No 5 Colonel Cameron Encampment
No 5 Col. Cameron Encampment GUOKGH The encampment was opened by the then Grand Knight Commander, Sir Knight Ben Sherwood on 4th January 1889, the year John Cameron became Town Mayor. Since then, the camp has provided a further eight Grand Knight Commanders up to 1987 when SSKC RED Pape took command. It met in various hotels in West Hartlepool eventually moving to The Bull and Dog in Greatham where its meetings were suspended due to falling rolls. Thanks to the efforts of AKC Clive Warham OM, Past Grand Scribe, himself a member of No 5 Encampment, the camp was re-activated on 16th August 2024 and transferred to the Teesside District as a “special encampment” meeting on the 3rd Friday of February, May, August and November at The Coronation Inn, Acklam, Middlesbrough. But it was always the intention to bring the camp home to Hartlepool and thanks to the good efforts of brothers Karel and Richard Simpson, from 16th May 2025 No 5 Colonel Cameron Encampment meets at The Causeway, Stranton, Hartlepool, TS24 7QT. (above). However for operational reasons, the camp has moved a few miles along the A689 and now meets at the Wellington Inn, Wolviston TS22 5JY, near Billingham.
JOHN WILLIAM CAMERON was born of Scottish heritage in Kirkby Stephen, Cumbria in 1841 where he attended grammar school. By 1861 aged 20 he was living at the Railway Hotel (now called the Old Well Inn) near the Butter Market on The Bank in Barnard Castle. It was there that he served his apprenticeship as a brewer under the innkeeper, Peter Dent. John is also recorded in the census as being a clerk, a skill which would gain him employment in the future. It was also at this time that John became interested in the military and joined the Volunteer Rifle Corps. This interest was to feature in his future after he moved to Hartlepool, aged 24, in 1865. Hartlepool’s Lion Brewery began as the Tennant Street Brewery in 1835, in a small house with a mill in Hope Street, (later called Tennant Street) opened by a young farmer, William Waldon (sometimes reported as Waldron) from Gainford, Co. Durham. Despite there already being two other breweries in the area, the move paid off and Waldon’s venture was a success. The brewery however was on the wrong side of the tracks when the railway came to town in 1847 and was put up for sale. By 1851 the family were living in “Greenbank”, a house in Stranton and a year later Waldon bought a plot of land bounded by a barn and cowhouse to the North, and Stranton Street to the South. It was on this 857 square yard plot that he built the Lion Brewery.
Sadly, Mr Waldon died before taking up his office as Town Commissioner and the brewery was run by his widow, Jane, until her son William Jnr came of age. William Jnr. built several pubs in West Hartlepool and purchased others to achieve his ambition of becoming a major brewer in the area. Jane died in1860 and William Jnr carried on for a further five years. In 1865, in need of a clerk, he employed John William Cameron to run the business side of the brewery. William Jnr. died suddenly in 1872 and so John Cameron, now a Sub Lieutenant in the Rifle Corps, agreed with the trustees to take on a 21-year lease for the brewery and started expanding the business until 1893 when he bought the brewery outright. Assisted by his brother Watson, they changed the name to Cameron’s Brewery based in Stranton, Hartlepool where it remains to this day.
In a short time, Camerons bought up the Nixey Brewery, Coleclough & Baxter and Rickinson & Co., doubling their number of tied houses to 103. In equal short time, John was promoted to Captain and then in 1885 when the Rifle and Artillery Companies amalgamated, he was promoted to Lt. Colonel in the 4th Durham Volunteers. In 1881 John married Emma Victoria Chapman, and “Greenbank”, became their home before becoming the brewery offices and later those of Housing Hartlepool. John and Emma were involved in public works and kindness to the poor of the town. As well as running a successful brewing business, John became Alderman, Mayor (1889) and Town Commissioner.
John also took an interest in shooting on the Marske Hall Estate near Richmond, North Yorkshire and it was there on 28th December 1896, aged 55 years old, John William Cameron died of cancer. A special train carried members of the two corporations of “The Hartlepools”, along with officers of the 4th Durham Volunteers, family and friends to Richmond. His coffin, covered in the Union Flag, was carried on a gun carriage from Marske Hall, headed by a firing party of Durham Volunteers. He is buried in the churchyard of St Edmunds Church in Marske, Richmond, DL11 7ND. His wife Emma erected a window to John’s memory. It was unveiled by the Bishop of Richmond in May 1897, “to the Glory of God and one who loved this church and this place”. Perhaps the most important memorial to Col. Cameron was the Cameron Hospital which was presented to the town by his family.