Show on map A Franciscan Friary was founded on this site around 1239 by the De Brus family.
Destroyed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries, a mansion was built in the early 17th century.
In the early 1800s it became the town workhouse, followed by the building being converted into a hospital in the 1860’s.
St Hilda’s Hospital developed on the site and this last original piece was left when the rest was demolished in 1987
Show on map On my previous visit to the site in mid-2014 this monument did not exist, it appeared a few months later.
It commemorates the death of 114 civilians, 9 soldiers and 7 sailors killed in the Bombardment of the Hartlepools on 16th December 1914.
It was erected to mark the 100th Anniversary and unveiled on 16th December 2014 by the Lord-Lieutenant of County Durham Sue Snowdon.
The engraving is tricky to photograph, but it a reproduction of the painting The Bombardment of the Hartlepools by James Clark, painted in 1915.
A huge amount of information about the events of that day is on display in the nearby Heugh Battery.
