...

What was the point of things like being hung, drawn and quartered?

..and going into battle with the Roundheads and Cavaliers.

To war!

You scoundrel! A pox on your King!

This is one of West Yorkshire's most historic towns - Pontefract.

Meaning "Broken Bridge".

It's known for its racecourse and its liquorice,

the so-called Pontefract cakes.

And it's home to this broken castle.

One of the most important in the British Isles.

In fact, the castle dates back to the time of William the Conqueror.

After he won the Battle of Hastings in 1066,

he set about securing what he considers to be

the rebellious north, by building castles all over the place.

In its heyday, Pontefract Castle stood five storeys high

on top of a rocky outcrop,

so it would have looked even more imposing.

It was also whitewashed to glow in the sun.

Oooh, it's very Lord Of The Rings!

The castle and its defences were added to throughout the centuries,

and Pontefract ended up with as many as eight large turrets,

housing hundreds of people.

It was known as the key to the north for almost 600 years

and was one of the strongest fortresses in the country,

built to safeguard the King's interests.

But, sadly, today it's a shadow of its former self.

Today, it's undergoing a huge restoration project,

which will include a new visitor centre

and restoring what's left of the old walls.

The castle has been on the English Heritage At Risk register

since 1998, so these works are long overdue.

Pontefract was the last royalist stronghold in the English Civil War.

I mean, it's hosted Henry VIII, Elizabeth I and Charles I.

It also boasts one of history's most feared dungeons.

Deep beneath the castle remains lie a grim network of tunnels.

Being imprisoned here was a living nightmare,

but building the dungeon was also tortuous.

Workers had to hack it out of the bedrock, 35 feet below the ground.

Before meeting the current builders, I've an appointment

with Ian Downes, from the local council,

who's going to give me a quick history lesson.

-Hello, Ian, Dave.

-Hello!

Wow, this is incredible.

In British history, how important is Pontefract Castle?

Well, Edward I called it the "Key to the North".

But it's been involved in all kinds of major political events

over the centuries.

It really has been the place in the north of England to keep your valuable prisoners.

-Who's been locked up here?

-Well, all sorts of people over the years.

Richard II was kept at Pontefract Castle,

and died here in 1399.

-Did he die quite an unusual death?

-He did.

He supposedly starved to death,

because you can't murder a king, it would be regicide.

They starved him to death instead.

-Just outside, above the bakehouse.

-No!

So imagine that smell each morning.

-Technically, they didn't murder him. Yeah.

-That's the idea.

Good grief! I mean, Henry VIII had a link here, too, didn't he?

He does. On his tour of the north,

he came to Pontefract Castle with one of his wives, Katherine Howard.

It was whilst they were staying here that she was caught for the first time with Thomas Culpeper.

And so they both lost their heads.

It is amazing. It's only when you hear tales like this, with the monarchy,

that you realise Pontefract Castle's importance in British history,

-which is why it's worth conserving.

-Absolutely.

It's played a pivotal role in history.

It's one of the last Royalist strongholds to fall in the Civil War.

The English Civil War began in 1642,

as a series of armed conflicts between Parliamentarians,

headed by Oliver Cromwell, and the Royalists, supporting

King Charles I, otherwise known as the Roundheads and Cavaliers.

Parliament wanted more power and was angry at just being convened

whenever King Charles I wanted money.

The bloody battles of the Civil War lasted nine years, until 1651.

By which time, Charles I had lost his head

and Oliver Cromwell ruled the land.

The end result was that no English monarch can rule

without Parliament's consent, which is still the case today.

It's a real piece of the castle's history we've got on the walls here.

Because these names - Robert Pryor and Robert Greathed -

relate to the prisoners actually kept down here in the Civil War.

Would these have been Parliamentarians?

Yeah, that's right.

They were kept down here during the third siege of Pontefract Castle.

Good grief! The history of Pontefract is so rich, isn't it?

It is, yeah.

And right now it's all around us.

-Yes, literally written in the walls.

-Yep.

Construction firm William Anelay are working hard

to bring this incredible ruin back to life.

Site manager Andy Gravil, tells me more.

-How do, Andy.

-Hi, Dave. Pleased to meet you.

-Pleased to meet you too.

This is a rather unique building site, isn't it?

Yeah, it's a remarkable, unique building site.

Yeah, is this what they would call a scheduled national monument?

It is, Dave, that's correct.

That means it has the same status as Stonehenge.

So it kind of almost goes beyond your regular building regulations.

It's very intricate building regulations here.

Some of the other buildings that we visit need a new roof or

a new gargoyle or it needs bits and pieces replacing.

But that's not the way you go about this place, is it?

-You're not actually really building much, are you?

-No, no.

The aim is to consolidate the ruins.

The areas that aren't safe are fenced off,

but we're down to make them safe and open some up to the public.

Each area has been identified - the royal apartments,

the kitchens, the sally port, and we've a certain amount of work to do

to each one, so it's all split up into sections.

-Shall we go and have a look?

-Yeah, let's go for a wander.

As well as restoring the castle,

nine highly skilled craftsmen will be building

a new visitors centre and restoring an old Victorian barn,

with 300 square metres of handmade wooden tiles.

Works will take 18 months and are budgeted at £3.6 million.

After centuries of being left to rack and ruin,

it's high time what's left is saved for future generations,

starting with the castle walls themselves.

Loose stones are falling out left, right and centre.

Oh, it's a health and safety nightmare!

So this is a repair that we've got to sort out and make safe.

What's all that? It looks like tiles put in.

Yeah, this is from the Victorian era,

-and that's how they repaired and did stone repairs.

-Really?

-Yeah.

It's a bit cheap and nasty - you won't get that with your lads!

No, no, we've got to do the proper stone repairs.

But we've still got to keep that intact because it's part of the history of the castle.

We're going to take these out, re-use what we can.

What we can't use, we'll get new ones cut...

-Right

-..and puts new ones back in.

Would you ever go beyond, say, the height of the existing walls?

Would you ever try to kind of improve a little bit what's left?

No, we have to stop there

and just repair what's here and not go any higher.

Right, so really, this is proper restoration of what's there,

-not a flight of fancy.

-No, it isn't, no.

-So there'll be no roof going on!

-No, not on this one!

Oh, right!

HE GRUNTS

Oh, look how easy that came out.

There must be thousands of stones like that all over the castle.

And if summat like that came out and fell on a child,

it would be unthinkable.

Yeah, and it is open to the public all the time,

so we do have to make sure it's safe for them.

So, really, if you don't restore it,

then the castle will have to be shut down.

Yeah. It'll just be a ruin and get lost for ever.

That's why the restoration is important.

-Yeah, that's why we're here.

-Yeah.

Safety at all times.

But safeguarding the castle's future is much more complex than

just stopping the walls doing a Jericho and coming tumbling down.

What's going on here, Andy?

Well, this is a test piece of the works that we've got to do

-all around the castle.

-Right.

New stonework to go in where needed,

re-pointing works and then the soft-top consolidation on top.

It's almost like a sample piece of all the various techniques.

That's what we've got to achieve all around.

And then, when it's all like that, it's going to be safe.

-Yeah, safe, clean, secure.

-Another 1,000 years.

Hopefully. I'll not be around.

-I don't know. There'll be part of you in this, Andy, I'm sure.

-Yeah.

Sometimes, before you can get to the building itself,

you have to clear the undergrowth. Time for some extreme gardening.

-What's going on here, Andy?

-Well, we've got Chris down here.

-Chris.

That's Chris making his way down to the sally port.

-What is a sally port?

-It's the castle's emergency exit.

That makes sense because if the castle's under siege, everybody's

going up the hill, you want your secret way so you can escape.

-Yeah, out of the back door.

-Gosh.

Have you any idea when the last time it was that this was weeded?

This place hasn't been weeded since the Civil War.

-So nobody has been down here since the 17th century?

-No, nobody.

Cor, blimey, Chris, keep your eyes open,

you don't know what you'll find.

-Is this what you would regard as a rotten job, Chris?

-No, I like it.

-Do you?

-It keeps me fit.

-Not half.

You'll work off your Yorkshire puddings.

Cheers.

And when the restoration's completed,

will the public be able to come down here?

Yeah, eventually we're having a walkway coming in from over there.

-Right.

-Raised platform and then it's down a spiral staircase

and out through the sally port.

Fantastic. So really this is just your basic ground clearance.

Yeah, this is just weeding.

Come on, Chris, I'll give you a spell.

If I end up looking like you, it'll be worth it. Hold on.

You'll rip your nipples off.

So, Andy, this wall around here, how old will that be?

Roughly this wall would be about 800 years old, behind you.

That's extraordinary, isn't it? Really.

-When you think what's gone on since then.

-If only walls could talk.

Aye.

Fortunately there are plenty of re-enactors on hand

keen to play dress-up and bring this exciting period

of British history back to life.

Oh, and they do love to get into character.

Ah, what do we have here, gentlemen?

-PLUMMY ACCENT:

-Greetings, sir, welcome to our camp.

And what are you doing here at Pontefract Castle?

We're here for the siege, of course, have not you heard?

-No.

-There's going to be a great siege at the castle indeed.

The brave and powerful and wonderful Royalists are camped

inside the castle, and the pitiful, traitorous scum, calling themselves

the Parliamentarians, are coming to attack us.

So, gentlemen, who are you?

Well, I'm very glad you asked me that, Dave.

-NORMAL VOICE:

-A-hem. I'll stop talking in that ridiculous voice.

Hello, yes, Nathaniel, also known as Dave.

I'm part of a group called Histrionics, the fantastic gentlemen

to this side of me here are part of the English Civil War Society.

What is it about this particular period, the English Civil War,

that fascinates you all?

So many of the battle sites, you're still able to go and see them.

The castles, like Pontefract, although a ruin, are still here.

You can really feel the ambience of the time, you can really get

involved in pretending to be a pikeman or a musketeer.

There are so many people doing it.

-It's like a family more than it is a hobby.

-Yes.

So, gents, it must gladden your hearts to see the work that's

-being done here, given your interest in the period.

-Very much so.

I'd love to see more re-enactment events

-and really bring the place back to life.

-Yeah.

-It's so rich in history,

not only from this period, but so many other periods as well

that are associated with rebellion and revolt and this is really

kind of the icing on the cake. To be able to come back here

and do something that visitors can see en masse will be a wonder.

En masse might be a slight exaggeration,

but these four warriors will be attempting to recreate

one of the castle's key sieges a bit later on.

Life during the Civil War was certainly tough,

especially if you got onto the wrong side of the law.

I'm headed a few miles north to York

to experience justice, 17th-century style.

Back then, most village greens had stocks and whipping posts and

you could be hung for the simple crime of stealing a loaf of bread.

And once found guilty, you don't just get an ASBO,

a whole host of punishments await you.

Look away now if you've got a weak stomach.

Say hello to the tongue tearer.

What we do, place the tongs onto the fire until it's white hot.

-Dave...

-Aye.

-..stick out your tongue.

What we do, we attach the tongs onto the muscle, then it's...

once, twice, three times, yank!

Removing the muscle and making a nice mess over my nice, clean floor.

Ooh, isn't he scary?

-I always save the best till last.

-Smashing.

-Dave...

-Aye?

-..stand up.

I can't, I've got my manacles.

This is the chappy chopper.

-You've got the size right.

-Definitely haven't.

-What we do is put your little fella in here and chop him off!

-Oh, dear.

As for you, little Dave, these would have been more appropriate.

HE LAUGHS

Now I'm sick and tired of looking at your disgusting face.

You're going to get in my cage and I'm going to deal with you later.

Get in there, now! In you go.

I think you've got an attitude problem

and I want to speak to me lawyer.

Unfortunately, my lawyer's at lunch but my trusty Civil War expert,

David Cooper, is on hand to shed some light on my sticky situation.

-Hello, David.

-Mr Myers.

That's a relief. Thank goodness.

You know, I mean, torture wasn't a laughing matter.

Did this sort of thing go on in the Civil War?

It did quite a lot and you're getting off very,

-very lightly in receiving some mild treatment here.

-Really?

-Absolutely, yes.

-What was the purpose of torture?

Well, they might torture you to get the names of your accomplices

out of you to see if you're part of a gang or indeed just to punish you

for the very, very high crime of high treason.

Was torture sanctioned by the government?

It was. Even in medieval times, the case that

no confession obtained under torture would really be legally allowed

but that didn't stop people doing it off the books anyway.

And certainly during Pontefract at the time of

the English Civil Wars, there were a whole range of horrible things

done to people that were essentially kept out of the records.

Good grief.

A lot of the buildings that we're working on, we're building

and restoring, they have got quite a dark underbelly, really.

There is. They may look very, very beautiful and very picturesque

upon the surface, but once you begin

to scratch beneath into the dungeons,

into the bowels of those castles,

you begin to find an all too darker history.

I mean, what was the point

in things like being hung, drawn and quartered?

Because obviously once you were hung, surely you were dead.

Well, actually, no, it's almost like a shaming ritual.

You would be dragged to your place of execution behind a horse,

then you will be hung until almost the point of death...

And then be cut into four parts and taken to the four corners

-of the earth, really.

-Absolutely.

That particular last one was a very popular form of execution

given out to those people who had rebelled against

King Charles I during the English Civil War.

These surely were dark times, weren't they?

They were truly hideous.

Call me old-fashioned, but I think I'll just take the easy way out.

Gah!

You might think that Pontefract Castle ended up a ruin

due to being the scene of many a major battle,

but the story is much more interesting than that.

Being known as the key to the North just invited trouble,

and every time someone tried to take the castle by force, the townsfolk

would also suffer and, to be frank, they were sick to the teeth of it.

And that's the type of thing that they had to face every day.

Not huge cannonballs,

but these cannonballs would do some serious damage.

And there were reports of all sorts of incidents in town.

One poor lad was delivering beer.

He had a flagon of beer to deliver,

walking across the street and one of these took off his leg completely.

But he didn't fall over.

He managed to hop to a doorway and deliver the flagon of beer intact.

So, after three sieges, the townfolk of Pontefract were,

to put it mildly, brassed off.

They'd had enough.

They had the Royalists encamped at the castle

making raids and taking goods.

They'd had the Parliamentarians eating and drinking them

out of house and home and they petitioned parliament

and said to parliament, "It's the castle.

"We don't want the castle any more."

Parliament gave in to their demands and ordered that the castle

be systematically demolished.

So Pontefract Castle was never, ever taken by force.

The strongest fortress in the North of England ended its days

systematically demolished due to the will of Pontefract.

It truly was democracy in action.

The castle's stone was pilfered for DIY jobs for centuries.

The good people from Pontefract would go down to the castle,

fill up their barrows, their carts, etc, and the stone was used

to repair damage caused by the sieges, to make do and mend.

And often this was covered over in later years by rendering.

It's as the rendering drops off,

that's where we find the castle stone.

And to this day it can be seen all over town

in the most unlikely places, from tea rooms to alleyways...

..boundary walls to car parks.

Today the people of Pontefract are rightly proud of their glorious

history and the memory of Pontefract Castle isn't being allowed to die.

Amongst the ruins, a new visitor centre is being built

to bring the place to life for a 21st-century audience.

Crikey, this is a new one. What's happening here?

These are the new foundations for the visitor extension,

so that's the old building and this is going to be the new.

-So we've had to put these steel piles in.

-Yes.

Because we can't dig mass excavations

because it's an ancient monument.

In fact, this place is an archaeologist's dream.

This 17th-century pickaxe recently found nearby was used to dig

trenches in one of the Civil War sieges and these siege-era coins

from the 1640s are likely to be all over the place.

So you can't just turn up and dig a trench because you've got this

scheduled ancient monument there. Who knows what lies beneath?

So basically it's on these piles of concrete?

Yeah, yeah, we drive these down till they hit rock,

then we fill them with concrete.

-So basically your building's sat on stilts.

-Yes.

-Yes.

That's fantastic,

-without doing too much damage to the groundwork underneath.

-That's it.

-How far will that be down?

-Eight to ten metres generally.

-That's a...

-A fair depth.

-..a fair old depth, isn't it?

You do things to last, you lads, don't you?

I hope so.

-Right, shall we fire it up?

-Let's go.

In total, eight piles will need to be sunk into the ground

for the foundations of the building to stand on,

and thank goodness we're not still in the 11th century.

These days, machines can do all the hard work.

Crikey.

It's amazing to think, with compressed air,

you can drive that all the way down into the bedrock, isn't it?

-I know, it's amazing.

-Fantastic.

And then, of course, when you've got it down so far,

-welding the section of pipe on...

-That's it.

And so it goes on till you hit the bedrock. Clever stuff.

You're going to have a go at the welding.

Aye, yes, I haven't done it for years. I was never good.

Each pile is made up of 1.5-metre sections

which need to be welded together.

-I feel like Darth Vader.

-Don't hold it on too long.

I can't see anything.

That'll do, mate.

-Marks out of ten, Matt?

-I'll give you a five...

-for effort.

-THEY LAUGH

This isn't as easy as it looks.

Keep your hands steady, if you can.

-Right, that's enough.

-Yeah?

-That's a bit better. That's thicker.

-Yeah, done with it?

-That's a lot better, that.

-Yeah.

-You've burned a hole in it.

-Eh?

-You've burned a hole in it. Do you see the hole there?

-Yes.

-There.

-That's not a good thing, is it?

-No.

-That lets water in.

-Right. Can you patch that?

I'll patch it, yeah.

Time to let the experts take over. I'll just stick to me cooking.

Just look.

Matt's...

..mine. I surrender.

We need to crack on as we've got cement waiting.

And while Matt pours it in to secure the foundations,

I want to find out a bit more about the new building.

What's the visitor centre going to look like?

Is it going to look old-fashioned or...?

No, it will be a glazed extension with timber cladding on it.

Are you going to pull that old shed down?

No, Dave. We're not pulling the old shed down, we're restoring it.

What's so special about that, Andy?

It's an Arts and Crafts building from the Victorian times.

Right, right. Nothing's ever simple, is it?

No, not in this job.

The original Arts and Crafts barn dates from the 1880s

and was initially built to store equipment to maintain the castle.

It's had many uses over the years, from a tea room to a boxing arena,

a blacksmith's workshop and even a temporary morgue during

World War II after a Halifax bomber crashed near the castle.

At the moment, the castle only gets 40,000 visitors a year

and the council hope that this new visitor centre

will see the numbers rocket.

So you've got the restored Arts and Crafts barn,

the glass to indicate the transition, and the modern building,

which will be on these wonderful foundations.

I bet these foundations will be here longer than the castle.

-Well, the castle will give it a run for its money.

-Aye, aye.

-I love your funnel. It's a cut-down traffic cone.

-It is, yes.

-It makes sense.

-It does, doesn't it?

-Yup.

So that pipe, that's going down eight to ten metres,

is now being filled, it's quite a coarse concrete, isn't it?

-It is, yes.

-When that sets, it's going to be there forever.

-It is, yeah.

-Just a solid rod of concrete.

-You can build anything on that.

-You can.

Now we've got the concrete in, we need to put the steel reinforcing

down the centre of the pile, so if you'd like to grab one.

Right, so this way,

so the concrete will grab around the bar and it will never shatter.

Yeah, it's reinforcement to keep strengthening it up.

This is like making a cake, you know.

You know, you're doing a wedding cake...

Job done.

-I can do that. It's easy, that. Better than welding.

-Piece of cake.

The less said about me welding, the better.

I'm far more at home doing me Bob the Builder with the wheelbarrow.

Make it a light load, eh?

Champion.

-Come on, Dave.

-Come on.

-SQUEAKING

I don't know if it's that barrow squeaking or me knees!

Right.

Righto, you lot, on a scale of butchness, at the moment, I'm 11.

Pontefract Castle really has seen it all. Been there and done that.

So I think it's only fair to recreate its historical high points

for those of us who weren't there the first time around.

Of course, there would have been hundreds of soldiers

battling it out back in the 1640s.

Sadly, we've only got four, and me in a very silly King Charles wig.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,

welcome to the siege of Pontefract Castle. It's 1645, it's the big one.

In the blue corner, we have the Roundheads,

otherwise known as Obadiah and Bill.

In the red corner, we have the Royalists, Nathaniel and Martin.

You're not going to see it again. Lap it up while it's here.

I know there's only four of us, but we'll do our best, all right?

Gentlemen...

To war!

Oh! Obadiah's let rip.

Martin looks confused and dazed, I think the shot's took his head off.

Obadiah's reloading.

You scoundrel! A pox on your king.

Billy has squared up to Nathaniel.

Nathaniel is doing all the talking, really, but, you know,

that was a Cavalier for you.

Oh, no, they've made commitments, swords have clashed, that's it.

I know your sort, I know your style and I fear you not.

Obadiah's reloaded. Big boy, big gun. Here we go.

Oh, boom!

Martin is going to try and take on Obadiah while he's reloading.

This is an interesting tactic.

He nearly lost his hat then, but maybe he's going to lose his head.

Obadiah fights back with the butt of the gun, he's not loaded.

Oh, oh, dear. Oh, no.

Obadiah's down. Oh, dear, right through the kidneys.

It was a really, really, really nice defence from Obadiah

but, Martin, that's one to you.

The Civil War is reaching its climax.

A blow across the jaw, he's down, he's down, he's going in.

Oh, straight through his stomach.

The Royalists lost.

Charles I lost his head and Oliver Cromwell ran the show.

Well, that was until 1660 till the Restoration,

when his son, Charles II, took the throne again.

There might not be much left of Pontefract Castle,

but its historical legacy is well worth maintaining

and that is why this site matters so much.

Next week, I'm in Sunderland in the north-east of England

helping to restore this iconic superstructure, Roker Lighthouse.

-Welcome to the best view in town.

-You can see for miles.

I take time out for a spot of fishing with the locals.

-It's pulling.

-Mackerel.

-Belter.

I get my hands on a monster machine down at the docks.

As big boys' toys go, this has to be the biggest I've ever played with.