Folklore of Sussex

INTRODUCTION

There have been many books written about Sussex, its history and the beauties of its countryside, but in all of them its folklore, legends and folk-customs receive only minor and incidental mention, or, at the best, a single chapter. Yet the foundations for the study of Sussex lore had been well laid in the nineteenth century by three pioneers whose essays, though brief, are crammed with valuable material – M.A. Lower, who recorded several local legends (two of them verbatim) in his Contributions to Literature (1854) and in an article in Sussex Archaeological Collections XIII (1861); Mrs Charlotte Latham, who published a collection of ‘West Sussex Superstitions’ in Folk-Lore Record I (1878); and F.E. Sawyer, who listed many seasonal customs in Sussex Archaeological Collections XXXIII (1883), and also produced a pamphlet on Sussex Place-Rhymes and Local Proverbs (1884).

This promising beginning, however, was never systematically followed up, though many individual items appeared in various scattered sources. Local historians describing their own towns and villages would often include two or three local tales and superstitions, while some of the more colourful legends attached to topographical features naturally appear again and again in general descriptions of the county. First-hand accounts of customs and festivals are also found in the reminiscences of people who have known rural working-class life from the inside, notably Harry Burstow in 1911 and Bob Copper (1971, 1973, 1976), but books of this type are unfortunately rare. The Sussex County Magazine (1926-56) includes a good many articles and letters touching on points of folklore; many are of great value, being based on first-hand observation or personal memories, but a few merely repeat, without acknowledgement, material drawn from older printed sources. Of particular interest are the articles contributed by Miss L.N. Candlin to the Sussex County Magazine and to the West Sussex Gazette from the 1940s onwards, since these are drawn from her own family traditions (particularly concerning the Washington, Brighton and Lewes areas), and from oral informants in many parts of Sussex. I am very grateful to her for allowing me the free use of this material, and for supplementing it with conversation and correspondence. Some of her writings have now been collected as Tales of Old Sussex (1985) and Memories of Old Sussex (1987). Other useful recent books are Tony Wales’s A Sussex Garland (1986) and A Treasury of Sussex Folklore (2000), Jim Etherington’s Lewes Bonfire Night (1993), and Andrew Allen’s A Dictionary of Sussex Folk Medicine (1995).

The aim of the present book, therefore, is to give a coherent picture of the considerable amount of Sussex folklore which has been recorded over the last 150 years, and some of which is still very much alive today. Broadly speaking, the material falls into four main categories. First, local legends: that is to say, stories that are attached to some particular place (whether it be to a natural feature such as a wood or pool, to a visible archaeological feature such as a burial mound, or to a church, house or monument), or else to some particular person whose notoriety or eccentricity serves to attract anecdotes. The actual content of such legends is very often supernatural, fantastic or grotesque; they include tales of buried treasures, lost bells, giants, bogeymen, dragons, fairies, ghosts, witches and the Devil. Occasionally they are not merely linked to well-known landmarks, but are vouched for by their narrators as having happened to ‘a man my great-grandfather knew’, or perhaps even to a closer friend or relative. Such stories have a good chance of surviving well in oral tradition, since once one has heard the legend attached to a prominent building or landmark, it is almost impossible to see the place without remembering the story.

The second major category is that of traditional beliefs and magical practices. Two chapters are devoted to particular aspects of this field – non-rational healing methods and beliefs concerned with the human life-cycle – while others are mentioned in the chapters about the Devil, fairies and witches. Thirdly comes the very extensive category of seasonal observances; this includes a varied assortment of festivals, ceremonies, customs, games, rituals, beliefs and sayings which are linked to particular dates. Here the main emphasis is on what the community, or certain groups within it, actually do in obedience to tradition, rather than on their stories and beliefs. Needless to say, there is no town or village that ever observed every single one of the seasonal customs; I have been careful to name precise localities wherever possible. Finally, there are the stock rhymes, sayings and anecdotes applied to inhabitants of certain villages by their neighbours. Sussex people have not been saddled with a regional ‘character’ to the same extent as, say, Scotsmen and Yorkshiremen; on a more local level, however, taunts and teasing sayings are quite plentiful.

Local legends, as has been remarked already, are closely linked to topographical features, especially those which seem in any way mysterious. They may be dramatic natural formations, such as prominent hills and steep coombes ascribed to the Devil’s work, or to a giant (pp. 26, 58–60), or man-made structures whose age and purpose had been forgotten. It is noteworthy that all the hills alleged to have treasure buried on them are the sites of Iron Age forts (pp. 21–3), that several spots named as fairy haunts are prehistoric or medieval earthworks (pp. 51, 56), and that certain barrows are associated with the Devil or with giants (pp. 26–7, 58–9, 63). Other conspicuous archaeological features mentioned in legends are the Long Man of Wilmington and Stane Street (pp. 25–7, 58).

There is an obvious connection between coastal erosion and legends of lost churches (pp. 19–20), while particularly deep places in rivers, bogs, moats and harbours have attracted stories of sunken bells (pp. 18–21). In three of these the name ‘Bell Hole’ occurs, and the name may well have given rise to the legend rather than vice versa; it has been suggested that in these cases ‘bell’ is a corruption of the dialect word pell, which simply means a deep hole in a river. Then again there are the strange pools called Knucker Holes, sometimes said to have monsters in them, the outstanding example being at Lyminster (pp. 34–9); dense woods may be reputed haunted; oddly placed or conspicuous buildings, notably churches, have their typical stories too. Indeed, so close is the correlation between landscape and legend that it would hardly be an exaggeration to say that every landmark and almost every building mentioned in this book is notable in its own right, quite apart from the story attached to it.

History too is reflected in legends, albeit in a very simplified form, and often distorted by mistaken antiquarian theories which linger on at popular level long after they are discarded by scholars. Thus, it was once thought that the name Alfriston meant ‘Alfred’s Town’, and this idea fostered the growth of legends that Alfred fought the Danes nearby, and even that an iron pot displayed in the Star Inn was the very one in which he burned the cakes. Danes occur quite often in Sussex stories, even though the county suffered relatively little from their raids. One tale about them, concerning the battle in Kingley Vale (p. 45), may well be based on fact; there are two others in which any original factual basis has vanished beneath fictional motifs (the raid on Bosham, pp. 18–19, and an alleged battle which Alfred fought against them on Terrible Down near Isfield, in which men waded knee-deep in blood); and one which is a sheer fantasy inspired by place-names – that Danish warriors cut withies at Withy Pits near Three Bridges to conceal their numbers, but were turned back at Turner’s Hill and crawled away to Crawley. Clearly, when folk-imagination functions in this way, it is rash to seek historical information from tales about colourful figures of the far past, such as Druids, Danes or Julius Caesar. Oddly enough, the most momentous event that ever took place on Sussex soil, the Battle of Hastings, has left only minor traces on its tales (pp. 16–17, 46).

Even stories about comparatively modern personages are often unreliable. Charles II figures in Sussex lore because he passed through the county when fleeing to France in 1651; oral tradition has so multiplied his alleged hiding-places and overnight stops on the journey that one wonders how he ever reached the coast at all. The famous episode of his hiding in an oak tree after the battle of Worcester has inspired Sussex imitations; he is said to have hidden in a yew near St Leonard’s Forest, where ‘an old woman came out and gave him some pease pudden’, and also, more plausibly, in a hollow elm in what are now the grounds of the Royal Pavilion, Brighton. This latter tale has been handed down among the descendants of a Brighton boatman who sailed on the king’s ship, yet even this excellent provenance cannot stifle an uneasy suspicion that there would have been no elm at Brighton if there had been no oak at Boscobel.

The broad trends of popular feeling have left more solid traces in folk tradition – such as the anti-Catholic prejudice which accounted for the intensity of the Guy Fawkes celebrations at Lewes and elsewhere, and perhaps for some ogre legends too (see pp. 29–30). This feeling, however, never suppressed the legends of local saints, nor could it entirely erase traces of old Catholic customs such as laying money on coffins (p. 112), and possibly the form of wassailing described on pp. 150–1. And it is almost unnecessary to point out the close links between certain crafts and ways of life and particular stories and customs – blacksmiths had their craft legend and their feast of Old Clem (pp. 143–5); cobblers their St Crispin feast (pp. 135–7); shepherds their tall stories, tales of sheep-stealers, and beliefs about ‘wish hounds’ (pp. 48–9, 162–3); carters their tales of carts bewitched (pp. 68–9); bellringers their tales of lost bells (pp. 20–1); while the connection between agriculture and many seasonal customs is immediately obvious. The smugglers hold a particular place in folklore, for they are thought to have encouraged all sorts of super-natural beliefs and stories as a cover for their own activities; in addition, of course, their exploits are often locally remembered, their alleged tunnels are talked of to this day (p. 24), and their ghosts are often said to walk.

It must also be said that the stories collected in this book, though ‘real Sussex’ in the sense that they have been cherished here for several generations at least, cannot be considered exclusive to this county – on the contrary, very many can be matched in other parts of England. The story of the Hangman’s Stone (p. 163) is told also of rocks in Northumberland and on Exmoor; the stolen Bosham Bell has a counterpart at Whitby Abbey, Yorkshire; the story of the lost Slinfold Bell shares its white oxen and its verse with that of Great Tom of Kentsham; there are irremovable skulls like those of Warbleton Priory (pp. 46–7) in various houses in Dorset, Yorkshire, Lancashire and Westmorland; the upside-down burial on Highdown Hill (pp. 41–3) can be matched on Box Hill, Surrey; the bogey called Spring-Heeled Jack (pp. 28–9) was feared by London children too – and these are but a few examples from what could be a long list. The same holds good for beliefs and for most seasonal customs too; they are traditional in Sussex, but not unique to her. Regional differences do exist in folklore, but they seldom follow county boundaries.

Inevitably the question arises, at what period did these tales, beliefs and customs flourish most? And how old are they? No general answer is possible; each case must be assessed on the evidence available, which all too often is less full than one would wish. I have given the oldest source known to me for each item in the notes at the end of the book, but in most cases it is obvious that the story or custom was already old by the time it was first mentioned in print. Roughly speaking, the picture given here refers primarily to the nineteenth century and the first few years of the twentieth, the period which was brought to a close by the First World War and by the revolution in modern agriculture and transport. When the tale or belief remained current in more recent times, I have indicated this.

But it would be wrong to assume that there is no folklore to be found nowadays; on the contrary, it is quite easy to find people, including young people in their teens and twenties, who know local traditions which have reached them orally, not from any printed source. It is indeed very likely that some Sussex readers of this book will be reminded of stories, beliefs or customs in their own districts which I have not mentioned, or of variant versions of the stories I do tell; information about such items would be most welcome.

Finally, I wish to express my thanks to the staff of the Reference Department in Worthing Public Library, who laid before me the rich resources of their Sussex Room; to Miss L.N. Candlin, whose valuable contribution has been mentioned already; to many friends in and around Worthing who (sometimes unwittingly) added items to the list; and to Dr Venetia Newall for additional information and encouragement.

Jacqueline Simpson

Worthing, 1972

A Note on the Second Edition

In the years since this book was written, many people have given me additional information; some are personal friends, others were members of audiences to which I have given talks on Sussex folklore. Their contributions have been gratefully used in the second edition. I am also grateful to those who could confirm that the tales or customs I mentioned were still remembered.

Jacqueline Simpson

Worthing, 2002

1

CHURCHES, BELLS AND TREASURES

One would expect that churches, by virtue of their prominent place in the landscape and in village life, would be the subjects of many and various types of legend; in fact, however, stories about them are predominantly of one type only, the ‘foundation legend’ – that is, a tale which purports to explain some peculiarity in the siting or structure of the church.

One such is at Alfriston; it is a cruciform building dating from around 1360, and it stands at some little distance from the houses, on what is probably an ancient Saxon mound, on the Tye, the village green. The real reason for the choice of this site may very well have been its comparative safety from flooding in a rather low-lying area, but legend ascribes it to supernatural guidance. The foundations were first laid, so the story goes, in a field just west of the village street, but the work made no progress, since every morning the builders found that all the stones they had laid the previous day had been uprooted, whirled through the air, and flung onto the mound on the Tye. They were puzzled and anxious, not knowing whether the supernatural force at work was a heavenly one, to be obeyed, or diabolical, to be resisted. But after some days of this, a wise man noticed four oxen lying on the Tye with their rumps touching, so as to form an equal-armed cross. The sacred sign formed by these innocent beasts was taken as settling the matter, and accordingly a church, cruciform in construction, was built upon the Tye.

There is a similar tale about Udimore Church, though here it is the name, rather than the site, which provoked the legend. It is said that the site originally chosen was on the opposite side of the river Ree to that on which the church stands now, but every night the stones were miraculously shifted across, while a voice was heard calling out; ‘O’er the mere! O’er the mere!’ Hence the present site was chosen, and hence the name of the village arose. The explanation of the name is not in fact correct (it actually comes from ‘Uda’s Mere’), but at any rate it becomes a trifle less implausible when one remembers that in broad Sussex dialect the sound ‘th’ becomes ‘d’.

At Hollington, on the other hand, it was the Devil who was held responsible for the curious site of the church, on the outskirts of Hastings, quite a distance from any centre of population, and surrounded by thick woods. There are two slightly divergent accounts, both dating from the 1840s. Both start by telling how, when men of a nearby village tried to build a church, each day’s work was undone during the night. According to the first, all the building materials used simply to vanish into thin air, and this continued until the day when ‘a countryman, happening to pass through an unfrequented wood, found there, to his no small surprise, a church newly built; the Evil One having contrived, since he could not utterly prevent the erection, to get it placed where no one could easily approach it’.

According to the other account, the angry workmen resorted to exorcism when they found their work spoilt:

Priests were summoned to lay the fiend, and they had prepared to commence their potent conjurements, when a voice was heard offering to desist from opposition if the building were erected on the spot which he should indicate. The offer was accepted. The church was raised, and then there sprung up around it a thick wood, concealing it from the general gaze.

Yet another variant on this theme is the legend attached to Battle Abbey Church, built by William the Conqueror in thanksgiving for his victory. It is said that he dreamed that his descendants would rule England for as many years as the nave of the church he was planning would have feet in its length. He therefore ordered the foundations to be marked out at 500 feet, but every night they were miraculously cut back to 315 feet, till the proud king accepted the verdict of Heaven, and allowed building to proceed on this reduced scale. Actually, this legend is rather unsatisfactory, for the date it indicates, 1381, is not particularly significant in our dynastic history. Perhaps the story really belongs to some other church with different dimensions, and has only become transferred to Battle Abbey by accidental confusion.

The founding of a church may also be a major point in a saint’s legend. Everyone who has visited Steyning probably knows how St Cuthman pushed his mother in a wheelbarrow from Devon to Sussex, waiting for some sign from Heaven to show him where he should settle and build a church. As he came into Steyning, the barrow broke, and he cut some withies from a hedge to make a rope to mend it. Haymakers working in Penfold Field (which is still also sometimes known as Cuthman’s Field) burst out laughing at his stupidity. ‘Laugh man, weep Heaven,’ answered Cuthman, and at once a heavy cloudburst drenched that field, and that field only. From that day to this, it always rains on that one meadow in haymaking time; indeed, some call it ‘the Accursed Field’, and declare that nothing will grow upon it. Meanwhile, St Cuthman had struggled a little further on his way, but again the barrow broke, this time beyond repair. Suddenly he realised that this was the sign he had been waiting for, and on this spot he later built the first church at Steyning, a timber one. It said that Christ Himself appeared in the guise of a travelling carpenter, and helped Cuthman to raise a roof-beam which was more than his own skill could manage.

A church may also become a bone of contention between a saint and the Devil. It is said that Satan, furious at certain humiliating defeats he had suffered at the hands of St Dunstan (see pp. 61–2) bided his time until the saint embarked on building a wooden church at Mayfield. Then he came in the night and gave the whole church such a thrust that it leaned all askew; but next day St Dunstan, who was of more than human size and strength, set it upright again with a single heave of his shoulder. Once more, Satan waited for his revenge – indeed, having grown wiser, he waited until the saint was dead. Then, when men of a later generation wished to build a new stone church, he undid their day’s work each night, and also pestered the stonemasons in their quarry, where the mark of his hoofs was long pointed out. How he was foiled the story does not say, but foiled he must have been, for Mayfield Church, dedicated to St Dunstan, now stands completed and in its rightful place.

A grim story is told concerning the church spire at West Tarring (once an independent village, now absorbed into Worthing). This is slightly crooked, a flaw which allegedly caused the architect such shame and despair that he killed himself by jumping from the spire, or hanging himself from it, or jumping from the cliffs at Beachy Head, according to different local informants. In fact, the distortion only became gradually apparent after the roof was reshingled late in the nineteenth century with slabs too heavy for its timbers, so the original architect was not to blame. Legends featuring suicidal or murderous architects are fairly widespread, and a story conforming to the pattern presumably began to be told in Tarring early in the twentieth century.

If churches attract legends, so too do their bells. Indeed, bells hold a great fascination for the imagination, because of their holiness and beauty, their power against evil spirits, and the slightly eerie sense of mystery which surrounds them. Particularly memorable are the legends of lost church bells, and Sussex has its full share of these. The most famous, undoubtedly, is that of the Bosham bell, which first appeared in print in the late nineteenth century, but must certainly be far older.