At the side of a quiet country lane in rural Northumberland, a small, pokey farmhouse squats forlorn and abandoned – its rickety fixtures showing the effects of time and neglect.
And on the other side of the road, the house’s previous residents are very angry indeed.
Because the Beal family can perhaps claim to be the ultimate victims of governmental incompetence as highways chiefs forced them out of the home – which they had occupied for 118 years – to make way for a road that has never been built.
The Beal family moved into Charlton Mires in 1904 and four generations have farmed the land ever since.
But three years ago Martin Beal, 61, his wife, daughter and his parents were forced to make a heartbreaking exit from the farm and steadings in Northumberland.
They were left with no choice as it was in the path of what would become the newly widened A1, the cross border route linking Newcastle and Edinburgh.
Government mandarins made it clear Charlton Mires, which is near Alnwick, would have to be flattened and their family history with the rambling old farmhouse could not stand in the way of progress.
The Beals moved out into properties nearby and could only stand by and watch as the old house steadily fell into rack and ruin as they waited for the bulldozers to roll in and begin the long-awaited dualling of the A1.
Pictured: Michael Beal who lost his farm where his family have worked for generations as part of a plan to dual the A1
An aerial view of the family farm by the A1 in Northumberland
The Beal family moved into Charlton Mires in 1904 and four generations have farmed the land ever since
But last year their heartbreak turned to fury when the new Labour government scrapped the dual carriageway scheme because the black hole in the country’s finances meant it was just too expensive.
It meant the anguish of moving out had been for nothing, but there will be no reprieve for Charlton Mires – it will be demolished anyway at an estimated further cost of £100,000 to the taxpayer.
Martin Beal said: ‘It is complete madness that a 200-year-old house which our family moved into in 1904 has been sacrificed for a road which now is not being built.
‘It’s hard to describe how great an emotional attachment my family have for that place, my father was born in that house and he lived there until the moment came when it was made clear he simply had to move.
‘It’s heartbreaking for him now to see the state it is in because it has not been looked after or lived in for over three years. He can’t bring himself to go back and look at it.
‘And for me it feels as though a family legacy has ended with me and it’s made so much worse by the fact that it never needed to happen at all.
‘The only foreseeable outcome now is that it will be demolished completely even though the road it was to be buried beneath isn’t going to be built.
‘Words fail me when I think about the huge waste of public money and the unnecessary suffering placed on my family.
‘If the people responsible had to run a business, like we do, they would go bust, it’s been an absolute shambles.’
At first the Beals tried to fight back, assuming there must be something they could do to hang onto the farm.
A visualisation of the proposal for the Charlton Mires junction on the A1 following the proposed dualling of the road
Mr Beal is seen standing by his abandoned farm. He lost his wife to cancer in the upheaval
But it became clear that their departure was compulsory and all they could do was bargain over the terms.
The family was promised fair compensation to build a new home close to their old one, but far enough away for it not to impede the passage of the A1.
The one condition on building their new home was that Charlton Mires would be demolished – and even though the road is not being built that condition remains in place.
Mr Beal said: ‘When we start to build the new house, Charlton Mires will be bulldozed and there’s nothing we can do about that because we don’t own it any more.
‘There isn’t a solution that suits us any more, the house will be lost whatever happens – in reality it is already lost to us.
‘I have so many problems with the Highways Agency, it’s not just about the house.
‘They started doing test drilling on the land as they prepared for the road, but they left behind great ditches that filled with water and two of our sheep fell into them and died.’
All the Beals have left of Charlton Mires now are sepia photographs from a bygone era.
Martin’s great grandfather and grandmother, Thomas and Mary Ellen Beal, took ownership in 1904.
It then passed into the possession of their son George Beal, whose son Gordon, Martin’s dad, was born in the house in 1936.
Gordon and wife Gladys continued farming the land until Martin stepped up to join them at the age of 20 in the mid 1980s.
Martin, a father of one daughter, said: ‘Despite that long family connection going back generations we were only ever viewed as collateral damage, they just didn’t care about the history of the place or what it meant to us. It’s incredibly sad.’
An aerial photograph of the property in Northumberland dating from the 1970s
Whilst grieving the loss of the family home, Martin also lost his wife, Amanda, to cancer while the unwelcome transition was taking place. ‘It’s been a very very hard time,’ he says.
Plans to dual the A1 have rumbled on for decades but a firm plan to make it happen was announced in 2014 by then Prime Minister David Cameron and consultations began with families whose homes were standing in the way.
The A1 scheme stalled for a few years, alternating between ready to start and still on hold until, in May 2024, Rishi Sunak’s government approved the Development Consent Order which gave the final go-ahead.
However, Labour swept back into power two months later and cancelled the project in October 2024, stating it had to make ‘difficult decisions about road schemes which were unfunded or unaffordable’.
By this time an astonishing £68million had been spent on consultations and preparatory work for the new road, which was suddenly all for nothing.
Mr Beal said: ‘I heard about it on the news and just sat there in disbelief. The sheer wastefulness of money paid by the taxpayer is amazing.
‘And that’s before you even consider the terrible effects it had on families like ours.’
Others were also devastated by the A1 plans – with one couple forced to start afresh miles away in Cumbria.
Meanwhile Wendy and Julian Wensby-Scott, were forced out of Northgate House, near Morpeth, after 10 happy years there.
Mrs Wensby-Scott told the BBC of the day in October 2024 when she discovered Labour had performed a U-turn.
She said: ‘When I heard the news, I just thought ‘oh my God all that for nothing’.
‘Everything we went through, the heartache, the angst, I just couldn’t believe it.
‘You drive past now and it’s falling apart, it just looks awful. It’s such a shame, it was such a beautiful house.’
Another family said they were forced to move miles away from their friends after their cottage, on the route, was affected by the now abandoned plans.
Felicity and James Hester, whose home was near the village of Rock, described their home as the ‘perfect place’.
They said they went through four to five years of ‘utter hell’ trying to find a new place to move to.
National Highways said: ‘We carefully review expenditure on all our projects to ensure that lessons are learned and processes are improved for any future road improvement schemes.
‘Discussions surrounding the future of the homes purchased as part of this scheme remain ongoing and will be communicated in due course.
‘The properties are being managed by our estates team until a strategy is agreed.
‘During this time, the properties will be secured by our maintenance contractor and inspected on an appropriate basis.’
