| Harton | |
|---|---|
 The church of St Peter, Harton Village, 2006 | |
  Harton Location withinTyne and Wear | |
| OS grid reference | NZ 3782 6513 |
| Metropolitan borough | |
| Metropolitan county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | SOUTH SHIELDS |
| Postcode district | NE34 |
| Dialling code | 0191 |
| Police | Northumbria |
| Fire | Tyne and Wear |
| Ambulance | North East |
| |
Harton is a suburban area ofSouth Shields,South Tyneside,Tyne and Wear, England. It was historically a village, however as the urban area grew it merged with its adjacent villages to become part of the town. Some of the original village buildings are still intact today, such as St Peter's Church. Until 1974 it was inCounty Durham.
The nameHarton appears to be ofOld English origin and is derived from the elementsheorot ("hart, stag") +dūn ("a hill"), giving the name a meaning of "stag's hill".[2]
The electoral ward of Harton, like all wards in the borough, votes for three councillors on theSouth Tynesidemetropolitan borough council.[3]
Harton is one of ten wards who vote for theSouth Shields seat in the UK Parliament, with an estimated electorate of 4098 people in the 2015 elections.[4]
The area of Harton contains two schools,Harton Academy serving pupils between 11 and 18 years old,[5] and Harton Primary School, serving pupils between ages five and 11 years.[6]
Harton was formerly atownship andchapelry in the parish ofJarrow,[7] in 1866 Harton became a separatecivil parish, on 1 November 1921 the parish was abolished and merged with South Shields andWhitburn.[8] In 1921 the parish had a population of 2437.[9] It is now in theunparished area of South Shields.
The village of Harton has been built around St Peter's Church for over 150 years now,[10] and the church is still active to this day. Other buildings of note in the village are The Vigilant Inn and The Old Shippubs. Opposite The Vigilant, the old walls of the village are still visible.
The whole town ofSouth Shields had horse-drawn, then electric trams, beforeelectric trolleybuses were introduced in 1936.[11]
There was a colliery near Harton established sometime in the 1800s, as it features on, and has full rail infrastructure on, the Ordnance Survey map of 1896.[12] There is also reference from the Durham Mining Museum to one fatality, where a man was "crushed in the cage" ('the cage' being slang for the carriage that transported men to and from the surface), on the 25 February 1851,[13] although it is not known how well-established the colliery was at this point.
Harton Colliery was the location of a successful experiment in 1854 by theAstronomer Royal,George Biddell Airy, to calculate the mean density of the earth by recording the difference in the movements of apendulum at the top and bottom of a coal mine.[14]