Burying in Woollen Acts

Following a decline in the wool industry, c.1660s, the English government, in a bid to boost sales, made it law that the dead be buried in pure English woollen shrouds to the exclusion of all other textiles.

As the document above shows, an oath had to be made by a member of the deceased’s family confirming that the ‘lately deceased, was not put in, wrapt, or wound up, or buried in any shirt, shift, sheet or shroud, made or mingled with flax, hemp, silk, hair, gold or silver, or other than what is made of sheep’s wool’. The same went for the lining of the coffin.

The legislation was in force until the 1810s, however, it went mostly ignored after 1770 by people who could afford to pay the £5 fine for noncompliance.

[Sources: Burying in the Woollen Acts | Needleprint Blogspot]

Corpse Road

In medieval Britain, corpse roads provided a practical means for transporting corpses from remote communities to cemeteries in larger towns, that had burial rights. Concomitant expansion of church building throughout the UK during the late medieval period inevitably encroached on the territories of existing mother churches or minsters. Demands for autonomy from outlying settlements made minster officials feel that their authority was waning, as were their revenues, so they instituted corpse roads connecting outlying locations and their mother churches that alone held burial rights.

For some parishioners, this decision meant that corpses had to be transported long distances, sometimes through difficult terrain: usually a corpse had to be carried unless the departed was a wealthy individual. Many of the corpse roads have long disappeared, while the original purposes of those that still survive as footpaths have been largely forgotten, especially if features such as coffin stones, on which the coffin was placed while the parishioners rested, or crosses no longer exist.

Such corpse roads have developed a great deal of associated folklore. The essence of spirit lore is that spirits, that is, spirits of the dead, phantasms of the living, wraiths, or fairies move through the physical landscape along special routes. Such routes are conceived of as being straight and by the same token, convoluted or non-linear features hinder spirit movement.

Similarly, corpse roads would run in a straight line over mountains and valleys and through marshes. In towns, they would pass the houses closely or go right through them. The paths end or originate at a cemetery; therefore, such a path or road was believed to have the same characteristics as a cemetery, where spirits of the deceased thrive. As such, corpse roads became intrinsically associated with fairy roads and the supernatural entities which reside there. 

[Image Source]

Christmas with the Saxe-Coburg and Gothas

When Queen Victoria’s German-born husband, Prince Albert, arranged for a fir tree to be brought from his homeland and decorated in 1841, it created a minor sensation throughout the English-speaking world. Everyone knew about Queen Victoria’s Christmas tree. A print of the royal family gathered about the Christmas tree at Windsor Castle [above] appeared in the Illustrated London News in 1848, then in Godey’s Lady’s Bookin 1850, and was reprinted again ten years later. The six-foot fir sits on a table, each tier laden with a dozen or more lighted wax tapers. An angel with outstretched arms poses at the top. Gilt gingerbread ornaments and tiny baskets filled with sweets hang by ribbons from the branches. Clustered around the base of the tree are dolls and soldiers and toys.

It was not, however, the first German tree in England, as is commonly thought. Queen Victoria had seen one as a girl in 1832. The little princess wrote excitedly in her diary that her Aunt Sophia had set up two “trees hung with lights and sugar ornaments. All the presents being placed around the tree.” And long before that, in 1789, Queen Charlotte, wife of George III, the last king of America, sent to her native Meckelberg-Strelitz in northern Germany for a Christmas tree. The queen’s physician, Dr. John Watkins, described it as “a charming imported German custom, [with] bunches of sweetmeats, almonds, and raisins in papers, fruits, and toys most tastefully arranged” on its branches. [Source]

During Christmas 1841, after the recent birth of Edward, Prince of Wales, there was great happiness within the palace. A joyful Queen Victoria wrote in her journal, “To think that we have two children now, and one who enjoys the sight [of the Christmas tree] already; it is like a dream.”

In addition, Prince Albert, writing to his father, said: “This is the dear Christmas eve on which I have so often listened with impatience for your step, which was to convey us into the gift-room. Today I have two children of my own to make gifts to, who, they know not why, are full of happy wonder at the German Christmas-tree and its radiant candles.” [Source]

Advent Calendar of Oddments 2012: December 4th

Christmas is Cancelled

Oliver Cromwell, “who was part of the joint republican, military and parliamentarian effort that overthrew the Stuart monarchy as a result of the English Civil War, and was subsequently invited by his fellow leaders to assume a head of state role,” [Source] banned Christmas in the ‘anti-fun charter’ of 1651. Public notices were nailed to trees around Britain warning that:

The observation of Christmas having been deemed a sacrilege, the exchange of gifts and greetings, dressing in fine clothings, feasting and similar satanical practices, are hereby FORBIDDEN, with the offender liable to a fine of five shillings.

In 1657 he also banned mince pies because they symbolised Catholicism.

Advent Calendar of Oddments 2012: December 3rd

David Lloyd-George and Edward VIII. 1919.

Sir Arthur Aston: Death by Wooden Leg

Sir Arthur Aston (1590–1649) was a lifelong professional soldier, most noted for his support for King Charles I in the English Civil War, and in folklore for the gruesome manner of his death.

In 1648, whilst the war raged, Aston was made governor of Drogheda, a vital strategic port. The, in 1649, Oliver Cromwell’s forces attacked the town in the Siege of Drogheda, one of the most vicious episodes of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. When the town was stormed, the garrison and many civilians were massacred by the victorious Parliamentarian soldiers.

Aston agreed to surrender after a parley on the bridge but Cromwell’s officers were ordered to put the entire town to the sword. It is widely believed that the Parliamentarian soldiers killed Aston by dashing his brains out with his own wooden leg, which they believed to conceal gold coins.

Image: The offending prosthetic.

(Source: Wikipedia)

collective-history:

A policeman in London directing three Burmese women along Elgin Avenue, London, ca. 1935 

(Source: collectivehistory, via itcouldbeamazing)

Mary of Exeter

Mary of Exeter was a carrier pigeon who flew many military missions with the National Pigeon Service during World War II, carrying top secret messages across the English Channel back to her loft in Exeter, England. She was awarded the Dickin Medal in November 1945 for showing endurance on war service despite being repeatedly injured.

On one occasion she was attacked by German-kept hawks stationed in Pas-de-Calais returning home with wounds to her neck and right breast. She recovered sufficiently and was put back in service two months later. 

On another occasion, Mary returned with the tip of one wing shot off and three pellets were removed from her body. She recovered, passed flight tests, was returned to service despite the shortened wing. 

During her final trip her neck muscles were damaged by shrapnel. Her owner made her a leather collar to hold her head up, and took her out of service. 

Mary’s loft, located at the Exeter home of a shoemaker named Charlie Brewer who had become a loft keeper and intelligence agent during the war, was damaged during the Luftwaffe’s 1942 raids on Exeter, killing many of the pigeons housed there. Mary, however, survived.

She died in 1950 and is buried in Ilford Animal Cemetery.

[The pigeon depicted in the image above is not Mary (she can be seen here, looking unremarkably pigeon-esque), however, GI Joe up there better demonstrates what a pigeon looks like wearing a Dickin Medal - marvellous!]