Turret 5A, known as Quarry House turret, was one of the regularly spaced observation towers built into the fabric of Hadrian's Wall, positioned between Milecastles 5 and 6 in the eastern sector approaching Newcastle (Pons Aelius). Like other Wall turrets, it was constructed in the AD 120s under Hadrian and would have been a small stone tower roughly 4–5 m square internally, manned by a handful of auxiliary soldiers drawn from the nearest milecastle or fort, providing surveillance over the Wall's berm and the ground to the north.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
As part of the integrated turret-milecastle system, it contributed to the close-interval signalling and observation network that defined the Wall's eastern approach to its terminus, an area of dense military infrastructure close to the bridge crossing of the Tyne.
Very little survives or has been investigated at this turret; its presumed location lies under the modern suburban landscape of east Newcastle, and unlike better-preserved central-sector turrets (e.g. 26B Brunton, 29B Black Carts) it has not produced significant excavated remains or published structural evidence.
Turret 5A, known as Quarry House turret, was one of the regularly spaced observation towers built into the fabric of Hadrian's Wall, positioned between Milecastles 5 and 6 in the eastern sector approaching Newcastle (Pons Aelius). It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a watch tower site from the Roman period in Britain.
Turret 5A is classified as a Roman watch tower — a military site in the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer. Roman Britain's archaeology encompasses thousands of sites ranging from legionary fortresses and marching camps to villas, temples and towns.
Several Roman sites lie within a short distance, including Turret 5B (0.5 km), Milecastle 5 (Quarry House) (0.5 km), Turret 4B (0.9 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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