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Alnwick Camp was built on The Pastures, a beautiful landscape in front of Alnwick Castle which housed thousands of soldiers in wooden huts before they were sent to the trenches.

The men were mostly from the Tyneside area and had joined local battalions like the Scottish Tyneside. But as there was no room to billet or train them in Newcastle, the Duke of Northumberland provided land for the camp at his castle some 35 miles north of Newcastle.

Many of the men were marched along the old A1 to great fanfare with crowds greeting them at places like Morpeth and Felton along the route.

Sadly, many of those men took part in the Battle of the Somme where the Tyneside Battalions suffered catastrophic losses.

Later in the war, the camp became a convalescent camp for wounded soldiers.

It was dismantled after the war and the huts auctioned off to local people.

Location: The Pastures, Alnwick Castle, Alnwick, Northumberland NE66 1NQ
Image: Alnwick Camp, courtesy of Dave Barras