Yeller Bellies

The 1st of October has been designated as ‘Lincolnshire Day’ by the local BBC radio station. They hope it is the start of a movement to get official recognition for an annual celebration of the county.

I can’t say it got off to a good start because it was also the day when the county council closed all its libraries and heritage sites ‘for staff training’.

October 1 was chosen because it was the day when the Pilgrimage of Grace, the uprising in protest against the dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII, began in Louth. A rather controversial choice, in my opinion. Henry’s motives may have been venal but I doubt many Lincolnshire people are nostalgic for the days of the priestocracy.

Henry’s response was swift and brutal. ‘How presumptuous then are ye, the rude commons of one shire, and that one of the most brute and beastly in the whole realm. . .’ he said and had the leaders executed. One of these – allegedly, it has to be said, because he denied involvement – was Sir John Hussey. The remains of one of his homes, Hussey Tower, are still to be seen next to the playing-field of the Boston Grammar School.

It was to be expected that one of the main talking-points on the radio was the old question: where are Lincolnshire people called ‘yeller bellies’? When I worked for the library service it was such a common question that we listed all the proposed explanations, printed them up and dished them out.

The first explanation I heard was from my father. According to him the Lincolnshire Regiment were involved in a battle during which they had to crawl on their bellies through a sandy or marshy area. Hence yellow-stained bellies. Yellow bellies, there you have it. Well, possibly. I’ve heard a similar theory concerning poachers crawling through the marshes after game. Do poachers do that?

Other military theories concern the North Lincs Militia whose officers are supposed to have worn yellow waistcoats. Or was it the Lincolnshire Yeomanry who wore yellow cuirasses? (I can't help remember a parallel here with the nicknmae given by American Confederate soldiers to Union men , namely 'blue bellies'. Or has it something to do with the Lincolnshire Regiment’s flag, which until 1881 was a yellow field with the cross of St George.

Or does the term go back to the Wars of the Roses and the yellow livery of the Lincolnshire forces which fought against Edward IV during the rebellion of the Earl of Warwick in 1470? During a battle near Stamford, the Lincolnshire forces fled, dropping their yellow coats as they ran. Hence the name ‘Losecoats Field’, not to mention the ‘Bloody Oaks’ area where many rebels were hanged.

If this is true then 'yeller belly' becomes a derogatory term and incorporates yellow’s connotations of cowardice. On that subject I have heard the theory that the large number of Lincolnshire men who were excused military service in the World Wars led to the term as one of abuse. However, I think this is ruled out by the fact that the words are first seen in print in 1796.

And then there are the animal theories. It’s amazing how many animals have yellow-belly varieties. There are yellow-bellied ducks, Indian toads and pythons. But, according to some, we Lincolnshire folk are nicknamed after – take your pick – eels, newts, frogs. No-one ever gives a name to these creatures, let alone a scientific one. (Correction: I’ve just come across a reference to the Great Crested Newt). There is even talk of a ‘marsh bug’ from which people developed a ‘malaria-type’ disease, one of whose symptoms was a yellowing of the skin. Maybe it was also a symptom of the ague to which fenland people were once prone.

One I like is the idea that fenland reclamation workers would become covered in yellow clay. This clay was the reason, it is claimed, for coaches’ undersides being painted yellow.

On the farm we have sheep with yellowish wool and potatoes with yellowish flesh and bare-chested workers bending over yellow corn. And women would go to market with their money (yellow gold!) under their aprons. It all gets a bit fanciful, doesn’t it? Especially when I also read that the high level of calcium in our water gives us yellow, albeit strong, teeth. The last time I looked, my teeth were indeed somewhat yellow, but it’s nothing to do with the water. In any case my teeth are in my mouth, not my belly.

I expect there are many more theories, and there’s probably a PhD awaiting someone willing to do some real research on the matter. My own preference is for the military option, for yellow seems to have been associated with the local soldiery for a long time. Even if the phrase ‘yeller belly’ was originally an insult, it wouldn't be the first time that such a thing has been adopted as a badge of pride. It’s a rather British thing to do.

Charles Ernest Hundleby (1903-1986)

In a recent post Evelyn wrote about Cornelius Bradley Hundleby. Charles Ernest (pictured) was Cornelius' grandson, the eldest son of Cornelius junior.

Evelyn writes:

Charles Ernest Hundleby was born on 21 April 1903 in West Ashby, the son of Cornelius and Lucy Ann Hundleby.

He attended Horncastle Grammar School and then went on to qualify as a teacher at Westminster College, London, in 1923.

While in London he met his future wife, Constance (Connie) Parker, who was also studying to be a teacher at Whitelands College.

One of his friends at college persuaded him to emigrate to South Africa, and he travelled to teach at the Clarkebury Institution in the Transkei, Eastern Cape. The Institution had been founded in 1835 and it was there that Nelson Mandela received training in the 1930s

On 15 December 1928, Charles and Connie were married at Cambridge, East London.

The same year saw Charles appointed as Assistant at St Matthews Teachers' Training College near Keiskama Hoek in the the Eastern Cape. He was appointed Principal at st Matthews in 1939 and continued to teach there until 1968. Connie also taught there for many years.

In 1962 Charles received his doctorate from Rhodes University in Grahamstown, his subject 'The Phonetics of the Xhosa Language'.

After his 'retirement' Charles was still in demand as a teacher and filled many other posts until 1986. In all he was a teacher for 63 years.

Both Connie and Charles were staunch Anglicans. He was admitted to the Order of Simon of Cyrene by the Anglican Church of South Africa for his lifetime of service to education. The Order was established in 1960 and takes its name from the North African saint who carried the cross for Jesus at his crucifixion. The honour is awarded by the Archbishop of Capetown to distinguished laypersons for exceptional service to the Church and is limited to 60 members at any one time.

Charles passed away on 6 January 1986 following surgery at the Groote Schuur Hospital in Capetown.

The following is a sonnet written by Charles about the place of his birth. For many Hundleby people who have found their life's work in many different countries around the world, the poem surely expresses their heartfelt feelings for Lincolnshire:

The Wolds of Lincolnshire

Oh well remembered in deep summer haze,

The swelling wolds made golden with their wheat

That gentle winds caressed. On willing feet

I strode among the richness, used my days

To blend my spirit with the ancient ways

Of those ancestral Danes come with the fleet

From long lone shores where cold waves ever beat

Against the solid walls of Ness and Naze.

I heard them call; I saw their plaited hair;

Their fires burned; their gods around them shed

An old eternal essence, everywhere

An ancient benison came from the dead.

The dead! To me they live forever here,

On this rich sacred soil of Lincolnshire.

Firsby

St Andrew's Parish Church, Firsby.

This is another of the articles written by Susan for the benefit of delegates to the Hundleby Convention in May 2007 (with a few interpolations by Roger).

We believe we have traced our ancestors back to Robert Hundleby, who died in 1766, leaving a will in which he is described as 'a Graiser in Firsby'.

(A 'graiser' is probably someone who owned/lived on/worked a patch of meadow; or a reaper who cut grass with a sickle for fodder.)

This Robert Hundleby married Elizabeth Gresswell in Great Steeping on 27 May 1740. Based on the information in his will, he and Elizabeth had five children: Mary, Robert, Ann, Elizabeth and John (born about 1756).

We think it was Robert and Elizabeth's eldest child, Robert, who married Elizabeth Dawson in Irby on 11 July 1777. Robert junior and Elizabeth's first two children (Elizabeth and Ann) were baptised in Irby but thereafter in Firsby.

(It is interesting that this second Robert underwent an adult christening a week before he married Elizabeth, which would have been necessary for the ceremony in an Anglican church.)

Following Elizabeth's death in 1811, Robert junior married his second wife, Sarah Cheales, in Firsby on 16 April 1812. Like his father, Robert left a will when he died on 2 December 1824. This refers to farms in Firsby, Ashby by Spilsby and Ingoldmells.

It was Robert (senior) and Elizabeth's youngest child, John (b ca 1756), who married, we believe, Mary Cockson on 30 January 1789 at Firsby.

The Anglican parish church was dedicated to St Andrew and was rebuilt from local stone in 1856, presumably on the same site as the one in which John and Mary married.

John and Mary Hundleby had three sons: John (bap 1791), Robert (b 1793) and Thomas (b 1794). We don't know exactly where John and Mary lived, but John junior was baptised in Great Steeping; Robert was also born, according to census records, in Steeping (although he appears to have retired to Halton Holegate after farming for many years in Surrey). Thomas was born in either Firsby or Steeping.

(Robert died aged 82 in 1875. Nothing is known about any progeny.)

John Hundleby senior was, we think, buried at Monksthorpe Baptist Chapel on 21 July 1793, aged 37.

(This means that Mary was pregnant with Thomas when her husband died and had two other sons less than three years old.)

In 1841 the two brothers John and Thomas were living with with their families in Ashby by Partney. Almost everybody at the convention were descended from one or other of them.

(Other known 'Hundlebys' descend from Thomas and John's uncle Robert (the one christened as an adult in 1776), and include the antipodean branches.

There is a record of a Hundleby earlier than the original Robert (the graiser), namely Elizabeth (bap 1682 in Willoughby), who married William Sizer in 1721. Her latest descendant, her great (times seven) granddaughter is nearly ten!

Whatmoughs and Hundlebys

I’ve mentioned the usefulness of Google alerts before, I think. I have two set up, one for each of the variant spellings of ‘Hundleby’. It provides a lot of interesting links from the news, websites and blogs, although it has to be said that it isn’t perfect and misses many. But it recently led me to a useful website, called RootsWeb. It's one of many such sites on the net, and often you need to pay to get access to the best information and sources, but this was one’s great advantage is its message board.

A Google alert let me to an enquiry on that board by Becky Whatmough about her great-grandfather who had married a Hundleby sometime around 1916/17.

http://boards.rootsweb.com/thread.aspx?mv=flat&m=38201&p=localities.britisles.england.lan.general

It fitted neatly with one of Susan’s charts and I calculated that I was Becky’s third cousin, once removed. I mention that partly because I’m proud of the fact that I have finally learned what that sort of expression means. There’s a helpful explanation here, including a handy chart.

The way our families are linked seemed quite straightforward, but the correspondence on the message board has thrown up one or two mysteries. So I’ll list the facts and queries in chronological order, for information and in the hope that people out there might throw some light where things are dark.

I should add that I have not visited any original sources myself, and I have Becky’s permission to name the current members of her family.

First generation:

Let’s start with Joseph Hundleby (1853-1938), the grandson of Thomas Hundleby and Ruth Bradley. He married Annie Inman, and spent his first years in and near Lincolnshire - Baumber, Laughton, Worksop – and worked in the threshing trade, as did so many Hundlebys of that time.

By 1889 he had moved south to Hertfordshire, and his fourth child, Samuel, was registered as being born in Standon. It is worth noting that his third child, who was sadly killed in action in 1918, was called William.

Second generation:

Joseph’s sixth child was his daughter, Susan (1892-1972), and it is possible that her place of birth was Standon Lodge (pictured above).

According to Susan, Susan married John Whatmough. One of Becky’s correspondents has discovered that John (known as Jack) Whatmough married a Lily Hundleby at Willesden, London, in 1917.

This is our first query. Is Lily the same person as Susan, and if so, why the difference in name? Did she bear them both? Was Lily a pet name for Susan, as our contemporary Susan has suggested, as the Hebrew for lily is the basis for the name Susan?

Third generation:

William Alexander Whatmough appears to have been born in 1916. This is or Susan’s belief and also that of Becky’s family. There are a few questions, though:

There is a record of the birth of William Alexander Hundleby in Lambeth, 1916. Is the father’s name on the birth certificate? Was that father John Whatmough, and was William subsequently legitimised and renamed by the marriage of John and Lily/Susan? Or was he adopted?

According to Becky’s information, William was born on 21 June 1916 in St Mary’s London and his death is recorded as 21 June 1987, aged 70.

William had a sister, Marjorie Jane, who was born about 1926 in Manchester. She went on to marry Peter Haynes.

Doubts have been raised by a correspondent searching in ancestry.com’s births, marriages and deaths index who found a William Whatmough born in Preston in 1916 to a mother named Mitchell.

Moreover, there is also a strange reference to two children, Marjorie Whatmough and William Alexander Whatmough, born respectively in 1924 in Prestwich and 1930 in Lambeth, both with a mother whose maiden name was Hundleby. How can that be explained?

Becky is adamant that William, her grandfather, was born in 1916. And she should know.

At this point I should name some of the other surnames acquired by Joseph Hundleby’s other daughters, which might be helpful to Becky:

Mary (1885-1955) married Joseph Ratcliffe.
Jennifer/Jane (1894-1948) married William Stone.
Annie Dora (1901-1972) married William Sutherland.
Eva/Evelyn (1904-1976) married Edward King (possibly Wing).

Becky is aware that her grandfather, William, had a cousin named Hundleby, possibly ‘A. Hundleby’, who could well be Alfred Joseph Barber Hundleby (b 1916), son of the Samuel mentioned earlier.

Just as a matter of interest, Annie Dora Hundleby, Susan’s younger sister (1901-72), who married William Sutherland, had four sons, the first three of whom married respectively women called Alexandrina, Jamesina and Christina.

Fourth generation:

William Alexander Whatmough had three sons, Clifford, Alexander and Tracy (now known as Terry). Alexander is Becky’s father and, if my calculations are correct and the established information accurate, my own third cousin, born by chance in the same year as I, 1949.

Fifth generation:

This brings us to Alexander’s children, Becky herself and her brother Mark Alexander, and Becky’s son, Joshua Shaun, born on 17 January 2007, the representative of the 6th generation. Since I think I’ve got the hang of the term, I can’t resist saying that little Joshua is my third cousin, twice removed.

Probably.

Cornelius part IV

Just one more blog inspired by Cornelius and then I’ll move on. I promise.

As a modern forename Cornelius is not common. Offhand I can think only of Cornelius Ryan, who wrote The Longest Day and A Bridge Too Far, amongst other works on the Second World War.

Roddy MacDowell’s chimp in The Planet of the Apes was called Cornelius and Shakespeare used the name a couple of times, in Cymbeline and Hamlet. I’ve found that there is a basketball player called Cornelius Hawkins, nicknamed Connie.

But its origin is much grander. The Cornelii – let’s call them the Cornelians and my spellcheck will stop bothering me – were one of the great aristocratic clans (gentes) of Rome. Over hundreds of years they provided a high proportion of Consuls, Rome’s chief executives, as well as many other leaders.

One of her greatest generals was Scipio (pictured), the man who finally defeated Hannibal at the battle of Zama in North Africa and ended the Second Punic War (202 BC). In full his name was Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus Major, where Publius is a personal name, used by intimates, Cornelius his clan name and Scipio is family name. The ‘Africanus’ was an honour given to him after his victory over Hannibal, similar to the British award of a peerage to a successful general, for example Montgomery of Alamein. ‘Major’ distinguishes him from a later Scipio. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scipio_Africanus

I read that Scipio turned down huge powers in Rome, such as ‘dictator for life’ at the end of his campaign, but later Cornelians were less modest.

Cornelius Sulla, who lived from 138-78 BC, was another general who twice marched his armies on Rome at one time was granted an indeterminate term as dictator. He was part of the process whereby the Republic, with its checks and balances and fears of absolute power, was breaking apart and moving towards the time of the Emperors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucius_Cornelius_Sulla

Cornelius Cinna (d 84BC) was another strong man who served as Consul for four years in succession – strictly illegal – and continued the dangerous precedents, using his army to cow the Senate, murdering his opponents and subverting the constitution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucius_Cornelius_Cinna

Later in the century other Cornelians tried the same thing with less success. Cornelius Lentulus Sura and Cornelius Cethegus were involved in the Catiline conspiracy to take over Rome. They were exposed by Cicero, found guilty and judicially strangled in 63 BC.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publius_Cornelius_Lentulus_%28Sura%29

So, to bring these meanderings back to the Hundlebys, was there once an ancient history buff called Bradley who fancied the name? Highly unlikely, I would have thought, because most of these men were rather unsavoury characters and were known in any case by their surname – Scipio, Sulla, etc.

It’s more likely that the name was used for religious reasons. Here there are two main candidates, two ‘saints’ in fact.

The first is the Roman centurion Cornelius, whom we meet in The Acts of the Apostles, chapter 10. Already a devout man, Cornelius was told about the gospel in a dream and approached the apostle Peter with a view to baptism. Peter needed a dream himself to be convinced that gentiles as well as Jews were welcome in the Christian fold but eventually Cornelius was baptized. Later he was canonised by the Catholic Church, as was just about anybody whose name appears in the New Testament.

The whole story is drenched in myth, but it represents a vital moment in the history of Christianity, when it ceased to be a Jewish heresy and began its rise to domination of the western world.

The Bradleys seem to have had a taste for Biblical names and I would guess that Centurion Cornelius was the reason for its adoption.

There are other saints named Cornelius, one of whom was a pope and a martyr.

He was a member of the old Cornelian clan and ‘reigned’ as Bishop Rome from 253-251 AD.

Finally, my researches have turned up one interesting fact. Did you know that the rooster mascot of Kellogg’s is called Cornelius?

Corn – Cornelius, get it?

Thoughts on Christian names

My last post was about the name Cornelius, which is a name passed down over several generations of at least one branch of the Hundleby family.

In trawling through the charts, two things struck me. First, the tendency of generations to be linked in this way, children being named after one or other of their parents or grandparents and uncles, etc being honoured. Second, that the pool of names was quite small. This seems to have been the practice about 100-200 years ago, but I think that the tendency has declined.

I rather hope that my elder son, if and when he settles down and raises a family, has an eye to tradition and carries on the names Henry and, maybe Sarah for a girl. It doesn’t have to be the name used, but it provides a link, however sentimental, with the past.

We may never know how a name like Cornelius came to be given to a Bradley child in the prehistory of our records. In my own case, my wives and I agreed that she would have the final choice of names for our daughters and I for the boys.

My first wife named our first daughter after an Orkadian aunt, Jessie being a diminutive of Janet, rather than Jessica. Janet is itself a diminutive of Jane, the feminine equivalent of John. Corinne came from who knows where. I believe I’d never come across it before, but I’ve learned since that it comes from the Greek and means ‘maiden’. Ovid wrote poems to a woman named Corinna.

James received the second name, Henry, for reasons of family continuity and the third, Barrett, was his mother’s maiden name. His first, James, is one of the few boys’ names that I actually like. Names like William, George, Joseph and Henry I find old-fashioned. On the other hand I’m not fond of trendy, modern ones. I’d better not give any examples, for fear of offending people. And I wanted to avoid ‘fancy’ names like Winston or Sylvester. And I’m not fond of those beginning with vowels. This fastidiousness left me a pretty small pool, James, David, Robert, Richard, John and Michael and little else.

I did ponder on Old Testament names – Jacob, Joel, Micah, all of which can be shortened to sound normal – but was, shall we say, dissuaded.

I have a fondness for girls’ names beginning with J and my second wife’s decision on Juliet for our daughter was never a cause for disagreement. A Roman name, of course, the diminutive of Julia, but mainly a tribute to Shakespeare’s heroine.

I’ve often teased my son David that, had he been born three days later on February 14, with a Juliet in the family, he might have been called Romeo. As it was he received another from my limited supply. Nearby cousins named Richard ruled that name out. David grew up happy to bear a king’s name, but less happy to be told it meant ‘Beloved’ or even ‘Darling’.

My youngest daughter was given a queen’s name and her second name, Grace, seemed to fit naturally with it.

So there we are. Forgive me for a somewhat self-indulgent blog. Next time I’ll share my findings about the origins of the name Cornelius. It’s the least I can do, since I fear that at my age I’m unlikely to be able to revive it as a family name.

The Cornelii

In 1967 I went up to university in Bristol. For the first two years I lived in a hall of residence on the Somerset side of the Avon Gorge. The hall was a collection of large, rather grand houses which had been bought up by the university for use as student accommodation. Each house had a ‘sub-warden’, usually a lecturer, whose role was to supervise and support us.

My sub-warden was a lecturer in English called Basil Cottle, whom I discovered to be the author of The Penguin Book of Surnames. In the first few weeks after or arrival he would invite small groups in for sherry and conversation before one of the formal evening meals for which we were obliged to wear academic gowns. It seems like another world, doesn’t it?

At these gatherings, designed to make us feel at home and get to know each other, he would tell us the meaning and origin of our surname. I expected that he would find mine fascinating and unusual. But no. ‘A simple locative,’ he said, ‘place name.’

Nevertheless, I’ve always been fascinated by names and words in general, and wrote about it earlier in the year.

Posting Evelyn’s pen-portrait of Cornelius Bradley Hundleby – sounds like an American general, doesn’t he? – reminded me of when I first came across the name Cornelius. I was doing some desultory browsing through some census records for Hundleby when the name jumped out at me. Such an unusual name amongst all the Henrys, Williams, Samuels and Thomases.

When eventually Susan sent me some of her charts I found more Corneliuses (Cornelii?) and wondered where it had come from and why it had been chosen in the first place. I learned it had been used originally by the Bradley family and imported along with names like Nathaniel and Susanna.

The first instance I find is Cornelius Bradley (born ca 1837), son of Susanna Bradley. He was therefore the nephew of the Ruth and Ann, the sisters who married Thomas and John respectively. Susanna, at some stage, married Daniel Pocklington. Was he the father? If so, why didn’t Cornelius bear his name?

Let me digress to ask the same question about John Hundleby Bradley, born ca 1811 and the first child of the aforementioned John and Ann. Was he John’s child? Why did the parents wait 6 years to marry? Again, why didn’t he take his father’s name?

The fact of being born ‘out of wedlock’ is irrelevant to most people today but I find it a little odd that it happened so often at this period. Other examples are my own great-grandfather, Henry, and Samuel Fox Hundleby (born 1799). It was contrary to the prevailing morality, and many of the family seem to have been keen Christians. But since when have things like that hindered the course of true love?

I was wrong to say that Susanna’s Cornelius was the earliest we know about, for his Aunt Ruth had provided Thomas with a son of that name in 1830, Cornelius (Bradley).

Thomas and Ruth went on to have three grandsons with the name

Their sons William and Joseph (the latter incidentally an example of the name of a deceased child being given to a later baby) used the name for their own sons, Thomas ‘Cornelius’ (b 1848) and Cornelius (b 1859). The third (b 1864) was the namesake of his father.

Cornelius Bradley Hundleby’s wife, Rebecca, was probably glad of the two servants they had acquired by 1871, because theirs was another large family, seven boys and one girl (Ruth of course), who was the eldest. One of the boys was another Cornelius (b 1864) and his brother George continued the tradition by naming his younger son Cornelius Frank (b ?, d 1974). So did Ruth, whose marriage to George Griffin produced Cornelius Griffin.

Going back to Thomas and Ruth, another of their sons was John (b 1833), whose grandson Cornelius was born in 1901 and died 1971 in Louth. Is he the last?

I have been reading up on the original Cornelii of Rome and may write about that soon.

In the meantime I’ll provide this link as I’m wondering which Cornelius is referred to. And who might be the ‘Miss Hundleby’ mentioned? The name Elmhirst also recurs, reminding me of Evelyn’s reference to Moses Elmhirst JP in her essay on Cornelius Bradley Hundleby.

http://www.granthamjournal.co.uk/custompages/CustomPage.aspx?PageID=63664

If the link doesn't work - and it didn't when I checked - try googling "cornelius hundleby", using the quotation marks.

Cornelius Bradley Hundleby (1830-1897)

Evelyn writes:

Cornelius Bradley Hundleby was born on 27 May 1830 in Ashby by Partney, Lincolnshire, and was christened 26 December at St Helen’s Anglican church.

He was the son of Ruth (née) Bradley and Thomas Hundleby, and followed in his father’s footsteps by ‘staying on the land’. By 1851 he was living in the village of Grebby, in the civil parish of Scremby, working as a ‘farm servant’ to Joseph Kime, a widower of 69, who was farming 90 acres.

(He was the younger brother of my own great-great-grandmother, Sarah (1822-1839) - Roger)

In 1858 he married Rebecca Rysdale, who was christened on 11 March 1834 at St Peter’s, Nottingham. She was the daughter of William, an agricultural labourer, and his wife Frances, of Great Sturton, Lincolnshire. William had been a grocer at Greyfriar Gate, Nottingham.

Cornelius worked in Revesby and Butterwick before settling in West Ashby, two miles north of Horncastle, in 1863.

His younger brother, Samuel, states in his journal that Cornelius was a local Methodist preacher working on the Horncastle Circuit. According to the Directories of the time, a Wesleyan chapel was not built there until 1878, and it is quite possible that Cornelius preached from his own or a neighbour’s house before then.

By 1871, still in West Ashby Cornelius was a Working Foreman and Farm Bailiff. He had two servants, Thomas and Steven Wattam, and a lodger, George Hodson, who was a labourer.

In 1872 another ‘Revolt of the Fields’ broke out. From the early years of restriction of Trades Unionism through various pieces of legislation, it was now legal for men to belong to Associations and Unions. The 1867 Report on Agriculture highlighted the hard times that the farm workers were still experiencing. A certain John Kinswood of Ludford had said, ‘I don’t like the lasses to go out to work so much; nor boys nor women. There’s lots of men out of work, when women and boys can get it. It’s because they’re cheaper. At weeding time it is so, and at turnip-dragging time in winter; women do it.

There was a Labourers’ Association conference in Grantham on May 3 1872. One of the delegates was George Wilson, who represented the Spilsby Amalgamated Society of 181 men. Agricultural labourers were asking for two things: a nine-hour workday (7am – 5pm, not including lunch), and a raise in pay from 2/6 (two shillings and sixpence or about 12 pence) to 3/0 (three shillings or 15 pence) per day.

Moses Elmhirst, of West Ashby, was a Justice of the Peace, and on Feb 20 1872 he had a labourer from Hagworthingham, Tom Jeffery, brought before him in this regard. It must have been a very hard time for Cornelius, trying to keep everything running and yet feeling sympathy for the men he supervised.

The Golden Age of Farming, or High Farming as it was called, was almost over and by 1879, when a very bad harvest was experienced, an agricultural depression was well underway which was to last until World War I. By 1891 we find Cornelius once more an agricultural labourer.

He died on 6 April 1897 and was buried on the ninth in the churchyard of All Saints, West Ashby. By his epitaph we know that he was well-love and respected during his lifetime:

‘His life was a life of truth

and his heart was the law of kindness.’

His wife Rebecca stayed in the farmhouse in west Ashby with her sons until some time after 1901 and then went to live with her daughter, Susan Squires, until her death in May 1918.

This is one of several articles written by Evelyn for the May 2007 Convention. More will be posted in due course.

A Little Politics

I NEVER THOUGHT I’d be talking about Vladimir Ilyanovich Lenin on the Hundleby weblog, but it’s an interesting idea.

The pub where I am a regular is one of those which have several shelves of books. I am one of the very few customers who actually read them, when I can find one worth reading, that is. For these books are obviously acquired by the truckload and you need to trawl through yards of dross to find the odd nugget.

I’ve found A G McDonnel’s England Their England sitting next to a 1924 textbook on accounting; Sinclair Lewis’ Dodsworth and Somerset Maugham’s Of Human Bondage squeezed between rows of Georgette Heyer and Peter Cheyney. I’ve even discovered Shakespeare’s Henry V translated into German.

‘Uns wen’ge, uns beglücktes Haüflein Brüder . . .’

And then, the other day, sitting next to Lord Montgomery’s war memoirs was volume 12 of the Selected Works of Lenin: Theory of the Agrarian Question.

I haven’t read it and I won’t, because I’m prejudiced, not to mention easily bored. But what little browsing I have done shows that it’s hardly a serious economics discussion, more a political polemic. But my eye was caught by the mention of Lincolnshire in his chapter on ‘Capitalism in Agriculture.’

His aim is to demonstrate that the agricultural worker, whom he variously describes as ‘the small producer in agriculture’, ‘the small tiller of the soil’, or ‘the small peasant’, was even worse off, in the late nineteenth century, than the artisan or industrial worker. For not only did the farm labourer work his fields as long as there was light, he also had to repair his equipment, tend to his and his animals’ buildings and his tools; all things which the industrial worker would expect to be paid for as overtime.

He quotes from a British Parliamentary Commission of 1897, where a witness from Lincolnshire stated, ‘I have brought up a whole family and almost worked them to death.’ Another said, ‘We and the children sometimes work 18 hours a day; on an average we work form 10 to 12 hours.’ ‘We work harder than the day labourers; we work like slaves.’

Maybe I’m wrong, but I rather get the impression that these witnesses were farming their own, or at least rented land. Which makes them capitalists themselves, doesn’t it?

*

BE THAT AS IT MAY, Lenin never had many adherents in Lincolnshire, although God knows farm workers’ wages were always appallingly low and the amount of forelocking tugging that went on was sickening. For all that, the county has always been staunchly Tory, apart from the county town itself which until ten years ago was usually marginal. It’s represented currently by a former ‘Blair Babe’, who probably rings the PM for the right answer before she answers the question, ‘Is it raining?’

My own personal interest in politics began at the time of the 1966 general election when Harold Wilson’s government was returned with a large majority. We had a mock election at school and I acted as agent to the Labour candidate. Who won, I might add. Our 500-strong electorate reflected pretty closely the country as a whole, except for the fact that our Communist opponent did unexpectedly well. My explanation was that he’d bribed all the first-years with promises of longer school holidays and the summary execution of the headmaster.

During the campaign, my father, Ernie (pictured on his wedding day in 1948), took me to see George Brown who spoke from a makeshift platform in Boston Marketplace. It was a good old-fashioned political speech, complete with hecklers, whom George saw off with ease. As I recall, he was sober. He was always Dad’s hero, proof that you could reach the top from humble origins.

Somehow I was invited to attend our constituency count. This was ‘Holland-with-Boston’, by the way, a longtime Conservative stronghold. To be precise it was a ‘National Liberal’ stronghold, a label that went back to the days of Ramsay Macdonald’s National government, when many Labour and Liberal MPs defected.

The old MP, who had had a high personal vote, had retired and Labour sensed a chance to take the seat. They nearly did. At the count I watched the bundles of ballot papers for the two candidates stacking up and creeping along trestle tables, neck and neck. I saw a huddle of officials consulting with them and then there was the announcement that there would be a recount. Finally, the result, and I declare that Richard Body, Conservative, is duly elected to serve as Member of Parliament for this constituency.’ Something like that is how it goes.

He won by about 300 votes. Body was later to become Sir Richard and a strong opponent of the European Union, a stand which moved me to write to him once, urging him to keep up the good work.

*

MY FATHER, ERNIE HUNDLEBY, was always a staunch Labour man. He was the first person I ever heard speaking disparagingly about Winston Churchill. Great war leader he may have been, but that counted for little against the fact that he was an upper-class Tory. I grew up in the fifties, when MacMillan was prime minister, another Tory toff much despised by my father. I rather liked Supermac’s style, which was one of languid nonchalance and aristocratic aloofness.

Dad just snorted when Macmillan described the resignation of several members of his cabinet as ‘a little local difficulty’ and responded to an angry outburst by Khrushchev by politely asking if he might have the translation.

But Dad’s support for the Labour Party was never ideological. It was a matter of class. Labour was the only party interested in improving working conditions, the health service and education, and making the rich pay for it. He wasn’t bothered about egalitarianism, and so he was pleased when my sister and I found places at local grammar schools. I suppose he was interested in opportunities to rise, rather than bring everyone down to the same level.

But even Dad had a political crisis. In the seventies, the Left was taking control of the party and Dad was appalled, for the working class is essentially rather conservative. It doesn’t want a different kind of cake, just a bigger slice of the one on offer.

So, when Dick Taverne, Labour MP for Lincoln, resigned to fight a by-election under the ‘Democratic Labour’ banner, Dad supported him. Taverne won and but it was a brief victory for the movement which was later resurrected later as the SDP and finally in the person of Tony Blair.

Dad was long gone by then, sadly, and it’s one of my great regrets that he died too early for us to share many a great political argument.

Boston Grammar School

THE SUCCESSION of Gordon Brown as Prime Minister has led to articles in the press about his home town in Scotland, Kirkaldy. One theme has been the number of celebrated or successful people who have emerged from a place where the protestant virtues of hard work and self help held sway for so long.

Men like Adam Smith, the ‘father of modern economics’ and apostle of the free market. I always remember learning about him at school and was particularly struck by his analysis of the division of labour. His most famous illustration was the pin, to produce which requires 19 separate operations.

Robert Adam, the architect, came from Kirkaldy, as did David Steel, the Liberal Democrat politician, and Sandford Fleming, who built the Canadian Pacific Railway. Another Scots-Canadian from Kirkaldy was the recently deceased Bertha Wilson, who became the first female judge of the Canadian Supreme Court.

And I mustn’t forget Jocky Wilson, world champion darts player.

ANOTHER POLITICAL STORY recently was the Conservative opposition’s change of policy on grammar schools, secondary schools where pupils are selected on academic ability. Most secondary schools in Britain are comprehensive, but some grammar schools have survived, especially in Lincolnshire. They remain a bone of political contention.

At the age of ten I was set an examination at my primary school. I had little idea of what it was all about, but some time later I was told that I would be going to Boston Grammar School. Apparently I had passed the ‘eleven-plus’. My family seemed very pleased, even proud. I myself was, if anything, merely relieved that I wouldn’t be attending the secondary modern school, about which I’d heard horror stories about initiation ceremonies.

THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL occupies a former monastery, Franciscans or Greyfriars I believe, together with modern additions. It was granted its charter by (Bloody) Mary I and the main building, ‘the old school’, now the library, has a stained glass window depicting her alongside her husband, Philip of Spain. Philip thought being married to the Queen Regnant entitled him to be called King of England, and later would send the Armada in an attempt to make that a dream a reality. I remain quite proud of my old school, but not the bloodthirsty Catholic and foreign invader who founded it.

Lessons were held in classrooms arranged in a rectangle around a large grassed quadrangle. Teachers often wore gowns and would dispense summary corporal punishment for minor infractions. Surnames only were used. It was also a single-sex school, although in recent years the sixth form has become co-educational. I find it odd that the idea prevails that sixteen and seventeen year-olds are better able to work ‘maturely’ with the opposite sex than eleven-year olds. Be that as it may, the award of best scholar of the year was recently awarded to one of the girls.

All in all, an old-fashioned institution, with emphasis on discipline, competition and academic achievement.

In the sixties I was in favour of comprehensive education, Frankly I am still uneasy about the stark division of pupils into ‘academic’ and ‘non-academic’ at an early age, with little free flow between them. Moreover, it has always seemed wrong to me that the percentage attending grammar schools varies from area to area depending on places available. On the other hand I believe that the ethos of the grammar school is sadly lacking in modern education.

COMPREHENSIVE EDUCATION went wrong, in my opinion, for various reasons. First, the schools are too big. This is one area where the economies of scale do not apply. Second, it was accompanied by trendy liberal educational theories, such as the downplaying of competition and the fear of ‘elitism’. The non-selection of pupils (as I insist on calling ‘students’) was extended with the new schools so that streaming was no longer the norm. Third – and this is not the fault of schools – a new breed of parents was coming into being, who are frankly incompetent at the job, unable to discipline or motivate, concerned only with earning money for foreign holidays and second cars, thinking that the rearing of children is the government’s job.

It’s an indictment of the social mess we have created that grammar schools, for all their apparent unfairness, remain quiet commonsense engines of social mobility, leaning and citizenship.

IF YOU ASK what has all this to do with the Hundlebys, the answer is ‘not a lot’. Merely that BGS is my old school. What’s more, I once delivered newspapers to the home of one the school’s more celebrated old boys, R J Budge, boss of a company running some of Britain’s few remaining coal mines. As I remember the household had two newspapers a day – that always impressed me – probably The Telegraph and The Daily Mail. You could tell a lot about people from the newspapers they bought.

Another famous old boy was George Bass, surgeon and explorer, who gave his name to the strait between Australia and Tasmania.

Lincolnshire has had more than its fair share of explorers. Yorkshire, as usual, grabs the glory with James Cook, the only English captain to tour Australia without playing a single test, but we have had Bass (from Lincon), Flinders (from Donington) and Franklin (from Spilsby).

As a film fan I must pay tribute, though, to Barry Spikings, who left BGS to work for the Boston Standard and somehow ended up in Hollywood producing The Deerhunter. Now that is an achievement.

I became a librarian. Hey ho!

The Hundleby Convention 2007

IT'S TAKEN ME over a month but at long last I’m ready to set out my personal thoughts on the Hundleby Convention. Sunday 6 May 2007.

The bus from Lincoln to Horncastle continues to Skegness and I wondered if it would be full of day-trippers. I arrived at the bus station to find a crowd of children and large women eating a breakfast of hamburgers. ‘Bother,’ I thought, or words to that effect. But then the transport arrived, the children dashed upstairs, the mothers wobbled, gasping, after them, and I settled down to read Far From the Madding Crowd and fantasise agreeably about Julie Christie.

It was a sunny day, a good one to travel through the open, rolling foothills of the Wolds. Hundleby country, I thought, as I saw the signs for Hemingby and the original village itself.

As we drew into Horncastle we passed the library, which I used to visit when I worked for the County Council. It is built over part of the Roman wall which once surrounded the town and indeed part of it is exposed in the reference library. But I hadn’t inspected the town itself until today. It has that organic feel of a town that has developed in a natural but practical way, with streets winding out from the large market square and along the river.

ONTO THE Admiral Rodney Hotel where the clan was gathering. It was an odd feeling: sixty or seventy people, for the most part complete strangers, but all linked by a name, a Lincolnshire village and varying amounts of genetic material.

They came from Lincolnshire – Orby, Spalding, Lincoln – from Lancashire, Cheshire, from Essex, from Berkshire. And from Vancouver Island and South Africa. Not quite from the four corners of the earth, because the Solomon Islanders couldn’t make it. Nor the Brazilians, Japanese or Hong Kongers.

Almost everyone there could trace their ancestry to John Hundleby (1756-1793) and two of his sons, John and Thomas Hundleby, born in or near Great Steeping, who married two sisters, Ruth and Anne Bradley, in 1817. For this information I am grateful to Evelyn, Susan and the other organisers whose notes and charts were of great value in placing ourselves in context. We were even all colour-coded.

I was interested to see any physical resemblances amongst us all. Would it be a roomful of Viking look-alikes? Unfortunately not. We’ve obviously been diluted by the Anglo-Saxons. It seemed rude to stare into people’s eyes looking for the tell-tale blue. And as for the nose, I think that’s peculiar to my branch. Perhaps someone will do a detailed study of the many photos that were taken. I mused on the potential rsults of a DNA study of everyone. Maybe next time. Then again, maybe not.

I grew up knowing that my name was unusual, with very few relatives on my father’s side. And when, as a child, I checked the local phone book, I found very few Hundlebys. And frankly I’d no idea where Orby was then. To find so many cousins in the same room, let alone to see from the charts that there are so many more around the world. I guess there must be hundreds of living ‘Hundlebys’, let alone those in the many female lines. (I’m fortunate enough to be in a female line but still have the name, although I doubt my great-great-grandmother was thinking of the favour she was doing me in 1841.)

Evelyn's notes are invaluable and I’d like to highlight one character she describes. This is Joseph Hundleby, born in 1853 to John and Ann (née Jarvis). He appears to be from a 'senior’ branch of the family, his great-grandmother being Elizabeth Hundleby, eldest daughter of Robert (himself the grandfather of the abovementioned John and Thomas). Another disguised female line, it would appear.

I think I will extricate myself from that genealogical tangle and go on to say that Joseph interests me because in 1874, as a young man, he set sail for New Zealand and a new life. Evelyn tells us he was an installer of sheep-shearing machinery, which must have been pioneering work at the time and in later years he set up his own business exterminating rabbits. No doubt there was never any shortage of work.

As far as I can see he was the only Hundleby who migrated to Australasia and his many descendants are scattered around that corner of the world – Sydney, Christchurch, Japan and Hong Kong. And I note with interest that his great-grand-daughter, in the Solomon Islands, is my own daughter's namesake.

IN THE AFTERNOON many of the delegates set off on a tour of local villages associated with the family – Firsby, Great Steeping, Monksthorpe and Hundleby itself. I find Ashby-by-Partney particularly interesting because it was the birthplace of Thomas, ancestor of myself and so many others. He married Ruth up the road in Candlesby, but seems to have spent most of his life in his home village, and was buried there in 1881, aged 87.

Thomas took his children to be baptised in the Ashby’s Anglican church, but Thomas’ son Samuel preached in the newly built Methodist chapel in 1885. By coincidence, Far From the Madding Crowd, which I was reading that day contains the comment of one character, ‘Chapel folk be more hand-in- glove with them above than we (church people).’ I’ve a feeling that great-great-great-uncle Samuel might have agreed with that.

Methodism seems to have been strong in the family at one time and I myself was baptised into that church. I like to think that nonconformism is still strong in the family, preferably secular - with all due respect to the one vicar we have in our ranks.

I suppose it’s true of all families, as it is of society, that people are pursuing quite different lines of work. 100 years ago Hundlebys descendants were agricultural labourers, many illiterate, with the more upwardly mobile becoming threshers, tenant farmers, carpenters, butchers and publicans. Women were busy raising large families, as well as working in the fields. Now there are engineers, computer experts, doctors, businessmen, artists and civil servants, but the links with farming are still there, as far away as South Africa and Japan.

THE DAY CLOSED with a quiet moment to remember the Hundlebys who had fought and died in the armed forces. Men like L/C Herbert Henry Hundleby of the Lincolnshire Regiment, killed in action in 1915; and Pte W Hundlebyof the Ist Hertfordshire regiment. See: http://www.hertfordtown.fsnet.co.uk/hertsregt.htm (This link didn't work for me, but the site is there). How many others died, I wonder.

It’s as well to remember that and even worse destroyer of human life was Spanish flu, which swept through Europe in the years following the Great War. This affected the Hundlebys too. Harry Hundleby, for example, who was taken by the disease at an early age.

A GREAT DAY. Lots of information, lots of links, lots of contacts and conversations. And even more questions and areas to follow up. And many ideas for postings here.

I can't finish without belated thanks to Evelyn, Susan, Suzanne and Janet for all thier efforts in conceiving, planning and organising the event. A great success. Thank you.

Countdown - Tuesday

One or two things I've been pondering since meeting Evelyn and Walter the other day.

• After chatting with Evelyn about all those academic Hundlebys with titles and degrees that seems to go with being Canadian, I've been making notes for the article on 'Identity' I plan to write and send to Dr Catherine. I believe I have a more biological than psychological approach to the subject.
• On behalf of Lincolnshire, many thanks to Evelyn for donating Samuel's handwitten memoir to the county archives. Have I got this right - he was my great- great- great-uncle?
• I was surprised to hear that no Hundleby seems to have emigrated directly to the USA, though some have found their way there from Canada. I'm wondering where Margaret Hundleby, who lectures in English at the Universty of Houston-Downtown fits into the family tree.
• It seems that Hundlebys abroad - I'm including the female line in all this, of course, coming from it myself - stem from single emigrant families, whether it be Canada, Australia, South Africa.

Just a few thoughts and questions. Maybe I'll get a few answers at the weekend.

Countdown to the Convention - Monday

With less than a week to go before the Convention, I had the pleasure yesterday of meeting both Evelyn and Walter from Canada, and Phil and Lynn Whitworth from Louth.

Strange isn’t it that although we’ve never met before and lead such different lives we feel we have so much in common?

Evelyn’s already taken up residence in the Central Library and the Archives and was reporting enthusiastically of her discovery of Hundleby wills, which take the line back into the 1600s. (It can be a bit ghoulish, can’t it, this family history business?).

Lunch in the Wig and Mitre ‘uphill’, Lincoln, where I thought I might be able to demonstrate the pleasure of drinking Bateman’s real ale. Pity that it was the worst pint I’ve ever drunk. No wonder people stick to lager and what I think of as pasteurised beer. It may not be any good, but you’re never disappointed.

By chance, when I called in later at Wetherspoon’s Ritz pub there was an inspection of beer going on. Every year or so, without warning, an independent inspector arrives to check that the beer is being stored and dispensed correctly and to award, or withhold, the ‘Cask Marque Trust’ seal of approval. The manageress showed me the form he fills in, marking each beer on taste, temperature (ca 50 deg), colour, appearance, etc. She was pleased to report that all had passed with flying colours. She also told me that all staff have to watch a video which teaches them precisely how real ale should be drawn through the hand-pump.

All this explains why a lot of pubs don’t like it. To me the worst part of it all was that the inspector had left six pints on the counter with just a mouthful removed.

‘How about selling them off at half-price,’ I suggested, always willing to be helpful.

‘I’m afraid not,’ she said. ‘He’s had his gadget in them.’

I pursued the matter no further.

Hundleby Convention - 6th May 2007

The Hundleby family is gathering at The Admiral Rodney Hotel in Horncastle at 10am on Sunday 6th May 2007. Hundleby descendants from across the globe (including Canada and South Africa) are meeting for the first time. There will be around 55 people at the gathering and lots of people have been searching their attics and cupboards for old family photographs, letters, journals and other historical information to bring with them. Whilst the event will be a good opportunity for serious family history research most of the fun will come from meeting long lost relatives. Some of the family are using the event as an excuse for a close family get together whilst others want to meet distant cousins they have heard about but never met. If you are related to the Hundleby family in any way please feel free to come along and add your name to the evergrowing family tree.

Just a couple of points of interest.

My son has been surfing the net, using the Images facility. He tells me he's discovered a Hundleby in the US Marine Corps. Unfortunately, he's forgotten the name and I haven't been able to find the reference myself.

Then a death in my wife's family. An uncle by marriage called George Norman Emerson. I only discovered yesterday that he was born in Hundleby.

Just a few weeks to the convention.

The Greenwich Meridian

As far as I can discover the only place in the whole world with the name Hundleby is our own dear village in Lincolnshire. I would have thought the Americans would have obliged, but apparently not.

I was surprised to find, however, that there are three towns (‘cities’) in the USA named ‘Lincolnshire, one in Illinois, one in Kentucky and a third in South Carolina.

By the way, I was obviously thinking American when I wrote ‘named Lincolnshire’. For I recall that Alastair Cooke once broadcast that Americans can always spot an Englishman, no matter how much he has adapted to their speech, when he says things like ‘I am called Roger.’ That, apparently, indicates a nickname. President Eisenhower was called Ike, but he was named Dwight.

Another tell-tale sign, so I am told, is saying something such as ‘I like Californian wines’ rather than ‘California wines’. I suppose that’s why the Beach Boys sang about California Girls.

It happens within Britain as well, not just broad regional accents, or those U and non-U shibboleths (is it a drawing-room or a lounge, sweet or pudding?), which used to divide the classes. For example, I like to think I’m reasonably well-educated, with an accent that is pretty middle-of-the-road and non-descript, but I only have to say ‘bath’ or ‘castle’ to show I’m not from southern England, and the trouble I have with words like ‘bus’ or, even worse, phrases like ‘good luck’ mark me as coming from Lincolnshire.

Anyway, what was I talking about? Towns called Lincolnshire. And I only mentioned that because I found them when looking for information on the Greenwich Meridian, which runs through Lincolnshire. Actually, all four proposed lines run through Lincolnshire, but that’s another story.

The Meridian, starts at the North Pole (obviously) and doesn’t hit land until it reaches Yorkshire. It crosses the Humber and passes close to Cleethorpes. It then runs through the middle of Louth. If I remember correctly, the library there sat on it.

The next main town it reaches is Boston. Not far from where I lived was a street called Meridian Road. I’ve never found out whether the Meridian actually runs along it, but it is a nice thought.

The line leaves Boston and after London crosses the English Channel into France and then Spain. It doesn’t touch land again until Mali. Then Burkina Faso, Ghana and, briefly, Togo. After these countries it’s all ocean until Antarctica.

So when winter returns to Britain tomorrow, as we are assured it will, it might be some comfort to know that my co-meridianites in Ghana will be baking in the sun, and that further south it’s a lot worse.

Bovates and carucates

http://www.british-history.ac.uk:80/report.asp?compid=53623

My Google alert for ‘Hundelby’ [sic] throws up some interesting items occasionally.

The link above takes you to British History Online, in particular a list of disputes and/or agreements about land. Frankly, I find working my way through old documents rather dry and boring work, but there is the odd intriguing nugget.

This one is a list of ‘final concords’ (agreements, I assume) for Lincolnshire during the reign of Henry III. Henry was the son of King John and, although he reigned a long time, is probably the one king of England about whom no-one knows at least one fact.

But it was during his reign that one of the most important events in our history occurred, namely our first Parliament. It wasn’t his idea, of course. Simon de Montfort put a sword to his throat.

These particular cases are dated 34 Henry III, in other words the 34th year of Henry III’s reign, 1250. Acts of Parliament are still dated in this way. Having said that, I wouldn’t be surprised if Tony and his mates have decided unromantically that it’s out of date. Imagine abolishing the office of Lord Chancellor! But I digress.

One of the settlements involves a prior from ‘Kattele’ (Catley, near Digby) and a couple from Digby itself over land and a church. It’s a nice touch that when the dispute is settled, the prior gives them a ‘sore’ sparrowhawk. Sore?

The words used are rather strange. The people involved are often called ‘querents’, which I assume means ‘petitioner’ and ‘impedients’, the other side. And the agreements often involve ‘bovates’ of land. I’ve discovered that a bovate was the amount of land that could be ploughed with one ox in a year (bos is Latin for ox) and was one eigth of a ‘carucate’, eight being the normal number of oxen in a team or yoke. A carucate, from the Latin caracus meaning plough, was nominally 120 acres, an acre as we all know being one furlong (furrowlong) by one chain, still the length of a cricket pitch. Wake up at the back!

By this time, of course, the terms were rather loose and could apply to land that never saw a plough.

‘Tofts’ are often involved, meaning a farmhouse or homestead, sometimes including the surrounding land.

There were no surnames fixed at this time, apart from the aristocracy, and the description of Gilbert and Anthony as ‘de Hundleby’ simply refers to their home, not that they were brothers or are related to me.

Despite what I said earlier, these old records can be fascinating. They show an efficient legal system, functioning well despite political turmoil, with judgments accepted, compromises made and appropriate gifts given and received.

You get an impression of a very agricultural way of life, with hints of the feudal social structure, such as the mentions of ‘scutage, lordship and foreign service. Payment is in ‘marks of silver’ and sometimes shillings sterling. There are disputes over ‘dowers’ and women feature quite prominently. There is one case of a lady, widowed, in dispute with the Knights Templar - thanks to Dan Brown, we all know who they were -over lands which she claimed were her dowry. She agreed to renounce her claim in return for 20 shillings a year for life.

Even at this distance of time I don't think she got a very good deal.

Some Lincolnshire Place-names

I thought I would muse a little on places in Lincolnshire and their names.

I learnt a little about the various suffixes of towns and villages at school, but just a little research shows that it was all rather over-simplified. For example, I was always told that ‘wick’ was Anglo-Saxon for ‘market, and therefore Butterwick was obviously derived from a dairy or a place where butter was sold. Apparently not true, because ‘wick’ can also be of Scandinavian origin, especially when the place is found near the sea, because it means ‘inlet’ or ‘creek’. The Butterwick where my people come is just a mile or two from the Wash and it seems pretty likely that Butruic, as it was called in the Domesday Book, was a Viking settlement.

It stands to reason that the earliest Viking invaders or settlers would create colonies near the coast. Skegness was one of them. Admittedly ‘ness’ can be Old English as well, but ‘Skeg’ has the giveaway K, characteristic of Scandinavia. The suffix ‘ney’ was old Norse for ‘island’ – eg Orkney – but came to mean an enclosure or, especially in Lincolnshire, land reclaimed from the marsh. Bardney, Friskney and Stickney, where I lived briefly as a child.

Butterwick is not far from Benington, an Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, ending, which shows how the two nations lived in close proximity to each other. I expect the local derby football matches had a bit of needle in them. I read that there are places where the Vikings took over an English settlement and renamed it, but only partially. Grimston (there’s one in Leicestershire, another in Yorkshire) has an Anglo-Saxon ending, but a Scandinavian prefix. It looks like Grim gave his name to the place but didn’t bother to remove the suffix, perhaps not wanting people to get his village confused with Grimsby.

The ‘by’ ending is well-known as the great Viking indicator – Hundleby, Spilsby, Hemingby, etc (incidentally, I read that Rugby in Warwickshire is the most southerly town with a 'by' suffix) – but less well-known that it can be a prefix occasionally. The village of Bicker is the only example I can bring to mind, being a combination of ‘settlement’ and ‘marsh’. The ‘car’ in Redcar, Yorkshire, is another variation of the Norse word for marshland.

So ‘Bicker’ does not mean ‘Wrangle’, where an uncle once lived. That name means ‘crooked’ in Old Norse and refers to a winding stream long since gone.

Back near Butterwick, there’s Frieston, an English ending with a suspiciously Nordic beginning, and down the road there’s Fishtoft, definitely Scandinavian, but I doubt it’s got anything to do with fish. I may well be wrong about that. In any case, the ‘fish’ came later; the village was simply ‘Toft’ in Domesday.

Boston, of course, is St Botolph’s town, but now incorporates the old Danish settlement of Skirbeck. ‘Beck’ means stream in both language traditions, but we know that Skirbeck was called a ‘wapentake’, a small administrative unit, similar to the Saxon ‘hundred’, which theoretically contained a hundred households. The concept of the wapentake wasn’t finally abolished until 1888. It’s possible that the ‘Skir’ means ‘church’, for it’s not just Scotland where ‘kirk’ has that meaning.

Back to ‘wick’ and a variation is ‘wig’, as in Wigford, the area that became part of Lincoln as I know it today. This time it does mean market, market by the river crossing to be precise and lies at the bottom of the hill on which ancient Lincoln proper stands. There’s still a bit of snobbery in the city about whether you live ‘uphill’ or ‘downhill’.

The various names in Lincoln are reminders of the different peoples who became strands in the fabric of the city. The ‘Lin’ in Lincoln comes from ‘llyn’, a Celtic word meaning lake; and the ‘coln’ is a reminder of the Roman colony established on the hill for retired soldiers, who would have been of all nationalities throughout the Empire, not just Italian. The Romans also left us the Fossdyke, as well as the Fosse Way and Ermine Street, which meet at the bottom of Cross o’Cliffe Hill. (By the way, that’s where one of the Eleanor Crosses was erected). The Angles founded Wigford and the Scandinavians left us several ‘gates’ or streets, such as Hungate and Saltergate. The Normans are remembered in Beaumont Fee, as well as the Castle and Cathedral.

I’d better stop before I get on to Swineshead, which probably has nothing to do with pigs. I strongly doubt that that Threekingham has any royal connection at all.

'Never been twenty-one before'

David reached the age of 21 yesterday, and we had a little family get-together to celebrate the occasion.

We went to Zucchini’s for Sunday lunch. Zucchini’s has a fine array of Italian food, but we all went for the traditional roast beef dinner, made all the more attractive by being served as a buffet, with the words ‘Eat as much as you like’ on the menu.

Certain people, who had better remain nameless, had two huge platefuls and even had the cheek to ask for a clean plate.

It struck me that this was the first time in ages that all five of us were in one place at the same time.

Zucchini’s by the way gained a little notoriety when it was patronised by (Lord) Jeffrey Archer, minor politician and all-round dodgy character, when he was in the North Sea Camp open prison near Boston and allowed out to work at Lincoln’s Theatre Royal.

The age of majority has been eighteen for a long time, but the tradition of marking one’s twenty-first still seems pretty strong. I was amused, though, when David asked me why his grandmother had sent him a card with a large key on it. I thought it might be fun to embarrass him by singing ‘Twenty-one today . . . I’ve got the key of the door, etc.’ but thought better of it.

We rounded off the afternoon by adjourning to a nearby pub, where the beer is cheaper and we could watch the rugby, Ireland against France. Needless to say, we all became honorary Irishmen for the day.

Mediaeval Hundlebys

'HUNDELBYS'

I've found that the above spelling is worth using in a Google search for the name. Not only is the name often misspelled - I do it myself - but it appears to have been the standard form up to the 1500s. I suppose it has to do with 'Hundulf'.

I see that John (or Johannes) Hundelby, a 'carvour', was admitted as a freeman of York in 1423.

Robert Hundelby registered a will in Lambeth in 1406, leaving most of his money to his father and mother (John and Cecilie), who lived in Alford.

And going further back, Ralph de Hundelby, of Benington, received a 'lay subsidy' of 11d in about 1332. Benington, of course, is only a few miles from Butterwick, my own ancestral home.

A trip to Boston

Every now and again, my sister and I meet in Boston for lunch, with varying numbers of Hundleby family members. Boston is equidistant between our homes in Lincoln and Peterborough, and as our Aunt Kath lives there it is convenient for her to come along.

It was rather sad yesterday that since we last got together, we had lost our Aunt Lynne, our mother’s sister, and Herb, our step-father.

Carolyn and I always take a bus from Lincoln. It takes an hour and a half, but I always enjoy the journey, because the bus’s route is not along main roads but through a succession of villages and landscapes.

We climb up the Lincoln Edge towards Metheringham and then down towards the fens. At this stage the narrow roads bend and wind through woods and stone buildings, and I always wonder if we aren’t just going a little too fast. When we emerge onto the long straight roads towards Kirkstead, the deep dykes either side look like another accident waiting to happen.

We pass through Woodhall Spa, whose waters cured my mother-in-law of arthritis and where my great-uncle owned one of his shops. It’s now known as the refuge of the rich and retired, recently in the news for opposing a chicken farm. It has a delightful cinema, located in the woods (hence its name ‘Kinema in the Woods), the only one in the country, I believe, where the image is projected from behind the screen.

Before long we are in Tattershall, home of the Castle and the church where 'Tom Thumb' is buried.

I was always told that on a clear day you could see both Lincoln Cathedral and Boston Stump from the top of the castle and I’m happy to report that it’s quite true.

On to Coningsby, home of the Battle of Britain Memorial flight.

Well over halfway now. All around are vast fields, empty in January, dotted with idle tractors. Sometimes in the middle of them, a mile away, is a farmhouse, with barns and other buildings, set in a grove of trees.

Along the road are several isolated chapels, Methodist, Primitive Methodist and Baptist. Lines of windbreaking poplars, signs to places like Dogdyke, Gypsey Bridge, Scrub Hill, Cowbridge, Anton’s Gowt, even New York. I see we have turned out of ‘Hundlehouse Lane’.

We come a behind a typical Lincolnshire driver, ambling along at just below 40 mph, oblivious to the impatient bus tailgating him. We overtake eventually and as we take a bend at 60 I think we’re in the hands of the other variety of typical Lincolnshire driver.

But we arrive, safe and sound, and I’m all set to interrogate my aunt about the family, and listen to my sister reminding everyone how awful big brother was to her.

I wonder if it was sensible to invite her join this blog.

Random Stuff

Some photos of my son, David, testing himself in the Lincoln 10k last year. Any resemblance to anyone out there?

http://www.everybodysmile.biz/cgi-bin/public.cgi?form_status=emailfriend&event_id=28021&photo_id=322&img=10KP4522{1030.jpg&ss=&sk=1030

A Hildred Connection

It was very interesting to see you mention the name Hildred, Roger as a Hildred did marry into the Hundelby family. Matilda (Tillie) Hundleby of Hemingby, daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth, married James Hildren on Oct. 8, 1898. He was 24 years old, living at 75 Burgfield Street, London and was was a Porter with the GN Railway. His father, Thomas, was deceased. He and Tillie lived at 25 New End Road, Hemingby and Mildred's parents lived at #10 and her brother, John at #19. My Dad remembered Aunt Tille and Uncle Jim and evidently he was a very jolly sort of person (at least to an 8 or 9 year old boy)

The Lincolnshire Village

I have a friend in Lincoln, Ken by name. He was 65 the other day and was born and bred in the city.

He's a man who seems to know everybody and it's amazing how he can find a link between newcomers and people he already knows. Another friend returned to Lincoln from New Zealand and Australia after nearly 10 ten years and tried to look me up. He went to a pub where I used to be a regular a decade ago and asked after me. The one barmaid left from those days said, 'He doesn't come here anymore - he think he drinks in Wetherspoon's.' So he went there and was told, 'He usually comes in at 1 o'clock.' And sure enough I did. You can't have secrets in this place.

I introduced Dave to Ken and of course, though they'd never met, they had lots of people in common.

The same thing happened when Ken and I were talking to one of the barmaids in Wetherspoon's (this is the Ritz, formerly a cinema) and when she mentioned her surname, he was bound to know someone with the same name. 'Hildred' was the name, and I thought I knew it too.

'I'm sure I know that name from Boston,' I said, and wasn't surprised to hear that, yes, there were lots of Hildreds there. But I was sure I'd heard the name from one of my relatives. I had a feeling that a Hildred had been a local councillor when I was growing up. And after checking on the net I found I was right. Councillor John (Jack) Hildred had been Mayor of Boston from 1979-80.

And what's more he'd come from Benington, and that was my connection, because my step-father, Herb, came from Benington (a few miles north of Boston) and knew Jack.

Herbert Millard was a close friend of my father, Ernest, and stood as his best man. At the time he was 'courting' my mother's sister, Nellie, but that never came to anything. After my father died, Herb, himself a widower, married my mother. Herb was another man who lived and died in the same place and seemed to know everybody in Boston.

He died just over two years ago. While he was in hospital, Nellie herself died.