Folklore of Essex Page 6

  Pitsea chimney sweep Mr Derek Williams.

  Wheat-whopping

  We expect customs and traditions to be ancient but now and again a brand new custom hits the headlines, as it did in Blackmore at the time of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee in 1977. A spot of ‘invented’ folklore to help local fundraising brought high jinks on the village green and attracted the national press and TV cameras to the village, when the ‘ancient art of wheat-whopping’ took place.

  The rudiments of the ‘sport’ required the village maidens to parade on the village green in front of the band of wheat-whoppers. Each maiden was required to wear a garter which was inspected before the event. The maidens chose their station on the village green, consisting of bales of straw, buckets of water and bags of flour. At a given order, the whoppers sang the wheat-whopping anthem, during which handfuls of green wheat were ceremoniously dunked into a large tankard of ale. Then the chase was on. The wheat-whoppers chased the girls with the bunches of wheat and attempted to whop their hindquarters. Once whopped, the maiden had to surrender her garter to her pursuer. This continued until the hunting horn was sounded, a count of garters per whopper was made and the winner – and Chief Wheat-Whopper of Blackmore – was the person who had collected the most garters. As a result of the publicity, one group of women’s libbers took offence. However, every now and again, this colourful custom comes out of mothballs and goes on to the Blackmore summer fête programme.

  Wheat-whoppers on Blackmore Green, 1977.

  July

  Both the Fairlop Fair and the Dunmow Flitch Trials were held in July (see chapter one: Essex Traditions).

  August

  Lammas Day

  Behold, behold the summer has grown old,

  And with the harvest now begun,

  Lammastide – mix work with fun.

  On many modern calendars, 1 August is still marked as Lammas Day. To town dwellers this means little, but to Essex farmers in past centuries Lammastide was one of the most active times of the year and signalled the start of the harvest season, the time when the first fruits or crops were gathered.

  The word Lammas derives from ‘Loaf Mass’. With the advent of Christianity in Britain, pagan rituals were officially replaced by church services or masses in which the first harvested grains were milled and baked into loaves of bread, taken to church, blessed and then offered as thanksgiving to God. The loaves were then shared among the congregation as a symbol of communal thanks for what would hopefully be a successful harvest. Lammas Day itself was a Christian holy day in Britain from Saxon until medieval times. A number of places in the county held fairs at this time and several parts of old Essex still have a Lammas Road, including Leyton.

  There are some poignant old farming photographs of harvest time in Great Burstead and, thankfully, Essex churches celebrate this happy time of the year. Old beliefs and superstitions about county lore, taboos and rituals are deeply embodied in subconscious folk memory. The origins have often been forgotten but they still linger as part of the collective county memory.

  Rural Essex folk believed the Harvest Spirit dwelt in the fields and that as the reapers cut the corn, the spirit was forced to retreat into the ever-dwindling remainder. No man wished to be the one who destroyed her refuge, so the reapers took turns to throw their sickles at the last stand of corn. It was then plaited into a woman’s form – known as the Corn Dolly, Kern Baby, Ivy Queen or Harvest Queen, among other names. The figures were usually semi-human effigies, paraded around the field or placed on the wagon with the last load. The figure held the place of honour at harvest supper and was sometimes hung up in the farmhouse until the following year.

  Harvest time – Dick Kent helping with the harvest (on horse), 1909.

  September

  Punch and Judy

  Mr Punch is one folklore character that most children will immediately recognise. He and his long-suffering wife Judy, together with their baby, little dog Toby and a whole panoply of traditional characters, appear every September at Clacton, Walton-on-the-Naze, Frinton and other Essex coastal resorts.

  Mr Punch goes back almost 400 years in this country and puppeteers were mentioned in Elizabethan times. In 1662, Samuel Pepys, a frequent visitor to Essex, described in his diary the appearance from Italy of Punchinello (soon renamed Mr Punch). This carved caricature of a hunchback with a shrill voice, who did dastardly deeds, has been popular among children ever since, but the ‘politically correct brigade’ has somewhat muted his activities.

  Holidaymakers who visited Old Leigh Regatta during Septembers of the past will remember seeing Peter Pascoe, the Thurrock writer and puppeteer who entertained children as Professor Balbo at his regular site at Chalkwell. He carved his own cast of puppets, including Punch and Judy, and wrote the mini-dramas that so many children enjoyed. He carefully guards his method of making his ‘swazzle’, the metal device which, when held in the mouth, transforms the voice into Punch’s screech.

  Punch and Judy man, Professor Balbo, at Leigh Regatta.

  Michaelmas

  Michaelmas, which falls on 29 September in Essex although the date differs in other counties, is the grandly named Feast of St Michael the Archangel. In centuries past, tenant farmers in North Essex would be expected to give a goose to the farm owner. The Michaelmas goose is said to be at its prime at this time of year, fattened on a summer’s lush grazing and the gleanings of the harvest field. A goose once formed part of the annual rent of a cottage or farm, traditionally payable at Michaelmas. The idea was perhaps to dissuade the landlord from raising the next year’s rent. Michaelmas Day falls a week or so after the Harvest Moon, the full moon of the autumnal equinox. William Ward from Chelmsford remembers how, as a boy, he was told to stop picking blackberries at Michaelmas because ‘otherwise left hanging, they will be spat on by the devil’, a well-known Michaelmas saying.

  October

  Harvest Customs

  Hone’s Everyday Book for 1830 describes a contemporary harvest tradition that took place in several villages surrounding Chelmsford. At the conclusion of the harvest, a supper was provided, usually consisting of a roasted joint, plum puddings and copious supplies of good strong English ale. The proceedings opened with the singing of the following verse:

  Here’s health to our master, the Lord of the feast,

  God bless his endeavours

  And send him increase;

  May prosper his crops, boys

  That we may reap another year,

  Here’s your master’s good health, boys,

  Come drink up your beer.

  Several national folklore traditions cluster around this time of the year on the farming calendar. Although the harvest festival supper started in more rural districts of Essex, it is now a regular custom for many local town gardening societies to hold their harvest supper during October. In churches throughout the county, special harvest festival services are held and the churches are perhaps fuller than at other times of the year. Gifts of fruit, vegetables and flowers are brought to church to make simple decorations; there are bags of seeds, arrangements of autumn leaves – even old farm implements such as scythes and pitchforks are brought into church.

  The Season of Hallowe’en

  Hallowe’en, 31 October, is the Eve of All Hallows’ or All Saints’ Day. It was originally a season rather than a single night and was celebrated over the last couple of weeks in October. In the Essex farming fraternity, it was a time to prepare for winter. In medieval times, the local lord of the manor would gather his servants, tenants, soldiers and workers together to see who was under his control. At this time, he was expected to give a feast for everyone in his employ. Hallowe’en was an occasion when bonfires were lit to guide people home and welcome travellers to the hall. The Celtic name for this season was Samhain or Summer’s End, a closing of the door to the year opened at Beltane or May Day and a gathering in of all crops.

  In Essex there is now much ‘tricking or treating’, a relatively recent import fr
om America, which is not popular with everyone. Many people in the village of Writtle will remember bobbing for apples by the eerie light of turnip lanterns. This Hallowe’en tradition still takes place occasionally at children’s parties.

  November

  No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds, No-vember

  Thomas Hood

  November is a time of mystic darkness. During Roman times, 11 November marked the beginning of winter. The Anglo-Saxon name for November was Blot-month, blood month, which probably derived from the custom of slaughtering cattle for winter consumption. In parts of Essex, horse fairs and markets were held during November, one being at the Halfway House Farm fields close to Brentwood.

  Guy Fawkes

  The novelist Daniel Defoe passed through Barking some time before 1722. He recorded his impressions of Eastbury Manor House in his book A Tour Throughout the Whole Island of Great Britain:

  A little beyond the town, on the road to Dagenham, stood a great house, ancient, and now almost fallen down, where tradition says the Gunpowder Treason Plot was at first contriv’d, and that all the first consultations about it were held there.

  The Guy Fawkes link with Eastbury House, which is still a lovely mansion house at Dagenham, could have been Lord Monteagle. This staunch Catholic peer, who is believed to have owned Eastbury House in 1605, received an anonymous letter thought to have been written by his brother-in-law Francis Tresham, one of the conspirators. It warned him not to attend Parliament on 5 November. A search of the vaults was made and Guy Fawkes – with his thirty-six barrels of gunpowder –was discovered. Fawkes was arrested for treason and tortured until he revealed his accomplices and the purpose of his insurrection, which was the introduction of a Catholic regime. He was executed on 31 January 1606, opposite the Palace of Westminster. The jubilant Government ordered thereafter that 5 November should be kept as a holiday, with special services, the pealing of bells and the firing of cannon.

  Eastbury House.

  Although these acts of remembrance were discontinued, the story of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot are still celebrated nationally. Many Essex villages have communal gatherings at which bonfires are built. Collections are made to buy fireworks. Jack Bartlett remembers his childhood days in Thorpe-le-Soken just after the First World War, when, during most of October, the children built a huge pyre on the Brickfield and he and his brothers gained great pleasure from seeing their often creatively-dressed guy being burned on the enormous bonfire to the accompaniment of a fusillade from squibs and crackers:

  Remember, remember the fifth of November

  Gunpowder, treason and plot.

  I see no reason why gunpowder treason

  Should ever be forgot.

  Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes

  ’Twas his intent

  To blow up the King and the Parliament

  Three-score barrels of powder below

  Poor old England to overthrow

  By God’s providence he was catched

  With a dark lantern and burning match.

  Remembrance Sunday

  Until 1945, this poignant tradition was known as Armistice Day and commemorated the anniversary of the armistice signed on 11 November 1918, ending the First World War. Since 1956, the day of commemoration has been the second Sunday of November. Many Essex war veterans and families travel to London’s Whitehall to see the Remembrance Day ceremony at the Cenotaph. Flanders poppies, symbolising the bloodshed, are sold in aid of war invalids and their dependants. Many war memorials were erected in Essex in 1920 and people traditionally observe the two-minute silence, remembering those who died in the two world wars and in later conflicts.

  December

  On 1 December, the old Town Crier of Colchester used to announce:

  Cold December has set in,

  Poor people’s backs are clothed thin,

  The trees are bare,

  The birds are mute;

  A pint of purl would very well suit.

  The Cinque Port Liberty

  The ancient maritime town of Brightlingsea is the only Cinque Port outside Kent and Sussex. It is a ‘limb’ of Sandwich, one of the original five ports. Each year a Deputy is chosen by the Freemen of Brightlingsea. He is the mayor of Sandwich’s representative and, in the past, would have been responsible for maintaining law and order. The election takes place on Choosing Day, the first Monday in December, when the Freemen gather in All Saints church. At this ceremony, new inhabitants who have been resident for a year and a day can come forward to be ‘recognised’ and declared Freemen of the town. In July each year, the Deputy is confirmed into office, along with the Deputies of the other two limbs of Sandwich, in an historic ceremony in Sandwich’s Guildhall.

  Halcyon Days

  In the old (Julian) calendar, 21 December was celebrated as the first day of the New Year. Even now, it holds significance as the shortest day of the year in the northern hemisphere, the time of the winter solstice, when the sun is at its furthest from the equator. Expecting wintry conditions, we are often surprised by how mild it is. This is what weather forecasters refer to halcyon weather. It is also St Thomas’s Day and in Castle Hedingham on this day, old women went ‘a-Thomasing’ or collecting money.

  Christmas

  Advent is the beginning of the Church year for most churches in the western tradition. It begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day, which is the Sunday nearest 30 November, and ends on Christmas Eve. It is a time of preparation in the religious lead-up to Christmas, before celebrating the birth of Christ. In the fifth century, it began on 11 November, St Martin’s Day, and took the form of a six-week fast leading up to Christmas.

  Historically, Advent was a period of quiet contemplation but this is rarely the case nowadays with visits to overcrowded shops and markets to buy presents, trees, decorations and other seasonal fare. In the twenty-first century, ‘Christ’s Mass’ is obviously a time of celebration worldwide and in Essex, as in many other places, its religious significance has become buried under the trappings of an age far removed from that of centuries past.

  The last Sunday before Advent is known as Stir Up Sunday, so called from the first two words of the collect, ‘Stir up, O Lord, we beseech Thee, the hearts of Thy faithful people’. The timing coincided with the preparation of the Christmas puddings and cakes and Eva Baxter remembers the children in Great Warley singing on their way home from church:

  Stir up, we beseech thee,

  The pudding in the pot,

  And when we get home

  We’ll eat it all hot.

  Even in this day of convenience food, some Essex families keep to the old traditions and enjoy the ritual of making their own Christmas puddings. When Mrs Margaret Bray was ready to steam the Christmas puddings, each member of the family would ceremoniously stir the mixture three times in the direction of the sun’s path – a biblical association with the Holy Trinity and the Three Wise Men. The inclusion of a silver joey, a threepenny bit, in the mixture was meant to bestow wealth on whoever bit upon it on Christmas Day.

  With the county almost on the doorstep of East London, fashions and traditions which started in the capital reached Essex quickly. When you sit down to study your Christmas card list, you can either thank or blame that brilliant artist, inventor and Assistant Keeper at the Public Record Office – and perhaps the greatest entrepreneur that England has every known – Henry Cole, who made the Christmas card popular. In November 1843, this busy man realised that he was not going to have time to write the hundreds of personal letters that he usually sent to people every year at Christmas and commissioned the artist John Calcott Horsely RA to design him a card that could simply be signed and addressed. Horsley produced a lithograph 5½in long by 3½in wide that depicted the poor being clothed and fed, as well as a wealthy family drinking a Christmas toast. By December, 1,000 copies of the card had been hand-tinted and printed. Henry Cole took as many as he wanted and the remainder were put on sale in London at a shilling each. Within a
few years, enterprising printers were producing printed Christmas cards, which were put on sale in Essex stationers and fancy shops, including the Great Eastern Stores owned by William Wilson in Brentwood and other Essex towns.

  Before the traditional Christmas tree reached England, it was customary for county children to fashion a kissing bough. Hung from the ceiling on Christmas Eve, it took the form of a globe created from evergreen boughs fastened with twine. It was the seasonal centrepiece in many Essex homes, decorated with a ring of candles and a sprig of fresh mistletoe – another pagan custom.

  The poet Frederic Vanson often wrote in Essex Countryside about the pre-Reformation custom of appointing a Lord of Misrule at Christmas. This character, chosen by the lord of the manor, acted as an unofficial motley fool, dressed in outrageous garments with a cap and bells, and chose his own ‘court’. He played jokes on high-ranking people, with impunity, and could legally enter any house in the parish and there create disorder, without constraint. Henry VIII put a stop to this ancient custom, which was believed to descend from the Roman Saturnalia in celebration of the winter solstice that took place in parts of Essex.

  Christmas Day itself is filled with all manner of customs, both local and national. The boar’s head, cooked and elaborately dressed in its finery of greenery and garlands, was once the splendid centrepiece of feasts and banquets. Lynn Pewsey, in her book A Taste of Essex (1994) wrote:

  Up until 1868, in an ancient custom, the boar’s head was the coveted prize in an annual wrestling competition held each Christmas Day at Hornchurch. It was cooked and prepared at Hornchurch Hall where the first slice was cut. Then in the afternoon, it was taken to the Mill Field perched on the prongs of a pitchfork and resplendent in a festive decoration of bay leaves, coloured ribbons and holly and with a fresh orange in its mouth, where the wrestling match took place.