Images and Site Records from an Archaeological Watching Brief at Harby Brow Tower, Mealsgate, Wigton, Cumbria 2022

This collection comprises images and scanned site records from an archaeological watching brief by Oxford Archaeology (OA) North at Harby Brow Tower, Mealsgate, Wigton, Cumbria. The fieldwork was completed in three days between 24th October and 11th November 2022, and was undertaken as a condition of Listed Buildings Consent (planning ref: LBC/2022/0035).
The site consists of a scheduled Pele tower (Scheduled Monument No.: 1007257), as well as a farmhouse and adjoining barn, which, along with the Pele tower are Grade 1 listed buildings (Listed Building Ref.: 1327215).
The archaeological watching brief involved the monitoring and recording of the archaeological remains encountered during the groundworks associated with the proposed residential redevelopment. The groundworks, involving the installation of new foul and surface water drainage, was undertaken by a mechanical excavator fitted with a toothless ditching bucket, under direct supervision by a suitably qualified and experienced archaeologist at all times. Any spoil arisings were checked, and any finds were retained.
All of the drainage trenches and new septic tank pit were monitored by an archaeologist and no archaeological remains were observed. This is potentially due to the scale of the excavations being minimal, the trenches were only 0.4m wide and excavated to a maximum depth of 0.5m, whilst the pit for the septic tank was larger, it still only covered a small area. The ground and light conditions throughout the fieldwork were favorable, as such if archaeological remains had been present, they would have been easily identified.