Charles Hall goes coursing greyhounds, 1818

York Herald, 12 December 1818

In addition to the several convictions which have lately taken place in Cleveland, under the game laws, John Leng, of Bilsdale, carpenter, was convicted before the Very Rev. the Dean of York, on Friday week, in the penalty of £20 for setting snares in the estate of Sir Wm Foulis, at Ingleby Greenhow, on Sunday the 29th ult. and Charles Hall, of Hutton, near Rudby, labourer, was convicted on the same day before Sir W Foulis, in the like penalty, for coursing with greyhounds, without having obtained a game certificate

I think this is the Charles Hall mentioned in my research notes (People of Hutton Rudby in the C18/19):-

30 Nov 1817:  Charles Hall of Whorlton married Mary Taylor otp [of this parish].  Their children’s baptisms:  Jane 1818, Elizabeth 1819, Charles 1821, John 1823, Benjamin 1827, Robinson 1829, Marianne 1831, Isabella 1837.  Charles is described as farmer 1818-9, and labourer thereafter.  Their son Benjamin married in 1851 and remarried in 1861.  Charles died in 1854 a60.  His family’s gravestone [MI 396] is near the cholera mound, and records Charles, Elizabeth his daughter who d1844 a22, and Mary his wife

(On the subject of the Game Laws, it looks as though Gentlemen & Poachers: The English Game Laws 1671-1831 by P B Munsche is definitely the book to read.  I see from the 'Look Inside' preview pages on Amazon that Charles Hall should have paid £1 a year tax for keeping a greyhound.)

The Dragon of Sexhow

I wrote this version of the old story a long while ago for schoolchildren and had quite forgotten it until I came upon it recently.

I have to admit - this is one blog post for which I really cannot make any claims of historical accuracy!

Once, long ago, when wolves hunted along the high moors and down the wooded valleys, there came one spring morning a mighty dragon to Sexhow. 

Down he flew and his shadow darkened the sky, and the children of Sexhow and Hutton and Rudby ran from their houses and down to the church where the bridge crosses the river and their elders came out and stood before the dragon and trembled for their lives. 

Down flew the dragon and wrapped his great tail three times around himself and roared in a voice that shook the hills that he must be fed or he would lay waste the land. 

"What can we give you?" called the people, quaking.  "We are a land without children.  Your kind have taken them all." 

The dragon hissed and his poisonous breath scorched the trees on Folly Hill. 

"Then it must be milk," he groaned.  "Milk me nine cows and I will drink it now." 

And every day he called for milk and hissed and roared until the ground where he lay was brown and burned and bare.  And the villagers worked and toiled.  There were no children to help them.  The children were playing hide and seek among the trees by the river where the dragon could not see them. 

"This is too much!" groaned the fathers as they hitched the oxen to the plough. 

"This is too much!" sighed the mothers as they fed the chickens and swept the floors. 

The dragon hissed for milk and the children skimmed stones across the river. 

And so it went on through the long summer days and the parents grew wearier and the dragon grew fatter and the children grew wilder.  And the lord of the castle at Whorlton whose walls were black from the dragon's smoky breath called for champions to save his people from their plight. 

But no one came. 

"This dragon is no match for us," said the King's knights.  "There is no glory in fighting a dragon who drinks milk." 

And so the parents toiled and the children played and the dragon hissed until there came at last an unknown knight journeying north to seek adventure.  He came one evening to the castle and the lord begged him to rid the land of the fiery serpent and the knight agreed. 

"But only," said he, "if no one knows my name.  There is no honour in killing a dragon who drinks milk." 

And early in the morning, so early that the villagers had not yet begun to milk the nine cows for the dragon's breakfast, he left the castle and surprised the dragon as it snored and, driving his spear deep into its heart, he left it dead and went on his way. 

The villagers were overjoyed and took their knives and skinned the great beast and hung its scaly pelt up in the church by the river in thanksgiving for the unknown knight whose bravery had saved them all.  And the children every Sunday would gaze at the dead dragon's wrinkled skin and remember the long summer when they had played all day. 

And so my story ends.  But where the dragon skin is now, that nobody knows.

Thomas Milner of Skutterskelfe: the life & times of a Tudor gentleman

Thomas Milner of Skutterskelfe, a gentleman of about sixty-four years of age, made his will on 28 June 1589, the year after the Spanish Armada.  He had inherited his mother's share of the estate of his grandfather, Thomas Lindley, including one-third of the manor of Skutterskelfe where he lived with his wife Frances Bate and their daughter Mary, aged twenty-one. 

He does not seem to have been suffering from ill health when he made his will – simply describing himself as "whole of mind and remembrance thanks be given to God" – and was possibly prompted to do so because of his extreme irritation at the behaviour of his wife's family over the estate of his father-in-law, who had recently died.  Thomas's will, after careful directions for his burial in All Saints' at Hutton Rudby and legacies to the church (with forthright comments about the current incumbent and his predecessors), proceeds with a bequest to his wife:

"my best breeding mare, my best nag to ride upon, with five of my best kine."

This is immediately followed by a confirmation that she is to have

"all such things as in right she ought in conscience to have and be answered of"

continuing, in a fling against his mother-in-law (for how could he leave his wife his father-in-law's goods?)

"either of mine, or of the goods of her father to whom she was executor, and got nothing thereby of things certainly known to be embezzled at the death of her father by her mother as may appear by a note [in] writing set down whereof she should have had a part, and got nothing through the greedy dealings of her [un]loving brethren, and the witness of some of no great honesty nor yet true feelings therein"

After this, he continues with the disposal of the residue of his estate to his wife and daughter, a legacy to the poor of the parish, and bequests and legacies to family, servants and godchildren.  His will, and the surscription set above his burial place in accordance with its provisions, provide us with valuable details of his family and a picture of gentry life in Cleveland in the sixteenth century.

Rudby Parish Magazine: February 1892

Excerpts from the parish magazine of Rudby-in-Cleveland:

CHURCH OFFERTORIES

Dec. 27th, 1891 ....................... £1 3s. 8½d.
Jan. 3rd, 1892 .......................... 8s. 1d.
Jan. 10th, 1892 ........................ 10s. 0d.
Jan. 17th, 1892 ........................ 14s. 8½d.

MARRIAGE

Jan. 2nd – Harry Butler and Hannah Honeyman, both of Hutton.

BURIALS

Jan. 12th – Thomas Milburn, of Hutton, aged 77 years
Jan. 16th – James Richardson, of Potto Carr Farm, Parish of Whorlton, aged 65 years
Jan. 16th – William Hammond, of Hutton, aged 47 years

EAST ROUNTON

There is a Service in the Church at East Rounton on Sundays at 2.30 pm

CHURCH OF ST CUTHBERT'S, MIDDLETON-ON-LEVEN

A Service is held on alternate Sundays at 2.30 pm

COAL AND BLANKET CLUB

The names of those who have kindly subscribed to the Coal and Blanket Club this year are –

Viscount and Viscountess Falkland

Mrs Sadler

Mrs Brigham

Mr A B Wilson

Miss Wilson

Miss Paver

Mr Barthram

Mrs Chapman

Miss O'Connor

Mr Park

The Misses Park

Mr T Bowes Wilson

Mrs Blair

Mr Passman

Mr Coverdale

N. H. Coal Company

These subscriptions amounted to £13 10s. 7d.  Money paid into Club by members, £17 0s. 9d.  With this fund 25 tons of coal and 9 pairs of warm blankets were distributed to the members, the total amount paid for the coals and sending being £24 16s. 9d., and for the blankets £5 9s. 9d.

Our best thanks are again due to Mrs Brigham this year for the time and thought she has given to the Coal Club.  Her good work is much appreciated throughout the village, both by the poor and by those who realise what an amount of labour and of anxiety is incurred by the successful carrying on of a Coal Club.

CONFIRMATION

A Confirmation will be held at Yarm on March 7th.  It is requested that the names of those desirous to be confirmed may be sent in at once to the Vicar.

CHOIR TEA

The members of the Choir and their friends gathered together at the Schoolhouse on December 29th, for their Annual Tea.  After a comfortable tea dancing began, and continued with unabated spirit until one o'clock in the morning.  The dancing was interspersed with a few much-appreciated songs from Miss Clarkson.  

The Sunday School Tea took place on December 31st.  Oh, children!  judging from the noise you made you must have been happy.  Prizes were given to the scholars for attendance at school during the year.

The Stokesley parish magazine of 1876

A few notes from the Stokesley, Whorlton & Ingleby Parish Magazine of 1876.

(I find to my dismay that I can't find the source of these notes at the moment!  Perhaps if I have time to go through my hand-written notes, I'll find it.  I think the Northallerton County Library is the source).

The following services were held in January 1876:

Stokesley:  Sundays at 10.30 am and 6.30 pm, with a 2.30 pm service on the first Sunday of the month

Easby: Sundays at 2.30 pm

The Workhouse: Wednesdays at 6 pm

On Saints' Days there were services at Stokesley at 11 am and 7.30 pm.
Daily Prayer was held at 4.30 pm and 7.30 pm on Wednesdays and Fridays. 

Other activities:

Bible Class
Mothers' Meetings
Catechising at Church on Sunday afternoons
"working parties at the Rectory"
"an instruction class in church".

"In case of sickness … send at once to the Rectory, to the Rev R E Briggs, or to the Rev W V Palmer".