Early Recollections of Grange / Cumbria Reading Detectives

The team

Other teams

Early Recollections of Grange Find!

I have just finished reading the most delightful piece of writing about Grange over Sands, and regular readers of the Cumbria page on the Reading Detectives website will perhaps recognise it as one of the titles referred to by Mary in her very first blog (Mary Learns to Blog)

The title in question is called Early Recollections of Grange.

It was published in 1909 by A M Wakefield and is contained within a larger volume called Cartmel Priory and Sketches of North Lonsdale.

By my calculations, these early recollections must go back as far as 1839. It really is the most fascinating read, which describes a Grange which is at once very different to the one we know now, but which also allows the reader to see and recognise the very strong roots and connections of the modern day town.

In the days about which A M Wakefield writes, Grange was a very small village when she first visited (she later settled here permanently):

When half way across the way on that memorable first journey of ours, the most beautiful view broke upon our sight, the glimmering golden sands all round us, and as far as eye could see were fells and woods and hills terminating at length in the distant lake mountains. Nestling at the foot of the woods was the lovely little village of Grange, consisting then of only a few white cottages. The Grange from which it took its name was John Brough's farm, on the exact site of the present Police Office.

There was no church, no railway, no butcher (the nearest one being in Cartmel) and it would seem, no shops:

Peggy Keith, the carrier, brought most of the provisions in her cart from Kendal. She never forgot a commission and carried them all "in her head," as she said. She smoked a short black pipe and always wore a man's coat in preference to more womanly attire. She came to a sad end, poor body, for one dark night she fell off her cart and was killed.

In those days, the route to Grange from Lancaster and further south was precarious to say the least as it involved crossing the sands of Morecambe Bay.

Riders, coaches and carts alike all made their way from Hest Bank to Kents Bank with the aid of the "Guide over the Sands", which Chris has mentioned in her "Find", The Sand Pilot of Morecambe Bay.

A M Wakefield vividly recounts two "near misses" where coaches almost met a sticky end in the tides and quick sands of the bay. She also tells the story of the only Guide to die whilst carrying out his duties, thanks to two headstrong men who insisted on crossing the sands on a wild and stormy night with or without a Guide. When they set out despite his advice, the Guide saw no option but to lead them across himself. They all reached the other side safely, but the Guide was caught by the incoming tide on the way back.

I was fascinated to read that up until the time of which A M Wakefield writes, all the Guides had been descendants of the same family - the Carter family- which made me wonder if this is how Carter Road in Grange actually got its name, almost as a kind of memorial to them. Until reading Early Recollections of Grange I always thought it was called Carter Road as a reference to "carters" ie carriers!

There was also another intriguing link between this title and the entry which Anne has posted on the Cumbria page - Smoke Across the Fell. Both of these finds are linked by their references to John Wilkinson of Castle Head, "the famous iron master and free thinker" as A M Wakefield describes him. The tale of his iron coffin, his three burials and the supposed haunting of Castle Head is recounted with great glee. She also pays tribute to the fact that thanks to John Wilkinson, marshland was converted to arable land and his flat bottomed iron boat was the forerunner of future large iron sailing ships.

It was also quite amazing to read that until 1851 Grange did not have a church - worshippers either had to go to Lindale, a small village 2 miles away, or to the Priory Church at Cartmel, which was so cold that "even sturdy old farmers and hardy youths brought overcoats...to keep themselves warm during the service"!

In 1851, when a Miss Clarke was deeply shocked to learn that none of the mothers of the village could spare the time to attend services at either Lindale or Cartmel, fund raising began in earnest to build a church in Grange.

The Church was built in 1852 and became St Paul's Church. This is an image from an old print which is included in A M Wakefield's book, and can be viewed with the others which appear in the book online (see below).

This is what St Paul's Church looks like today:

One means of raising money, apparently, was through the publication of a book called Sketches of Grange - this was a small, bound volume of letters "descriptive of the neighbourhood" which had been previously published in the Kendal Mercury.

Having read this reference and been intrigued by it I think my next step must be to track down a copy of Sketches of Grange and read it for myself, since I have found A M Wakefield's recollections about the town so fascinating.

I can honestly say that this engaging, illuminating and interesting title has given me a deeper appreciation of the place where I live, and were it not for Reading Detectives I probably would not have discovered it. It would certainly have been my loss.

Once I had finished reading it, I felt compelled to research more about the title and also about A M Wakefield.

I was delighted to find that the full text of Early Recollections of Grange is actually online so if you want to read it for yourself go to: http://www.stevebulman.f9.co.uk/cumbria/grange_f.html

The illustrations can also be seen online too, click the link below and scroll down to where it says Grange over Sands. http://www.stevebulman.f9.co.uk/cumbria/archive_index_f.html

One of the images on this site shows Grange as it was in around 1840.

This is what Grange looks like in 2009, viewed from exactly the same place:

As for A M Wakefield, I was intrigued to discover online that some letters written by an A M Wakefield are held by the National Archive, in the correspondence of Lucy Broadwood.

Lucy Broadwood was a great expert in music whose main claim to fame is her work in developing the study of folk music. She was friends with Vaughan Williams and Percy Grainger and corresponded with musical luminaries such as Grieg and Charles Halle. The Wakefield letters are listed on the National Archives website as follows:

Miss AM Wakefield at Nutwood, Grange-over-Sands, Cumbria, to Miss [Lucy] Broadwood. Refers to a letter about a diamond pendant and thanks her for her arduous work 'so splendidly executed' [at Wakefield Competition and Festival, Kendal] 2185/LEB/1/46 3 May 1897

Miss AM Wakefield, honorary conductor, Wakefield Competition and Festival, Kendal, at Nutwood, Grange-over-Sands, Cumbria, to Miss [Lucy] Broadwood. She asks Lucy to serve on the judges' panel, this year for the children's as well as the solo competitions 2185/LEB/1/47 12 Aug 1897

Miss AM Wakefield at Nutwood, Grange-over-Sands, Cumbria, to Lucy Broadwood at 84 Carlisle Mansions. She thanks her for her notice in The Times the previous day, saying how much her sister had enjoyed Lucy's visit and enclosing [now missing] a copy of the Westmoreland Gazette 2185/LEB/1/56 25 Apr 1901

So are these letters written by the same A M Wakefield and what is the link between her and the Mary Wakefield Westmorland Music Festival? More detective work needed I think!

9 September 2009 from Helen

1 Comment

Helen | September 29, 2009 11:02 AM | Reply

Jackie, our brilliant Local Studies Librarian based in Kendal Library, has been able to help me out with my little A M Wakefield mystery!

She tells me that the author A M Wakefield is, indeed, Mary Wakefield, the founder of the Music Festival and her home was Nutwood, in Grange.

Because of an issue over dates I had decided that they couldn't possibly be the same person because the time scale was all wrong, but Jackie tells me that there is a bit of confusion over the dating and this could have arisen because Early Recollections was edited by A M W but “taken from material collected from A. T.” Although Jackie is not sure who/what A.T. may be!

It turns out that there is a lot of material about Mary Wakefield in the Local Studies Collection at Kendal Library and her work included writings on Ruskin, descriptive articles and musical subjects. The collection holds many Music Festival programmes and copies of Rosa Newmarch’s Memoir.

Jackie also tells me that there is a very interesting reprint from the Kendal Mercury and Times of April 1897 entitled Miss Wakefield at Home. This was a special illustrated interview by Edward Gill and, although it is in poor condition, it is a signed copy by the interviewer which was presented to Miss Wakefield.

I shall definitely be making a point of looking at that as my detective trail continues!

Thank you Jackie for shedding light and solving the mystery!

Helen

Name

Email Address

URL

Remember personal info?

Comments

All blog posts | RSS feed

Finds

Help the team

Have you got something to contribute? You can contact us to report your clues and you can comment on our blog posts. It doesn't matter where in the world you are!

The team

Other teams

Early Recollections of Grange Find!

1 Comment

Leave a comment

Finds

Recent posts

Help the team

See posts tagged with