Geograph - photograph every grid square

Ingram churchyard has gravestones recording the family of John and Elizabeth Turnbull who lived here in the 1800s, and Benjamin and Margaret Turnbull and family who succeeded them at Reaveley Hill into the 1920s.

Sarah Wilson in her Reflections: the Breamish valley and Ingram (2005) describes the life of Belle Armstrong who came to live here in 1950 with her shepherd husband, Bill, and young family. The cottage was very damp and the children developed pneumonia, prompting them to leave after only a year.

The house has just two rooms, the door at the rear opening into a lean-to scullery with a pantry at the far end. All water was carried from a spring, 200 yards away. The toilet (nettie) was a tin shed which stood between the cottage and byre. The left hand room of the cottage (from the front) was the single bedroom NU0017 : Bedroom fireplace, Reaveleyhill Farm. The right hand room was the living room and still has the cast iron range made by Henry Moat & Son Ltd. of Newcastle, recorded by Belle as being kept constantly lit, even in the hottest days of summer NU0017 : Living room range, Reaveleyhill Farm

Life must have been hard on the hilltop site with distant neighbours and only a rough track to the nearest road. Surprisingly, though, it was occasionally visited by the local postman, if he had deliveries to make at The Dod or Threestoneburn. It is a dramatic and remote location, with extensive views.

The remains of an even older farmhouse can be seen behind, alongside the byre NU0017 : Old ruins at Reaveleyhill Memories of what it was like then can only be guessed.