Pastoralism In Upper Redesdale : Vaccaries And Bercaries

Pastoralist exploitation of the upland demesne was effected by two distinct means. The first was through the establishment of directly managed stock farms, a practice especially associated with great ecclesiastical landowners such as the Cistercian abbeys of Fountains, Rievaulx and, more locally, Newminster. The Umfravilles themselves definitely ran a herd of mares in the forest on the west side of Cottonshope during the later 12th and 13th centuries.

The tithe foals from this herd were granted to the Abbot and Convent of Kelso, probably in the later 12th century, and confirmed by Gilbert de Umfraville in 1227/28 (Liber de Calchou; cf. Hodgson 1827, 15-18), when the Abbey successfully defended its claim to the foals in a dispute with the rector of Elsdon.

There may have been a permanent settlement of some kind associated with the maintenance of the herd, akin to the vaccaries, or demesne cattle farms, common further south in the baronial "forests" of the West Riding Calder valley and the Lancashire Pennines (Faull & Woodhouse 1981, 758-761; McDowell 1988, 8-9; cf. Charlton & Day 1979, 209). Such an installation would clearly be of especial interest if its precise location could be identified and a start might be made by examining the neighbourhood of the present Cottonshope farm.

The existence of 24 "vaccaries or cow pastures" in the manor of Otterburn was noted in the inquisition of Gilbert de Umfraville in 1308 whilst 10 were totalled there in 1330 on the death of his wife Elizabeth (Cal IPM V, 14, no.47; VII, 156, no.208; cf. Hodgson 1827, 109). Unfortunately in the absence of any further detail none of these dairy farms can be located more precisely within the manor, but it is likely that at least some lay in the hopes of upper Redesdale.

It is noteworthy that the Cottonshope ranch, itself can only be identified because its stock figured in a grant to an ecclesiastical institution, which thereby ensured the preservation of the associated documentation in the Chartulary of the Abbey of Kelso and also gave rise to a legal dispute over the rights to the tithe foals.