CASTLE DONINGTON MUSEUM TRUST … AHEAD Page 2 CASTLE DONINGTON MUSEUM TRUST We have had news from...
Transcript of CASTLE DONINGTON MUSEUM TRUST … AHEAD Page 2 CASTLE DONINGTON MUSEUM TRUST We have had news from...
Diary 2011 Saturday 25th June
Midsummer Barbeque in the
Stone House garden for
Members 6,30—9.30 p.m.
£6. per person.
Tuesday 5th July
Museum Lunch, Donington
Manor Hotel, 12.30 for
1.00p.m. £13.25 per person.
Saturday 23rd July
A talk on the Hemington
Bridges at the Catholic
Church at 2.00 p.m. as part
of British Archaeological
Fortnight. £2.50 per person
Saturday 6th August
Tea in the Garden.
Change of date and
venue.
This event will now be held
at 72 High Street, the home
of Mr and Mrs Dalby,
2.00—4.30 p.m. £3.00
Friday 16th September
Cheese and Wine evening at
2A The Biggin, from 7.30—
9.30 p.m. £4.50 /£5.
Tuesday 4th October.
Museum lunch at Donington
Manor Hotel. 12.30 for 1.00
p.m. £13.25 per person
CASTLE DONINGTON MUSEUM TRUST
NEWSLETTER
Registered Charity 1058715. May 2011 No 67 Accredited Museum 2028
After a rather hectic period through
March and into April, we now have
another show on the road.
All the research has been done, pho-
tographs copied, histories written
and all the papers put on the walls.
The final touch was to arrange our
artefacts, both from the collection
and those generously lent by mem-
bers of the public. The often men-
tioned banner hangs in Room 2 and
two more banners from the Parish
Church are in room 3 and quite
stunning they look. Our new exhi-
bition, “Village Churches and Chap-
els” has opened to the public and
right from the very first day, we
have had some very favourable
comments. Now we know what they
talk about in the local pubs and very
kind they are too!
The exhibition was opened by the
Vicar Rev. Andrew Micklethwaite
on Easter Saturday and at the same
time, Room 3 was renamed the
Hetty Carr Room in memory of
Hetty. Several members of her fam-
ily attended the little ceremony and
at the same time had a good look
around the exhibition.
All the churches and chapels of the
village are included, as well as those
of Hemington and Lockington and
Isley Walton.
We hope you will come to see it,
and we hope that you enjoy it.
We would like to hear from you if
you spot our not-so-deliberate mis-
take. If you can put the correct cap-
tion to it, you might even win a
prize!
VILLAGE CHURCHES AND CHAPELS
MEDIEVAL MAY MARKET
The unusually fine and dry
spring weather made the May
Market a great success. The
sun shone, there was quite a
stiff breeze, but the crowds
came out in force to make it a
successful day for most of the
participants. The museum
was of course open all day, a
Tombola was manned on the
lawn at the Stone house, and
our most public face was on
the street stall in Borough
Street. There were Morris
dancers, falconry, musicians
and a hog roast.
Our street stall sported old
The stall won a prize for
the best decorated, which
gave us our stall rent back,
(always good for funds), and
the volunteers were resplen-
dent in “medieval” dress. A
satisfactory but very tiring
day was had by all the work-
ers.
Thanks and well done every-
one and congratulations also
to the Parish Council for
their organisation of another
successful event.
fashioned games which proved very popu-
lar, as well as the sale of parish history,
books, the museum had more than 450
visitors, and the Tombola sold out.
CHANGES AHEAD
Page 2 CASTLE DONINGTON MUSEUM TRUST
We have had news from the
Carr family that following the
death of Hetty, they intend to
sell the property in which we
have a lease for the museum.
For some months work has
been carried out on the upper
floors, to provide a very nice
flat which will be rented out
however, we will be secure in
our tenancy unless we fail to
carry out the duties spelt out in
the lease.
We sincerely hope that all goes
well, and that the changes
which are inevitable will not
adversely affect the museum
and its working.
IT’S A SMALL WORLD
DOWN MEMORY LANE
This museum has participated
in the Leicestershire Museums
website “Leicestershire Re-
vealed”, where each member
museum submitted photographs
and details of an object in their
collection which they felt re-
flected their museum or their
community.
As our contribution, we posted
photographs of our two wooden
shell formers, with other related
pictures, along with an account
of the employment of our vil-
lage basket makers during
World War I. Have a look for
yourself.
It always feels good when we
get a response from those “out
there” who decide they want to
know more, or even just to con-
gratulate us and say “hello”.
This time we have spread our
image a bit further and have
been in email contact with
someone interested in the same
kind of work carried out during
WWI in Holland, which was a
neutral country during that con-
flict. It’s a small world …
DR
Part of the new exhibition on Churches and Chapels
This is one of the many photo-
graphs of Castle Donington
taken by Edwin Elkington, who
lived on Castle Hill. It shows
two men, by the gate leading to
Miss Eaton’s house, Hall Farm.
near to where the entrance to
Barn Close is today, behind the
bus station. The man on the
right is William Bexon.
Two wooden shell
formers, used by
basket makers of
Castle Donington
during the first
World War
A GRAVE PROBLEM By Bruce Townsend.
Dr. Massey, the Medical Officer
for health described the situation in
Castle Donington in dramatic lan-
guage:
“… Demoralising spectacles in a
church yard for many years past,
full to overflowing and a persistent
infection of the sub soils and wells
with the loathsome products of de-
composition for a like period”.
He was describing a 19th century
problem which was widespread,
especially in places like ours, which
had experienced a sharp growth in
population, but no corresponding
growth in the size of their church
yards. In earlier times there had
been a more pragmatic approach to
the problem, that faced all grave
diggers in an old church yard—
”Alas Poor Yorrick I knew him
well”. In those days an area was set
aside to receive the bones of the
long forgotten forefathers to make way for fresh interments. To
approach the difficulty, notice how
every medieval church yard, our
own included, stands several feet
above the level of the surrounding
land.
Our population rose from 1,959 in
1801 to 3,508 in 1841, and although
over a thousand had departed for the
heady delights of Long Eaton and
elsewhere by the time of Dr.
Massey’s report (1879), people
were much less likely to counte-
nance the destruction of their ances-
tors and relation’s graves, many of
them with headstones, which had
become more fashionable in the
18th century.
There were no District Councils at
the time of this crisis and National
Government delegated the responsi-
bilities for enforcing its Acts on the
Unions, or as they were commonly
known, the Workhouses, which
controlled a number of parishes in
the area surrounding them. The long-
suffering Board of Guardians was
composed of representatives from
each parish and besides dealing with
the Poor had many other contentious
and unpopular matters to enforce,
including health matters. By 1875,
Castle Donington was instructed to
provide a new public cemetery im-
mediately.
It goes without saying that this in-
struction met with stiff opposition
and even a demand that we should
be given authority to make our own
decisions on such matters. Dr.
Massey, a Melbourne resident,
reached an all-time low in the popu-
larity stakes, but the Vestry Coun-
cil’s protests were in vain and it was
decided to build a cemetery and to
make a thorough job of it. It is de-
scribed in detail in a report of 1879:
“A most eligible site was selected at
a convenient distance from the vil-
lage and commanding a beautiful
prospect of the valley of the Trent. In
a sanitary point of view the sub soil
and ‘dip’ were pronounced as excep-
tional. The ground has been laid out
in the most approved method,
planted with ornamental trees and
shrubs and enclosed with a hand-
some Palisade. The style of architec-
ture Gothic, in strict accordance with
the sacred character of the place and
the aesthetic requirements of the
most fastidious taste, the excellence
of the workmanship and the natural
beauty of the situation form a most
pleasing feature of the landscape.”
“Wonderful”, they must have
thought, “when our time comes, we
shall definitely be going to a better
place. The Council’s got something
right for once”.
Unfortunately, there was one aspect
of this demi-paradise that the Coun
Page 3
cil got wrong and that was to be
their undoing. It was in Park Lane,
where Studbrook House stands
now. It was therefore alongside the
route to Donington Hall, taken by
Mr. Abney Hastings, (soon to
become Lord Donington) and his
vis i tors . Unl ike his near
neighbours, the Harpur-Crewes at
Calke, motto Cogita Mori (Think
of Death) Mr. Hastings was
definitely not amused. Up with it,
he most definitely would not put.
So although the new cemetery was
up and running, and had already
received its first clients for burial it
had to be moved to the site on
Barroon. Life is rarely quiet in
these parts and the squabbling
started all over again. Dr. Massey
thought the new site might infect
the streams and wells flowing in
Hemington and no doubt the
people who had so recently buried
their loved ones in the Park Lane
beauty spot weren’t best pleased
either.
But the man at the Hall had to be
obeyed. To his credit he gave us
the land on Barroon apart from a
small strip of the adjacent
allotments and paid for everything
at Park Lane to be demolished and
replacements made at Barroon.
This would include the Caretaker’s
house, the Mortuary and Chapel,
(now demolished), palisade, trees
and shrubs—the lot!
Residents of Hemington can sleep
easy in their beds, by the way. It
was soon established that Dr
Massey’s fears were unfounded
and there was no danger
whatsoever of contamination of
their water supplies.
As for the unfortunates buried in
Park Lane, I haven’t found out yet
what happened to them, I don’t
suppose they’re too bothered now
either.
CASTLE DONINGTON MUSEUM TRUST
CURATORIAL CORNER
Everyone is keeping very quiet
at the moment, we do not offi-
cially have a back-log of
items, but with the work re-
quired to set up a new exhibi-
tion, there has been a bit of a
build up. It is now heads
down, pens at the ready.
Procedures are reviewed from
time to time and new ideas for
the re-assessment of the col-
lection are put into place, both
physically and on the com-
puter. There is not usually
much to show for what might
be several weeks work, but it
all helps toward better organi-
sation and care of the objects.
We are fortunate to have vol-
unteers who are interested in
computer work as well as the
practical side of things. A new
pamphlet has been printed to
Castle Donington Museum Trust 4 Apiary Gate
Castle Donington DE74 2JA
Contact Tel No 01332 812711
[email protected] [email protected]
Website :
www.castledoningtonmuseum.org.uk
Page 4
There have been no signifi-
cant new acquisitions in the
last few weeks, but this gives
us time to work on the objects
we have received previously.
.
RECENT
ACQUISITIONS
FUNDRAISING
May I please draw your attention to the change of date and
venue for this year’s Tea in the Garden. It will now be held on
Saturday, 6th August, at 72 High Street, by kind permission
of Mr and Mrs Dalby.
An additional event this year is our participation in the British
Archaeological Fortnight, when we have one of the Leicester-
shire archaeologists coming to talk on the Hemington Bridges
found in the gravel extractions at Hemington Fields. This will
be held at the Catholic Church on Saturday 23rd July at 2.00
p.m. Please join us in what promises to be a most interesting
afternoon and bring your friends.
Tea in the Garden, Saturday 6th August, 72 High Street.
2.00—4.30 £3.00
Work in progress on one of the Friendly Society sashes.
A case of memorial cards.
The banner.
offer information to visitors on the
opportunities of volunteering, indi-
cating the variety of work done and
the times at which we do it.
Newcomers are always welcome,
they provide the man power while
we provide the training and the cof-
fee and biscuits.