< Back The Life and Loves of my Great Great Grandfather A talk for the Stamford Local History Society on 4th Dec 2025 by Trish Auciello George's death certificate This is my great great grandfather’s death certificate, he died in Spalding in January 1912 of bronchitis. There are three problems with this certificate: That’s not his name, that’s not his age, and that’s not his wife George was born in Barholm in 1844 as George Bunning Peake, the son of John and Susannah. John was an agricultural labourer and George followed in his footsteps. George's marriage certificate George married Margaret Hyde in January 1868 in Uffington Church, when he was 24 and she was 28. Margaret was born in Stamford in 1840 and had a tough childhood. Her father, John, was a stonemason, a skilled occupation, but they lived in Protection Place, just off Scotgate, known as a notorious slum. There were five children and Margaret’s mother, also Margaret, died aged 32 of tuberculosis when Margaret was four. John’s mother, another Margaret, moved in with them but she died in 1851, and John died in 1861. In 1861, Margaret was in service with an ironmonger in St. John’s Street, and in 1865, she had a son, called William. Margaret's Affiliation Order In March1866, Margaret obtained an affiliation order against William Harrison for child support of 1s 6d per week, worth about £15 today. He is described as a former employee of Mr Daffurn, did he lose his job because he had fathered a child outside of marriage? If life was tough for Margaret growing up, it did not improve after her marriage. Her daughter, Betsey, was born in July 1868, so Margaret was pregnant when she married George. They moved into Stamford and were living in Brittain’s Court, another slum area off Scotgate in February 1870. George's court appearance early February 1870 George appeared in court on 7th February 1870, accused of breaking into his mother’s house in Barholm and stealing various articles, some of which he pawned in Stamford. I’ve not found any follow up to this story, perhaps his mother decided not to press charges. However, just 3 weeks later…. George's trial late February 1970 George pleaded guilty to stealing a manure fork, value 1s 6d, and pawning it in Stamford. I don’t think the pawn broker was too fussy. His solicitor stated that George hadn’t been able to find work all winter and the family was in a fearful state of poverty. Margaret was described as being near her confinement, but didn’t want to enter the workhouse in case they lost their current home. George was sentenced to seven days in prison and Margaret was advised she could seek out-relief for a week. The sad postscript to this story is that there’s no record of a live birth to Margaret, perhaps those months of deprivation took their toll and the baby was stillborn. Margaret was pregnant again in the summer of 1870. George's court appearance November 1870 George was charged with fraud in Market Deeping and committed to trial at the sessions. His crime was obtaining an pair of trousers and boots by deception, it would probably only merit a fine today, but in 1870 it meant he spent the next two months in prison awaiting trial. George's trial January 1871 George pleaded guilty at his trial, and was sentenced to a further month in prison with hard labour. Folkingham House of Correction George served his time in prison here. The gatehouse is still standing and can be rented as a holiday home for around £2,000 a week in peak season. If Margaret hadn’t wanted to enter the workhouse earlier in 1870, it was inevitable when George went to prison. Stamford Workhouse on Barnack Road In the 1871 census, Margaret is in Stamford workhouse, with William, Betsey, and her son George junior, aged just 3 weeks. In the same census, George is working on a farm at Deeping St. Nicholas and claiming to be single. Inquest 1872 In August 1872, Margaret was a witness at an inquest into the sudden death of her neighbour from apoplexy. They were living on Rock Road, so it’s safe to assume George has returned to the family and indeed he started working for Hayes Coachbuilders around this time. William's Death Record Margaret’s son William died in 1874 aged 9, after being ill for a year with tubercular peritonitis. Rock Road, Stamford In 1881, the family was still in Rock Road, somewhere on the left of this photo but long since demolished. The family now consisted of George and Margaret, Betsey, George junior, my future great grandmother, Mary Ann, bon in 1875, and twin girls, Margaret and Martha Jane, born in 1879. They also had a lodger, Thomas Dexter, who worked at Hayes. So had life settled down? After all, George had been in stable employment for nearly 10 years, they had been living in the same house for around the same time, a lodger provided extra income – unfortunately not. George's trial August 1883 In August 1883, George and another man were found guilty of stealing five trusses of clover, the property of Hayes and Son, his employers for the past ten years. If a truss of clover is the same size as hay, they weighed at least 60 pounds each, not something you could easily hide. Folkingham had closed by now, George may have served his three month sentence in Sleaford. Why did he do it? Was he still struggling to support a growing family, or was it just stupidity? Corporation Buildings built 1891 George left his family, and Stamford, sometime between his 1883 prison term and the 1891 census. In 1891, Margaret was living in Corporation Buildings, on Scotgate. She is sharing three rooms with Betsey, George junior, the twins, her widowed brother John, their lodger from Rock Road, Thomas, and another lodger Elizabeth Andrews aged one. Elizabeth’s mother was unmarried and left Stamford soon after her daughter’s birth, leaving her with Margaret to look after. Margaret’s brother John remarried in 1892, but the sleeping arrangements would still have been interesting as Betsey and Thomas married in 1893. In 1891, my great grandmother was in service at 4 Barn Hill, where I like to think she had her own bedroom. 22 Scotgate built 1901 Margaret’s situation has improved by 1901, she’s now living at 22 Scotgate, the left hand half of the building in the picture. Although I imagine Thomas was paying most of the bills, Margaret was described as head of the house, also living there are Betsey and Thomas, the twins, and Elizabeth, now described as a foster daughter. My great grandmother, Mary Ann, had married in 1895, after she had their son in 1894. George junior married in 1899. With life improving for Margaret, let’s look at what George has been doing. 48 Westgate, Peterborough George was living in Peterborough in 1891, in the left hand corner section of this building. He is described as a bricklayer’s labourer. With him and described as his wife, is Susannah W. Peake, a laundress aged 39, and her son Alfred W. W. Peake, also a bricklayer’s labourer aged 17. This property looks more spacious than the three rooms Margaret is sharing with seven people in Stamford. Susannah was born in Stamford in 1851 as Susannah Harrison. In 1871, she was living and working in a pub, and later that year, she married Harry Wallis, a carpenter originally from Empingham, and had their son, Alfred William, a year later. Harry’s enlistment? Harry's enlistment? In 1876, Harry Wallis, born in Empingham, living in Stamford enlisted in the Royal Artillery. His age is four years younger, but surely this must be Susannah’s husband. So is this chicken or egg? Did Harry enlist and Susannah say “sod this for a game of soldiers”? or did she leave and Harry went for a less extreme version of the French Foreign Legion? After Harry’s army career, he spent the rest of his life in Leicester with at least two female housekeepers, and died in 1912 aged 63. What is certain is that Susannah was living in Kensington, London, in 1881, with her son Alfred. She is described as the wife of Thomas Wallis, a bricklayer, born in Kilsby, Northamptonshire. I haven’t been able to find Thomas Wallis anywhere else, so I think Susannah was using her name on the census. I don’t know whether Susannah thought Kensington would be smart and exciting, but there were four families totalling twenty five people in the same house. A plot worthy of EastEnders? So many questions…. Who was Thomas and how did he get together with Susannah? Stamford or London? Why did Susannah leave London, was it with or without Thomas? With Thomas being a bricklayer, is there any significance in George and Alfred being bricklayer’s labourers? Did they work with Thomas, perhaps locally? It’s likely that George and Susannah knew each other from her time at the pub, did they meet again through Thomas? If Thomas and George did work together locally, did they continue to do so after Susannah got together with George? Although these events could have been used in EastEnders, unfortunately this is real life and I have no answers to the questions raised. There’s no information on the 1891 census for 48 Westgate so perhaps they didn’t complete it that year. 22 Scotgate again in 1911 Margaret’s daughter Margaret married in 1905, and Martha Jane in 1908. In 1911, the remaining family are still at 22 Scotgate, but Thomas is now shown as head of the family, with Betsey and the foster daughter Elizabeth. Margaret has been relegated to the bottom of the page as mother-in-law. George in 1911 How I know that the George Wallis on the death certificate is George Bunning Peake? It’s because of the 1911 census. George and Susannah are living at 88 Winsover Road in Spalding, he is described as George Peak Wallace (Wallace and Wallis seem to have been interchangeable), aged 72, a bricklayer’s labourer from Stamford. His age is incorrect but it’s also wrong on the death certificate. The 1911 census asks for number of years married and children born alive. Susannah says she had one child, now dead, I haven’t been able to find Alfred to confirm this. She has given her years married as 39, which is factually correct, just not to George. 88 Winsover Road, Spalding This is where George and Susannah were living in 1911 and where George died in 1912. Spalding Cemetery George is buried in Spalding Cemetery, there’s no headstone but he’s somewhere in this area. Susannah died in 1918 of heart failure and she’s buried four graves away from George. Margaret's death Margaret died in 1917 aged 76 of arthritis deformans and exhaustion. By the time of her death, she had raised six children, seen two of them die, and had nine grandchildren. Margaret’s son George junior had died in 1915 from tuberculosis of the spine. One son-in-law and her eldest grandson served in WW1 and they both survived. Stamford Cemetery Margaret is buried in Stamford cemetery, she doesn’t have a headstone either, but her grave is shown here with the arrow. The grave with the book headstone is her daughter Martha Jane and her husband Charles, the cross is her grandson Thomas who died in 1926, and the small low marker to the right is Betsey and Thomas. Her other children are all buried in the cemetery. Conclusion George seems to have done his best for his family in the early years of his marriage, even if crime didn’t pay – not the ones we know about anyway. I’ve tried not to be too judgemental but it’s difficult to forgive George for deserting his family. I hope Margaret’s children were grateful that she was made of sterner stuff. Trish Auciello December 2025 A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

Daniel Lambert BACK CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO SEE IN FULL Stamford Crested China – Daniel Lambert T.S. Duncomb, Greaves & Co, and Dolby Brothers all who traded on High Street, the Stamford Supply Company, and Starsmore & Co. to name another two are just a few of the shops in Stamford before and after the First World War that sold crested china in Stamford. From small pots and vases to aeroplanes, submarines and zeppelins, crested china came in all sorts of shapes. The most local shape to Stamford is of course Daniel Lambert who died on June 21 st 1809 in the Wagon and Horses Inn in St. Martins. His gravestone in St. Martin’s New Churchyard records his weight as Fifty-Two Stones and Eleven Pounds. DOWLOAD PDF Previous Next

< Back The Rock Tennis Club: A Brief History By John Daffurn and Andrew Harwood Fig1. Major Wingfield's original court design Lawn tennis was developed as an outdoor version of court or real tennis. Its inventor was Major Walter Clopton Wingfield who patented his version of the game in 1874 and sold equipment packages including nets, balls and rackets. The sets were sold initially to the aristocracy who possessed large gardens that could incorporate the courts. In 1875, Wingfield attended a meeting at the MCC, who had their own court, and a set of rules was confirmed. Two years later the All England Tennis and Croquet Club held the first Wimbledon Championship. The game grew rapidly and, besides the private courts of wealthy families, clubs sprang up providing access for the middle classes to play. In this regard Stamford was behind the curve, as tennis clubs had been set up in towns and villages nearby (Bourne, Oakham, etc.) before the first, Stamford Tennis Club, was opened in the town. That club was formed in 1885 by Stamford School and was still operating in the 1960s, but then closed. It was re-formed in 1990 on hard courts leased from Stamford School with access from Conduit Road and is still in operation. Stamford, like most market towns in England at this time, was rather class conscious. Families in business or the professional classes went to private or grammar schools and mixed with people of similar backgrounds. Some of the wealthy, in larger properties like Rock House and Barn Hill House, had their own private courts, but others were keen to share this growing sport with like-minded people. These middle-class business owners founded the second of Stamford’s tennis clubs in 1887. It was named the Stamford Victoria Tennis Club, in honour of Queen Victoria’s golden jubilee in that year, and its courts were located on Burghley land opposite the Bottle Lodge entrance to Burghley Park. Fig 2. Albert Cliff in 1923 In 1909, Albert Cliff became the joint owner of Williamson, Cliff, Limited, a newly formed brickwork company; later one of Stamford’s most successful businesses. Albert had moved to Stamford from Leeds and was renting 2 Ermine Villas on Empingham Road from Samuel Fancourt Halliday, whose family were major builders in the town. That house, and another called Rock Lodge at the bottom of the road, had been built in the 1870s by the Hallidays and Samuel was living there. In 1916, Halliday decided to sell both of those properties and move to Tinwell Road. Albert Cliff bought the larger Rock Lodge, which was adjacent to both Rock Terrace and Rock House, all named as such as the latter two were built on the site of an ancient quarry. Rock Lodge had extensive gardens to the rear, on land rising to the old windmill site, and needed several domestic staff, including gardeners, to keep it maintained. In 1916, a few keen tennis players, including Albert Cliff and Percy Banks (Albert’s wife’s nephew), who attended the Congregational Church in Star Lane, were eager to start a tennis club and when Albert Cliff offered the church members some land behind Rock Lodge it was accepted and work began to prepare the ground. Percy Banks, who had worked on his father’s farm at Cranwell, until invited by Albert Cliff to join the brickworks staff, levelled and seeded the courts, installing other facilities including water, a separate toilet, and a small pavilion with two changing rooms. The Church Tennis Club was formed, and the courts were ready for play in the summer of 1919, the first year in which Albert Cliff was appointed mayor of Stamford, and two years before the formation of the Lincolnshire Lawn Tennis Association. Fig 3. Rules card c1923 Albert Cliff, who was re-appointed mayor in 1920 and 1921, had Cliff Road named in his honour, and by 1922 the Church Tennis Club had become known as the Rock Tennis Club (Club). At the time of the Club’s name change a small folded card containing the rules, fees, and matches for the upcoming season was printed for all members and the front showed the officers of the Club. This included Albert Cliff as President and F W Williamson, the other co-founder of Williamson Cliff, as Vice-President. Albert and his wife Helen (Nell) had no children, but Nell’s nephew, Percy, who later became managing director of Williamson Cliff, is named on the card as Captain. The Club membership from that time was extended to others, not connected with the church. During the second world war, double summertime allowed members of all clubs to play late into the evenings, often until 10pm, and the Club was open throughout the war, but only after a rearguard action by its lady members. The minutes of the AGM held at the Crown Hotel on 23 March 1942 showed that the men’s captain had suggested that it would be better to close the Club for the duration of the war. The ladies, who represented 70% of the membership for that year were not happy. A vote was taken of those present at the meeting and it was agreed to continue even though the minutes read that ‘it would chiefly be a ladies club’. Later minutes recalled that in 1943 some cows had escaped an adjoining plot and damaged the court so severely that the club was closed for the remainder of the season. Then, in 1945, it was noted that eight American allies had used the courts as force’s members, and it was hoped to welcome them again. From its inception the names of Cliff, Williamson, and Banks, who were directors of Williamson Cliff, were always associated with officers of the Club. However, another name, Burgess, regularly appears in the minute books from 1933 to 1947. Humphrey George Burgess was the personal secretary and confidant of Albert Cliff, and after Albert’s death became general manager of the brickworks. Burgess was a committee member from 1933 to 1939, but it was his wife who played a more prominent role: Hon Sec, 1933-38; Ladies Capt, 1939-40; Committee Member, 1941-47. The minutes in 1946 referred to her as Mrs H G Burgess but in 1947 she was called Mrs E Burgess, indicating that she had, by then, been informed that Humphrey had died of enteritis whilst a Japanese POW in Malaysia; his body was never recovered, or so she believed. [1] [2] Later, a chairman of the Club, Trevor Kirk, described playing on the courts with his grandmother in the early 1940s. The booking sheet, to reserve the courts, was displayed in a small hut by the courts where one could pencil in a name. This was at a time when vandalism and defacement were unheard of. Membership of this private club was by invitation or application only and the members attending the Annual General Meeting voted on any new applications to join. To be accepted, applicants had to be competent players able to maintain a high standard of play and, to some extent in those early years, of an acceptable social standing. Some members still remember the ordeal of playing in front of committee members to prove their worth. However, the Club was also social, and members met for tea on Saturdays, made easier by the installation of a calor gas stove in 1949. Other tennis clubs appeared in the town in the 1930s but they were short lived; Stamford St John’s Tennis Club, and the Stamford Infirmary Tennis Club. Another club, Blackstone’s Tennis Club, was part of the well-known engineering works’ leisure facilities. Blackstones was originally for employees only, but accepted others later when numbers fell, until closing in the 1950s. Another, the West End Tennis Club, originally played at Foundry Road, but in the 1950s took over the courts which had previously been the home of the then defunct Stamford Victoria Tennis Club opposite Burghley Park. The West End Tennis Club was wound up in 1964. Fig 4. The booking office (left) for the bowls, putting green and tennis courts at the Rec c1960 Percy Banks was followed as managing director of Williamson Cliff by his son A. J. F. Banks (Alec), who became a member of the Club in 1950, and during his fifty years of membership was both its chairman and benefactor. By the late 1950s the membership of the Rock Tennis Club was eighty strong, some of whom were regarded as social members. Any more would have made it difficult to provide play on the two courts. When friendly matches with neighbouring clubs were organised, they were played on the three grass courts at the Recreation Ground (Rec), as the extra court enabled matches to cater for teams of six. They were booked and paid for via the duty groundsman. These were public courts available to all and, in those days, were often fully booked by townsfolk. The Rock Tennis Club continued to thrive in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, but by the 1990s membership began to fall. The remaining members continued to maintain the courts, employing a groundsman to cut and mark them, but with members re-seeding and doing some of the extra work on a voluntary basis, as required. Money raising activities such as jumble sales and raffles helped to raise funds towards the growing costs of maintenance, but inevitably the quality of the courts started to suffer. Rock Lodge changed hands several times over the years. While the Cliff family lived at the property they took in Gladys Archer, the daughter of one of Nell’s sisters who had been orphaned. Gladys later married T. D. Ross, a director of Williamson Cliff who became the next owner of Rock Lodge. After Ross others followed, most with an interest in the Club, allowing it to continue in return for a small donation and the promise to maintain the area to a reasonable standard as it was a part of their garden. However, as more of the land was sold for development, several houses were built nearby, and the owner eventually informed the Club that he wished to develop all the land on which the courts stood. This was now a prime area for building properties close to town and notice to quit was received by the Club in 1999, after eighty years of occupancy. The members discussed their dilemma at an Extraordinary General Meeting to see if it would be possible to continue providing a grass courts club for the town. There were insufficient funds available to consider purchasing land and it was agreed to approach South Kesteven District Council (SKDC), with a view to transferring the Club to the Rec and to use the three courts there, which were now used less frequently by the general public. The courts were still in excellent condition and the Club was welcomed, with an offer to rent them in their entirety. This was too much for the Club, but an alternative to hire the courts for fixed periods during the summer months was agreed at an appropriate hourly charge. Maintenance remained with the SKDC and in 2019 the Club celebrated its centenary, with its members photographed in 1919 tennis attire. The arrangement, which started with the SKDC, continues although the ownership of the Rec and courts passed to the Stamford Town Council some years ago. The Club maintains a happy relationship with the Council, through the Town Clerk, despite the increasing pressure on funding for recreational activities and its inevitable impact on services and their maintenance. There is no longer a duty groundsman, employed by the council, at the Rec so casual bookings are now rare, but the Club has maintained a steady level of enthusiastic members at the only remaining grass court club in the town. Play is offered on four afternoons from May to September (Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday), and the members maintain the friendly atmosphere for which the Club has become known. This includes the long-standing tradition of “Tea at 4pm” on a Saturday, although the brew is no longer made using the calor gas stove, which was replaced by electricity in 2025. NOTES [1] Daffurn, John, Stamford Tenants , (Stamford, 2020) [2] It is probably a blessing that Mrs Burgess never knew the truth. Her husband had been captured in 1942 after the battle of Java and a year later was transferred to Sandakan in Malaysia. In 1945, 2,400 prisoners were held at Sandakan and as Allied Forces started to bomb the area it was decided to march the prisoners for 155 miles, through the jungle, to Ranau. During this death march most died and only six escaped. Burgess was one of less than 200 who made it to Ranau, where illness took most until only fifteen were left. To cover their atrocities the Japanese recorded most of the men as having died from enteritis, dysentery or beri beri. The Japanese government surrendered on 15 August and on 22 August leaflets were dropped over Ranau informing everyone that the war was over. On 27 August, Burgess along with his fourteen remaining comrades were marched out of the camp expecting to be taken to a release point, instead they were all executed by gunfire at close quarters. It was not until many years later that an Australian military historian Lynette Silver started to investigate this death march. The project would become all-consuming and remarkably, through her tenacious investigation, interviews with Malaysians, and research in Japanese archives, she was able to catalogue the outcome of all 2,400 soldiers {Silver, Lynnette Ramsay, Sandakan: A conspiracy of silence , 4 th rev. ed. (Binda, NSW, 2011)} Silver, with the help of Malaysian officials and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) continued to investigate those buried as ‘unknown’ and since 1996 has identified thirty-five more soldiers who are now buried in named CWGC graves. One of those is Flight Lieutenant H G Burgess (promoted whilst in captivity) who was identified by his RAF cap and badge which had been found at the site of the final massacre. A Print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back Anti-Printing Poem by an Unknown Hand, Published in 1820 The Banished Printer to His Trade – A Parody Submitted by Chris Hunt Compositor of printing name! Quit! Oh quit your wooden frame! Working, starving, idling, drinking Oh the gain, the loss of printing! Cease, fond printer, cease your trade, And shun the laws for printers made! Hark! they sentence; - judges say, ‘Libel printer, go away!’ What is this embitters life? Starves my children, kills my wife, Sends me abroad for punishment? Tell me my trade – ‘tis banishment! England recedes; it disappears -- France opens to my eyes! my ears With foreign accents ring: Lend, lend your ships! I sail! I fly! O judge! where is thy victory? O law! where is thy sting? The above poem was attached to a letter to the editor, which stated: I trespass upon your time and patience with an ode, intended to convey a faint idea of the inky breathings of an aspiring letter-press printer, who was fully conversant, and even deeply versed, in the ‘black arts’; and being considered too noxious a weed to remain in the garden of England was transplanted into a more degenerate soil. Leaving it to your candour to determine whether the ‘setting-up’ will warrant its being ‘sent to press’, I remain, sir, with grateful acknowledgements for your encouragement. X. Source Drakard’s Stamford News January 7th 1820 p4/c3 Note We shall never know the author of this poem, although its contents almost certainly mirrored the views of the Editor of the Stamford News, Mr Drakard. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back A Print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back Restoration and Rebuilding of Browne's Hospital 1870 David Wallington 2012 A report of 1869 stated: The Hospital buildings are in an advanced state of decay and dilapidation and with the exception of a small part are hardly fit for habitation. There was pressure to completely clear the site which occupies land between Broad Street and North Street and erect new buildings, but local opinion forced a rethink and the current two storey building on Broad Street was retained. James Fowler (known widely as Fowler of Louth) was appointed architect. Fowler was born in Lichfield and trained under Joseph Potter, the Cathedral’s architect. His career spanned the years of the Gothic revival and following his move to Lincolnshire he was active in building or restoring churches, vicarages and public buildings as well as being responsible for designing three alms-houses: Browne’s, Allenby Almhouses in Fotherby and Orme Almhouses in Louth as well as adding buildings to Holy Trinity in Retford and Gospelgate Bedehouses in Louth. It is therefore not surprising that Fowler should turn to Minton for the tiled floor in the passage between the Common Room and Chapel and to Skidmore of Coventry for the gas fittings and art metalwork. Francis Skidmore took over his father’s firm in 1845 and initially repaired church silverware. But he was soon designing church furnishings and was a pioneer in the gas lighting and heating of churches. He exhibited at the 1851 Great Exhibition and was widely used by George Gilbert Scott for the then fashion of metal screens separating chancels from naves. Of these the best known are the screens at Lichfield (still in place), Hereford (now in the V & A) and Salisbury (parts of which are being rediscovered). One of his largest commissions was the huge fleche on the top of the Albert Memorial in London and the wonderfully intricate metal fencing around that memorial. Sadly his obsessiveness with detail led to bankruptcy and because of the loss of his firm’s records he remains an obscure Victorian innovator and entrepreneur. His gas fittings have largely disappeared but we are fortunate that at Browne’s we have three examples of light fittings adapted for electricity: two in the passage and cloisters and one (lamp standard) on the eastern side of the lawn. Inside we have a rare example of two gas fittings still in place on the balcony of the chapel and a part of another fitting in the Confrater’s Room. A lot of the metal work on the doors of the old building and on the accommodation for the residents is clearly also from the Skidmore Manufactory. A tentative examination of Fowler’s work suggests that he turned to Skidmore when working on other projects in the county. It somehow seems fitting that in the 19th Century Browne’s Hospital turned to Coventry for work on the alms-houses as William Browne had developed links with it when developing his wool trading business four hundred years previously. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back Royal Air Force Wittering Christmas Menu 1942 Submitted by Chris Hunt A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back William Shakespeare and Stamford Chris Hunt 2022 Hidden away within William Shakespeare’s King Henry IVth Part 2; a mention is made, almost in passing of Stamford. A seldom performed play which on occasions is shorted by the removal of some of the conversations between minor figures. In Act 3 Scene 2 there is a conversation between Robert Shallow, a Justice of the Peace in Gloucestershire and his colleague Justice Silence, as they wait for the arrival of Sir John Falstaff who is recruiting soldiers for the Royal Army. Their conversation strays into a discussion of Shallow’s youthful indiscretions at Clement’s Inn which is part of the Inns of Chancery. It is within this part of the play that Stamford is mentioned:- Justice Shallow. “Yes, that Sir John, the very same. I saw him beat Scogan on the head at the gates of the Court, when he was just a lad, only this tall. On that same day I happened to have a fight with a man called Sampson Stockfish, a fruit seller, behind Gray’s Inn. Oh Jesus, Jesus. I’ve had some wild times! And now so many of the men I used to know are dead.” Justice Silence. “That will be us one day.” Justice Shallow “You’re right. I know you’re right, that’s for sure. As the Psalms say in the Bible. “death is certain.” Everyone will die. What price are people charging for a good set of young bulls at Stamford Fair?” Justice Silence. “I’m not sure. I wasn’t there.” Justice Shallow. “Death is certain. Is Dooble, that old man from your hometown, still alive?” Justice Silence. “He’s dead. Sir.” Justice Shallow. “Jesus, Jesus, dead! He was such a good archer, and now he’s dead? He had an excellent shot! John of Gaunt loved him, and used to bet money on his incredible aim. Dead! Oh, he would have hit the target even from two hundred and forty yards away! He could shoot straight at the target from two hundred and eighty yards away, maybe even two hundred and ninety, it was quite something to see! How much are they charging for twenty ewes now?” Justice Silence. “That all depends on their quality, but twenty good ewes would be worth about ten pounds.” Justice Shallow. “But old Dooble is dead?” Justice Silence. “Here comes two of Sir John Falstaff’s men. I think.” At this stage of their discussion more characters join them on stage and the conversation changes. In these preceding paragraphs Justice Shallow and Justice Silence seem to be talking about different things and then not listening to what the other has said. So what have we learnt about Stamford? Probably nothing as we have not discovered the price of two young bulls at Stamford Fair. And as to the price of twenty good ewes, was this the cost of sheep at the time of King Henry IV (1399-1413), or was that the price of sheep at the time the play was performed? It has been suggested that the play was written between 1596 and 1599, it was registered at Stationers Hall in August 1600 and published in quarto form by the end of the year. So why did Shakespeare choose Stamford when he could have chosen any other provincial town and also why choose a Lincolnshire market town when the two characters are men from Gloucestershire? Of course we shall never know. A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

< Back Black Sabbath Plays Baston 1970 It might come as a surprise that Black Sabbath with their original line-up of Ozzy Osbourne on vocals, Tony Iommi on guitar, Geezer Butler on bass and Bill Ward on drums, played on Saturday July 11 th 1970 in a Marquee on the Baston Playing Field. A Barbecue and Dance was organised by the Baston Community Association and for 12 shillings and 6 pence (62½ new pence) you would have heard a band that became the founders of Heavy Metal music and led by the legend that is Ozzy Osbourne. SOURCE SLEAFORD STANDARD (FRIDAY) JULY 10 TH 1970 p4/c8-10 A print version can be downloaded HERE Previous Next

Stamford Half Penny BACK CLICK ON THE IMAGE TO SEE IN FULL Stamford Half Penny On the restoration of King Charles II in 1660 there was a shortage of small coinage and as a result towns like Stamford issued small non silver coins. The Stamford coin had the words Half Penny and the Borough Arms on the obverse and on the reverse a woolsack and the words Charged to Ye Overseers. There were minor variants and some coins were slightly smaller and thinner. DOWLOAD PDF Previous Next

< Back Transcript of Bert Bailey's WWI diary P Massey & K Hansell 2014 Pte Bert Bailey Following the Society's WW1 exhibition in November 2018, to commemorate the signing of the Armistice, we have been given kind permission from the family of Bert Bailey to publish the following transcript below from his diary. For further details and the location of Bert’s residence please visit the Stamford Boys of 1911 . The diary transcript can be accessed HERE Previous Next