Well known for its farming, Lincolnshire is ‘overwhelmingly agricultural…the county supplies Britain with a cornucopia of vegetable…its pigs are famous…Lincolnshire sausages…’
Cumbrian and Lincolnshire sausages are two of the best known in the country but there were other farming traditions which made Lincolnshire famous. There is a specific Lincolnshire breed of sheep called Lincoln Longwool, larger and heavier than the Leicester, and also there is the Lincoln Red; a breed of red shorthorn beef and dairy cattle. There was once a breed of pig, the Lincolnshire Curly Coat, aptly named due to its woolly coat, but it has now died out.
Also known for its tremendous fishing industry, the Lincolnshire sailors and their wives have a tale or two to tell about life with the sea.
A community heavily reliant on agriculture, much of the Lincolnshire landscape encompasses fields upon fields of farmland.
We shall begin our journey through Lincolnshire’s store of tales and folklore by introducing the canny nature of the Lincolnshire folk through their shrewd tradition of decoy ducks.16
They say that some Lincolnshire farmers used to breed ducks in a special way, for the specific purpose of betraying their fellow ducks! One source suggests there were up to forty such farms in the county, taking somewhere in the region of 13,000 birds via this method, in one season.
The decoy ducks were bred in specially designed ponds, where they were given much attention and care so that they became tame and fed from the farmer’s hand. When they were ready they were ‘sent’ abroad, possibly to Europe, where they met other ducks and enticed them back to Lincolnshire, in their ducky language, with tales of a wondrous life!
When the decoy ducks returned with flocks of followers, the men began to secretly feed the newcomers handfuls of grain in the shallows of the ponds. The decoy ducks were used to this and happily went to eat and soon their new friends copied, confident in their host’s judgement.
The grain was soon scattered in a wide open place and the ducks went there to eat it. Then it appeared in a narrower area, where the trees hung over like a tent. All the ducks now followed the food, feeling secure but unaware that there had been a large net placed in the foliage above their heads.
The decoy ducks had led their new friends into the netted area and all were feeding greedily, oblivious to the nets gradually lowering down on them with one end nipping into a point.
Suddenly a dog was let out and came towards them barking ferociously. The ducks all attempted to fly away but the net prevented their escape. They were instead driven towards the narrow point of the net where a man was waiting to catch them, one by one.
The decoy ducks were also caught but their fate was not the same as their new companions. They were stroked, calmed and placed back into a safe pond with plenty of food, ready for another flight to Europe. As for the foreign visitors, let us just hope the folk of Lincolnshire are kinder to people than ducks!
ONE
THE DEVIL AND
HIS SERPENT
Fables about the Devil abound all over the British Isles, and Lincolnshire is no exception. Superstition in Lincolnshire would not allow people to use his name: ‘Don’t say the Devil. Say the Owd Lad or he’ll come when he’s called.’1
Ethel Rudkin confirms this notion,2 noting how he goes by many names in Lincolnshire, such as Old Nick, Old Sam, Sammiwell, Old Harry, the Old ‘Un or Old Lad. However, even if he is not referred to directly, his appearances all over Lincolnshire are still rife – or maybe it is because of his regular visits that people try not to attract his attention!
Of course, there are exceptions to the rule and some people like courting trouble. It was believed by such folk that if you were to drop a pin in the keyhole of a church door and then run around the church seven times that the Devil would appear. Quite what they would do then is unclear.
The legend of Dorrington Church boasts a similar belief. On a clear, moon-lit night you can peek through the keyhole to watch the Devil playing with glass marbles across the church floor.
Exactly what Old Nick looks like we are not sure, although there is one story, retold by Rudkin,3 that describes him as a ‘funny little ole man’. He appeared when a young girl at Crosby decided she wanted to become a witch, and so at midnight one time she visited an old woman known locally as a witch. The old woman told the girl that, in order to become one, she must stand up then bend over and touch her toes, saying ‘all that I ‘ave a-tween me finger tips an’ me toes I give to thee’ (meaning the Devil). So the girl did as instructed, but just as she was half-way through her sentence, ‘She see’d a funny little ole man come in an’ sit i’ th’ chair opposite to ‘er.’ This figure frightened the girl, who suddenly ended the sentence with ‘I give to – Almighty God!’ instead of the Devil. ‘Well! – there was a ter-do-ment! The little ole man disappeared in a ‘urry, an’ th’ owd woman was fit ter kill that lass, an’ she was very glad ter escape out th’ ouse.’
A pub sign in Horncastle, an example of the Lincolnshire tradition of never naming the Devil directly.
Folklorists Gutch and Peacock4 relate a tradition used in Lincolnshire to have power over the Devil. They say on St Mark’s Eve at midnight to hold two pewter platters under bracken for the seeds to drop into. The seed will go right through one and be caught in the other held below, whereupon the Devil will appear riding upon a pig and tell you anything you wish to know.
It is upon a huge black pig that the Devil will appear, again on St Mark’s Eve, at Willoughton, but bizarrely only if you attempt to stop the horses and sheep which apparently kneel down and talk on this night. Legend states that whilst waiting in the stables some men did try this, but just before the appointed hour (always midnight) a mighty wind blew open the stable doors with a tremendous bang, whereupon the men fled home, terrified.
Also, a sure way to escape the contract if you have sold your soul to the Old Lad is to say he can amass the debt either inside the house, or outside. Then when the payment time comes, sit astride a windowsill or doorframe and he cannot collect.
If you wanted to see him, he is said to appear when he hears the clock strike twelve at The Devil’s Pulpit stone in Tealby. He is supposed to come down to the stream for a drink. The only problem is you could be waiting a long while, as who knows when the Devil hears the clock strike here?
The church keyhole at Dorrington, through which one can observe the Devil playing marbles across the floor at night.
There is another Devil’s Pulpit in Hemswell – a slab of rock that juts out above the natural spring. At the bottom of the hill here there is another stone which, legend states, children used to visit. They would apparently stick little pins into the holes in the rock, run round and round it very fast, then put their ears to the stone, and allegedly hear the Devil talking. One can understand this practice when observing the stone, as it is an unusual spherical shape.
The most well-known story of the Devil in Lincolnshire has to be connected to Lincoln Cathedral. A carving of him, peering over a witch’s shoulder, can be seen high upon the side of the cathedral. This image gives credence to the old saying, ‘He looks as the Devil over Lincoln’.5 This particular phrase, used when one is jealous or has malicious intent, is said to derive from the displeasure of the Devil when the cathedral was built:
The Devil is the map of malice, and his envy, as God’s mercy, is over all his works. It grieves him whatever is given to God, crying out with that flesh devil, ‘Ut quid hæc perditio’ (what needs this waste?). On which account he is supposed to have overlooked this church, when first finished with a torve and tetric countenance, as maligning men’s costly devotion, and that they should be so expensive in God’s service.6
So annoyed was he at the completion of the building that legend states he decided to pay it a visit with his two little imp friends and have some fun.
I’ll blow up the chapter, and blow up the Dean;
The canons I’ll cannon right over the screen;
I’ll blo
w up the singers, bass tenor and boy;
And the blower himself shall a blowing enjoy;
The Devil’s Pulpit or Chair, situated on private land at the bottom of Beckhill Road, Tealby
The Devil’s Pulpit in Hemswell. Across a field and up a hill from Brook Street, this juts out of the cliff face, above three small springs.
Spherical rock just below the Devil’s Pulpit stone at Hemswell. A spring runs out around the rock.
The Lincoln Imp, located in Lincoln Cathedral’s Angel Choir, high up on the last but one column.
The organist, too, shall right speedily find
That I’ll go one better in raising the wind;
I’ll blow out the windows, and blow out the lights,
Tear vestments to tatters, put ritual to rights!7
The imps entered the cathedral and began to cause chaos, tearing down tapestries, knocking over pews, pushing the bishop around and generally being very unpleasant and unruly – until an angel appeared and ordered them to stop. Of course they did not stop but carried on with their havoc until the angel had no choice but to make them stop. Just as one imp was throwing a rock at the angel, he was suddenly turned to stone in his tracks. The other, horrified, escaped and left the cathedral well alone but the petrified imp still stays in the cathedral as a reminder that the Devil should not toy with God’s work!
For the tiniest angel, with amethyst eyes
And hair spun like gold, ‘fore the alter did rise,
Pronouncing these words in a dignified tone
‘O impious Imp, be ye turned to stone!’
The petrified imp has become something of an attraction now, with tourists clamouring to get a glimpse of his cross-legged pose and wicked grin, peering down from his high place in the Angel Choir at the east end of the cathedral.
The Devil must have been a regular visitor to the cathedral, as there is a legend connected to the tomb of St Hugh. The belief was that when you closed your eyes to pray, you were in danger of the Devil coming up behind you, unseen, and so when you knelt to pray at St Hugh’s shrine there was a shallow dip containing salt which you could take and throw over your left shoulder to blind his approach! This may have been the origin of the superstition that if one spills some salt accidentally, a pinch of it should be thrown over the left shoulder to blind the Devil.
Also, outside near the Chapter House there once stood a well and the myth ran that on Halloween, if you circled around it three times anticlockwise and then peered into its depths through holes in the walls, you would see the Devil.
A close-up carving depicting the Lincoln Imp. Found in the top Humber Bridge car park area, on the Hull side.
Another popular visitation from the Devil appears in the form of wind. The Lincolnshire Life magazine explains that the residents of Boston have a special name for the footpath which runs between the river and the tower of Boston Stump.8 They call it ‘Windy Corner’ and it seems that in this particular spot there is a constant wind. Even on a calm day there is a ‘stiff breeze which seems to blow from all directions at once’. The legend states that St Botolph, to whom the church is dedicated, had an encounter with Old Nick here. They were engaged in an epic battle but Botolph came out victorious, giving the Devil such a beating that he is there, panting from exhaustion, or anger, to this very day.
St Hugh’s shrine is situated at the east end of the Angel Choir of Lincoln Cathedral, to the north side of the area below the great east window. A shallow depression a little to the left and behind the shrine is where the salt could have been kept.
They say that the buffeting gusts of wind that howl round the south-west side of Lincoln Cathedral are remnants of the great wind that threw back the Devil! This is an alternative version to the Lincoln Imp story – the Devil with a horde of demons came to cause havoc to the beautiful building in 1092. They swirled round the cathedral, intending to lay waste to it but the bishop, Remigius, prayed to the Virgin Mary for aid in defeating these foul beasts. His prayer was answered by a tremendous gust of wind, and the strength of it blew back the devilish crowd, defeating the Old ‘Un and his cronies. However, legend tells that one imp was actually blown inside the cathedral but the stone angels protected their domain by petrifying the imp – hence the stone figure we see today.
These stories and the figure of the imp are so well known that today Lincoln City football team are nicknamed The Imps and the little Devil appears on their crest!
Adrian Grey has a variation on why this corner of the cathedral is so windy.9 He says it was in the days when Lincoln fell into bad ways, with drunks and adulterers roaming the city. The Dean was apparently no better and was actually on good terms with the Devil. One day the Devil was visiting Lincolnshire with his friend, the wind, causing a bit of a stir and blowing up trouble, when he looked upon Lincoln and decided to pop in and see the Dean. They made their way to the cathedral but the Devil told the wind to wait outside for him. The wind waited and waited, blustering around but the Devil never returned and so the wind waits there still.
The Lincolnshire Life magazine tells us of an incident when an angel disrupted another of the Devil’s plans.10 A rich squire named Simon Greenleaf, who owned Nut Hall, Quadring, refused to give alms to the village church, as expected from a man of his standing. His loyalties lay elsewhere and it is said he practised black magic in the tower of his residence. The local priest was irritating him and they had had a few arguments, one of which left Greenleaf with the desire for revenge. Using his black magic he brewed up a potion ‘which would destroy the souls of the infants which it touched’. He broke into the church and swapped the font water for his devilish creation, knowing there was to be a christening the next day. Little did he realise, however, that he was being observed – an angel appeared and commanded him to leave. In his irreverence, he taunted and laughed at the angel who then took up the font and poured the evil mixture all over Greenleaf. He ran from the church screaming and when people came to see what was going on, they found him stone dead in the graveyard.
The Devil is often blamed for people’s misdemeanours, unfortunate events or bad luck. One old belief in Lincolnshire was that every Michaelmas night the Devil would travel around and spit on all the blackberries, and so after this date they were not fit to be eaten. Michaelmas occurs on 29 September, which is naturally towards the end of the blackberry season – a convenient tale to explain their decay. Gutch and Peacock add that when Satan was thrown out of heaven he fell into a bramble bush and was sorely annoyed!11 Thus every year he spoils the very bushes that remind him of his fall and the berries become ‘as hard as the Devil’s forehead’.
Rudkin quotes a Mr Sibsey, who tells of another old belief that helps to explain the supposed power Old Nick has over crops:
In the neighbourhood of Frieston, triangular corners of fields are filled with trees, and the groups were known as ‘Devil’s Holts’. The belief is still current that these were left for the Devil to play in, otherwise he would play in the fields and spoil the crops.
Polly Howat relates an interesting story of the unfortunate farmer John Leech, who got on the wrong side of the Devil.12 The legend says Leech was rather the worse for wear in his local tavern and his friend wanted him to go home. Leech, however, wanted to stay and apparently shouted, ‘Let the Devil take him who goeth out of this house today,’ and they both carried on drinking. Eventually Leech decided to leave, as he wanted to go to the local Whittlesey Fair, near Raveley. His friend was said to remind him of the oath he swore, but the farmer just laughed and started his journey. He was so drunk, however, that he lost his way and ended up riding round in circles until nightfall. Two griffins then appeared and barred the poor man’s way and he heard a dreadful voice remind him of the oath he had broken. Leech was terrified and fell from his horse, whereupon two imps emerged from the bushes and began to beat him. They hauled him up into the sky and flew with him for miles, eventually dropping him and disappearing. The bloodstained farmer was found the next mornin
g and taken to a local house, where a doctor was called. The poor man seemed to have lost his mind and tried to attack the parson, who was summoned after he had narrated his tale. The frightened locals tied him to the bed and locked his door overnight. All seemed very quiet in the morning, so they unlocked the door, but were faced with a horrible sight. Leech’s neck had been broken and his body was black and swollen all over, with every bone pulled out of joint. It was then that his story was believed and all who saw his body realised the awful consequences of making drunken oaths.
What is left of the Melton Ross gallows today, in a field next to a lay-by along the A18, midway between Melton Ross and Wrawby.
Rudkin tells the tale of another man, Tommy Lindrum, who sold his soul to the Devil. As the road was usually so bad between Wroot and Lindholme, he decided one day to make a causeway between the two. The Devil pledged to help his disciple, boasting he would make it faster than a man on a horse could gallop. For some reason, however, the Devil seemed to give up helping Tommy halfway through the job. It has been speculated that Tommy had tricked him somehow and thus escaped with his soul intact. People say there is still evidence of the beginnings of a cobbled causeway there now, although it is mostly grassed over. The legend states it is bad luck to touch the stones, and one farmer, when he tried to move them, lost all his horses in the process – they just dropped down dead!
Folklore of Lincolnshire Page 2
