Until the early years of the 19th century Seaham was a small farming community whose only claim to fame was that the local landowner's daughter, Anne Isabella Milbanke, was married at Seaham Hall to Lord Byron on 2 January 1815. Byron began writing his Hebrew Melodies at Seaham and they were published in April 1815.
It would seem that Byron was bored in wintry Seaham, though the sea enthralled him. As he wrote in a letter to a friend: "Upon this dreary coast we have nothing but county meetings and shipwrecks; and I have this day dined upon fish, which probably dined upon the crews of several colliers lost in the late gales. But I saw the sea once more in all the glories of surf and foam."
The marriage was short-lived, but long enough to have been a drain on the Milbanke estate. The area's fortunes changed when the Milbankes sold out to 3rd Marquess of Londonderry, who built a harbour in 1828 to facilitate transport of goods from the industries locally encouraged. However, this harbour later proved inadequate to deal with the millions of tonnes of Coal being mined from the nearby mines, and the 6th Marquess commissioned engineers Patrick Meik and Charles Meik to reclaim land and extend and deepen the dock. It was officially opened in 1905.
From 2001 most of the Durham coastline was designated as a ‘heritage coast’ and Seaham beach was entirely restored. In 2002 the Turning the Tide project won, jointly with the Eden Project, the prize for Outstanding Achievement in Regeneration in the annual Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors awards.
Today, the town has a population of around 22,000.
| Preceding station | [image] National Rail | Following station | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hartlepool | Northern Rail (Durham Coast) | Sunderland | ||