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SRFN: Miscellany: Henry Burstow: Reminiscences of Horsham |
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Reminiscences of Horsham. |
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The house, now No. 30, Carfax, "The Carfax Café," was always a bough house at these fairs. The fair also attracted a large number of pick-pockets, roughs, and cheats of all sorts, many of whom were on their way to Lewes or Brighton Races; gentry, whose contributions to the proceedings, usually tendered at the drinking booths, would sometimes turn the place into a pandemonium: special constables used to be sworn but did not always suffice to cope with the business. In 1835 there seemed to be an extra number of roughs about: on Saturday night, between eleven and twelve o'clock, in consequence of a disturbance the constables attempted to clear one of the drinking booths kept by a man named Rhodes. One of the roughs asked Mr. Clark, a headborough, by what authority he ordered them to quit the booth; Clark shewed his staff, which was immediately taken as the signal for a fight. About fifty of the roughs collected, and, arming themselves with the legs of chairs and forms, which they smashed up, attacked the constables and soon got the upper hand; they then sallied forth round the town in a body, knocking down and robbing anybody who got in their way, until at length a sufficient body of townspeople collected to withstand them. A general riot and fight then took place during which, I have been told, the Riot Act was read from the Town Hall steps. Fifteen of the roughs were apprehended and put in the black hole that night; five were taken at Roffey and two at Warnham the next morning, and all were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. The duration of the pleasure fair on the Carfax was reduced to one day only in 1874, by an order from the Home Secretary; and by another order in 1886 it was removed from the Carfax altogether. Its shadow still annually appears in the Jews' Meadow. I give a sketch of it in full swing about 40 years ago. [ facing page ] |
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Recollections of Henry Burstow. |
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It would seem that a very interesting celebration was contemplated by some people in 1779; whether it actually took place or not I do not know. Four years later, however, several people were indicted for assisting in making a fire on Nov. 5th, but from about this time right up to 1845, when the magistrates again interfered, Horsham never went without a regularly arranged bonfire on Nov. 5th. Sometimes there were three separate bonfires and parties, one, the largest, on the Carfax, another (ours) in the Bishopric, and the third down in the Collyer's School Croft. There were no factory-made fireworks about seventy years ago; most people who took an active interest in the proceedings made their own, and very strong ones they were. I used to make lots of them for my mother to sell, as well as those I made for my own use. I remember an amusing adventure with one of these home-made fireworks — a big "serpent." There used to be on the "Crown" side of the "Lamb" a very small lock-up shoemaker's shop, used by old "Cobbler Will," the old soldier referred to on page 46; he was a queer-looking little man, with a large head, and fists like legs of mutton; as he used to stand at his door, with his apron on, his appearance was so goblin-like as to frighten some of the passengers who came in the coaches that then used to pull up at the "Crown Inn." On one November 5th, he was at work in his little shop when Bob Reading opened his door, put in the live serpent, then shut the door and held it so that old Will could not get out. There were some lively moments whilst he and the serpent chased each other round the little room, which quickly filled with smoke, and from which old Will was presently allowed to emerge, vowing vengeance, and declaring that he had not had a hotter time at the battle of Waterloo. Several parties used to parade the town during the day, each with a guy seated |
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Reminiscences of Horsham. |
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in a chair, those in charge singing the old doggrel, "Remember, remember, the 5th November," &c. In 1870 "The Horsham Bonfire Boys" Society was formed, and by it the affair was organised into a splendid celebration, in which nearly the whole of the population seemed to join. Scores of people were disguised and dressed up in all kinds of fancy costumes; huge guys, 10 and 12 feet high, were made and paraded round the town in a long procession, with bands, trees of fire, and various performers in vans, on horseback, and on foot. On the Carfax a bonfire was made so large in later years that it scorched the paint on some of the surrounding houses. The Horsham celebration in the early seventies was one of the best in the Kingdom. St. Crispin Day, the 25th Oct., used also to be well celebrated at Horsham, but it was regarded as an affair of the shoemakers, whose patron Saint Crispin was, and every one of them could on that day be depended upon to get thoroughly drunk in his honour. The townspeople generally were interested in the day because it was made the occasion for holding up to ridicule or execration anyone who had misconducted himself or herself or had become particularly notorious during the year. An effigy of each offending person — frequently there were two together — was on Crispin Day hung on the signpost of one or other of the Public Houses, usually in the district where he or she resided, until the 5th November, when it was taken down and burned. For several weeks before the day people would be asking "Who is to be the Crispin?" The first "Crispin" I ever saw was hanging outside the "Black Jug" on North Street, when I was quite a tiny little shaver; I never heard whom it represented, nor what the offender had done to get himself disliked. Another year the effigies of a man and his wife named Fawn, who lived in the Bishopric, |
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Recollections of Henry Burstow. |
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were hanged up on the signpost at the "Green Dragon." Together they had cruelly illused a boy, son of the man and stepson of the woman; they had also whipped him with sting-nettles. There they hung, each with a bunch of sting-nettles in the hand until November 5th, when a hostile crowd collected, some of whom went down to Fawn's house, assaulted him and smashed his hand-cart. For this they were summoned and fined £2 each, an amount quickly recovered by public subscriptions. Another year old Skiver Tilley, the bootmaker, offended his brother stitchers. I never knew what he had done, but they suspended his effigy to old Whiting's sign-post, up at the beggar's lodging house, on Crispin Day. Skiver came to Horsham from London, and being a particularly active and knowing member of the bootmaker's party, he was paid special honour; every evening from Crispin Day till the 5th Nov., the gentlemen of the wax went up to the beerhouse, they took the effigy in and sat it down in the tap-room, then in its company all got drunk together. The last "Crispin" was old Tolhurst, a master bootmaker. He found one of his men scamping his work, so determined they should show him the boots they were making before the soles were put on; when he passed their work he gave them each a ticket. This system might be thought commendable by some people, but with his men it was very unpopular, and so his effigy was hanged at the "Green Dragon" and labelled "Old Dollars (sic) and his tickets." Old Tolhurst afterwards married a lady with some money, whereupon he opened a Pawnbroker's Shop at what is now No. 18, West Street — the only pawn-shop Horsham ever had — advertising that he was prepared to advance on goods sums of from 2d. to £500. He put out the sign, three gold balls, two at top and one at bottom, representing it was said a two to one |
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Reminiscences of Horsham. |
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bet that the articles pledged would never be redeemed. This was a pretty safe bet here, for the pledgers soon found that from the pawnbroker's inexperience, and rather generous disposition, they were able to get such high advances on their goods as to make the business, in fact, a satisfactory sale, whilst old Tolhurst found himself in such unhappy financial circumstances that he thought it advisable to change his place of residence by the distance of two or three counties, without saying good-bye to his friends. Yet one more day in the year to which an old custom attached was "Gooding Day," the 26th Dec. The larger gentry in the neighbourhood used to systematically distribute gifts at Christmas time. Sir Timothy Shelley, of Field Place, used to give about 6lbs. beef and a plum pudding to about sixty or seventy families; Mrs. Fox, of Chestnut Lodge, used to give ¼lb. tea and 2s. 6d. in cash to about eighty poor old women, and 2ozs. tea and 1s. cash to about two hundred more; others gave away articles of clothing, caps, stockings, &c. Gooding Day was the recognised time for other poor people, who had not benefitted by the above distributions, to make their demands upon the charitable disposition of the remaining well-to-do people. 
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