49 
A PEAT DEPOSIT AT STOKESLEY. 
BY REV. JOHN HAWELL, M.A., F.G.S. 
{Read August ith, 1899.) 
On this occasion of the meeting of the Yorkshire Geological 
and Polytechnic Society at Stokesley, it has seemed to me to be 
fitting to bring briefly before you a notice of a Post-glacial Peat 
Deposit or Porest Bed which occurs in the immediate vicinity 
of our place of meeting, and of which, so far as I know, no 
record has previously been made public. 
In the autumn of 1892, Mr. Henry Fawcett, Head Master 
■of the Preston Grammar School, Stokesley, called my attention 
to a section exposed in digging a tank in the garden adjoining 
his house, some few yards east of the river Leven. After passing- 
through 5 ft. 6 in. of surface soil and alluvial matter a thickness 
of 1 ft. 6 in. of fine clay was met with, and immediately below this 
occurred a peaty deposit, the depth of which was not ascertained. 
Subsequently Mr. Fawcett and I gained further information 
regarding this bed of peat. Some years previously, when the 
late Canon Bruce was rector of Stokesley, he made an attempt 
to sink a well near the rectory, which is on the same side of 
the stream. The same bed of peat was then reached. The 
water which came up smelled so offensively that the well had to 
be filled in again immediately. But before doing this the 
workmen thrust an iron rod into it to the depth of 12 ft. At 
a depth of 9 ft. from the surface they met with leaves and 
twigs of trees. There is a mill at a distance of two fields from 
Mr. Fawcett's house, and when the foundations of this mill were 
being dug a tree of black oak was found embedded in the clay 
at a depth of about 7 ft., and below it occurred hazel bushes 
with nuts upon them at a depth of 10 ft. from the surface of 
the ground. At a greater depth gravel was come upon. In 
a garden adjoining the mill some large horns were found at 
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