Natural England, working in partnership with English Heritage, Hadrian’s Wall Heritage, the Northumberland National Park and a land-owner, have funded £250,000-worth of work that has removed a half-mile section of Hadrian’s Wall from the English Heritage ‘At Risk’ register and protected a Site of Special Scientific Interest.

The money came through the government-funded Environmental Stewardship scheme that Natural England manages.

The work required 450 tonnes of sandstone walling to be brought in from Northumberland Stone’s Dead Friars Quarry in Weardale. It arrived on a temporary road, since removed, across the SSSI.

The stone was used to rebuild a dry stone wall that had been constructed on top of and alongside parts of the Roman wall in the 1890s to enclose animals in the adjacent fields. The collapse of this wall over the years had left the fragile core of the Roman remains exposed and vulnerable.