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On an Exposure of Sands and Gravels containing Marine Shells at Easington, Co. Durham

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2009

Extract

The purposes of this short paper are to place on record and to bring to the notice of geologists a deposit of sands and gravels containing numerous marine shells which is exposed on the Durham coast north of Easington. Marine shells (Littorina, Cyprina, etc.) have been collected before from sands and gravels lying above sealevel on this coast, but the deposits containing them have usually been removed in the course of quarrying operations, and no collecion of shells has been preserved in any museum; it is therefore of interest that a deposit has lately been observed which can be examined at any time by geologists, and from which specimens of shells can easily be obtained. It is also of importance that the exact mode of origin of these particular deposits should be determined.

Type
Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1920

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References

page 307 note 1 Shells were collected at Marsden by Howse and others at 100–50 feet, and also at Cleadon at 100 feet. I have collected shell fragments of Littorina, Cyprina, and Cardium and one whole specimen of Littorina from the Cleadon Sand Pit at 100 feet, and numerous entire specimens of Littorina littorea and fragments of Cyprina from sands and gravels in Fulwell Quarries at 150 feet. Trechmann has collected broken fragments of Mactra, Turritella, and Cyprina islandica from the Sheraton Kaims, which are about 4 miles inland at an elevation of 400 feet, and I have collected shell-fragments from the spreads of sand and gravel at Salton Piercy, near Hartlepool. It is, however, important to disconnect clearly the shell-bearing deposits which are found lying along the Durham coast up to 150 feet from the shell-bearing gravels and sands of the Kaims, and the spreads of sand and gravel which are associated with them.

page 308 note 1 “Old Sea-caves and Sea-beach at Whitburn”: Nat. Hist Trans. Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle, vol. vii, 1880, p. 361.Google Scholar

page 309 note 1 Geologist, 1860, p. 294.Google Scholar

page 309 note 2 Geology of Northumberland and Durham, p. 19.Google Scholar

page 309 note 3 Nat. Hist. Trans. Northumberland, etc., 1900, and Univ. Durham Phil. Soc. Trans., 1907Google Scholar; Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. lxi, 1905, and Geog. Journ., July, 1907.Google Scholar

page 309 note 4 Geog. Journ., July, 1907, P. 56.Google Scholar

page 309 note 5 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. lxxi, pt. i, 1915, p. 75.Google Scholar

page 309 note 6 It is peculiar that a kitchen midden occurs on Fulwell Hills about 20 feet above the highest point at which these gravels occur. The suggestion that the shells in these deposits were from a kitchen midden is shown, by the nature of the deposit at Easington and also by the fragments that can be got from almost any exposure, to have been nonsense.

page 310 note 1 Deposits have been observed raised from the sea bed in Spitsbergen by Garwood, Gregory, and Lamplugh.

page 310 note 2 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. lxxv, 1920.Google Scholar

page 310 note 3 It is admitted that shell-bearing gravels have been transported inland in County Durham. The question at issue is whether there has been an uplift of the coastal area of Durham since Glacial times.

page 310 note 4 I have not seen any Patella in place on the rock shelf, although some appeared to have been attached to the large pebbles in the gravel.

page 310 note 5 Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. lxii, 1915, p. 74.Google Scholar