Tag Archives: Lichfield

Bringing up the Bodies

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Our city churchyards are full of those Lichfeldians who have left us. There are gaol keepers and executed prisoners, civil war soldiers and WW2 airmen, paupers and presumably, somewhere, plague victims (although that’s a whole other line of enquiry). Yet there are also others, denied the right to a Christian burial, laid to rest in unhallowed ground.

I’ve written before about Bessy Banks and the tragic tale of Lichfield’s ‘love-desperate maid’. The story seems to have been well known in the 17th and 18th centuries, being written about by both Anna Seward and David Garrick, and the place name ‘Bessy Banks’ Grave’ survived until the start of the 20th century, when the supposedly haunted spot was built on as the area around Dimbles Lane, once a ‘sunken road leading north from Lichfield’, was developed. Ironically, given that Bessy appears to have been denied a Christian burial and instead interred at a crossroads for taking her own life, her grave now seems to lie within the grounds of a Catholic church. Unfortunately, there are no records of any remains being uncovered on the site when St Peter and St Paul was built which may have answered at least some questions about Bessy and her story.

1815 Map of Lichfield showing Bessy Banks Grave

At other Lichfield locations, we have the opposite problem – skeletons without a story. In 1862, workmen digging the foundations of a building at the warehouse of the Griffiths Brewery on St John Street, adjoining the South Staffordshire Railway, found the bones of ‘a full-grown person’, which ‘had been there for many years’, about four feet from the surface. As the newspaper reports that only the head and arms were removed, I can only conclude that the remainder of the remains remain there.

A burial place at the old brewery

Then, in February 1967, a skeleton believed to be around four hundred years old, turned up four feet down from the existing ground level during excavations at the new shopping precinct at Castle Dyke. Most of the bones were crumbled but the teeth were in a good condition. So good in fact that the site foreman said, ‘I would have been pleased to own them’. What became of the body and its nice set of gnashers is unknown.

Could either body belong to a man named Gratrex, found hanging in Lichfield on Wednesday 7th September 1763 and buried in the highway after the Coroner’s Inquest issued a verdict of ‘felo de se’? If not, it seems there maybe another skeleton lying somewhere beneath the streets of Lichfield still to be unearthed.

Sources

Lichfield Mercury 2/2/1967

Burton Chronicle 18/9/1862

Aris’s Birmingham Gazette 12/9/1763

Queen of the Stone Age

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One of the highlights of this weekend’s coronation, appearances from Floella Benjamin and the Grim Reaper through the arched door aside, was The Coronation Chair. It is possibly the most famous piece of furniture in existence, rivalled only by Lichfield’s Victoria Hospital Chair now in the Samuel Johnson Minor Injuries Unit. Royalist or not, there is something rather thrilling about a graffiti and bomb scarred throne on which the behinds of thirty eight kings and queens, and the rump of Oliver Cromwell, have sat.

A big chair for the NHS. Hip hip hooray!

Even more ancient than the chair is is the ‘Stone of Destiny’ it was built to incorporate. The sandstone block, used for centuries as the crowning seat of Scottish kings, was stolen by Edward I in 1296 and only officially returned to the people of Scotland seven hundred years later. Many myths, legends and rumours surround the stone’s origin and its authenticity but today there’s another mysterious coronation seat somewhere in Staffordshire that I want to investigate.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then we’ll begin.

In September 1959, the Western Mail carried a story about a seat-shaped stone, located in the grounds of Blithfield Hall, Staffordshire. Visitors to the hall were told it was the ‘Welsh Coronation Stone’, which caused a great deal of confusion in Cardiff as nobody knew whether a Welsh Coronation Stone was actually a thing or not. An official at the Welsh Folk Museum was also non-committal given, ‘It is one thing to have a Stone and another thing to have a stone around which a story or tradition may have arisen’. It seems there was also reticence to discuss such monumental matters here in Staffordshire for fear of the stone being returned to its rightful home. All that could be established was that the family heirloom/national treasure had arrived at Blithfield in the 1920s.

Dancing kings aka the Abbots Bromley Horn Dancers on the lawn on Blithfield Hall

Ten years on, around the time of Charles’ investiture as Prince of Wales in the Summer of 69, another reference to the stone appeared in the Rugeley Times. The then headmaster of Hill Ridware School is pictured in the hall’s inner courtyard looking at what the newspaper describes as ‘the Welsh equivalent of the Scottish Stone of Scone’ and ‘the seat on which early Welsh kings were crowned’. It says it came from the Bagot’s estate near Ruthin called ‘Pool Park’ and a virtual visit there via the Ruthin Local History Society reveals that a ceremonial ‘coronation stone’ dating to the 5th or 6th century is mentioned in the estate’s 1928 sales catalogue, which fits in with the date of the Blithfield stone’s arrival in Staffordshire. The society give the Welsh name of the stone as ‘Cadair y Frenhines’ (The Queen’s Throne) and says it was brought down from ‘Llys y Frenhines’ (The Queen’s Court) in the early 19th century, along with another ancient monument with Ogham and Latin inscriptions (1). The latter was moved to the museum in Cardiff in 1936 and replaced by a replica at its unoriginal location at Pool Park but according to the history society, the whereabouts of the Queen’s Throne is now ‘unknown’.

Claim of thrones

I’m certain that this missing stone is the one described as being at Blithfield but so many questions remain. Fifty plus years later, is the monument even still at the hall? Was it ever really used to crown queens, or indeed kings, or did it gain this reputation through Georgian whimsy and the fact it looks a bit like a chair? Hopefully if the royal chair is still to be found in the courtyard at Blithfield, the true backside story of The Queen’s Throne might finally be revealed.

Sources
https://www.scone-palace.co.uk/stone-of-scone

https://www.historicenvironment.scot/archives-and-research/archives-and-collections/properties-in-care-collections/object/the-stone-of-destiny-13th-century-medieval-edinburgh-castle-6132

https://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=49523

https://www.ruthinhistoryhanesrhuthun.org/pool-park

An Inventory of the Ancient Monuments in Wales and Monmouthshire Volume 4

https://www.mythslegendsodditiesnorth-east-wales.co.uk/pool-park-ogham-stone

(1) In defence of Bagot, the chair was rescued from one of his tenants who had been using it as a horse block. Sadly, its said that the tenant simply went and fetched another ‘old stone’ in its place.

Memento Mori

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Many people are familiar with the story of John Neve, William Weightman and James Jackson, the last men to be hanged in Lichfield on 1 June 1810, for the crime of forgery. Their shared headstone can be seen tucked away under the tower at St Michael’s, although they are buried elsewhere in the churchyard in a now unmarked a communal grave. One particularly poignant postscript to these events is that after his execution, the friends of John Neve commissioned three mourning rings to be made, each with an inscription to his memory and containing a lock of his hair. I wonder whether it was these same friends who erected a headstone as to my knowledge there are no memorials to any of the other executed criminals buried here?

Amongst them is another tragic trio, Thomas Nailor, Ralph Greenfield and William Chetland who met the same end for the same crime at the same place on 13th April 1801. Prior to their execution, two of the men had attempted to escape from Lichfield gaol by filing through their irons and putting them back together with shoe maker’s wax. Their cunning plan had been to knock down the gaoler when he came to lock them up for the night and they would have gotten away with it had it not been for pesky Joseph Vaughton, a private in the 38th regiment of foot, to whom Nailor had given a pattern of the wrench he wanted making and a Bailiff called Mr Scott who discovered the file they had been using. Headstone they may not have but incredibly a tangible link to this execution does apparently exist. In 1947, the Town Clerk of Lichfield received a letter from a Mr Clayton W McCall of Canada to say a morbid memento had turned up in an antique shop in Vancouver in the form of a silver salver, ‘Presented by the Corporation of the City of Lichfield to Revd. Bapt. Jno. Proby, Vicar of St Mary’s, for his pious attention to three unhappy convicts who were executed in that City April 13th 1801’. However, as with the rings, its current location is unknown.

One very unhappy convict sentenced to be hanged at the gallows on 6th September 1782 was 62 year old William Davis who had been convicted of horse theft. The Derby Mercury, reported that in his final moments, David’s behaviour was bold, paying little attention to anything that was said to him. Then, just as the executioner was about to send him eternity, Davis threw himself from the cart with such force, that the rope snapped. After much confusion and delay, the rope was replaced and Davis’s last earthly words are recorded as having been, ‘This is murder indeed!’.

In 1935, the site of the old gallows was described as being ‘preserved and indicated to passers-by with an inscription recording its ghastly use in bygone days’. The area has developed significantly since then, but I was told by Janice Greaves, former Mayor and current Sheriff of Lichfield, that the exact spot where the gallows stood is now marked by a walnut tree growing on the patch of grass alongside the garage. There has been some discussion about what form the gallows actually took, but there is evidence to suggest that there was a permanent structure to which the cart carrying the condemned convicts would be brought. In Aris’s Birmingham Gazette it describes how ‘On Friday Night last, Richard Dyott Esq, who lives near Lichfield was going home from thence, he was stopp’d near the Gallows by two Footpads, who robb’d him of five Guineas, and in the Scuffle he lost his hat’.

My plea to you this Halloween is to keep your eyes on Ebay for Neve’s mourning rings and the silver salver. If however you decide to take a wander over to Gallows Wharf in search of Richard Dyott’s hat, please be warned that an ex-executioner from centuries past appears to have been sentenced to linger at the spot and you may well feel a push from behind as he attempts to dispatch you to your doom.  

Sources

Evening Dispatch 31st March 1935

Aris’s Birmingham Gazette 3rd February 1752

Pipe Lines

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The traffic lights at Pipe Hill crossroads are haunted. Let’s just put that out there right away. Ever since this was pointed out to me by Deb from Melbourne in Lichfield, I’ve often found myself on red, sat waiting for something that I can’t see to pull out of Fosseway Lane. I’m imagining this spectral vehicle to be a Roman chariot because that’s the way to Wall and all of us good classical scholars know that ‘fosse’ is a Latin word meaning ditch. We also all know that ‘Caecilius est in horto‘ but we’re going up Pipehill not Up Pompeii.

Yes that is snow on the ground. Yes this has taken me a while to write.

The Walsall Road was once owned by the Lichfield Turnpike Trust who had built a toll house and gate on it by 1787. In November 1879, the Trust held an auction at the Three Crowns inn, to dispose of them. The Victoria County History suggests the house was probably demolished by 1909, although the person who lives in it assures me that it probably wasn’t. The supposition most likely arises from a parish meeting at Hammerwich in 1909, where an old minute notebook from Pipe Hill parish (which by then had joined up with Wall) was produced, saying that the tollhouse had been sold to the Marquess of Anglesey on the condition it be taken down. At the time of the meeting the building was still standing but encroaching significantly on the footpath and the matter was referred to the overseers of Wall.

Further along towards Muckley Corner is Pipe Place, a mid-eighteenth century farm house. When owner Mr Bradburne was in horto he made a fascinating discovery that, like so much of our local Roman history, has never been acknowledged enough in meam humilem opinionem. As he was digging a drain, Bradburne discovered the trunks of several oak trees deliberately driven upright into the ground. Some had rotted away above the surface, but others were still whole, each with, ‘a cavity four inches wide and three inches wide from the top cut down its middle’. The structure was traced for about a quarter of a mile and was surrounded by a ‘fosse’ filled with peat.

From ‘A Topographical History of Staffordshire by William Pitt (1817)’

According to the Heritage Environment Record, this could still be seen as a linear feature on aerial photos in the 1990s but my amateur eyes can’t make anything out on Google maps. The Georgian gents who originally found it thought it must have been a military barricade erected by the Romans to defend Letocetum but more recently it has been suggested by archaeologist Jim Gould that it may have been an aqueduct built to provide the settlement with water. If you think about it logically, the water for that big bath at Wall must have come from somewhere. Two lengths of lead piping were discovered on the bath house site in 1874, last seen in the Lichfield Museum in 1961 but long since vanished with much else of the collection. In a later excavation, deer horns, a number of dogs’ skulls and the thigh bone of a teenage boy were discovered. Unfortunately, as yet I can’t find anything else about the context in which they were found although the pony skull discovered at the bottom of a nearby well may well have been a votive offering. It probably belongs to that one pulling that spectral chariot up at Pipe Hill cross roads.

Image from Lichfield Mercury. It was definitely a long term policy…

Let us now gallop 1,500 years forward in time from possible pagan practices to Victorian values. The Misses Topham opened an establishment at Pipe Hill for young ladies in 1856 and I’m sure there were definitely some good classical scholars amongst them. In 1882, a tiny chapel was built at Pipe Hill, as a mission room to the church at Wall and during the First World War, a street shrine listing the names of those from the local community who were serving their country stood outside it. These shrines were different to the later memorials we are all familiar with in that they were as much about praying for the living as remembering the dead, and were often bestrewn with offerings of flowers, flags and photographs. Perhaps we didn’t come all that far from those pagan practices after all….The Pipe Hill Mission Church didn’t quite last a century and after laying disused for several years it was bought by Staffordshire County Council and demolished in 1971. One other institution which warrants a brief mention is the Pipe Hill and Farewell Association for Prosecuting Felons who advertised in the Staffordshire Advertiser in November 1817 a list of rewards they offered for the apprehension and conviction of those committing offences such as ‘highway robbery’ (£21), ‘wrongfully milking any cow’ (£5 5s) and ‘maliciously pulling up turnips’ (£2 2s).

Finally, how can I write about Pipe Hill and not mention Lichfield’s creepiest cottage? The property has been empty and decaying ever since I moved here in 2004, intriguing us all with its mysterious ‘Not for sale or rent’ notice. I drove past earlier and saw this is no longer the case. Much of the wilderness surrounding it had been cleared and for just under £300,000 cash, it can be yours. I strongly suspect the traffic lights won’t be the only thing changing at Pipe Hill in the near future…

Sources

Staffordshire Advertiser 29th November 1817 and 30th January 1915

Gould, J. (1998) Letocetum

https://www.lichfielddc.gov.uk/downloads/file/1849/hammerwich-neighbourhood-plan-submission-version-march-2021

Lichfield Mercury 31st October 1879 and 3rd November 1916

‘Townships: Wall with Pipehill’, in A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 14, Lichfield, ed. M W Greenslade (London, 1990), pp. 283-294. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/staffs/vol14/pp283-294 [accessed 25 July 2021

https://www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=8244da13-c98a-4ad7-bb08-76e21870497e&resourceID=19191

Kill Bill

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The run up to Halloween feels like the right time to resurrect the blog and, in keeping with the spirit of my favourite season, it’s my intention to share some of the more sinister stories that I know about Staffordshire and the surrounding area over the course of the coming week. However, 2020 hasn’t quite gone to plan and it’s entirely possible that I could fall victim to an attack of the mutant crayfish clones by Friday and so whether my bad intentions will materialise or fall by the wayside remains to be seen.

Anyway, I’m not sure if it’s a Staffordshire thing per se but something I’ve noticed about the churches in our area is their habit of juxtaposing the mundane with the magnificent. By way of example, I once found the tomb of Richard Samson, Bishop of Lichfield between 1470 and 1554 underneath a tea tray and a packet of hobnobs. I am also starting to think that the eleventh commandment is ‘Thou shalt have a stack of plastic chairs behind thy font’.

I suspect Pevsner would not approve but I think it gives churches a nice lived-in feel and exudes an eccentric sort of charm and therefore, I make no apologies for failing to remove the carton of milk and bottle of spray from my photograph of the remains of this stone cross in Tixall Church.

The cross stood on Kings Lowe, a Bronze Age Bowl Barrow on Tixall Heath before what remained of it was removed to the church for safe keeping. Its exact provenance is a mystery but in 1818 Sir Thomas Clifford of Tixall described it as having been placed there in around 1803, it being, ‘a very antique stone cross, which once stood before the gate of a ruined mansion in South Wales…It is of very hard moor-stone; the shaft, which has eight unequal sides, supports a tablet of an hexagonal form, adorned with very rude carvings; on one side, a crucifix, on the other, the virgin with the child in her lap. On the edge of the tablet is also a figure thought by some experienced antiqueries (sic) to be St. John the Evangelist’. The cross was said to mark the spot where Sir William Chetwynd of nearby Ingestre Hall was assassinated in 1494, although you might think that after 309 years the moment for a monument to a murder had passed. Who erected it and why they did so after all that time is not recorded.

In 1825, Alexander Wilson wrote a travelogue called ‘Alice Allan, The Country Town etc’ and appears to have had some sort of down the rabbit hole experience, proclaiming that, “When I entered Staffordshire, my straight-forward, regular travelling was at an end”. After insinuating that the residents of God’s own county used to get up to some Summerisle-esque unpleasantness involving wicker, Wilson relays the story told to him by an old countryman whilst driving across the heath. Sir William Chetwynd of Ingestre and Sir Humphrey Stanley of Pipe Ridware were both vying for the favour of King Henry VII, and so Sir Humphrey decided to rid-ware himself of his rival. A letter purporting to be from the Sheriff of Staffordshire was sent to Sir William requesting his attendance in Stafford at 5am the following morning. As he crossed Tixall Heath at dawn, accompanied by his son and two servants, he was ambushed by twenty men, several of whom were members of the Stanley family.

Despite a petition by the widowed Lady Chetwynd, Stanley literally got away with murder. Or did he? According to the story told to Alexander Wilson, some years after he’d killed Bill, Sir Humphrey was thrown from his horse at the same spot on Tixall Heath, breaking his neck. Official records show he died in 1505 and is buried amongst the great and also probably not very good at Westminster Abbey. As of yet, I can’t find a record of where or how he died and so perhaps that old countryman was right and karma did catch up with him in the end. Interestingly, it seems with the Stanleys, the rotten apple did not fall from the tree. An effigy in Lichfield Cathedral immortalises the disgrace of Sir Humphrey’s son, John, a man who committed a misdemeanor so grave that he was excommunicated and had to agree to spending the rest of his death being depicted as paying penance in order to be granted a Christian burial inside the Cathedral. There is no record of his specific wrongdoing but in 1867, the Very Rev Canon Rock suggested that Stanley’s offence may have been that he had spilled blood inside that sacred space. A 17th century drawing of the effigy by William Dugdale shows the stone Stanley bareheaded and bare chested, flanked by two bucks’ horns, wearing a skirt decorated with heraldic arms and armour on his legs. It’s a strong look to carry off for eternity although during the Civil War, the Roundheads did make some alterations in their own unique style… The much mutilated monument can still be found in the Cathedral so do go and see what’s left of him. I bet you there will be a stack of plastic chairs somewhere nearby too…

Lichfield Cathedral - Effigy of Captain Stanley: engraving

Lichfield Cathedral - Effigy of Captain Stanley: engravingShowing a print of the Stanley effigy.   Anonymous.View Full Resource on Staffordshire Past Track

Sources:

Norton, E (2011) Bessie Blount: MIstress to Henry VIII, Amberley Publishing: Gloucester

https://www.pastscape.org.uk/hob.aspx?hob_id=77400

http://www.tixall-ingestre-andrews.me.uk/tixall/elytxhs.html

The Cathedral Church of Lichfield By AB Clifton

Handbook to the Cathedrals of England by Richard John King

Alice Allan, The Country Town etc by Alexander Wilson

Some remarks on the Stanley Effigy at Lichfield by The Very Reverend Canon Rock

Shed some light?

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I have a huge backlog of things to write about including the dead (an old burial road) and circuses (the greatest show-woman) because when I’m looking for one thing, I inevitably seem to find another. Case in point: Last week I went to see if there was anything left of a burial mound known as Offlow and ended up at Shenstone pondering 19th century funerary art.

Offlow

Offlow: the short answer is there is nothing left.

Shenstone gravestone.jpg

Shenstone: So much going on with this 16 year old woman’s grave. Look at the tiny tools!

To summarise my predicament using a popular meme like the cool kids do:

distracetd meme

I have no idea why my kids are ashamed of me and have me blocked on Twitter.

To show solidarity with my GCSE-sitting son, I have decided to show my working out. Or not working it out, as is probably more accurate as I want to share the things that have me stumped, the dead ends and the ‘not quite sure about this but maybe someone else will be able to help’ type stuff. Whether it’ll lead to quantity over quality or prove that a picture is worth a thousand words remains to be seen.

With that in mind, I have two sheds for your consideration and comments. Firstly, one spotted in a field on a walk around the lanes of Fradley, in the village proper rather than the site of RAF Lichfield. My best guess is that’s where it originated though, with the windows suggestive of an accommodation block. I imagine it was relocated here after the airfield closed in 1958 and re-purposed, although what for I’m not sure.

Fradley shed 2Fradley shed

Tonight’s second shed is this ramshackle affair spotted alongside the disused Walsall to Lichfield railway line in-between Sandfields Pumping Station and Fosseway. My best guess for this one is that it’s a platelayers’ hut where chaps working on the track would store tools and take shelter. As with the rest of the line, it’s slowly being reclaimed by nature which is sadly ironic given that the platelayers were responsible for keeping their stretch in good working order and free of vegetation.

Railway shed 2Railway shed

I’m hoping this new approach will be as effective at reducing the amount of draft blog posts I have as GDPR is at reducing the amount of emails I get. In the meantime however, shedloads of comments on this, or any other subject, are always welcome!

 

The Leomansley Witch Project

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Imagine you’re watching a horror film. A woman heads into ancient woods which are shrouded in mist. And before long, she comes across a tree. With an eye stuck to it.

leomansley-mist

Chances are at this point in the film, you’d be shouting, ‘Don’t go in there. Run away!, whilst feeling smugly confident behind your cushion that you’d never be as stupid as to stay hanging around in mist shrouded woods where there are eyes stuck to trees. Well, I was in Leomansley Woods earlier this week. It was shrouded in mist and there was an eye on a tree. But did I leg it? No. And not just because I don’t do running under any circumstances.

woods-oct-16-2

If something wicked that way had come, I had Finn the swamp dog to protect me and my experience of fighting off a clown in Beacon Park earlier in the month to draw upon. Crucially though, I know and love these woods and consider the tokens and trinkets that have been appearing there since the summer more curious than creepy, possibly symbols of someone else’s affection for them.

finn-swamp-dog

Back in 2004, when I was a newcomer to these parts, I remember getting a call from my sister telling me to go and take a look in the woods as somebody, or more likely somebodies, had created works of art in amongst the trees. There were mosaics created from leaves and petals, clay faces sculpted onto the trunks of trees and brightly coloured papers hanging from their branches. For reasons I can’t remember, I didn’t take any photographs but I can clearly recall the sense of mystery and magic someone had created in the woods that day. We never discovered who or why and there was no encore. The seasons turned and the years went by and then, early this summer, we began to notice things. At first it was subtle. A pebble placed here, a strip of silver birch bark there. It was the first piece of pottery appearing lodged in the knot of a tree that convinced us this was more than the handy work of squirrels and our overactive imaginations. Dog walks took on a new dimension as every day seemed to bring something new. I’m sure at its peak, others were joining in and making their own contributions. And this time I did bring my camera.

woods-june-2016-3

leomansley-woods-june-2016

woods-june-2016-6

woods-june-2016-4

As the summer faded, the activity seemed to wane, and I’d assumed there would be no more. The other half took over the dog walks for a while but recently, for reasons involving a prolapsed disc, I took up the lead once again. Many of the original tree decorations had vanished but a handful of hawthorn berries, melted candle wax and a tickle of feathers (that’s genuinely and rather pleasingly the collective noun for them) had taken their place. Interestingly, others seem to be joining in once again, including the Leomansley contingent of the One Direction fan club.

leomansley-wood-berries

woods-oct-16-3

Woods Oct 2016.jpgwoods-oct-16

Once again, the who and why is a mystery, and perhaps that is how it should remain. Whether activity continues beyond the season of the witch or not, for me, Leomansley Woods will always remain a magical place.leomansley-cobweb

amelia-bluebellssun.jpg

 

 

Crime Scenery

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I know. It’s been a while. You don’t know what I did this summer but I’d quite like to confess. There have been visits to gibbets, wells, shrines, mausoleums, derelict churches, ruined abbeys, tunnels and places with names which sound a bit rude. It’s less about serious history and more about a series of stories told by the landscape that surrounds us. Sometimes you have to listen very carefully to hear them (especially over the sound of my friend Jacky eating crisps), sometimes they shout in your face via an interpretation board funded by the parish council.  If you’re sitting comfortably*, then I’ll begin by sharing** evidence from some of the crime related activities we’ve been getting up to.

*unlike another friend Eddie the time we visited an old priory and had to stick him in the back of a van
**unlike Jacky with her crisps

Once upon a time, there was a little girl called Katie. When she grew up she wanted to be Mavis Cruet from Willo the Wisp. For a short while, she lived in Coleshill in North Warwickshire and almost everyday she’d walk past the town’s pillory. At the time she didn’t realise that it was a rare example combining three methods of corporal punishment i.e. stocks, a pillory AND a whipping post, and was last used in 1863, but she was curious all the same.

coleshill-pillory-michael-garlick

Coleshill Pillory by Michael Garlick from geography.org.uk http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/

Many years passed and in August 2016,  Katie was visiting her parents in Stone in Staffordshire when she turned off too early towards Hilderstone. This was in no way down to her lack of navigational skills, there was a tree obscuring the ‘Hilder’ bit of the sign. Around the corner was a patch of grass with a set of stocks.

Stocks just after Hilderstone turning on A51 near Stone

Stocks just after Hilderstone turning on A51 near Stone

Despite extensive research (doing a google search), she couldn’t find any information on them. Katie hadn’t grown up to be Mavis Cruet, but she had continued to be curious. How many more sets of stocks were there around the country? Had anyone ever recorded them? Who had been publicly humiliated and punished here and what were the reasons? Our towns and cities are filled with monuments to the so-called great and good of society. Are these our monuments to those considered petty and bad who lived on its fringes? And so, after musing over these thoughts with friend Patti who already had a knowledge of and interest in this area, they decided to set up a discussion group called ‘Offending Histories’, with the aim of finding remaining physical evidence of crime and punishment across the Midlands and telling the sort of stories in which no one lives happily. Ever after or otherwise.

In just a month, we’ve already started to record a fascinating range of sites and objects. Here are some samples of the more local examples.

The old gaol cells in Lichfield have an example of a Scold's Bridle or brank on display. There's an excellent article from the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic exploring the history of these vile items here - http://museumofwitchcraftandmagic.co.uk/…/object-of-the-mo…/). Of particular interest is the following reference,

The old gaol cells in Lichfield have an example of a scold’s bridle or brank on display. There’s an excellent article from the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic exploring the history of these vile items here. Of particular interest is the following reference, “In 1789, the brank was used in Lichfield. A local farmer enclosed a woman’s head “to silence her clamorous Tongue” and led her round a field while boys and girls “hooted at her” “Nobody pitied her because she was very much disliked by her neighbours.”

Outside St Michael's church is the relocated headstone of the last three men to be executed in the city. On 1st June 1810, Neve, Jackson & Weightman were taken by cart from the city gaol & publicly hanged for forgery at the city gallows (where Tamworth St, Upper St John St & the London Road cross). Interesting that at some point, the word 'hanged' appears to have been obliterated from the monument. Although this appears to be the only marker to executed criminals buried here, the church register records the names of others who were executed and buried e.g. John Wilson Sept 23rd 1583 and John Walle and Robert Hodgson described as prisoners executed and buried on 13 October 1587.

Outside St Michael’s church is the relocated headstone of the last three men to be executed in the city. On 1st June 1810, Neve, Jackson & Weightman were taken by cart from the city gaol & publicly hanged for forgery at the city gallows (where Tamworth St, Upper St John St & the London Road cross). Interesting that at some point, the word ‘hanged’ appears to have been obliterated from the monument. Although this appears to be the only marker to executed criminals buried here, the church register records the names of others e.g. John Wilson on Sept 23rd 1583 and, John Walle and Robert Hodgson described as prisoners executed and buried on 13 October 1587.

Patti pointed out this example of a sanctuary knocker on a door in Elford church, dating to circa 1450AD. By touchin the knocker, a fugitive from the law could be given sanctuary in the church for a period of time. If they made it that far. One example given by Karl Shoemaker in his book 'Sanctuary and Crime in the Middle Ages' tells of Elyas, a chaplain imprisoned in Staffordshire to await trial for murder, who 'killed the gaoler's attendant, escaped from the prison & fled towards the church'. The gaoler & others from Staffordshire pursued him and cut off his head before he could reach the church'. Another example comes from Colton History Society - in 1270 Nicholas son of William De Colton stabbed Adam, son of Hereward in a brawl; he fled to the church and took sanctuary. Claiming sanctuary was abolished 1623.

At St Peter’s in Elford, Patti pointed out this example of a sanctuary knocker on a door dating to circa 1450AD. By touching the knocker, a fugitive from the law could be given sanctuary in the church for a period of time (this seems to have been forty days which is a nice biblical number) . If they made it that far. One example given by Karl Shoemaker in his book ‘Sanctuary and Crime in the Middle Ages’ tells of Elyas, a chaplain imprisoned in Staffordshire to await trial for murder, who ‘killed the gaoler’s attendant, escaped from the prison & fled towards the church’. The gaoler & others from Staffordshire pursued him and cut off his head before he could reach the church’. Another example comes from Colton History Society – in 1270 Nicholas son of William De Colton stabbed Adam, son of Hereward in a brawl and fled to the church where he took sanctuary. Claiming sanctuary was officially abolished in 1623.

The Bilstone Gibbet Post, Leicestershire. Erected in March 1801 to display the body of local man John Massey, executed for murdering his wife Lydia and attemping to murder his step- daughter. Massey's headless skeleton, wrapped in chains, remained hanging from the post for seventeen years, his skull apparently being used as a candle holder in a pub in Atherstone. In the early twentieth century, the post was a venue for religious meetings but today, there are rumours of more unusual behaviour taking place here.

The Bilstone Gibbet Post, Leicestershire. Erected in March 1801 to display the body of local man John Massey, executed for murdering his wife Lydia and attempting to murder his step- daughter. Massey’s headless skeleton, wrapped in chains, remained hanging from the post for seventeen years, his skull apparently being used as a candle holder in a pub in Atherstone. In the early twentieth century, the post was a venue for religious meetings but today, there are rumours of more unusual behaviour taking place here.

Unable to find much on this pillor outside the Cock Inn at Stowe by Chartley, but it does appear to have been relocated here at some point.

Pillory outside the Cock Inn at Stowe by Chartley. Appears to have been relocated here at some point as not shown on early 19thc photographs of the pub

It is a dark subject at times but there are lighter moments too. Currently providing wry amusement is the question of how, and indeed why, was a seventeenth century cucking stool stolen from the church of St Edward at Leek? A meta-criminal mastermind at work? It’s very much an ongoing exploration and if you are interested or better yet, have something to contribute, and aren’t offended by an element of gallows humour, please do join our Offending History group here

Lock Inn

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Last year, Christine Howles from the Lichfield and Hatherton Canal Restoration Trust and I spent a summer’s evening exploring the Fosseway section of the Lichfield canal. Sharing the photographs on our respective social media accounts generated so much interest that we decided to do it again but with more people and less vegetation.

Lichfield canal lock

Christine from LHCRT on our lock crusade

The walk was originally arranged for November but Storm Clodagh had other ideas and so it was on the Sunday after Christmas when sixty five of us gathered outside Sandfields Pumping Station. Dave Moore, stood in front of the door that the Lichfield Waterworks Trust should shortly be getting the long awaited keys to, reminded us all why this building and its contents are such an important part of our local and national heritage.

Kate & Dave Sandfields

Despite how this might look, I genuinely never tire of hearing Dave talk about Sandfields. Photograph by Eddie Strain.

Another part of Lichfield’s industrial past once stood somewhere near here, west of the Chesterfield Rd and causing ‘a great nuisance to the inhabitants of the city’, according to the vicar of St Mary’s in 1806. The ‘noisome and offensive’ bone house was described as being to the north of the Wyrley and Essington Canal. Are their histories intertwined in some way? Did the latter provide a transportation link or even a source of power for the former?  Whilst we try and flesh out the history of our bone house, it’s worth having a read about Antingham Bone Mill which stood on the North Walsham and Dilham Canal and appears to have been a similar establishment.

Sandfields Canal Walk 2

Heading along the original route of the canal. Photo by Steve Martin

From Sandfields, we followed the original line of the canal to the start of the Fosseway Heritage Tow Path Trail. At the site of Lock 19, demolished during the building of the Southern Bypass in 2008, LHCRT directors Peter Buck and Bob Williams described the vision that the Trust has for not only the restoration of the canal in this section but also the creation of a moorings site and a wildlife haven incorporating lowland heath and wetland areas.

Lock 19

At the site of the now demolished Lock 19, photo by Dave Moore LWT

It has been reported that a hearth and lead musket balls were found near  Lock 19, possibly dating to the Civil War. The source of lead for this mini munitions factory can be found a short way along the towpath, where Peter pointed out the headwall to a culvert carrying a pipe beneath the canal. Not just any old pipe though but one that supplied the city’s Crucifix Conduit with water from the Foulwell Springs at Aldershawe, granted by Henry Bellfounder to the Franciscan Friars in 1301. The original pipe is thought to have been made of alder but was later re-laid in lead which it seems those soldiers may have helped themselves to. In 1805, the lead pipe was replaced by a cast iron one made at the Butterley Company in Derby, brought into the city via the canal and offloaded at Gallows Wharf, just as the Herkenrode Glass, recently reinstalled at the Cathedral, had been two years prior.

Conduit site.jpg

Ferreting around up a historic pipe.

At Lock 18, the first site worked on by LHCRT and restored to commemorate the bicentenary of the opening of the canal in 1797, Peter and Bob told us more about the engineering feat that was accomplished here and across the country with tools no more sophisticated than a wheel barrow. Peter told us that during restoration work elsewhere on the route, a brick with a small thumbprint on it was discovered suggesting that children made up part of the workforce. The results of their labour may still be visible but I suspect the details of who they were, where they came from and how they lived, may have disappeared without trace.

Peter and Bob at Lock 18

Peter Buck and Bob Williams at Lock 18

This section of the Heritage Towpath Trail ends at Fosseway Lane. The bridge here was removed shortly after the canal was abandoned in 1954 and will need to be reconstructed as part of the restoration work. The cottage once occupied by the lock-keeper remains though and still displays the number plate ‘268’ allocated by the Birmingham Canal Navigation Company. We know that in 1923 the cottage was lived in by Mr and Mrs Cass as in October that year, the Lichfield Mercury reported that they had rescued a Hednesford butcher using a canal rake. Charles Peake was driving nine beasts from Tamworth when one broke away near the now demolished bridge. As Mr Peake chased the animal he fell 14ft into the lock. Fortunately, Mr and Mrs Cass heard his shouts and managed to fish him out. Though understandably shaken, Mr Peake was uninjured but the Mercury was concerned others may not be so lucky as on a dark night there was, ‘nothing to prevent anyone who doesn’t know the locality from leaving the road and walking, riding or driving straight into the lock’ and suggested that something should be done to make it safe on the basis that ,’one does not expect to be liable to fall into unprotected death traps in a civilized country’.

Lock 18 fence

An unprotected death trap no more. Photo by Dave Moore, LWT

The Lichfield to Walsall railway line also crosses Fosseway Lane. Although the last train passed by in 2003, the signal box dating back to 1875 remains, albeit in poor condition.

Fosseway signal box 3

Fosseway Signal Box, Dave Moore LWT

As we gathered on the crossing, I was able to tell people about its keeper Emily who kept watch here every night between 1946 and 1963, thanks to a wonderful article about her life and her work shared on Dave Cresswell’s Rail Blog (here) and Brownhills Bob’s Brownhills Blog (here)  a couple of years ago.

Fosseway signal box

“Keep Crossing Clear” Photo by Steve Martin

After trespassing on the railway we headed down Fosseway Lane, stopping just before the junction with Claypit Lane to see Sandfields Lodge, where a private lunatic asylum operated between 1818 and 1856.   A series of visits by commissioners in 1846 revealed series of deficiencies in the provision of care at the Sandfields Asylum (you can read a transcript of the Commissioners’ Report here) and it was finally closed in 1856 after having its licence revoked due to the poor conditions.  We know that the asylum was transferred here from St John Street and it may be related to the one established on that street  in 1775 by a physician named George Chadwick. More research is needed into this and perhaps also into the reasons why by 1788, Chadwick had confined his wife to her room on the basis that she was a ‘lunatic’.

Falkland Rd canalFrom Fosseway Lane we walked along Falkland Rd and the new route of the canal to the Birmingham Rd roundabout where a tunnel has been constructed and temporarily buried (see we really do have secret tunnels in Lichfield!).  After passing beneath the Birmingham Rd, the canal will cross under the Lichfield to Birmingham Cross City railway line via a new tunnel, scheduled to be constructed at Christmas 2017.

With the weather on the turn, the real ales and real fire at the Duke of Wellington beckoned. En-route we passed another old pub, now Redlock Cottage but once known as the Board and later as the Spotted Dog. At this stage though, it was an open pub we were all really interested in. We know the Welly was definitely an inn by 1818 when the landlord is listed as Thomas Summerfield but the early history is sketchy. I have seen it suggested here that it began life in the mid eighteenth century as a slaughter house and only later became an inn to take advantage of the passing trade brought by the canal.  It was of course the canal which had brought us here too, for beer, tea, crisps and dog biscuits (Doug the Dog definitely deserved his!). A fitting end to a great walk at the end a great year.

dog xmas tree

Doug the Dog doing battle with the Falklands Rd Christmas Tree. Both now Lichfield legends in their own right

Thanks to the Lichfield Waterworks Trust, the Lichfield and Hatherton Canal Restoration Trust, Steve Martin and Eddie Strain for the photographs and of course everyone who came along. Happy New Year and here’s to plenty more of this kind of thing in 2016. Make sure you follow us all on Twitter @lichdiscovered and @LHCRT1 and on Facebook here, here and here so you don’t miss out!

Sandfields crowd

Further reading:

http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/staffs/vol14/

History of the Trust

History of Sandfields Pumping Station – Cholera in the Black Country

Listed building entry for Sandfields Lodge

Explore the LHCRT Heritage Towpath Trail for yourself here

 

 

 

 

Bath Time

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Although the waters at the Roman Baths in Bath were once known for their healing powers (the mythological Prince Bladud and his pigs are said to have been cured of leprosy after wallowing here in 863 BC), the water is now considered unsafe and is strictly off limits. This didn’t bother me in the slightest as I’d much rather be issued with an audio guide with commentary from Dr Alice Roberts than a fluffy white bathrobe.

The Great Bath at Bath

The Great Bath at Bath

The great bath is fed by a hot spring rising here at the rate of 1,170,000 litres a day and a temperature of 46 degrees Celsius. For our ancestors, the warm water gushing from the ground was the work of the gods. Even though I know the cause to be natural rather than supernatural, there was still something magical about watching vapour swirling up out of the bubbling, green-hued water into a torchlit, grey November afternoon. And it seems I’m not the only one the place has that kind of effect on. When the Romans arrived, the local goddess Sulis was already being worshipped here so they named the place after her, and built a new temple honouring both her and her Roman counterpart Minerva alongside the sacred spring.

Alongside the curing, a fair bit of cursing went on. One hundred and thirty prayers inscribed on sheets of lead or pewter were thrown into the spring between 200 and 400 AD. Many invoke the help of Sulis Minerva in seeking justice and revenge for heinous crimes such as the theft of a bathing tunic or gloves. The majority are in vernacular Latin, but one as yet untranslatable text is thought to be the only surviving example of an ancient British language. I quite like the thought that the only physical trace of something spoken thousands of years ago was not left by kings or queens but by one of the plebs like us, most likely complaining that their swimming costume had been nicked.

Curse tablets found in the Sacred Spring at Bath

Curse tablets found in the Sacred Spring at Bath

In 1727, the gilt bronze head of a statue of Sulis Minerva was discovered yet it’s not the face of the goddess which has become the symbol of Roman Bath but the face of the ‘gorgon’ found on the pediment outside her temple. And I have the fridge magnet to prove it. Re-discovered in 1790, and debated ever since, the ‘gorgon’s head’ is surrounded by a sea of symbolism including Tritons, a dolphin head shaped helmet, a star, an owl and two Victories. The ‘gorgon’ interpretation derives from the association of Minerva with Medusa and the supposed presence of a couple of snakes in the beard. Yes this ‘gorgon’ has a beard, which highlights the main problem with this explanation – gorgons are female whereas this is obviously the face of a man. It might be another example of the Romans combining a local god with of their own e.g. a classical gorgon and a British water god or could perhaps even be Neptune or Oceanus.

The so-called gorgon at Bath. I'm not convinced. But then I dropped Latin in the third year, so what do I know?

The so-called gorgon at Bath. I’m not convinced. But then I dropped Latin in the third year, so what do I know?

Other more easily identifiable gods found here include Jupiter and Bacchus whose images once formed part of the great altar where sacrifices were made. Post-sacrifice, the entrails of the animal were consulted by a haruspex (literal translation: gut-gazer) and we know there was one here in Aquae Sulis because the inscription on this stone reads ‘To the goddess Sul, Lucius Marcus, a grateful Haruspex, donated out of his devotion’. This is the only evidence we have of a priest in Britain who practised divination in this way, so it’s something of a rarity.  It has been suggested that whoever carved the stone wasn’t all that competent, originally missing out the ‘O’ from ‘Memor’ and also having to squeeze the letters ‘VSP’ after ‘the abbreviation HAR’. You’d think Lucius might have forseen these problems in the intestines.

The Haruspex Stone at Bath with the sacrificial altar behind

The Haruspex Stone at Bath with the sacrificial altar behind

Hopefully, all this talk of Romans at Bath will have whetted your appetite for something a little closer to home but just as exciting. Not only does our Roman site at Wall have carvings every bit as mysterious as those at Bath, evidence of Christianity in the area prior to St Chad’s arrival (in the form of  bronze bowl with a Chi-Rho symbol which you can see and read about here) and even rumours of our own statue of Minerva said to have been as big as a man, but not a man as it had a bust but also not a woman because it was wearing a soldier’s helmet. Unfortunately, it was used to fix a drain. If it ever existed in the first place that is.

Possibly one of the local gods at Letocetum. Found built into the walls of the Mansio at Wall.

Possibly one of the local gods at Letocetum. Found built into the walls of the Mansio at Wall.

This may represent a skull in a niche a la Roquepertuse or it may be another local god. We just don't know but it is fun speculating.

This may represent a skull in a niche a la Roquepertuse or it may be another local god. We just don’t know but it is fun speculating.

You can access the site of Letocetum all year round during daylight hours and the museum is open 11am to 4pm the last weekend of every month plus Bank Holidays between March and October. This Winter, the Friends of Letocetum have arranged a series of talks at Wall Village Hall starting on Wednesday 9th December with Dr Mike Hodder who will be talking about his own personal experiences as an archaeologist at Wall.

Further details of this and all other upcoming talks and events plus lots of other information about Letocetum can be found here on the website or there is a Facebook page here and you can follow @FndsofLetocetum on Twitter.

For anyone who would like to see the Gorgon’s Head but isn’t able to get to Bath, it will be coming to a lampost in Leomansley shortly along with a wobbly lobster. Details on request. And should anyone pinch it, I’ve got a curse ready.