An Old Soldier of Hadleigh
We don’t know his name but he
stands erect and dignified wearing a large rather ragged topcoat and a
battered hat looking into the distance, both hands resting upon his stick,
proud of being painted by a real artist. In the background are shadowy
outlines of the church spire and the milestone obelisk.
He was painted between 1823 and
1826 by J. Dempsey, possibly John Dempsey, itinerant painter of jewellery
miniatures and cutter of threepenny profile portraits. However he seems in
this case to have travelled the country painting the British poor, perhaps
on commission for a projected book? In Suffolk he chose four people,
Wilkinson the Town Crier of Ipswich, Mary Leagrove, attendant at Ipswich
gaol, Nanny Chapman of Bury St Edmunds and our Old Soldier.
There are 50 of these watercolours
altogether each of them highly individual we understand including portraits
of match-sellers, beggars, bill posters hawkers of a variety of goods, a
gardener, a dreadlocked hermit, a lunatic and a maniac. Whether they were
ever published we don’t know but the original portfolio survived travelling
out to Tasmania where it was in 1956 given to The Tasmanian Museum and Art
Gallery.
Their curator
David Hansen is trying to find information about the people with a view to
publishing in the future.
Nicola Mann kindly passed the
request for information on to us and we hope to be able to help – we already
know that there were at least two old soldiers here in 1842.
Interestingly he would have been living here at the time of John Mann’s
trial and execution. All this just from a small query via the internet.
A print of the
portrait was published in the January 2005 Newsletter.
This year the Civic Trust is
introducing a new scheme, which enables us to claim a discount on some of
the registration fee payable by the Society. For each member of the
Hadleigh Society who joins the Civic Trust as a new Individual Member, £10
will be deducted from next year's registration fee. If you join the
Civic Trust you will receive a free subscription to its quarterly magazine
‘Civic Focus’, advance information about 'Heritage Open Days', discounts on
Civic Trust publications and regular updates on its work. Individual
membership costs £20. Membership leaflets are available from Sue
Angland on 827298 or at any of our meetings.
The Work Of The Commonwealth War Graves Commission by
Major Peter Lee MBE RMP (Ret'd)
This is an illustrated history of
the work of the War Graves Commission through the years up to the present
day. Starting from what happened after the great battle of Waterloo in 1815,
where there were some 16,000 casualties, Peter takes us onto the Crimea in
1853-55 when Florence Nightingale set-up her Nursing Service which led to
the first Military Cemetery being established. This was followed up by
the various Regiments of the British Army making their own arrangements
until World War I. During this conflict Fabian Ware set up his Grave
Registration Unit. This led to the establishment of the Imperial War Graves
Commission in 1917 to tend all our War Graves world-wide which became the
present day Commonwealth War Graves Commission in 1962. If you ever wanted
to trace a friend or relative's final resting place, now is your chance. In
Peter Lee we have an expert.
Meeting as usual in the Old Town
Hall at 8pm. Entry is free for members, £2 for others.
Departing from the usual formula
of a prepared talk, on 19th May questions to Sue Andrews came
right from the start. To be honest the poster gave her a clue to what
might come first and she was well prepared to explain that the building
popularly known as the ‘Monastery’ or ‘Nunnery’ had been the Gateway to
Place Farm, whose origins could be traced back to “Hadley’s in
Hadleigh”. Pigot tells us the farm was demolished in 1847. The
gateway was demolished in the 20th century, and the bricks went
to Frinton.
According to a 19th
century traveller, Hadleigh was ‘not a place for tourists’ since it had no
made up history.
Unlike Hadleigh, Essex, we never
had a real castle. The house of that name was demolished in the early
1960’s but was only of the previous century.
The Gallows was not on the hill
of that name (which was a corruption of Galleybreads - curleybeard) but
probably at The Herst, near Hadleigh Heath.
The Rector found skeletons on Dean
(Dane) Field near Aldham Church suggesting there was once a battle there.
The brick tunnels to be found
in various places in the town were probably drains. Water St Lavenham
has good examples of such brick vaulted drains, built about 1500. On
the other hand the brick structures at the back of Hicks, and in the Deanery
Garden are Ice Houses.
A snippet of information for the
present editor: The Flying Chariot (or Royal Oak as it was then known) was
owned in 1695 by Thomas Scarlet, a Draper, and lived in by John Stevens.
Toppesfield Bridge was
positioned to lead to the market via Duke (or Duck) Street, which used to be
an open sewer.
Holbecks was previously Hobbarts
and Hobbits.
And finally, a piece of false
history: an account of staying at the White Lion in 1790 was composed for a
WI competition of 1922.
Following the request in the last
newsletter for information regarding the paintings of Maitland Mason we
received several useful responses. We were able to trace some more of
his paintings in Hadleigh and also discovered that some are to be found in
Aldeburgh. Many thanks to the members who responded to this enquiry.