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The Interglacial Problem and the Glacial and Post glacial Sequence in Northumberland and Durham

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2009

Extract

THE features of the Glacial deposits and associated phenomena just discussed are in general so clear that most observers would arrive at the same conclusion regarding them, but there are some other features about which, either due to their controversial nature or the conflicting character of the evidence, there is not yet such general agreement. These are (a) the evidence for interglacial Periods in the Drift of these counties, (b) the raised beaches of East Durham, (c) the origin of the leafy clays, (d) the explanation of the distribution of fragments of certain rocks —Flint, Chalk, Magnesian Limestone—in the Superficial Deposits.

Type
Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1921

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References

page 60 note 1 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. lxi, 1905, p. 68.Google Scholar I also state that “some of the thicker deposits (of sand and sandy clay found intercalated in the boulder-clay) may represent epochs when the ice was melting quicker than others, but whether they can be considered in any sense as ‘ Interglacial ’ is very doubtful”.

page 60 note 2 Glacial Geology of Northumberland, op. jam cit. p. 93.Google Scholar

page 61 note 1 Op. jam cit., 1920, p. 193.Google Scholar

page 61 note 2 There is, however, distinct evidence that ice bringing Scotch erratics reached the Northumberland coastal region before that from the Lake District.

page 61 note 3 Trechmann, , Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. lxxv, pt. iii, 1920, p. 192.Google Scholar

page 61 note 4 Smythe, , Glacial Geology of Northumberland, p. 94.Google Scholar

page 61 note 5 The difficulty introduced by this is seen when the Basement clay of Holderness and the Scandinavian Drift of Durham are compared. The former contains English and Scottish erratics mixed with foreign rocks (“Geology of Holderness”: Mem. Geol. Surv., pp. 18–19). the latter only such boulders as could be brought by the passage of an ice-sheet from Norway. The Durham Basement clay must therefore on this hypothesis belong to an earlier period of glaciation than that of Yorkshire with an Interglacial period (or possibly two such intervals between). This is, however, not impossible, but it is evident that the glacial deposits of North-East England will have to be critically reexamined if an Interglacial epoch between the Durham Scandinavian and the British Drifts is accepted as proved.

page 62 note 1 Geikie, J., Great Ice Age.Google Scholar

page 62 note 2 Op. jam cit., Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., 1920, p. 176.Google Scholar

page 62 note 3 Geikie, J., Address to the Geol. Section of the Brit. Assoc., Newcastle, 1889, p. 19, where a similar view of the origin of the loess ie given.Google Scholar

page 63 note 1 Op. jam cit., p. 189.Google Scholar

page 63 note 2 Geology of Holderness (Mem. Geol. Surv.), 1885, p. 53.Google Scholar

page 63 note 3 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. lxxi, pt. i, 1915, p. 74.Google Scholar

page 64 note 1 Flint and Chalk are, as I shall show, so peculiarly distributed in the Superficial Deposits that I do not regard them as all having been brought by the Scandinavian ice to the area.

page 64 note 2 About 1903 Mr. Bell, of Bishop Auckland, sent to me two or three small pieces of rock which he had obtained from material dug up in excavations in Castle Eden Dane. One was a fragment of Laurvik syenite. I visited the locality shortly afterwards, and decided that it had been obtained from a gravel deposit and not from boulder-clay. I did not, therefore, record it at the time. In 1910 I saw a boulder of Laurvik syenite cemented in the foot of the cliff north of Castle Eden near Warren House Gill, and at the same time saw other evidence—that Dr. Treehmann has since, along with much new material, fully described—which convinced me that the Scandinavian ice had reached the Durham coast and that the boulders were true erratics. I therefore recorded the boulders in the Boulders Com. Report of the Univ. Durham Phil. Soc. (Proc. Univ. Durham Phil. Soc., vol iv, pt. ii, 19101911, pp. 8990) and in Proc Geol. Assoc., 1912.Google Scholar

page 65 note 1 Op. jam cit., p. 190.Google Scholar

page 65 note 2 There is a photograph of this deposit in my paper on the Superficial Deposits, op. jam cit., p. 68.Google Scholar

page 65 note 3 e.g. Bullerwell, , “Section of the Cliffs near Newbiggen by the Sea, etc.”: Nat. Hist. Trans. Northumberland, etc., vol. iv, pt. i, 1914, pp. 61–6.Google Scholar

page 65 note 4 Glacial Geology of Northumberland, ibid, pp. 98–9.

page 65 note 5 Bullerwell regards some of the granites as being from Aberdeen.

page 66 note 1 I regard them as true Raised Beaches.

page 66 note 2 On the Superficial Deposits around Newcastle-upon-Tyne”: Proc. Univ. Durham Phil. Soc., vol. iii, pt. iii, 1909.Google Scholar

page 67 note 1 See photographs op. jam cit., pl. i.Google Scholar

page 67 note 2 Trechmann, , op. jam cit., 1920, p. 192.Google Scholar

page 67 note 3 See description of such a boulder by Professor Lebour, Proc. Univ. Durham Phil. Soc., vol. ii, pt. ii, 19011902, p. 81.Google Scholar

page 68 note 1 Has been recorded from the Horsebridge Head gravels, Lyne Burn deposit, from clays in the Tyne valley, from the Raised Beach deposit at Cleadon.

page 68 note 2 This table is only intended to show the general sequence of events: there must have been considerable overlapping, but the general order in which they took place is considered to be something of this nature.

page 69 note 1 and 3 If Interglacial Periods did not occur, then the Scandinavian ice must have occupied the North Sea area continuously during the glaciation of the two north-eastern counties. It was the first to reach the Durham coast, and the Tweed-Cheviot ice was held along this region by it until the retreat of the British ice had commenced. The Sewerby Raised Beach, the Horsebridge Head deposit, as well as the Interval-deposits given, may have been formed between 2 and 4. The Basement Clay of Holderness, if, as already suggested, it is not contemporaneous with the Durham Scandinavian Drift, may have been deposited and the Bridlington Crag also pushed inland in the period between 2 and 4. The Kelsey Hill deposits were probably carried inland at the same time as the Durham Kaims of Grindon, Warden Law, and Sheraton were formed.

page 69 note 2 As already stated there is evidence for an advance of ice from Scotland along the coastal region of Northumberland before the western ice occupied the area.

page 69 note 4 On the hypothesis that there was an Interglacial period before the Scandinavian ice reached England; if only a Glaciation-Interval, then Preglacial as far as North-East England is concerned.