THE PINFOLD PIPE

Recently found at Pinfold an almost intact clay pipe. It is thought the small stone barn at the front was a pipe pottery. With a pub, two beer houses and two brewers what more could the Scothern folks desire! 

Who's interred near

Prince Phillip

At Windsor

Charles Brandon, once the owner of the west half of Scothern, is interred in St Georges Chapel,Windsor, near his best mucker Henry VIII. Since Saturday it is also the temporary resting place of Prince Phillip, the Duke of Edinburgh.

Henry VIII was supposed to have an elaborate tomb and had purchased the black marble from Italy but after the old tyrant died no one could be arsed to get it made. Never mind, the marble was used 258 years later to make a true hero’s tomb for Lord Horatio Nelson

THE

SCOTHORNE

STRIPPERS

Similar Furlong Strips as these surrounded Scothorne                                                 Scothern's last strips were developed on recently                                                                                                                      

Until the 1766 Scothern Enclosure Act all the villagers had strips of land all over the place called Tarrows or Stintings. These strips were usually about 220 metres long (one furlong) and about 22 metres wide. The idea was that everyone had a bit of land in good fertile areas and everyone shared the stoney and boggy bits as well.  This is all well-and-good but the strips were passed down from generation to generation by word and mouth and were individually named. So in Scothern you may have land in the East Field called:  Long Shrib or Holme Moore or in the West Field: lying on Westtown Hill , Westwood Nooking, Odlands or on Standhills Field called: Millhole Leys, Gilh, Mandy Nook at Pringle End, Burmel Sike, Kirkin Hill or the Crooking

These long forgotten names and places would have been well known to our Scothern ancestors who farmed them before 1766.

Finding your strip amongst the many others after a night in the B n G must have been quite a problem and impossible for modern farming with tractors and combined harvesters. 

On a personal history note, my ancestor Edmund Clipsham, who was farming strips at Walesby, was brought before the Manor Court for ploughing at right angles across the strips so spoiling and stealing others land and on another occasion ploughing the vicarage lands!!

SCOTHERN PREPARES

FOR THE ARMADA &

A SPANISH INVASION

 In 1570 the Pope excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I and the Spanish started planning an invasion. In response in 1585 Elizabeth  ordered all local Constables to prepare to defend their villages against the invaders. Scothern reported that they had:  Two bows and two sheafs of arrows, one leather bracer to cover an archers forearm (What the other archer did I don't know. Get a sore arm I suppose!), two swearts (some sort of leather loop?), two daggers hanging from two girdles, two red capes and leather sculls (caps like Batman & Robin!), one caliver with flax (a musket with flax burning taper used before flintlocks were invented), a flint touchbox to light the taper, one steel helmet and a bullet mould to make lead musket balls.

By 1588 when the Armada was on its way Scothern was well prepared to fight off the 48,000 Dick Dastardly Spanish Army!

As Dad's Army Lance Corporal Jack Jones said, "They don't like it up 'em!"

               WHATS A BLACKGUARD?  APPARENTLY WE ARE :                 

   "SCOTHERN IS FULL OF THE MOST UNGRATEFUL BLACKGUARDS"

Richard Ellison was the owner of Sudbrooke Holme.  After his death in 1850 the curate of Sudbrooke said, "Richard Ellison was a generous supporter of all good causes, Richard founded a school at Scothern in 1837, and Scothern was a village supported by the bounty of Richard Ellison of Sudbrooke, yet it was full of the most ungrateful set of blackguards I ever met in my life". ............HOW RUDE

               Definition of a Blackguard:    'A man who behaves in a dishonourable or contemptible way.'    OK   fair enough                                                                                    Disclaimer, this was written in 1850 but I do not think it is a racial comment.

SCOTHORNE GAMBLERS

In March 1570 Scothorne's Constables informed Henry VIII on oath that : "Thomas Good and William Wright had been playing dice and other illicit games."  This was against the Kings Peace because Henry wanted all men to practice archery not waste time on any other pastimes. Thomas was fined 12 pence and William 8 pence, a small fortune in those days

 Scothorne what a Den of Iniquity!!! Not sure what Henry would of done to Bet Fred or Bet Victor......Off with their heads 

These rules didn't include Royalty or the Aristocracy of course. Nothing changes, we now have MP's telling us what to do while they crack on doing what they want!

On a more serious note it just shows what a police / snitchers state people lived under thanks to the tyrant Henry VIII

                         HAPPY EASTER,

                   A PAGAN TRADITION

Although chocolate Easter Eggs were invented in Germany in the 19th century the giving of Easter Eggs is a Pagan tradition. It is likely that our Scothern pagan ancestors from the Celtic Corieltauvi tribe gave eggs to each other to represent the spring and new life and a new beginning. It is thought they believed eggs found in the fields were actually laid by spring hares. Sounds like the Celts were as crazy as a Mad March Hare!

                                           PANCAKE DAY A

                                      HUNDRED YEARS AGO

Recently we have had queues for the Crepe Wagon that has started coming to the village hall. Some people in the queue at 5 o’clock were there for a second time after already having the delicious crepes for lunch. This year’s actual lockdown Pancake Day was a lonely affair with no grandchildren allowed to watch me tossing the pancake and to be fair they would probably rather play with their IPads anyway. 

How different things were a hundred years ago.  When the “Shrive Bell” at the church was rung on Shrove Tuesday the kids would be allowed out from Scothern School to walk in a chain up to Sudbrooke Holme to receive an orange each from the Lady of the Manor. I may suggest this to the grandkids next year but I think I know what the reply will be.

Alas Poor John

Is dead and gone

Who often toll’d the Bell

And with a spade

Dug many a grave

And said Amen full well

The words on a Scothern gravestone.

Thanks to Mrs Hibbs I have in my possession a pamphlet written by the Rev. H.F Allison, the Scothern’s vicar from 1901 to 1919. He gave a talk in the village, probably in about 1920, on our village history.  He tells us in the Church Register it states that Poor John was John Blackburn, the Parish Clerk, bell ringer and grave digger for 50 years before he himself was buried in 1739.  It also mentions past villagers names from the time :  Kirkgate, Ellekar, Christian Cod, Livewell Turner (great first name), Oxenbrook, Pyspring and the old village families that I come across time and again Paulger, Fox, Herringshaw, Waby, Oxenbrook and Baldwin. Finally one lady, he gave no name, was a Mantuamaker ? 

Any guess what she made without Googling it?