The Clockmaker of Amen Corner
Welcome to another of our Teesdale Tales, where local history, forgotten places and the people who shaped Teesdale come together.
This page tells the story of Thomas Humphreys, the Barnard Castle clockmaker whose little workshop once stood at Amen Corner beside St Mary's Church. It is the story of a family whose craftsmanship became known across Teesdale, of a remarkable clock that quietly watched over the town, and of the enduring tradition that links one local workshop with Charles Dickens.
Some parts of this story are well documented. Others have been handed down through generations of local people, appearing in newspapers, history books and family memories. Together, they tell the story of one of Barnard Castle's most memorable craftsmen.
So, let the story carry you back to a time when the hours of the day were measured by the swing of a pendulum, the turning of brass wheels and the steady hands of a man whose work was trusted throughout the town.
A Little Workshop Beside the Church
Long before cars filled the streets of Barnard Castle, there was a narrow corner beside St Mary's Church where people paused without really thinking about it.
The place was called Amen Corner.
It was never grand. The old buildings leaned a little closer together than they do today, their stone walls darkened by generations of weather. Market traders passed through with horses and carts, travellers entered the town through Newgate, and local people crossed the cobbles on their way to the Market Place.
Among those buildings stood a small clockmaker's workshop.
Behind its door worked Thomas Humphreys.
The room was probably much as you might imagine. Longcase clocks stood against the walls waiting for attention. Watches lay carefully arranged across the bench beside tiny files, screwdrivers and brass gears no bigger than a thumbnail. The only sound for much of the day would have been the gentle ticking of clocks waiting to be repaired.
Thomas had been born in Barnard Castle in 1787.
At nineteen he began his apprenticeship with the respected clockmaker Robert Thwaites, learning a trade that demanded remarkable patience and precision. After completing his training and spending several years working for the Chester-le-Street clockmaker John Bolton, he returned home in 1815 to establish a business of his own.
Amen Corner became that home.
From here, Thomas repaired clocks and watches for people across Barnard Castle and the surrounding villages. Before electricity, before radio time signals and long before mobile phones, families depended upon craftsmen like Humphreys to keep their clocks running accurately. A good clockmaker was not simply repairing machinery. He was helping the whole town keep time.
It was work that earned respect.
Slowly, Thomas Humphreys became known as one of Barnard Castle's finest craftsmen, and his little workshop became a familiar sight to generations of local people.
The Clock Everyone Looked At
As the business grew, Thomas was joined by his eldest son, William Humphreys.
William inherited his father's skill and soon proved himself to be an accomplished clockmaker in his own right. According to later horological accounts, an ornamental seventeenth-century Dutch longcase clock came into the Humphreys workshop in 1828 with a worn-out movement. The following year, William built and fitted an entirely new movement, bringing the old clock back to life.
Instead of hiding it inside the workshop, the family placed it in a niche beside the doorway.
It was impossible to miss.
People walking through Amen Corner soon came to know the clock almost as well as the men who cared for it. It stood quietly marking the hours while the town carried on around it, becoming one of Barnard Castle's best-known landmarks.
Local tradition tells of a time when the church clock stopped during a disagreement over the cost of repairs. While it remained silent, many people simply looked towards Humphreys' doorway instead. Whether every part of that story can still be proved or not, it captures something important about the place the workshop held in the life of the town.
The clock had become far more than a display piece.
It had become part of Barnard Castle itself.
When Charles Dickens Came to Barnard Castle
In 1837 and 1838, a young Charles Dickens travelled through this part of Yorkshire while gathering material for what would become Nicholas Nickleby. His visit to nearby Bowes is well known, but Barnard Castle has always claimed a story of its own.
For well over a century, local newspapers and historians have repeated the tradition that Dickens admired the famous clock at Humphreys' workshop while exploring the town. When Master Humphrey's Clock was published in 1840, many local people believed its title had been inspired by the Barnard Castle clockmaker.
No surviving letter or diary written by Dickens confirms the connection, so historians cannot say it is proven fact.
What can be said is that the story became firmly rooted in Barnard Castle itself.
By the early twentieth century, newspapers were already referring to the workshop as Master Humphrey's Shop, while visitors came hoping to see the famous clock that local people believed had helped inspire one of Dickens' best-known works.
Whether Dickens truly found his inspiration there or not, Thomas Humphreys' little workshop had become part of Barnard Castle's identity.
Some later accounts even suggest Dickens spent time talking with Thomas Humphreys before continuing to Bowes. Whether that conversation happened exactly as later writers described can no longer be proved, but it shows just how deeply the story became woven into Barnard Castle's history.
A Family Business That Kept Time
Thomas Humphreys had built more than a workshop.
He had built a family business.
His eldest son, William Humphreys, learned the trade from his father and became a skilled clockmaker in his own right. In 1839, William left Barnard Castle to establish his own business in Old Hartlepool, taking with him the famous Dutch longcase clock that had stood beside the doorway at Amen Corner.
Thomas, however, remained in Barnard Castle.
In 1842, he moved his own business from Amen Corner to larger premises at 9 Market Place. The move placed the family workshop in a brighter and more open part of the town, but the work remained the same: clocks and watches made, repaired and cared for by skilled hands.
Another of his sons, Thomas Gibson Humphreys, also followed the trade, working as a clockmaker alongside his father and helping carry the family name into another generation.
Thomas was not content to leave the doorway empty. After moving to the Market Place, he made a large round-faced clock bearing his own name and mounted it outside the new workshop. For many years, visitors believed this was the very clock Charles Dickens had admired at Amen Corner, unaware that William had already taken the original Dutch clock to Hartlepool.
The family business continued, but, as so often happens in family histories, success sat beside sadness.
Thomas Gibson Humphreys died at the age of just thirty-six. His death could have ended the family trade in Barnard Castle, but his widow, Elizabeth Humphreys, carried it on.
In the 1871 census, Elizabeth gave her occupation simply as Watchmaker.
That one word says a great deal.
At a time when few women were recorded in such a skilled trade, Elizabeth kept the workshop going and became the fourth and final member of the Humphreys family to earn a living as a clock and watchmaker in Barnard Castle.
Thomas Humphreys died in 1868, aged eighty-one.
Elizabeth continued the business until her own death in 1891. With her passing, more than seventy years of Humphreys clockmaking in Barnard Castle came to an end.
The Last Days of Amen Corner
Although the Humphreys family had moved on, Amen Corner itself remained.
The old buildings beside St Mary's Church still stood at the meeting of Newgate, The Bank and the Market Place. To some, they were an awkward corner in a town now dealing with modern traffic. To others, they were one of the last reminders of old Barnard Castle.
By the early 1930s, the future of Amen Corner had been decided.
Barnard Castle Urban District Council acquired the buildings through compulsory purchase as part of street improvements around Newgate and The Bank. Demolition followed in 1933 and 1934.
It was not a quiet ending.
Local newspapers reported that people gathered to watch the old corner come down. One account described part of the buildings collapsing with a roar "like the sound of an earthquake."
Among the buildings lost was the old shop remembered locally as Master Humphrey's Shop.
The demolition opened the view towards St Mary's Church that visitors see today, but it also removed one of Barnard Castle's most familiar historic corners.
What Can You See Today?
Stand beside St Mary's Church today and Amen Corner is hard to picture.
The buildings have gone.
The narrow shopfronts have gone.
The clock above the doorway is no longer there.
Yet Thomas Humphreys has not been forgotten.
A heritage plaque marks the site of his original workshop at Amen Corner, and another marks the family's later premises at 9 Market Place. Clocks bearing the Humphreys name also survive in museum and private collections, including examples connected with major collections of clockmaking and railway history.
If you pause beside the church gates and look towards Newgate, you are close to where the story began.
This was once a busy corner of tradesmen, townspeople, market days and passing travellers. Somewhere here, Thomas Humphreys built the reputation that made his name known across Teesdale. Somewhere here, a famous clock once stood beside a workshop door, marking the hours for anyone who cared to look.
A Story That Still Keeps Time
Whether Charles Dickens truly found the inspiration for Master Humphrey's Clock at Amen Corner can no longer be proved.
But that has never stopped Barnard Castle remembering the story.
For generations, the tale of Thomas Humphreys, his doorway clock and the visit of Dickens has been repeated in local newspapers, family memories and town histories. It has survived the moving of the business, the death of the family line, the demolition of Amen Corner and the passing of nearly two centuries.
That says something.
Thomas Humphreys was not a grand figure in national history. He was a local craftsman, working carefully at his bench, repairing the clocks and watches that helped ordinary people measure their days.
Yet his story still matters because it belongs to the fabric of Barnard Castle.
It reminds us that history is not only found in castles, battles and famous names. Sometimes it survives in a small workshop, a family trade, a clock above a doorway and a story that local people chose to keep telling.
The workshop has gone.
The famous clock has travelled elsewhere.
Even Amen Corner itself has changed beyond recognition.
Yet the name Humphreys still survives.
Not on a shop sign, but in the history of Barnard Castle, where one small workshop, one remarkable family and one famous clock became part of the town's story for generations to come.
An artist's impression of how Amen Corner may have looked before the buildings were cleared in the 1930s. Based on historic photographs, it gives a sense of the place rather than an exact reconstruction.
Part of our Discover Teesdale collection. Explore the dale’s walks, waterfalls, history and the stories of the people who shaped this place.
This tale is drawn from real events in Barnard Castle. Though the clockmaker’s first workshop has vanished from Amen Corner, the memory of his craft and the mark he left on the town continue to live on in Teesdale.
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