PLAWSWORTH, Kimblesworth and Nettlesworth huddle together alongside the main road between Chester-le-Street and Durham. Two of the villages, Nettlesworth and Kimblesworth, virtually merge into one, but Plawsworth, the most easterly of the three, is separated from its neighbours by the dual carriageway of the A167, or Great North Road as it was historically known.

The settlements that first bore the names of these villages were once much further apart than they are today. In fact, to get a full perspective of their history we should consider an area stretching from Edmondsley and Waldridge in the north to the outskirts of Pity Me and Newton Hall in the south.

Of these three worthy villages, Plawsworth is perhaps the only one occupying its original site. Unlike its neighbours it can't really be called a former pit village.

There was no great 19th Century colliery and the village has more of the feel of a rural age. A Plawsworth Colliery is mentioned in 1647, but was a small-scale enterprise compared with the standards of later centuries.

Today, several houses in Plawsworth are apartments or self-catering cottages developed in the late 1990s, but many buildings betray earlier, rural origins and the overall effect is quite picturesque.

Plawsworth's name dates to Anglo-Saxon times, and is first recorded in 1135. Intriguingly, the name signifies an enclosure for sports, games or amusements, but the nature of the play (plaw) area is unknown. We do know, however that "worth" was an AngloSaxon word for an enclosure.

In the 1100s, Plawsworth belonged to Simon Vitulus who provided greyhounds for the hunting expeditions of Durham's Prince Bishops. The family of one Prince Bishop called Richard Kellaw, held land at Plawsworth in medieval times.

Other medieval landowners included a family called Plawsworth, who were named after the village.

Plawsworth's land was divided into four parts in medieval times, making the history of its ownership rather complex. The landholders included the Daldens, Bowes, Claxtons, Lindleys and Reads.

After 1627, two separate segments of Plawsworth came into the hands of Barnaby Hutchinson, a proctor of Durham. His daughter and only heir married a South Shields man called Rowe and the Rowes gradually purchased additional portions of Plawsworth land.

Plawsworth Township covered approximately 1,244 acres in the 1850s and was the site of 58 homes. There were six farms, two pubs, a corn mill and a gentleman's house called Plawsworth Cottage. The cottage stood until quite recent times, half a mile north of Plawsworth, but was well across the western side of the A167 near Beaney Lane.

Most of Plawsworth is located along Wheatley Well Lane off the eastern side of the A167.

Unfortunately for the village, its pub, the Red Lion Inn, is inconveniently located on the west side of the road.

A former coaching inn, the Red Lion appears on the 1850s map, when crossing the road was less of a problem. It was a much smaller, cottage-like building in those days.

The map also shows that another coaching inn, called the Highland Laddie, stood slightly further south on the same side of the road.

The Highland Laddie was part of a roadside hamlet called Sunnyside that merged with Plawsworth Gate, a later row of 19th Century houses. Once inhabited by miners, only two Plawsworth Gate houses remain. Highlander farm, the former Highland Laddie Inn, lies to the south.

Directly opposite, across the A167, is Mill Lane, which leads off towards Leamside. A tollgate once stood near here from which Plawsworth Gate took its name.

Mill Lane proceeds east past the site of Plawsworth corn mill. The nearby house, called Mill House, dates from the early 1900s. The old mill was connected to a millrace fed by a stream that flows alongside the lane.

Further east, a railway viaduct carries the main London-Edinburgh railway line over the lane and then over the wooded dene formed by the stream.

Proceeding along the lane we enter an area of quiet lowland roads, wooded copses and scattered farmhouses. It is a sparsely populated area sandwiched between the A167 and the River Wear. The river is never more than a mile and a half to the east.

A Roman road runs through this area, but its course is uncertain. Rather mysteriously, it can be traced through Shincliffe and Sedgefield to the south and even through builtup Chester-le-Street and Gateshead to the north. The exact course near Plawsworth is unknown.

Farmhouses in this secluded area include the 18th Century Bishop's Grange, near Finchale Training College, and the delightfully-named Nag's Fold.

One private road leads to Harbour House Farm, an 18th Century property built on the site of a medieval manor.

It is located very close to the river but apparently takes its name from an old word, Herberwe, meaning lodgings. In medieval times it belonged to the same Kellaws who owned Plawsworth before passing to the Forcers who owned it until the 1780s.

A medieval chapel dating from 1432 once stood nearby and just south of the farm was a coal mine that had fallen out of use by the 1890s.

In the 19th Century, Harbour House belonged to Thomas Fenwick, a Newcastle banker who also owned Southill Hall just to the west near Plawsworth.

Dating from the 18th Century, the hall was substantially rebuilt for Fenwick by the Newcastle architect, John Dobson, in 1821.

Wheatley Well Lane, the road from Plawsworth, crosses the main railway line just north of Southill Hall.

Plawsworth Railway Station stood south of the lane on the eastern side of the railway. The line and station opened in 1868 but the station closed in 1963. It was demolished later in that decade but the line is, of course, still the main route from London to Edinburgh.

Next week, we visit Kimblesworth and Nettlesworth.

If you have Durham memories to share with The Northern Echo, write to David Simpson, Durham Memories, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington, DL1 1NF. E-mail David.Simpson@nne. co. uk or telephone (01325) 505098.