Suffolk Strange But True E-Book

Robert Halliday

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 189

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2008

Beschreibung

Suffolk Strange But True describes many unusual, odd and extraordinary people, places and events from this fascinating county. Featured within these pages are tales of 'the fasting woman of Shottisham', who was alleged not to have eaten for five months; the Suffolk man who invented the word 'communism'; local heroines; pioneering entrepreneurs; spectacular ruins and castles; lost towns and villages; extraordinary pets and animals; and unusual art treasures found in Suffolk churches. Local customs, folklore and legends are also examined, including 'the race of the bogmen', and the Southwold competition to discover an 'alternative umbrella'. Using a range of old and new illustrations, Robert Halliday tells an entertaining alternative history of Suffolk that will fascinate residents and visitors alike.

Leseprobe

SUFFOLK

STRANGE BUT TRUE

SUFFOLK

STRANGE BUT TRUE

ROBERT HALLIDAY

This book is dedicated to three Suffolk sisters: my aunts, Pat Morris and Margaret Stanworth, and my mother, Joan Halliday

First published 2008

Reprinted 2011, 2012

The History Press

The Mill, Brimscombe Port

Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 2QG

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

This ebook edition first published in 2013

All rights reserved

© Robert Halliday, 2011, 2013

The right of Robert Halliday to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

EPUB ISBN 978 0 7509 5333 7

Original typesetting by The History Press

CONTENTS

Introduction & Acknowledgements

1 Unusual Lives

2 By the Road

3 Seasonal Customs

4 Architectural Curiosities

5 Castles and Fortifications

6 Churches

7 Follies, Garden Lodges and Mazes

8 Lost Villages and Towns

9 Industry and Enterprise

10 All Creatures Great and Small

INTRODUCTION & ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I have spent much of my life in Suffolk, since moving to Bury St Edmunds in 1966, and have found the history, architecture and countryside a constant source of amazement, as well as inspiration. I hope this book will help develop the understanding of some of the many interesting facets of life in this beautiful county. This book would be much shorter and poorer were it not for many dedicated people in county-wide or local organisations who have worked hard to maintain the places and customs mentioned here.

Many thanks are due to the following: the staff at the Suffolk Record Office who have, as always, proved ever-helpful suppliers of information; Julian Ackland of the Pin Mill Sailing Club for information on the Thames Barge Race and a photograph of the barges in sail; Bob Carr of the Suffolk Archaeological Unit for a photograph of Basil Brown; Mike Chester, keeper of Porcelain at Lowestoft Museum for a photograph of Lowestoft Porcelain and information on the museum and its history and contents; the Kentwell Estate Office for a photograph of Kentwell Hall; Sarah Friswell of St Edmundsbury Cathedral for a photograph of that building; Julia and Stephen Mael for a photograph of and information about the Long Shop Museum at Leiston; Bob Pawsey for a photograph of Gedding Hall and the last herd of Suffolk Dun Poll Cattle; and John Telford-Taylor of Mendlesham for a brilliant photograph of the Boy Bishop. Other people who deserve thanks include Derek Andrews and the Revd Judith Andrews (no relation) of Hollesley for supplying information on beating the bounds at Hollesley; Hannah Deverson of Brandon Town Council for information on the gunflint industry; Jane Haylock for an informative tour of Hadleigh Town Hall; David Johnson, local historian of Acton, for information on that village; Karoline Kennedy, who first showed me the war memorial in St Edmund’s Place in Bury St Edmunds; Chris Lamb of Lavenham for insights into that town’s history; Dr John Ridgard for many ideas, and for first drawing my attention to Goodwyn Barmby; John Sutton, for information on the royal palaces at Newmarket; Barry Wall for all things Sudbury and Long Melford; Dr Ann Williams, formerly of the North London Polytechnic and tutor for my B.A. degree, for observations on the story of St Edmund and allowing me to publish them.

Insights were provided by members of Bury Heritage Guides; Jeremy Hobson; Duncan MacAndrew; Alan Murdie; Peter Northeast; Nigel Russell; Adriana Sascombe-Welles; Andrew Snowdon and Roy Tricker.

1

UNUSUAL LIVES

Redwald

A list of people who shaped Suffolk’s character and history might start with Redwald, an Anglo-Saxon king of East Anglia and the first native Suffolk person of whom we have personal knowledge. Rising to prominence in the seventh century from a power base on the south Suffolk seaboard, he became Bretwalda, a position awarded to either the senior, most powerful, or most respected Anglo-Saxon king. Archaeology indicates that Ipswich was established at this time, suggesting that he ruled a prosperous and enterprising realm.

Redwald accepted Christianity, but could not reject his queen’s ancestral Nordic religion, and installed Christian and pagan altars in a temple at his palace. Edwin, an exiled Northumbrian prince, took refuge at Redwald’s court. When King Ethelfrid of Northumbria wanted Redwald to kill Edwin Redwald’s wife, he said it was dishonourable to kill a guest: instead, Redwald led an army against Ethelfrid. They met in battle and although Redwald’s son, Regnhere, was killed in combat, Redwald was victorious and installed Edwin as king of Northumbria. It is a pity that we do not know more about Redwald’s wife: she must have been a forceful and persuasive woman.

In 1938 archaeology gave Redwald a new fame with the excavation of a burial mound at Sutton Hoo. Built over a great ship, it contained royal regalia and gold and silver treasures from all parts of Europe. Many objects displayed Nordic religious symbols, but some included Christian imagery, suggesting devotion to both beliefs. The acid soil had destroyed the body, but it is impossible to conclude that the person buried here was anyone other than Redwald. The discovery revised historical and archaeological opinions of Anglo-Saxon England, previously thought of as a poor, impoverished society; this showed that it was a land of wealth and splendour.

St Edmund

No book on Suffolk would be complete without a mention of St Edmund. In 869, a Viking horde, The Great Army, landed in East Anglia, led by a chieftain called Ivar. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says it camped at Thetford and defeated and killed Edmund. His armour bearer later described his death to Dunstan, a monk who became Archbishop of Canterbury, who told it to Abbo of Fleury, a monk who wrote it down. Ivar took Edmund to a location called Haeglisdun (meaning ‘holy place’) and offered terms: to remain as king under Viking overlordship, sharing his treasury and estates with the Vikings. Edmund said that as a Christian, he could never submit to a pagan. Accordingly, he was tied to a tree, scourged, shot with arrows and beheaded. The death was dated to 20 November, which remains St Edmund’s Day. Edmund’s followers, seeking his remains, heard calls of ‘here, here’ and found a wolf guarding his head. To tie a person to a tree, shoot him with arrows and behead him was a way of sacrificing a prisoner to Odin. Norse belief said that Odin visited the world of men disguised as a wolf, so the episode of the wolf might suggest that Odin wished to reject the sacrifice and make amends for Edmund’s death. Edmund’s refusal to submit in the face of defeat turned him into a hero figure who sacrificed himself for his kingdom. The motif of a king sacrificed on a tree holds great symbolic power, as in the crucifixion of Jesus, Charles II’s escape from his enemies by hiding in an oak tree, or the Buddha’s enlightenment under the Bo tree testify. Edmund’s remains were moved to Bedereceworth, which was renamed Bury St Edmunds (Bury meaning ‘burgh’ or fortified town, rather than burial place). Haeglisdun was often identified as Hoxne, until Dorothy Whitelock, a leading Anglo-Saxon scholar, argued that the modern version of this name would be Hellesdon. In 1978, Stanley West, the county archaeologist, found a field called Hellesdon at Bradfield St Clare, and suggested that Edmund was martyred there: the location’s closeness to Bury makes this hypothesis rather attractive.

The martyrdom of St Edmund, as depicted on a medieval misericord (tilt-up seat) in Norton Church.

Edmund was regarded as England’s patron saint until he was replaced by St George. In 2006, the East Anglian Daily Times initiated a campaign to reinstate him: a partial victory was gained in April 2007 when Suffolk County Council proclaimed Edmund patron saint of Suffolk.

Suffolk and America

Suffolk people have played an important role in the development of America. These include Thomas Cavendish, the third person to sail around the world, after Ferdinand Magellan and Francis Drake. His family owned Grimston Hall in Trimley, where he was baptised in St Martin’s Church. At twenty-five, he captained a ship in Walter Raleigh’s expedition to Roanoke in Virginia. Although the fleet was destroyed in a storm, Thomas established a reputation as a naval commander by navigating his ship safely to the Caribbean.

Contemporary engraving of Thomas Cavendish.

In 1586, aged twenty-six, Thomas planned a trip around the world with 123 men in three ships, the Desire, the Hugh Gallant (built on the Orwell) and the Content. Crossing the Atlantic, he navigated the Pacific coast of America, plundering Spanish settlements and capturing several valuable cargo ships, before exploring the Chinese seaboard. Yet, he does not emerge as a wholly romantic figure: he tortured captives and quarrelled with the crew of the Content over the division of spoils; they sailed away and were never seen again. Thomas led another voyage in the Desire, but this was plagued by disease and bad weather. Arguing with his officers, and only able to control his crew by brutality, his physical and mental condition deteriorated until he died near the equator.

Bartholomew Gosnold belonged to a family who owned land in Otley and Grundisburgh. He married Mary Golding of Bury St Edmunds and their children were christened in St James’s Church (now the cathedral). Mary’s family had connections with merchants who backed foreign voyages, and in 1602, Bartholomew captained an expedition to North America in the Concord with thirty-two men. They explored the Massachusetts coast, naming Cape Cod and finding an island whose beauty so impressed Bartholomew that he named it Martha’s Vineyard, possibly after his mother-in-law or his daughter. The voyage set the route for the Pilgrim Fathers and provided William Shakespeare with material for theTempest. In 1607, Bartholomew left his family to command a ship, the Godspeed, in the expedition which established Jamestown. He showed some ability as a leader of the new colony (frightening off an Indian raiding party by firing a cannon over their heads), but the colonists suffered from disease and starvation. Bartholomew died after six months, but he had played a key role in creating Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in America.

John Winthrop, lord of the manor of Groton, was a leading Suffolk puritan. In 1629, he led over 600 people in eleven ships from Ipswich to join the Puritan settlers in New England, the largest single expedition in the New England migration, over a quarter of whom came from Suffolk. Governor of Massachusetts for thirteen years, John Winthrop played an important role in forming the colonial government and setting up Harvard University.

His son, also called John Winthrop, who was born in Groton and educated at Bury St Edmunds Grammar School, was interested in alchemy (which should be seen as an effort to understand what is now called science, rather than a desire to turn base metal to gold). Following his father to New England, he founded New London in Connecticut, which he envisioned as a centre of alchemical research: medical studies took place there. Setting up America’s first ironworks, John Winthrop the younger could be regarded as the father of North American science and industry.

John Yonges was the son of Christopher Yonges, vicar of Southwold and Reydon. Also becoming a priest, he emigrated to New England, settling at Salem in Massachusetts. In 1640 he and 138 members of his congregation moved to Yennycock on Long Island, which they renamed Southold, after Southwold; the first permanent English settlement in New York State, where he served as minister for the rest of his life.

Three Suffolk Writers

Robert Bloomfield, ‘the Suffolk poet’, was born in Honington in 1766. Soon afterwards his father died, but his mother gave him a sound education. At eleven he started work on a farm at Sapiston, but he proved unsuited for heavy labour, and went to London to become a shoemaker. Here he composed The Farmer’s Boy, based on his memories of rural life. In three years it sold 30,000 copies, the most successful book of English verse then published. Robert described life from the perspective of Giles, a farm boy, who is introduced with the lines:

T’was thus with Giles, meek, fatherless and poor,

Labour his portion, but he felt no more . . .

Strange to the world he wore a bashful look,

The fields his study, nature was his book.

A memorial to Bartholomew Gosnold, unveiled on the wall of the ruined charnel house in Bury St Edmunds churchyard on the 400th anniversary of his death and the founding of Jamestown.

This must have been a self-portrait, as Robert had lost his father and was physically small, but intellectually active.

Unable to escape contemporary literary conventions, Robert wrote The Farmer’s Boy with a classically influenced phraseology and metre that can sound stilted and artificial (although showing that he was widely read). Nevertheless, it was the first time that a member of the English rural working class wrote a description of life as experienced by himself and his fellows. Robert’s later poems included interesting anecdotes about Suffolk life and folklore, but were progressively less successful. Finding that many people in Suffolk either resented his success or expected money from him, he forsook his native county, spending his last years in Bedfordshire, where he died in reduced circumstances. Yet he left an important legacy: John Clare was inspired to write his highly regarded and influential rural poetry after reading Robert’s verses. Robert also made Aeolian harps: one, in Moyse’s Hall Museum in Bury St Edmunds, is considered the finest and most important example in existence.

Arthur Young was born in 1741 to a landowning family at Bradfield Combust. Passionately interested in the new developments of the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions, he conducted innumerable agricultural experiments using old and new methods (one of his books describes over 1,000). For example, he planted crops in different conditions, cultivated fields with different implements and fed his livestock varying diets, keeping meticulous records of the results. He started a journal, Annals Of Agriculture, providing practical information on new farming methods, which circulated widely (George III contributed articles on management of the royal estates). When the Board of Agriculture was set up, Arthur was the unanimous choice for its first secretary. Although he went blind in old age, he actively pursued his duties until his death. Arthur Young’s writings were the most important single factor in promoting and developing the ideas of the Agricultural Revolution in Britain, for which it is impossible to exaggerate his importance in the history of modern farming.

Contemporary engraving of Robert Bloomfield, ‘the Suffolk poet’.

M.R. James was inspired by his Suffolk heritage to write ghost stories. Montague Rhodes James, or Monty, as friends called him, was the son of the rector of Great Livermere. From childhood, he enjoyed visiting historic buildings and studying old books. Going to Cambridge University, intending to become a clergyman, he proved such a brilliant student that he was invited to join the university staff. Writing over 200 studies of medieval art and manuscripts, he became one of the most honoured and respected scholars of his age.

After studying a collection of historic manuscripts in Brent Eleigh Church, Montague wrote a story called Canon Alberic’s Scrapbook. He read this to some friends at Christmas who were so impressed that he wrote more for subsequent Christmases. Oh Whistle And I’ll Come To You My Lad described the sinister events that follow the discovery of an object on the golf course at Felixstowe (renamed Burnstow). The Ash Tree, recounting the revenge of a woman hanged for witchcraft, was set in a thinly described Livermere. A Warning To The Curious described events that follow a man who finds an Anglo-Saxon crown near Seaburgh (really Aldeburgh). At the end of his life he wrote A Vignette describing a personal experience at Livermere. Although M.R. James published little more than thirty stories, he drew on an extensive knowledge of folklore and history to avoid obvious horror or evil, but inexorably draw the reader into a build-up of uncanny forces. Often best read aloud, they can benefit from repeated reading for greater impact, and have been acclaimed as the best ghost stories in the English language. In 2001, Beryl Dyson, a Livermere resident, published a pamphlet, A Parish With Ghosts, describing fourteen supernatural apparitions seen in the village, suggesting that M.R. James grew up in an area where paranormal phenomena are common.

Arthur Young’s tomb in Bradfield Combust churchyard, designed as a cenotaph to celebrate his services to Britain.

Elizabeth Squirrell, a Suffolk Enigma

The story of Elizabeth Squirrell, ‘The Shottisham Angel’, who apparently lived for five months without eating or drinking, forms one of the strangest episodes in the history of Victorian Suffolk. The daughter of a Shottisham tradesman and the granddaughter of a Baptist minister, Elizabeth could read by the age of five; at eight she could recite pages of books from memory. When she was twelve she was infected by a spinal disease, after which her appetite disappeared; for a year she only swallowed small doses of milk and sugar. During this time she claimed to have lost the senses of sight and hearing, but to have had visions of angels. A glass tumbler by her bed made ringing noises, which were thought to be angel communications. From May 1852 she stopped eating and drinking altogether, but lost little weight. In August a committee, including doctors and clergymen, examined Elizabeth. Two nurses said they never saw her eat or drink in two days, although she used a parasol to shade herself from the heat. Eight committee members then watched her in pairs. After six days, two of them claimed to find soiling in her bedclothes that suggested food consumption, and to have seen her parents passing her food behind the parasol, whereupon the investigation broke up in confusion. Her case was debated in a public meeting in Ipswich Corn Exchange on 29 September, when several respectable figures affirmed full belief in the genuineness of her case, while sceptics ridiculed what they believed to be their credulity. One committee member, the Revd William Addington Norton, rector of Alderton, published a supportive work about Elizabeth, including poems and prose she had written. Although she used religious imagery that could sound artificial, she showed great powers of expression, especially for a fourteen year old. By the end of 1852, the Squirrell family had attracted such animosity that they left Shottisham. Some people tried to set up a fund to initiate legal action against their detractors, although no case came to court. Elizabeth gradually resumed food consumption; she appears to have married and lived into the twentieth century. Medical science generally agrees that no human could survive for five months without eating or drinking, but some people have lived on minimal or unconventional diets for long periods, and if Elizabeth was pursuing a fraud, she managed to dupe many people for a long time.

The denouement of Oh Whistle and I’ll Come To You My Lad, set in a Felixstowe hotel.

George Ellis

There can be no doubt of the duplicity of George Frederick Wilfred Ellis, who fraudulently became rector of Wetheringsett. Born in the Midlands, he became a teacher at a Roman Catholic school. He then approached the bishop of Truro, claiming to be an ordained Roman Catholic priest who wished to join the Church of England. He was given several posts as a curate, ending up at Wetheringsett, where he married the patron of the living’s daughter. He soon became rector there, with an annual stipend of £800. George was a popular clergyman for five years, until some people either investigated or developed suspicions about his past. In 1888 he was arrested for conducting a wedding service while not legally authorised to do so. He stood trial in Bury St Edmunds, where it was shown that anybody who had checked his story could easily have found that he had not been ordained as a Roman Catholic priest, or even studied for the priesthood. Never speaking during his trial, he was sentenced to seven years’ hard labour. An Act of Parliament had to be passed to legalise the marriages he had performed. After leaving prison, he is believed to have run a boarding house: it would be interesting to know whether the charm and plausibility he must have possessed served him well in this profession.

Goodwyn Barmby

John Goodwyn Barmby is little known, yet he invented an ideology that influenced the lives of everybody on the planet. Born in Yoxford in 1820, he never used his first name. At seventeen, Goodwyn became involved in Owenism, a popular radical doctrine, and Chartism, a movement which championed full adult suffrage. He spoke about these subjects locally and at national rallies, even arguing that women should be allowed to vote. Visiting Paris in 1840, he suggested a new name to describe the revolutionary ideals of the time: Communism. The first person to use this word, Goodwyn returned to England to pursue his Communist agenda, advocating a form of democratic communal lifestyle, incorporating a deep reverence for Christianity (he envisioned a national communist Christian church), which he promulgated in poems, pamphlets and journals.

The year 1848 was marked by revolutionary upheavals, most of which collapsed. After this, Goodwyn abandoned communism to become a minister in the Unitarian Church. In 1879 he retired to Yoxford, where he died two years later, probably never imagining how the expression ‘communism’ would acquire a wholly new meaning. His Unitarian beliefs precluded a Church of England funeral, and he was buried in Framlingham cemetery. When I asked about his gravestone, the cemetery caretaker had no knowledge of Goodwyn Barmby and had to find the grave from the cemetery register. It seems ironic that while Karl Marx’s grave in London’s Highgate cemetery is world famous, the grave of the man who invented communism stands unknown in Suffolk.

The little known gravestone in Framlingham cemetery of Goodwyn Barmby, the inventor of the term ‘communism’. The inscription reads ‘In memory of Goodwyn Barmby preacher and poet and true worker for God and his fellow men died at Yoxford 8th October 1880 aged 60 years.’

Basil Brown

Basil Brown was Suffolk’s most important archaeologist. The son of a tenant farmer at Rickinghall, he left school at twelve, but continued to study widely, publishing Astronomical Atlases, Maps And Charts,