Albert and Percy

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Ron Myatt of the Great Wyrley Local History Society has been back in touch with the names of the other two members of the Staffordshire Yeomanry pictured here with a young Frank Halfpenny at some time during the First World War.

Frank Halfpenny, later Sheriff and Mayor of Lichfield (left), Albert Handley (centre) and Percy Johnson (right)

In the centre of the photograph is Albert Handley, and Ron has very kindly passed on to me the following information given to him by Albert’s son.

Albert Handley was born in Bridgtown in 1893. He was the second son of Jairus and Elizabeth Handley (formerly from Willenhall) and brother of Charles, Ellen, Ethel and Maud.  The family moved to moved to Landywood (part of Great Wyrley) and Jairus Handley worked in several pits. Albert was educated at Great Wyrley Council School and left aged 14. Afterwards he went to the Evening Institute where he learnt mathematical skills and secretarial techniques. Albert worked in brickyard in Bridgtown before taking a clerical post with Siemens Electrical, Stafford. Although Albert was employed in a ‘reserved occupation’, in 1915 he managed to enlist in the Staffordshire Yeomanry, where he served until 1919.

After mustering at Burton on Trent, the 3rd / 1st Staffs Yeomanry were affiliated to the 12th Reserve Cavalry Regiment at Aldershot where Albert learned to ride horses and was promoted to NCO rank. In 1916, they served in Egypt, Palestine and Syria. During his service, Albert contracted a near-fatal dose of malaria.

Back home, Albert met Winifred Sambrook ,an infant school teacher, and they were married in 1924. Between 1919 and 1949, he was employed as a clerk at a large mine but also took on additional roles including church officer, society steward and Trustee of Wyrley Wesley Methodist Church. Albert also helped to set-up the fund for first Doctor’s Practice, was the founding Treasurer of the Wyrley Branch of the Nursing Association, and set-up a branch of the Ideal Benefit Society collecting subs and making pay-outs.

In 1937, Albert was appointed clerk of the Parish Council which brought with it a large range of duties including opening libraries, supervising burials, responsibility for recreation grounds and tennis courts as well as administrative tasks. In 1949, he became a Magistrate for Cannock and Penkridge Bench in 1939, eventually being elected chair.

During the Second World War, Albert was a founding member of Civil Defence Corps in 1939, who were responsible for recruiting wardens, issuing gas masks, organising training and dealing with the arrival and billeting of evacuees from Margate. In 1949, Albert became a local Government Officer in the Rating Department of Cannock RDC. Albert died in 1975.

The third man in the photo is Percy Johnson, who Ron believes was Lichfield farmer. However, we know nothing more about Percy, and would be grateful to hear from anyone who is able to help.  I’d also be interested to know the story behind this photograph. Why were Frank, Albert and Percy photographed together, and when was the photograph taken?

If you do have any further information on any of the above, please send me an email or leave a comment below, or alternatively you can leave a message for Ron on the Great Wyrley Local History Society guestbook here.

Ooh La La

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When old buildings at the back of the Bolton Warehouse Company’s shop on Bird St (1) were being demolished in December 1960, a large circular room containing murals created with shells and pebbles, was found above a ceiling. One mural depicted the Cathedral, another a tree and the third was some kind of summerhouse on top of a hill (2).

The murals are thought to have been created by French prisoners of war, on parole in the city.  According to the County History, Lichfield had long been used as a place to quarter French prisoners, due to its position on a main road (and I have also read that it had something to do with us being about as far from the sea as you can get!).  On 7th January 1747, the Staffordshire Advertiser reported that a party of seventy four passed through Stafford on their way to Lichfield, where they were to be put on parole. It also mentioned a house on Bore St, where there was a cooper’s shop at the back used by prisoners (3). Eighty arrived in Lichfield in 1797 during the Napolenic Wars and in 1809, forty officers were quartered here. It seems that Dr Johnson’s birthplace was also occupied by a prisoner –  in The European Magazine for 1810, a contributor called ‘TSW’ wrote, “The house in the market place in which our great lexicographer born still remains nearly in its original state. It is now inhabited by Mr Evans a brazier and a part of it, believed to be the very room in which he first drew his breath is now let to a French prisoner of war”. According to their website, Pipe Hill House on the Walsall Rd also hosted some of the prisoners.

As well as spending their time creating enigmatic artworks, some of the prisoners gave French lessons to the city’s residents.  If the fragment of a page of French exercises, found in the same room as the Bird St mural was discovered, is anything to go by, the teachers had their work cut out. The sentences on the fragment of paper had been heavily corrected, with the comment ‘very bad’ at the end! Perhaps the Darwin and Wedgewood children who were taught French by one of the prisoners at Darwin’s house on Beacon St were better students?

The old clinic on Sandford St? Is it me or can anyone else see numbers in the brick work on the second storey?

In September 1951, the author of the ‘Round and About with Clock Tower” section of the Lichfield Mercury visited the site of the mural accompanied by the caretaker, Mrs Disney, and reported that the ‘pictures’ were still in existence in the dome-like roof of a derelict outbuilding behind the Sandford St Clinic (4). One side featured ‘a perfect replica of Lichfield Cathedral, made entirely from small stones, bits of glass and sea shells’  and other pictures included a ‘mosque-like building’, (which the reporter failed to recognise (5)), several ‘beautifully executed trees’ and a map of Lichfield. The outbuilding was in a poor condition, described as being encased in a mass of creepers, with two gaping holes in the roof. There was also a large hole in the floor, and as if things weren’t exciting enough already, Mrs Disney told the reporter that there were two passages running beneath the hole – one leading to the rear of the property and one believed to connect with the old ‘monk’s passages’ beneath the Friary.

Box made by French Prisoners of War (c) Lichfield District Council

Sadly, I think that this ‘Disney’ story doesn’t have a happy ending as the outbuilding was been demolished and the treasures inside lost (although there is the possibility that as the murals were still in existence in the 1950s/1960s someone may have been foresighted enough to photograph them?). However, there is a small consolation at Lichfield Heritage Centre in the form of a wooden box carved by French prisoners quartered in the area.

Edit 18/6/2015
A display at Lichfield Museum at St Mary’s features a photograph and a chunk of the mural together with the wooden box and some information about the soldiers themselves. St Mary’s is also staging a costume drama called ‘Lichfield’s Waterloo’ by the Lichfield Players on Friday 26th June and Saturday 27th June. More information here

Notes

(1) Does anyone have anymore information on the Bolton Warehouse Company’s shop, particularly where it was on Bird St?

(2) Could this have been a representation of Borrowcop Gazebo? The PMSA record (here) says ‘In 1694 a building called ‘the Temple’, probably stood on Borrow Cop Hill, in the 1720s an arbour was recorded, by 1750 this replaced by a summerhouse which may have been the cruciform building there in 1776. In 1756 the corporation ordered a line of trees along the path to the summit, with extra trees in 1783, possibly in connection with a fete champetre held in that year. By 1805 the building was replaced with one of brick with two arches each side and seats around to admire the view, the funds were raised by public subscription’. On the subject of Borrowcop, I just found at that an information board was installed up there in September (more about that here).

(3) Again, where would this have been?

(4) I understand that the clinic occupied the former premises of the Victoria Nursing Home which was on Sandford St until it moved to the Friary and became the Victoria Hospital.

(5) Any ideas as to what building this could be depicting?

Sources

Lichfield and Archaeological & Historical Society Transactions vol 2 1961

Lichfield: Education’, A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 14: Lichfield (1990), pp. 170-184

Lichfield: From the Reformation to c.1800′, A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 14: Lichfield (1990), pp. 14-24

The European Magazine for 1810

Lichfield Mercury 21st September 1951

A Frank Discussion

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I’m a big fan of place names that actually mean something, rather than the pretty but ultimately empty kind that are sometimes embraced by developers. The authors of one of my all time favourite books ‘England in Particular’ have this to say on the subject,

“Names carry resonances and secrets. Respect local names and add new ones with care. It is not good enough to call a new estate Badger’s Mead when the badgers have been destroyed.”

Recently there was a notice in the Lichfield Mercury that the name ‘Halfpenny Lane’ had been assigned to a new development off the Walsall Road (1).  If streets, buildings, etc, are to be name after local people, then I think its important to know who those people were and what contribution they’ve made to that place. The following information was very kindly provided by Colin Halfpenny, son of Frank and Mary Halfpenny.

Frank Halfpenny was born on 11th September 1897 in Goldenhill, Stoke on Trent. At the age of fourteen he was apprenticed to Marsdon and Sons, a tailor and outfitting firm in Newcastle under Lyme. Between 1916 and 1919 Frank served in the Staffordshire Yeomanry as a signaller, spending time in Egypt and Palestine.

This photograph was sent to me by Ron Myatt of the Great Wyrley Local History Society. Ron and I had a chat about it – we understand that it shows Frank Halfpenny whilst serving in WW1, but the identities of the other men are unknown. If anyone can help, Ron and I would be very grateful!

On his return, Frank was appointed manager of John Key and Sons Tailors and Outfitters  in Market Street , Lichfield and lodged with the Misses Arnold of the Coffee Shop on Church Street (opposite to the vehicle entrance to Wintertons Saleyard). He was a keen sportsman, playing football and cricket for Lichfield teams. In 1923, Frank was appointed theMidland Area Representative for D Gurteen and Sons, clothing manufacturers of Haverhill, Suffolk. On New Year’s Eve 1924 Frank married Mary Emma Tayler.  Both were lifelong Methodists holding active posts both in the Lichfield Church and on the Lichfield and Tamworth Circuit. Eleven years later, Frank purchased Mr B T Sadler`s drapery and ladies outfitting shop opposite the Johnson Statue in Market Square

At the 1935 AGM of the cricket club Sam Brown (the father of Cuthbert Brown who published several books on growing up on Beacon St) the Treasurer told the members that the club finances were very low and that a method of raising them had to be found.  Frank offered the club a cup to be played for with an annual competition, this was agreed to and the competition was started amongst local village clubs in 1936. This has been played for every year since then and is thought to be the oldest 20×20 competition in the country. He was also a member of several bowls clubs, the allotments association and the City Institute where he enjoyed a game of billiards or snooker.

In 1936 he was elected to the City Council and became Sheriff in 1938. At the same time his father in law, Councillor F M Tayler, (later to become Alderman and a Freeman of the city) started his second year as Mayor. Many people will know the photograph of Frank maintaining the tradition of the Sheriff’s Ride in 1939, accompanied by Sam Ashley who at 70 years of age had followed the ride each year from when he was 7 years old.  Sam had walked to Four Oaks and collected the horses then rode to Lichfield , round the city boundary, back to Four Oaks and walked home again. The following year, Frank presented Sam with a copy of this photo. Sam replied that the day had always been a pleasure all his life and he had always enjoyed it, noting that ‘there were not above three people alive who went round when he was a boy and he hoped to go on as long as he could’. During the War Frank was also a prominent member of the ARP and spoke all over the Midlands for the Ministry of Information on national security, instructing Home Guard units on signalling.

Frank was a member of many committees and was Chairman of the Lichfield, Tamworth and Sutton Coldfield Hospital Committee for a long time and was also elected onto Staffordshire County Council. He was a magistrate on the County Justices Bench and Mary his wife was on the City Justices Bench. In 1965/6 Frank was elected Mayor of Lichfield, and after his death on May 12th 1966 , his wife Mary took his place as Deputy Mayor for 1966/7. Mary Halfpenny he was then appointed Sheriff in 1968 (when Ena Millard was Mayor) and became Mayor in 1971.

Mrs Halfpenny is on the front row of the above photograph, fourth from left. Until writing this I have to confess that I had assumed that the lane had been named after Mr Halfpenny, but clearly Mrs Halfpenny was also an active member of the community, and so perhaps the name should commemorate both of them? The photo was very kindly sent to me by David Shaw whose father John Shaw is sitting on the second row (second from left). In a nice bit of synchronicity, John wrote wonderful local history books, one of which is about the street names in Lichfield!

Colin Halfpenny also provided this photograph taken outside Christ Church Boys Club in 1939, when the Duke of Gloucester visited. It shows Cllr Halfpenny (the Sheriff), his father-in-law Cllr Tayler (the Mayor), and the chairman of the Youth club committee (name unknown, possibly a local bank manager?) with the Duke.

Notes:
(1) I can’t think whereabouts this is and am a little reluctant to go and look as with my poor sense of direction and the labyrinthine nature of the estate I always struggle to find my way back out again! Does anyone else know?
(2) Thanks so much to Colin, David and Ron for providing the above information and photographs.
(3) Information on presentation of photo to Sam Ashley taken from Lichfield Mercury archive

Get The Drift?

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Over at Curborough Craft Centre today, I noticed a plaque on one of the converted farm buildings explaining that it was a former drift house, possibly built on the foundations of an earlier building.

Back at home, I tried to find out what exactly a drift house was used for.  It seems there are plenty of them around (including one in Stonnall) but no real explanations as to exactly what purpose they served. And believe me I’ve looked – I googled, I read (an English Heritage study into farm buildings of the West Midlands and some ye olde book on farming) and I attempted to apply logic but all to no avail.

However, what I did find was that the drift house at Curborough was surveyed in August 1984 along with other agricultural buildings in the Curborough and Elmhurst area. The report on the Heritage Gateway site includes the following information – “Mrs Hollinshead referred to this as a ‘drift barn’. It is in a poor condition; the doors are blocked with corrugated sheeting, the roof is gone and is replaced with corrugated sheeting and the north-east side has been repaired”. The report was part of the Domesday survey of barns in Staffordshire co-ordinated by the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings in 1985 and clearly the building has had a lot of TLC since then. You can read it here.

Anyway, eventually, I gave up and went off on a tangent. I’d read previously that the place name Curborough is thought to derive from the Old English ‘cweorn burna’. However, what I didn’t know is that there have been an abundance of archaeological finds in the area, indicating that Curborough was inhabited long before the Anglo-Saxons decided to build a mill on the stream here.  A site near to the farm has been identified as a possible Roman settlement with large quantities of coins, brooches, pottery, tiles and glass being discovered in the late 1990s. It seems even the Romans were relative latecomers, with Mesolithic, Bronze Age and Iron Age finds also being unearthed nearby. So many wonderful discoveries and so much more to learn about this fascinating place I’m sure. However, at this moment in time, I’ll settle for an explanation of what a drift house (or barn) is, if anyone can help!

Sources

http://www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=MST4660&resourceID=1010

‘Townships: Curborough and Elmshurst’, A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 14: Lichfield (1990)

A New Penny

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New Lichfield pub ‘The Saxon Penny‘ is due to open on the 18th November (the day before my birthday in fact!). Its name, as you may have guessed, has been inspired by the Staffordshire Hoard discovered a couple of miles up the road.

The building of the Saxon Penny reverses the trend which has seen this side of Lichfield lose many of its pubs.The Carpenter’s Arms on Christchurch Lane was demolished and replaced by an apartment block. The Three Tuns on the Walsall Road still exists but in the form of a restaurant rather than an inn. The Royal Oak’s original premises at Sandyway, later a farmhouse, is today nothing more than a pile of bricks and a broken down barn awaiting development of some kind. The pub relocated in the 1860s, to a position a little further up the road at Pipehill, but that too has vanished. The Royal Oak is discussed in much more detail on Brownhills Bob’s Brownhills Blog here.

Three Tuns, December 2012

Remains of Sandyway Farm, December 2012

Wall at site of Royal Oak, Pipe Hill

Last week on my day off I had stacks to do but the sun was shining and so I went for a walk with my Mum up Pipe Hill, on the basis that with Autumn in the air you have to take your opportunities whilst you can (a good call as it happens. I don’t think I’ve seen the sun since!). We stopped to look at the site of the Royal Oak at Pipe Hill. I’ve heard that rubble from the building still remains on site. A chap we met later on the walk told us that there were also three cottages here, cut into the rock and that you could still see the chimneys. Well, of course we looked but we couldn’t see them, and so will need to return once winter has taken its toll on the plant life.

In the meantime, I decided to look at the newspaper archive to see what information there was on these pubs and buildings. I found that one of the licensees of the Three Tuns, Frederick Henry Shilcock, wrote poetry as well as pulling pints. Originally Mr Shilcock was in the hosiery trade, before serving in France during the First World War. He arrived in Lichfield in 1938, was at the Three Tuns for fifteen years. An anthology of his work, ‘Poems by a Lichfield Innkeeper’ was published in 1950. It would be interesting to know if anyone has a copy?

In October 1907, a young chap called Herbert Smith, a labourer living at the Three Tuns, was charged with being drunk and disorderly in Sandford Street, along with John Fryer, a blacksmith from Leomansley (interesting!). Apparently, arm in arm they walked through Lichfield making a nuisance of themselves by shouting, swearing and jostling people off the footpath. (Old newspapers are full of reports like this – who says binge drinking is a modern phenomenon?!).

The Royal Oak landlord George Hodges was fined £1 in April 1940 for allowing a light to show through the front door glass panel of the pub. Although the window had been covered with brown paper there was still one and a half inches showing meaning that the light ‘could be seen distinctly two miles away’.

At the end of the Second World War, a VJ party was held at Charles Hollinshead’s Sandyway Farm (which had previously been the Royal Oak) in September 1945, which was attended by 120 parents and children from the Walsall Road and Pipe Hill. The farmyard and barns were decorated with flags and bunting, and each child received an envelope containing a shilling. There was a varied programme of entertainment including a ventriloquist, comedians and ‘Billy’ Atkins and his band. The celebrations ended at midnight with a rendition of ‘God Save the King’.

The saddest story is that of an inquest held in September 1884 at the Three Tuns Inn. A young lad, just eight years old, had drowned whilst swimming in the canal near Sandfields Pumping Station. What particularly interests me is that the fact that the inquest was held in an inn. This was not a one off – in the absence of public mortuaries, inquests into unexpected or unexplained deaths were held in several of Lichfield’s public houses, and the same thing happened in villages, towns and cities across the country. I’m reading more about this and hopefully will be following up with a further post about this aspect of our social history shortly, but of course in the meantime, any comments are welcome!

Discovering Leomansley

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It’s been a little quiet here on the blog recently, but with good reason! I’ve been busy with the new group I’m involved in – Lichfield Discovered. As well as putting on a series of talks and workshops, we’re also really keen to get out and about exploring this fine city of ours together.

We’re using this badge belonging to one of the group members as our Lichfield Discovered logo!

So, on Sunday, around twenty people (plus dogs!) met at Martin Heath hall to explore some of the lanes and greens of Leomansley. Over the years I’ve lived here, I’ve tried to piece together some of the history of this lovely, but I think relatively unknown, part of Lichfield. As well as sharing this information, I was also hoping that others on the walk would contribute their own memories and information.  I wasn’t disappointed! I’ve added the notes that I prepared for the walk here –  Leomansley Discovered Walk Notes (disclaimer: they are a bit rough but hopefully of interest!) – but along the way we also heard:

  • how in the final years before demolition, Beacon Place was owned by the council and used to store items for the Lichfield Bower!
  • that children in the area would sometimes bypass the swimming baths on the Walsall Rd altogether, choosing instead to swim in the pools at Leomansley House and in Leomansley Brook, once they’d dammed it to make it deep enough!
  • that a mysterious stone with a perfectly carved letter ‘L’ had been dug up in a Leomansley backgarden
  • that one of the terraced houses on the Walsall Rd facing the old Conduit Lands Pumping station and the public baths may once have been a shop
  • there were actual baths at the swimming baths
  • how someone’s aunt lived in a house that was once part of the original Christ Church school building (after the school had been condemned and moved to its current position over the road)
  • that there was an air raid shelter behind Christ Church school
  • that the foundry on Beacon St (where Morrisons is now) once had an agreement that they could deposit some of their industrial waste on Pipe Green (some of which is still evident!)
  • that my Mum lives in the house where the jockey Greville Starkey once lived!

Unfortunately, despite accosting the owner of the old Vicarage on Christchurch Lane we still didn’t manage to get a definitive answer on the subject of the mystery bell outside one of the windows, but we did enjoy coming up with our own theories! We were also tantalising close to seeing what the Carpenter’s Arms looked like, as someone who had lived next door was kind enough to bring along an old photograph of their house, but sadly the now demolished pub was just out of shot!

As well as members of the Lichfield Discovered Group, it was great to have people from the Beacon Street Area Residents’ Association, the Pipe Green Trust, Friends of Lichfield Parks, friends and Leomansley residents, past and present, come along and I’d like to say a big thank you to all who joined in. I think sharing and working together is vital to understanding our local history – we can all learn something from each other (I think the posh word is synergy).

The start of the walk outside Martin Heath hall. Taken by Jane Arnold, Pipe Green Trust

I may do the walk again in Spring when the bluebells are out (and hopefully my Mum is in to make us all a nice cup of tea on the way round). There is also talk of a ‘Beacon Place’ walk, to discover the story of this lost estate, and the traces that remain in Beacon Park. In the meantime however, the next meeting of Lichfield Discovered is on Tuesday 12th November 2013, starting 7pm at the Lichfield Garrick studio, where we will be discussing and sharing memories of WW1 and WW2. For more information, please take a look at the Lichfield Discovered website here. You can also follow us on twitter @lichdiscovered and we’re on Facebook too https://www.facebook.com/pages/Lichfield-Discovered/488746161217038

Alas Smith

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With my ongoing fascination with the blacksmiths of Lichfield, I was interested to find a short article in an old newspaper about William Goodwin. At the time of the article, August 1950, Mr Goodwin was the oldest trading smith in the city, working with his son in the business his father had started before him.

The article says that at the turn of the century there had been around ten blacksmiths in Lichfield, with demand from stables at local inns and estates. Mr Goodwin remembered shoeing more than fifty horses a week, but in 1950 was doing less than ten. As a result of this reduced demand for the trade, Mr Goodwin’s forge was one of only three remaining in the city. Another of the three was Mr W Ball of St John St, who started his business after the First World War. He explained that his survival was down to the priority attached to agriculture, adding that his main work was now with agricultural implements and fixing wheels, most of the dealings with horses being confined to riding stables.

Of course, now there are none remaining.  Whilst Lichfield is clearly no Birmingham or Black Country, it did of course have its trades and sites of industry. I think that this is sometimes forgotten and so I’m always pleased to be reminded of where Mr Goodwin’s forge (the one where apparently a man from France had his dancing bear shod of course!) stood on Beacon Street and of the other blacksmiths of Lichfield, when I see the street names ‘Smithy Lane’ and ‘Forge Lane’. Place names can tell stories, and should always be chosen with care.

 

Battle Ground

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One Lichfield place name I’ve always been curious about is Bunker’s Hill. Most people will probably know the name from the car parkin between Lower Sandford Street and the football pitches at Beacon Park, but how did it come about?

Looking towards Bunker’s Hill car park, Beacon Park

According to Howard Clayton’s ‘Loyal and Ancient City’, it’s recorded that during the Civil War, parliamentarian leader Sir William Brereton erected a mount, described by the VCH as a raised defensive position, in the Sandford Street area.  Mr Clayton suggests that the mound known as Bunkers Hill could be the location and in John Shaw’s ‘The Street Names of Lichfield’, the author suggests that the name derives from these earthworks. I’d be really interested to know if there are any relevant archaeology finds from this area of the park. I wanted to see if I could find any more information about the site. I knew that in the 1800s there had been a farm around here and also one of the old lodges to Beacon Place, the mansion which once stood on what is now Seckham Rd (demolished in the 1960s). The original Walsall Rd must have passed nearby too, before the route was altered in 1837. Records show that there were six cottages here by 1883.  In 1901, Mr George Watts, a bricklayer and his family lived in one of those cottages – 5, Bunker’s Hill. By 1916, youngest son Albert was serving in the Motor Transport Section of the ASC and had an account of his experiences in France published by the Lichfield Mercury. He described his first experience of being under fire as ‘terrifying’, but said that one got used to it. After being taken ill, he acted as a clerk in a convalescent home where one of his jobs was writing out ‘Blighty” tickets. How hard it must have been for him that he wasn’t able to write one out for himself. I wonder if he did make it home to Lichfield?  Nowadays, the area has changed considerably. The lodge and farm are long gone, although there is a water tap which seems to correspond with the site of a pump on OS maps. I wonder if this was originally a community pump for those living in the cottages? I haven’t found much else on Lichfield’s Bunker’s Hill specifically, other than in September 1905, Lichfield City Council’s Streets and Highways Committee discussed a proposal to have it enclosed. In the end, it seems that they decided to have Bunker’s Hill levelled and sown with grass seed. However, whilst searching I have found references to other ‘Bunkers Hills’. In his book on Worcestershire place names, local historian and etymologist William Henry Duignan of Walsall wrote that ‘There are numerous ‘Bunkers Hills’ throughout the kingdom, but having met with no early forms, I conclude that it is a mere fancy name conferred after the victory at Bunkers Hill, US in 1775.’. A good example are the cottages at Bottesford in Leicestershire, which were named ‘Bunkers Hill’ after this battle. It’s also interesting that the 38th Regiment of Foot, raised by Col. Luke Lillingston at the Kings Head in Lichfield in 1705, fought at this battle. So, Bunkers Hill may have got its name from the English Civil War, but could there be an outside chance that it may instead relate to the American War of Independence? Perhaps it refers to something else altogether! Any thoughts? Notes 1 – I’ve seen the name spelt with an apostrophe and without Sources Lichfield: From the Reformation to c.1800, A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 14: Lichfield (1990), pp. 14-24. Loyal and Ancient City by Howard Clayton The Street Names of Lichfield by John Shaw

A Dance to the Music of Time

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Hot on the hooves of Lichfield’s Sheriff’s Ride comes another ancient Staffordshire tradition – the Abbots Bromley Horn Dance. No one knows just how ancient though. The earliest written record of the dance seems to be from Dr Robert Plot’s ‘Natural History of Staffordshire’ in 1686, yet the reindeer antlers themselves have been carbon dated to around one thousand years ago.

The Horn Dance c.1900. Apparently the splendid costumes are a Victorian invention. The original costumes were made by the vicar’s daughters from old bed curtains! The latest set of costumes were created at the turn of the millenium. On the subject of costumes, I love that the man dressed as a woman is wearing his shirt and tie beneath his!
Image from Sir Benjamin Stone’s Pictures – Festivals, Ceremonies and Customs. Published by Cassell & Co. London. 1906 (taken from Wikipedia)

Last night, we arrived as the dancers were weaving their way around the back lanes of Abbots Bromley, and so we settled for a while in The Crown and awaited their return to the village green. Outside the crowds were entertained by the Lichfield Morris Men and the Beggars’ Oak Clog Dancers amongst others. Sitting there in the pub I saw horns everywhere – antlers on the village sign, antler inspired light fittings and, sitting on a bench opposite, a man wearing furry antlers. We rejoined the crowd, as the dancers made their way up the High Street, taking up their position outside the Crown to applause. At first it’s the horns that command your attention – they’re enormous (apparently, the largest set weighs over 25lbs). Then gradually your peripherary vision kicks in and you spot the other characters – a man dressed as a woman, the young boy shooting the hobby horse, over and over again and the musicians accompanied by a child playing the triangle. Fortunately, I managed to avoid the Fool and his fertility aiding pig’s bladder…

In ‘England in Particular’, the authors describe the dance as both unsettling and reassuring. I know what they mean. What you’re watching has a significance that no longer makes much sense to our modern eyes, its symbolism like some long forgotten language. Yet there’s also something very British and familiar about the occasion in the scout tent set up over on the green, selling curry to the beer drinking crowds chatting together beneath umbrellas.

If this is a pagan fertility ritual, it seems to get along well with Christianity these days. The horns are kept in St Nicholas’s church for 364 days a year, and before the horns are taken out on their annual excursion around the village there is a short blessing. The dance is performed outside the Abbots Bromley throughout the year but I understand that a second set of horns are kept for this purpose, these original horns never leave the village. There is a great story in a book on the dance by Jack Brown of the English Folk Dance and Song Society that I bought from the Oxfam bookshop. Apparently, in the 19th century, the dancers took a set of elk horns dancing in Burton and having consumed quite a lot of rum, managed to lose them. Some say the horns were stolen; others say the dancers decided they were too heavy and deposited them into the River Trent so they didn’t have to carry them all the way back to Abbots Bromley.

It’s fantastic to have such a unique tradition taking place just ten miles or so up the road from Lichfield and although I’ve popped a few (rubbish) photos on here to give you an idea, it goes with out saying that there’s nothing like going along and experiencing it for yourself. So, put it in your diary for the next Monday after the first Sunday after the fourth of September 2014!

Note – I could claim that the blurriness of the dancers and musicians on the following photographs is an artistic statement on the passage of time or something, but in actual fact they’re just really BAD photos! Anyway, the chap with furry antlers is on one of them which warrants its inclusion.

Sources:

England in Particular by Sue Clifford and Angela King

The Abbots Bromley Horn Dance by Jack Brown

Four Legs, Two Wheels, One City

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As the participants in the annual Sheriff’s ride gathered on horseback outside the Guildhall to take part in this centuries-old tradition, another group met at the Stafford Rd pinfold to begin their inaugural two wheeled alternative.

As the cyclists left, a police car arrived, heralding the arrival of the horses and their riders travelling in the opposite direction.

You can find out how they got on with the alternative ride (straight from the horse’s mouth!) by reading all about it here on the Lichwheeld blog. I prefer two feet to two wheels, but I really wished I’d have joined in as it’s such a great idea and seemed like such a lot of fun (as all the best traditions are!). There’s always next year…

Cheers to all those who keep our traditions going and to those who start new ones – this city is definitely big enough for the both of them!