CASTLESIDE is a small village, and with Healeyfield township and Rowley hamlet was formed into an ecclesiastical parish July 28, 1863, from the parishes of Muggleswick and Lanchester. Castleside is 9 miles north from Stanhope, 16 south-west from Gateshead and about one mile from Rowley station on the Consett and Darlington section of the North Eastern railway, in the North-Western division of the county, west division of Chester ward, Lanchester union and petty sessional division, Consett county court district, rural deanery of Ryton, and archdeaconry and diocese of Durham. The church of St. John the Evangelist, erected in 1867, is a building of stone in the Early English style, consisting of apsidal chancel, nave, south porch and a turret containing one bell: there are 170 sittings. The register dates from the year 1867. The living is a vicarage, yearly value £300 (including £13 for glebe), with residence, in the gift of the Crown and the Bishop of Durham alternately, and held since 1864 by the Rev. Wesley Farrar M.A. of New Inn Hall, Oxford. The Wesleyan chapel here, erected in 1877, will seat 300 persons. There is also a Primitive Methodist chapel, erected in 1884, and seating 350 persons. A smelting mill at Watergate, Castleside, belongs to the firm of John Walton and Co.; and the Healeyfield Mining Co. are owners of the Healeyfield lead mines. Allansford House is the residence of James Hiddlestone esq. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners are lords of the manor, and with the Healeyfield Mining Co. John Walton and Co. and William John Scott are the landowners. The soil is sandy; the subsoil is gravel and stone. The chief crops are barley, oats and pasture.

The ecclesiastical district, taken in 1881, Castleside with Rowley, population, 1,676; acreage, 2,221; Healeyfield, population, 351; acreage, 1,282; rateable value, £2,894.

A School Board of 5 members was formed May 8, 1876, for Healeyfield & Cold Rowley; J. Proud, Castleside, Black Hill, clerk to the board; John Proud, Shotley Bridge, attendance officer.

Board School (mixed), built in 1877, for 203 children; average attendance, 200.