Andrew Simpson: Adventures in Middle England …... no. 5 looking for ghosts

Tuesday 13 August 2024

Adventures in Middle England …... no. 5 looking for ghosts

I say looking for ghosts but when we washed up in the village of Hallaton it was less ghosts and more just people that were absent.

The wall, 2024

The village is 17 miles from Leicester, has a fine church, a pub, a museum and a war memorial which shares the spot with the old market cross.

In 2011 it boasted a population of 594, and according to my Wikipedia is famous for the discovery of a hoard of Iron Age coins, runs a bottle kicking event and a "Hare Pie Scramble", which takes place usually on Easter Monday.*

And for those that sneer at the use of Wikipedia, I can testify that Lewis Samuel’s A Topographical description of England published in 1840 reports that “Hallaton is distinguished by a singular annual custom [when] on every Easter Monday the inhabitants meet on a piece of ground which was bequeathed to the use and benefit of the rector who then provides two hare pies a quantity of ale and two dozen of penny loaves to be scrambled for.”**

The house, 2024

And by all accounts it’s a brutal affair and once ended with a riot.

Now after a bit of a rough and tumble the event finishes in the pub.

There is more but for that you will have to look up the details leaving me to reflect that back in 1840 the population was 664 when some might say its best days were behind it.

It had been granted permission to have a market in 1224 but this lapsed in the late 17th century, and despite attempts to revive it in 1767 according to Mr. Lewis this “proved abortive owing in great measure to the badness of the roads, which were then nearly impassable in winter”.

Still the market cross or Butter Cross remains as a marker for busier times.

I have to confess I had never seen one before and couldn’t quite work out its purpose.

But a trawl of Historic England revealed that “A standing cross is a free standing upright structure, usually of stone, mostly erected during the medieval period (mid 10th to mid 16th centuries AD”, and were used for a variety of purposes. ***

The Butter Cross, 2024

That said the entry is somewhat confusing in that it describes it as a “a good example of a medieval or post-medieval Butter Cross”, but also asserts that the cross is thought to date from the 17th century, with modern repairs and refacing, and marks the location of the weekly village market”.***

The church, 2024

So, you “pays your money and takes your choice” and had we been in Hallaton at the weekend we could have also chosen to do the Museum, but we couldn’t because it was closed.

And that was a shame given that the museum’s site records that “Hallaton Museum was the inspiration of Mrs Honoria Whigham who wanted to record, for future generations, a way of life in a small village community which was rapidly changing.

To this end a great variety of artefacts were gathered to form the nucleus of an historic local collection and a display mounted each year”.****

Still, we wandered through the church yard and had a conversation with a stone mason from Birmingham who was repairing one of the walls.

Alas the pub was also closed, and in all our time in the village we encountered just four inhabitants along with a Waitrose grocery van.

Walking the graveyard, 2024

But that was enough especially as we discovered a remarkable scheme to honour those from the village who had died in the two world wars. I could say more but it’s a story I have already written.*****

And by then it was time to move on.