Buildings - St Mary's Tower, Marygate
July 2011
July 2011
This is St Mary's Tower, at the corner of Marygate and Bootham, a corner tower to the abbey wall. It once had a handsome information board on the Bootham side, explaining its significance, but that disappeared years ago.
This was the site of a major event during the siege of York - probably the major event, if we discount the famous battle of Marston Moor, which happened some miles away from the city itself. The tower partially collapsed, in June 1644, when mined by besieging forces trying to break the city's defences. Here was the only point where they succeeded, and the battle on the bowling greens followed.
I've always found it fascinating and picturesque, and have been looking at it more often of late, while trying to imagine how it might look with a giant observation wheel behind it.
Few people seem to appreciate St Mary's Tower. I guess that's why no one noticed recently that the broken bird deterrent netting under its eaves had killed so many pigeons, their corpses hanging pathetically from the netting. A sad sight, which reminded me of the gruesome customs of past centuries. Our ancestors would have seen corpses - human ones - hanging off the city's buildings. Heads on Micklegate Bar, and poor Robert Aske, leader of the Pilgrimage of Grace, was (according to some accounts) left to die hanging in chains from Clifford's Tower. We're a bit more civilised now, but apparently still leave birds to die hanging in netting on St Mary's Tower.
It's a shame this building isn't much noticed. With its disjointed bits and salvaged masonry it's a visible reminder of the 1644 siege, a part of our history which doesn't seem to have captured the public imagination.
There were many objection letters to the recent plan to site a tourist wheel here - I read most of them, and remember only one which specifically mentioned the site's connection to the siege of York.
The 'big wheel' plans have now been abandoned. Would putting a giant observation wheel behind this tower have enhanced our understanding? No, because York is best appreciated from pavement level. And unfortunately the intended wheel site is the same ground where the besiegers and the besieged fought, and where many died, in a frantic skirmish. Putting what is essentially a gentrified fairground ride on the site would be a little crass, perhaps.
Remaining at pavement level and looking upwards is available at no cost, and from down here we see the details, the unusual stonework, the damaged wall alongside, the faded wooden sign that still marks 'THE HAMLET OF ST MARY'S'.
And easier from down here to picture what it might have been like for the Parliamentarian armies outside the walls, in 1644, trying to break the defences of this Royalist garrison.