Custom survived: Redcliffe Pipe Walk

“For the health of the soul of Robert Berkeley, who gave to God and the church of St. Mary Redcliffe and its ministers the Rugewell and conduit. AD 1190 Erected.”

So reads the tap head beside that ‘most beautiful church in England’ (according to Elizabeth I and who’s to argue?) and when Robert Berkeley gave this gift, back in 1190, one wonders if he would have been amazed that some 800 years on, those same church ministers, several generations on of course, would ensure that the supply was still available by this annual custom. I wonder whether he would have been impressed that some 800 years, that his direct descendent would be joining the annual walk to reinforce the ownership of that water, as for the first time possibly ever a member of the Berkley family attended the walk, a Mr. Charles Berkeley from the impressive Berkeley Castle (although it was his father who lived there!). A point I was quickly aware would be a good bargaining point for any naughty children on the walk. Behave! This man has a castle and dungeon he could throw you in. It worked!

Well meaning!

I lived for many years in this crown of the South West, but surprisingly never joined the party which have continued this fine if perhaps defunct tradition. Bristol weather is not always the best and any custom taking place outside at the end of October looks like one which might be prone to the vagaries of the weather! However, I checked the weather it suggested overcast with sunshine, fine by me.

A lot of water under the bridge

The Redcliffe pipe walk is the oldest observed custom of its kind. It survived the Reformation, a time when many church related endowments would be lost or transferred. However, at some point the inspection appears to have fallen into abeyance and was revived in 1928s as a report in a newspaper records as ‘after a lapse of some time’. One assumes it died out at the First World War, a common time for such ceremonies to die out a result of the loss of men in that terrible conflict. A similar custom was established to check the more substantial Temple Conduit which died out in 1835. Why is unclear, but around this time the Corporation would be establishing their water works. If the Redcliffe custom died out then, it seems strange that it would be re-established almost 100 years later, unless there was some need to re-emphasise some other endowment or right associated with the original gift. We really don’t know. Even when a bomb hit through the pipe line, the custom never ceased. Even when the flow became a trickle or ceased filling the tap head the custom never ceased. So it seems likely that a big event, the War being most likely. Since the late 1920s it has continued unbroken and as I have accepted the World Wars as being acceptable gaps in an over 100 year tradition I shall with this one.

The pipe walkers are ready!

Well met

I arrived early and headed for St. Barnabus Church, Knowle where the walkers would traditionally in recent times gather for refreshments and soon was made very welcome. As soon as ten o’clock arrived we all congregated in an area behind the church. The group, 24 in, made up the surveyor, the vicar, churchwardens, and large number of curious bystanders. Here the leader of the group, the aforemention church’s surveyor introduced himself and gleefully asked who was new to the walk..I wasn’t the only ones there was quite a few! We would  find out why later. He also introduced the vicar of St. Mary Redcliffe who led us in a prayer for the provision of water and in memory of the vicar of St Barnabus’s church who was presently ill.

Well thought of

From the vantage point we made our way into the allotments where the spring, called the Huge Well, still arises. We were shown the possible actual site of the well and a part of a conduit which had recently collapsed and revealed the channel beneath. As we stood surveying this site: it began to rain!! Very typical Bristol. However, as soon as we walked a few places to the well head chamber: it stopped! This was especially opened by the surveyor and we all peered in to this considerable stone lined chamber. One wonders what went through the mind of Mr. Berkeley’s descendent as he peered 800 years of reflecting on the everflowing gift. It was a good photo opportunity I thought to mark the event.

Mr Charles Berkeley, the descendent of the original benefactor.

Here though I was asked to say a few words myself. Why? I by virtue of my other main interest (and blog) I was the well expert! I said a few words. I hope they were okay, although I did rather put my foot in it with my discussion of St. Anne’s well nearby…but that’s for another blog.

Inspecting the huge well

Walking on water

From this well head, a pipe line was laid travelling about two miles to a tap conduit head near the church of St. Mary Redcliffe. And of course we were there to survey it, the check at regular points that the pipe was still there and that access was still present. A two mile walk over the pipe, which was fortunately it was all downhill! For the next few 100 yards we travelled without any indication of a pipe, indeed the talk was more like a mass trespass through gardens and allotments, pass chickens and chard, raspberries and radishes…it wasn’t until we reached a garden on Raymend Walk that we saw our first real pipe laying under a metal manhole cover and flows through a Victorian metal pipe, replacing the lead and probably even wooden one of old. The family who owned the garden were very accommodating and offered the group apples from the tree. I asked them if they knew they’d be a yearly congregation of pipe walkers each year when they bought it! Fortunately they did. From here we had a bit of a detour as the surveyor worried that a wall on the route might be too prone to collapse to allow 20 odd people to pass it…but did this detour invalidate the claim I wondered! We still checked the stone, labelled SMP, which obviously reasserted the claim!

Through the allotments we go!

A bumping journey

Soon we arrived at Victoria Park, here the water filled a maze based on a labyrinth in St. Marys. It looked fairly clean and small shrimps disported themselves within it…but not sure I would drink it. At this point it was revealed why it was important to know who the newcomers were. At a larger pipe boundary stone the surveyor called forward newcomers to be bumped on the stone. This is probably the most traditionally part of the walk, often done of course at beating of the bounds, when mainly children were done. At first he said there were too many of us and he’d only do the children…however, this caused a bit of a ripple of indignation and so he offered anyone that wanted to be bumped would be done. I of course offered myself up. Followers of this blog will know that I’ve had a vicar on my chest being shoed at Hungerford Hocktide and this was much gentler. So I was lifted one…two…three. The vicar carrying me this time didn’t inflict any bruises. Also bumped was Mr. Berkeley. I am not sure his predecessor would have approved of the commoners manhandling him but of course this Berkeley thoroughly enjoyed it..and no-one would be sent to that castle dungeon.

The pipe inspected.

All ages bumped!

The descendent gets the bumps!

Pipe down we’re nearly there!

after the bumping, we examined another pipe. This one being much deeper, being reached by a ladder, and apparently had a tap where previous surveyors would take a sip. I noticed no-one appeared to volunteer this time. Then we regrouped and went under the railway, in the early 20^th century we would go over the railway and the group had the power to stop the trains! Fortunately, we didn’t risk it. We were close to the final tap head and deep into the buzzy thrall of Bristol a big change from these peaceful allotments. Crossing the Avon, and two major roads, one could be forgiven in forgetting we were following a pipe, but soon at the church we saw the tap head.   Charles Berkeley was impressed by this tap head with its fine Lion mouth. Another good photo opportunity, as this descendent peered into the source of water which was of great benefit to the people of Bristol.  Nothing flowed from this tap, but above it the final manhole cover revealed oily irony water. I jokingly offered Mr. Berkeley a sip. He politely refused.  The arrival at the church was very welcome as was the spread of sandwiches, cakes and very refreshing tea topped off by a nice choir, welcoming us in song!

A custom which involves a long walk might not be everyones cup of tea but the Redcliffe Pipe Walk is an enjoyable experience coupled with some friendly folk. And perhaps it’s this sense of camaraderie which despite there being a lack of water and purpose the walk continues.

– images copyright Pixyled Publications

 

Mr Charles Berkeley inspects the tap.

Custom contrived: Sheffield Fright Night

A nice couple

The urban city landscape can be a scary place for some. As the nights draw in, all manner of strange personages, loping characters and menacing youths appear from the shadows…in Sheffield the week before Hallowe’en these are the attendees of Fright Night, the country’s only Hallowe’en parade! This is a parade attracting over 40,000 people to the town, the majority dressed for the occasion. The whole of the city centre appears to be swallowed up by this spooky spectacle.

Bit of a youth problem?

How long have you been a crazed psychopath?

Fright on time

I arrived as the day’s light was fading. The first thing which hits one if the funfair and in this case the ghost train is not the scariest thing! Then bang coming towards you is a youth with bloody clothes and an axe. Usually I’d hide or run, but you quickly realise that its Michael Myers of the Hallowe’en film franchise and it’s nothing to worry about!! Tonight the city is full of crazed lunatics, monsters and aliens in the name of celebrating this ancient tradition of remembering the dead.

Fright thing to do

Fright night begun in 2001 in a city with perhaps the strongest pre-Stateside trick or treat tradition for the villages around and perhaps most of the city celebrated Cakin Night, which appears to have died out in the 1990s. Fright Nights almost laissez-fair attitude to the appearance of goblins, werewolves, superheroes and vampires is much in keeping with that tradition, almost normalising dressing up, indeed the people wandering around had a certain ‘we do this all the time…don’t you’. So perhaps this is a sort of revival and hopefully those in the ‘anti-US trick or treat’ camp may realise this soon rather than condemn it as another Americanisation! Halloween is a European tradition (see October’s post last year)

Death walks amongst us!

Unlike the Stateside versions, namely that regularly done in NYC, there is no real parade as such…rather a catwalk. Here, a local DJ calls on the stage a cavalcade of curious concoctions and in typical radio fashion asked things like ‘how did you make your open wound so realistic?’ or ‘what are you?’ in some cases as the costumes ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous. Those who had put the most effort in were more than happy to pose for photographs attempting their best fearsome grimace often under layers on impenetrable make up.

A digital monster!

The festival has a number of different aspects including a Zombie enclosure, a living dead chorus line and most impressive sight of all a ghost galleon which glided down the streets with its crew menacing peering out and staring with dead eyes with all those seen. Another highlight was the impressive carved pumpkins, not just grinning faces but even scenes as well, putting my efforts deep in the shade.

More scary than you first thought

Fright Night, perhaps the UK’s greatest commercialisation of this odd day and although the closest to the US, has still a very English style and needs to supporting especially as it’s free.  Finally the best thing perhaps about Fright Night is that most years it’s always before Hallowe’en meaning when you’re stuck for ideas you’ll get your inspiration here. Come along a feel the thrill! Happy Halloween!

– images copyright Pixyled Publications

Now that’s a pumpkin!

Custom demised: The Rhyne Toll

Every three years, the Manor Chetwode, in Buckinghamshire a property of the Chetwode family met at a Court Leet during which the Lord could levy a yearly tax, called the ‘Rhyne Toll,’ upon all cattle found within this liberty, between the 30th of October and the 7^th of November. An Elizabethan document records the reading of the order of the day:

“In the beginning of the said Drift of the Common, or Rhyne, first at their going forth, they shall blow a welke shell, or home, immediately after the sunrising at the mansion house of the manor of Chetwode, and then in their going about they shall blow their home the second time in the field between Newton Purcell and Barton Hartshorne, in the said county of Bucks; and also shall blow their home a third time at a place near the town of Finmere, in the county of Oxford; and they shall blow their horn the fourth time at a certain stone in the market of the town of Buckingham, and there to give the poor sixpence; and so, going forward in this manner about the said Drift, shall blow the home at several bridges called Thorn borough Bridge, King’s Bridge, and Bridge Mill. And also they shall blow their horn at the Pound Gate, called the Lord’s Pound, in the parish of Chetwode.. .. And also (the Lord of Chetwode) has always been used by his officers and servants to drive away all foreign cattle that shall be found within the said parishes, fields, &c., to impound the same in any pound of the said towns, and to take for every one of the said foreign beasts two pence for the mouth, and one penny for a foot, for every one of the said beasts.’ All cattle thus impounded at other places were to be removed to the pound at Chetwode; and if not claimed, and the toll paid, within three days, ‘ then the next day following, after the rising of the sun, the bailiff or officers of the lord for the time being, shall blow their home three times at the gate of the said pound, and make proclamation that if any persons lack any cattle that shall be in the same pound, let them come and show the marks of the same cattle so claimed by them, and they shall have them, paying unto the lord his money in the manner and form before mentioned, otherwise the said cattle that shall so remain, shall be the lord’s as strays.’ This toll was formerly so rigidly enforced, that if the owner of cattle so impounded made his claim immediately after the proclamation was over, he was refused them, except by paying their full market price.”

By the 1800s, changes had occurred such that toll begun at the more sociable nine in the morning instead of at sunrise, and the horn is first sounded on the church hill at Buckingham, and gingerbread and beer distributed among the assembled boys, sadly the girls received nothing. This was repeated at another area of the liberty and the toll would collect two shillings a score on all cattle and swine passing on any road. Then on the 7^th November, at twelve o’clock at night you could travel free as the toll closed.  The tenants of the land also has to pay one shilling. Before the coming of the railway the toll raised £20, but declined to £1 5s after as a consequence all cattle and sheep went that way.

Origins

The area was covered by an ancient wood called Rookwoode, said to be famed for giant boar and no one was safe who passed through it. Finally, the Lord of Chetwode, decided to remove the boar and entered the forest. A local song records:

“Then he Mowed a blast full north, south, east, and west, Wind well thy horn, good hunter; And the wild boar then heard him full in his den, As he was a jovial hunter. Then he made the best of his speed unto him Wind well thy horn, good hunter; Swift flew the boar, with his tusks smeared with gore, To Sir Ryalas, the jovial hunter. Then the wild boar, being so stout and so strong, Wind well thy horn, good hunter; Thrashed down the trees as he ramped him along, To Sir Ryalas, the jovial hunter. Then they fought four hours in a long summer day, Wind well thy horn, good hunter; Till the wild boar fain would have got him away, From Sir Ryalas, the jovial hunter. Then Sir Ryalas he drawed his broadsword with might, Wind well thy horn, good hunter; And he fairly cut the boar’s head off quite, For he was a jovial hunter.”

News of this deed reached the King, who granted to him, and to his heirs forever the full right and power to levy every year the Rhyne Toll. This it appears to have continued until the 1880s and as far as I am aware anyone can travel this day free of charge through this quiet Buckinghamshire village.