General

 

The image above is one of the earliest examples of a Sword Dancing ‘calling -on‘song. Sword Dancing in Northumberland and Durham is very peculiar, for unlike the sword dances found elsewhere in the country, the sword in the Northern area is two handled.

The earliest written description of sword dancing in Northumberland is part of the seasonal festivities written by John Wallis, Curate of Simonburn in his book “The Natural History and Antiquary of Northumberland” published in 1769, he relates the dances still performed at Christmas time he states:

“Young men march from village to village, and from house to house with music before them, dressed in antic attire, and before the vestibulum or entrance of every house entertain the family with the Motus incompositus, the antic dance, or Chorus armatus, with swords or spears in their hands, erect and shining. This they call, the Sword-Dance. For their pains they are presented with a small gratuity in money, more or less, according to every householders ability, their gratitude is expressed by firing a gun. One of the company is distinguished from the rest by a more antic dress; a fox’s skin generally serving him for a covering and ornament to his head, the tail hanging down his back. This droll figure is their chief or leader he does not mingle in the dance”.

On the 7^th January 1843 the Newcastle Journal published an article formerly printed in The Times of a custom called “Sword dancing”

“The sword-dancers are men entirely or chiefly composed of miners or pitmen, and of persons engaged in the various other vocations of a colliery, who during the week intervening between Christmas and New Year’s Day, perambulate the country in parties, consisting of from twelve to twenty, partly in search of money, but much more I believe, of adventure and excitement”  “on these occasions they are habited in a peculiarly gaudy dress, which, with their dancing principally attracts attention. Instead of their ordinary jackets they wear others, composed of a kind of variegated patchwork which, with their hats, are profusely decorated with ribands of the gayest hues, prepared and wrought by their sisters or sweethearts, the sword dances being usually young and unmarried men. This, with slight individual variations is the description of dress worn by all the members of a sword-dancing party, with the exception of two conspicuous characters invariably attached to the company and denominated amongst themselves respectively the “Tommy” and the “Bessy”  These two personages were the most frighteningly grotesque dresses imaginable; the former being usually clad in the skin of some wild animal, and the latter in petticoats and the costume of an old woman; it is the office of those two individuals, to go round amongst the company which collects to see them dance, and levy contributions in money; each of them being furnished for this purpose with a huge tin or iron box which they rattle in the faces of the bystanders, and perform other antics and grimaces to procure subscriptions. A fiddler also is an indispensable attaché to a company of sword dancers”….”The sword dancers are each furnished with long steel wands, which they call swords, and which they employ with a very peculiar and beautiful effect during the dance”.

In Northumberland the villages which continued the tradition into the 20^th century were Amble, Bedlington, Earsdon, Monkseaton, Newbiggin by the Sea, Prudhoe and Mickley, Walbottle and Westerhope.

 

 

 

In 1910 Cecil Sharp, keen folksong and folkdance collector was invited north, by William Parker Brewis of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne, and between 1910 and 1922 he collected five sword dances, and published them in the book “The Sword Dances in Northern England”, and within the first few months of publication was using the dances in the English Folk Dance Society as part of their “Advanced Certificate” course of folk dance, what the sword dancers themselves made of this we shall never know.

The term “Rapper” for the name of this kind of dancing comes from an interpretation of the poor written word which Cecil Sharp wrote in his notes as to the name of the implements the Earsdon men were holding in their hands, no earlier account of this word in combination with Sword Dancing has been found.

In Northumberland and Durham today, very few of the traditional Sword Dancing sides still perform. High Spen Blue Diamonds in County Durham, being one of the very last, passed down through the generations of the Forster family. Even though there are little traditional sides left, the dance still goes on with the likes of the Demon Barbers, from Newcastle upon Tyne bringing back the excitement of the fast dance, or the Monkseaton Morris Men who still perform every New Year’s Day at 12 noon outside the Ship Inn, Monkseaton. As traditions change and die out and everywhere becomes less magical and more mundane, it is good to support and remember the little things that make the North East a little bit different from anywhere else.

 

 

Season’s Greetings!

 

On the evening of Wednesday 1^st December 1943, tragedy struck the communities of Togston and Amble.  An RAF aircraft – a Short Stirling Mk. III – crashed into the top floor of Cliff House Farm, just outside Amble.

The bomber had taken off from RAF Mepal, Cambridgeshire, on 1^st December.  Its mission, along with other aircraft, was to drop sea mines off Denmark.  On the return flight, the aircraft were diverted to RAF Acklington due to fog.  The survivor reported that the plane had experienced trouble but that the Pilot, Warrant Officer Kerr, had managed to keep the plane in the air until he was safely over Amble, but could not maintain control and crashed into the farmhouse at 10.40pm

Mr and Mrs William Robson were entertaining their friends, Mr and Mrs Rowell, at the farm that Wednesday.  Mr Rowell, a butcher in Amble, had visited the Robson’s to roll some bacon, and Mrs Rowell had been invited along for supper.  They had just finished their meal when the plane crashed into the house.  Mr Rowell described the incident in the Newcastle Journal and North Mail (in an article published on Friday 3^rd December 1943),

there was a deafening roar and the house came down about our ears… Our first thoughts, naturally, were for the children.  We pulled at the wreckage in an effort to find them.  Then fire broke out and we had to throw water to keep down the flames.

The four adults were injured and in shock.  Neighbours and rescue squads arrived at the scene quickly.  The five Robson children, who were sleeping upstairs at the time of the crash, were killed on impact:

Sylvia, aged 9 years

Ethel, aged 7 years

Marjorie, aged 5 years

William, aged 3 years

Sheila, aged 19 months

 

The bodies of the children were found on Saturday 2nd December.  The image below is from a register, a ‘Record of Civilian Death Due to War Operations’.  All five children’s deaths are recorded within the register.  Sheila’s body is noted as being found at 1.30am.

 

 

The Stirling bomber had a crew of seven men, but only one survived the crash.  He was spotted by Mrs Rowell, running around the field on fire.  She called to her husband who ran across to the airman, rolled him on the ground, and extinguished the flames.  Mr. Rowell than rushed to the plane to help the aircrew, but could find no one else.

 

The aircrew were all members of 75 Squadron, Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve:

Warrant Officer (Pilot) George John Stewart Kerr, aged 22 years. Son of John and Georgina Kerr of High Ongar, Essex.  Buried in Chevington Cemetery, Northumberland.

Sergeant (Air Gunner) George William Thomas Lucas, aged 22 years. Son of George and Ellen Lucas of Shepherd’s Bush, London.  Buried in East Finchley Cemetery and St. Marylebone Crematorium.

Sergeant (Air Bomber) Ronald Smith, aged 20 years. Son of Basil and Sarah Ann Smith of Leeds; husband of Joan Smith of Halton, Leeds.  Buried in Leeds (Whitkirk) Cemetery.

Sergeant (Navigator) Donald Frank Wort. Son of Mr. and Mrs Frank Wort of Parkstone.  Buried in Poole (Parkstone) Cemetery.

Flight Sergeant (Wireless Operator/Air Gunner) Derek Arthur Holt. Son of Mr. and Mrs A. Holt of Shrewsbury, Shropshire.  Buried in St. Helen’s Cemetery.

Sergeant (Flight Engineer) Leonard George Copsey, aged 20 years. Son of George and Jessie Copsey of Hornchurch.  Buried in Hornchurch Cemetery.

 

 

 

The survivor of the crash was Sergeant (Mid Upper Gunner) Kenneth Gordon Hook of Hambledon, Surrey, who was 20 years old at the time.  Even though he sustained serious injuries, he was flying again by February 1944.  On 13 March 1944, he was in another Stirling bomber, again taking off from RAF Mepal, for a minelaying operation near Brest, when the aeroplane malfunctioned and the plane crashed, with three of its five mines exploding after impact.  Sergeant Hook survived, and by the end of the Second World War had flown 75 operational missions.  He retired from the RAF in 1977 with the rank of Flight Lieutenant.  He died in 1989 in Devon.

 

 

The crash at Cliff House Farm was reported the next day in the Log Book of Amble Church of England School, which Sylvia and Ethel both attended.  It notes that a wreath was purchased, and we know (from a newspaper article which reported on the funeral) that this was laid on the grave of the children by staff and pupils, when the funeral took place on Saturday 4^th December.  The service was held at Amble St. Cuthbert and the interment took place at Amble West Cemetery, where the children were all laid to rest in one grave.

 

 

Today, the children and the tragedy that befell them are still remembered.  A memorial table stands at the west end of Amble St. Cuthbert’s, and there is a housing estate named after the children, near the site of Cliff House Farm.  The estate is named Robson Way, with each of the closes named after a child.  The airmen who died are remembered on a plaque inside Acklington St. John the Divine, which was the official church for RAF Acklington.

Mr. and Mrs Robson moved to a farm at Shotley Bridge, before moving to Stannington and later, Fenrother.  They are buried in Amble West Cemetery, in the same grave as Sylvia, Ethel, Marjorie, William and Sheila.

 

In July 2016 we ran a blog about St. George’s Hospital, Morpeth, the former County Lunatic Asylum, describing life in the Asylum. In this blog we will look at a particular class of record found amongst the records of the Asylum and held by Northumberland Archives – the patients’ case books – and use an example of one case to show how the records can be used to build up a biography of a patient. In the early period of the hospital from its establishment in 1859 information concerning patients can be found in the admission registers. These provide brief details about the patient and their condition – name, address, age, gender, marital status, occupation, union or parish responsible for financing patient’s stay in hospital, diagnosis, supposed cause, comments about physical health further information about the illness and the outcome – whether the patient died, was discharged or removed.

In 1890 a new series of records was introduced – patient’s case books. These records provide much more detailed information about the patient as we will see when considering the case of Sarah Davison (patient number 1645).  Introductory information in the case book reveals that Sarah Davison was admitted to hospital on 9 August 1891. She is described as a 38 year old widow, a field worker living at Mitford Steads Farm, an Anglican and that the supposed cause of illness is ‘failure to affiliate child’. Affiliation or filiation refers to making a maintenance claim for financial support of an illegitimate child through the court system. This reference is supported by an entry in the Morpeth Petty Sessions Register of Summary Jurisdiction of 5 August 1891 – Sarah Davison brought a bastardy application case against Luke Youll that was not upheld. A search of the 1891 census reveals only one person named Luke Youll – a 24 year old farm servant living at Sturton Grange, near Warkworth, Northumberland.  Details in the case book suggest some unpleasantness surrounding the filiation case – Sarah was the recipient of ‘taunts and insults from the relatives of the reputed father’ and the failure to secure the affiliation order are attributed as the cause of Sarah’s illness. It does appear that there is at least the possibility that Luke Youll was the father of the child – he had been providing maintenance payments from the birth of the child eleven months ago.

 

The case was not the only distressing circumstances of Sarah’s life. We learn from the case notes that ‘she had a good deal of trouble about 8 years ago her husband and 3 children dying within 13 months …’. The casebook also reveals that Sarah’s father, Joseph Thornton, suffered from mental illness. . We learn that ‘he is said to have been 3 times in this Asylum being 16 years ago. The cause assigned in this case being the loss of a suit at law’. Further evidence of family history of mental illness is provided – the case book notes that ‘the father’s brother is also described as not quite compos mentis’. This information can be used to undertake further research into the family and we will explore this in a future blog.

The case books provide a physical description of the patient. Sarah is described as ‘A slightly built woman somewhat above the average height. Weight about 110lbs. Hair brown turning grey … teeth remarkably bad. Expression not very intelligent’.  Accompanying the physical description there is a photograph of the patient. Many of the patients appear to be wearing similar clothing suggesting that there may have been a hospital uniform.

 

 

 

A description of Sarah‘s mental condition is also provided –  ‘She is noisy restless & incapable of rational conversation. Does not know where she is or when she came here. With a little management she lies quietly in bed during examination, but is reported noisy, restless, knocking on shutter or spitting during the morning’.  Later on she is diagnosed as suffering from ‘acute mania’, in other words suffering from manic episodes. On 13 August 1891 it was recorded as ‘noisy, restless, incoherent, laughs & cries without apparent reason … resists all attempt at examination, occasionally refuses forcible feeding…’.  By 25 August Sarah appeared to have recovered from this episode – ‘She is now up taking food herself and sewing & is in every way greatly improved’. However, on 14 September 1891 it is recorded that Sarah had suffered relapse – ‘… was very excitable & violent last night till midnight & has been noisy since’. This episodic behaviour continued through Sarah’s confinement to hospital. The case book entry of 3 April 1897 records  ‘No change. She is now quite demented and occasionally abusive’. The apparent change in diagnosis is interesting – dementia was another commonly used diagnosis and in some instances may have been used to describe what we know as schizophrenia.  Able patients were expected to be involved in some work activity – hence the reference to sewing.  Later on, we learn that Sarah is employed in the laundry. By 1895 Sarah has been diagnosed as a chronic patient – one with little chance of full recovery – and had been placed in a refractory ward – solitary confinement.  Sarah Davison died at St. George’s Hospital on 24 August 1903. Cause of death was influenza and cardiac failure. She had remained a patient at the hospital since her admission twelve years previously.

 

 

Northumberland Archives holds patients’ case books for St. George’s Hospital from 1890 until the mid-20^th century. These volumes contain information about hundreds of patients that were treated at the Hospital throughout this period and many of the volumes includes photographs of the patients- for some researchers this may be the only photograph of a family member that survives.  Due to the sensitive nature of the content the volumes are ‘closed’ for 100 years – meaning that there is no public access to records that are less than 100 years old. However, it is sometimes possible to gain access to a ‘closed’ record if you are a descendant of a patient. Staff can provide further details about the process to gain access.