Hexham Marts

By Clive Dalton

There used to be three marts at Hexham. The two on a Tuesday were made up of ‘the top mart’ where the whole range of stock were sold by Iveson and Walton. The mart was called the top mart as it was on the hill above the town’s main street and bus station. Stock were delivered there and taken away by wagon so it didn’t affect the town with traffic and odour.

The bottom mart was also on a Tuesday and was for dairy cattle and run by a different company. The chief auctioneer was Lesley Dent, noted for his fancy cap with a button on the top, and his very precise Cumbrian accent. One of our King’s College Ag students, Johnny Johnson went to work for the company where you could qualify in Land Valuation. Johnny also used to sell stock and was very good too. I was a bit jealous of him and his job, as I’d always fancied myself as an auctioneer having spent so much time at the Bellingham marts while at school.

The dairy cows at the low mart were all tied up individually for inspection in a byre, especially to allow you to draw milk from their teats. They were spotless and even had their great horns polished as many were Ayrshires. The auctioneer would give out such details as – ‘she’s got a slight spray in her left front teat but still being a very sound cow’.

Lesley Dent in my time was also the Chairman of the King’s College Agricultural Society which was for both old and current students, and members used to go on fact-finding tours. I went on a visit to Denmark with them to study farming, and remember adding to the entertainment on the bus by imitating Lesley as we went on a visit. Imitating his Cumbrian polite accent I auctioned a Shorthorn cow, introducing it and the owner with what I remembered I’d seen at the mart.

‘Now ladies and gentlemen, here’s a grand little Allendale cow from a grand little Allendale man’. I can’t remember what I knocked it down for, or how amused he was. I took a photo of him and another Northumbrian farmer visiting a beach on our Denmark tour – them in their suits and sticks standing looking at the bare tanned bikini bodies – maybe putting a value on them!

Friday was the Irish cattle sale day at Hexham, and it was held at the low mart. I can’t remember what company sold them, and never thought at the time about the journey the poor beasts had taken to get to Hexham every week. Thinking back now it’s almost incredible.

Cattle would be born and reared on Irish farms and at around 18 moths would be purchased by dealers (such as three McGuill brothers) for transport to Hexham, starting their journey by boarding a cattle boat at Belfast or Newry to land after a night at sea at Stranraer in Scotland. Then they would be transported by rail in cattle wagons to Hexham.

Looking at the map it’s hard to imagine how they stood the stress of the long journey as they had to pass Newton Stewart, Castle Douglas, Dumfries, Gretna Green before they even got to Carlisle. Hexham would then be about an hour from Carlisle as the train would not be able to travel at express speed.

They would be fed before sailing and perhaps on landing in Scotland, but nothing more till they were unloaded from the special siding at Hexham station next to a holding field which was always bare of grass. From the empty wagons in the siding at Hexham station, there looked to have been at least 20 of them. Each cattle wagon would hold about 10 cattle and with the constant motion, animals would have very little chance to lie down without being trampled on by others.

I remember being in Hexham one Friday when up the main road past the station was this enormous drove of cattle, steam coming out their front nostrils, and dung coming out the other end all over the road. They were being guided by men at front and back jogging to keep up, guiding them up into the low mart yards.

But oh what fun when the selling started. The first thing was that they were sold in large mobs so the selling pen was bursting full with very little room for the vendor to walk around the outside of them. Any smaller beast (and there always was one or two) was belted with his stick to chase it back into the middle of the mob to hide and not to be seen as the mob did their circling while the bid built up.

But the greatest moment was the climax when it got to the last bid, and the auctioneer would turn to the vendor and ask – ‘Are they on the market Jimmy’?. And Jimmy would look as if he was going to have heart attack, and bring out an appeal from a wide range that he always had at the ready. Here’s one of my favourites - ‘Holy Mary, mother of Jesus, I’ll die of hunger at that price’!

And those poor beasts would not be done yet, having more transport to suffer to their new home. Thankfully the trade has disappeared into farming history.