Let’s build a retreat so we can escape from Brexit Britain
WITHIN hours of writing this letter, the formal process of Britain leaving the European Union will have begun.
Many people in Stockport will be deeply disappointed, as I am.
Some despairing ‘remainers’ will be praying for spiritual intervention, while others will be relying on spirits more commonly found in a bottle.
I fall back on the world of Blondie for my escape, but what if we were to create one or two places of escape in Stockport for everyone. A new Mersey riverside, downstream of King Street West, would be one such place.
Something striking and significant at Tiviot Dale, to remind visitors that a castle stood there for centuries up until 1775, could well be another.
Building a castle in 21st century Britain sounds outlandish, but the first new ‘castle’ in England for hundreds of years could incorporate several hundred apartments and all manner of commercially related outlets and themed entertainment.
You only have to consider the history and former strategic importance of this location to see its huge potential for tourism and our own recreation.
The fording point on the Mersey at Tiviot Dale was where the Roman legions crossed into the North West of England.
A castle was built by the Normans soon after their invasion in 1066 on the sandstone bluff overlooking the ford, to control this all important crossing point.
Troops came through here in the War of the Roses on their way to the battle of Bosworth field, where Richard III was slain and in the 1700s Bonnie Prince Charlie led his Jacobite army south through Stockport in his ill-fated march on London.
To top it all, it was here that the last wife sale in England took place, or so they say.
I imagined medieval times, but then you hear that the husband threw in the wife’s air miles for good measure and she, to get her own back, sold him, the cat and the kitchen sink for fifty quid on e-bay.
If it were anyone else, you would know I was joking. John Tyers Marple