AN historic clock in the centre of a market town is chiming again after undergoing repair work.

Specialist engineers were called in to fix the 1864 clock on Darlington market place after it stopped ringing at the right time.

Its bells of which were made by the same people who made Big Ben at the Houses of Parliament and is one of only four of its type in the country.

Clock repairers, Smiths of Derby were called in after it stopped chiming on the quarter-hour.

Peter Wilson, Darlington Borough Council's Markets Manager, said: "Around about Christmas time, we noticed that the peal on the clock tower was working properly and the bings and the bongs weren't going in sequence properly.

"It's something that the public of Darlington have enjoyed for almost 150 years and it would be nice to have it back." The clock, by Cooke of York, was donated to the town by Joseph Pease and the tower designed by Quaker architect Alfred Waterhouse in 1861.

* Read the full story in The Northern Echo today.