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Restoration and remembrance

Horncastle is a town in which the past is very much part of the present

Words: David Robinson Pictures: Mike Cowen, David Robinson and John Smith

When the Horncastle Union Workhouse opened in 1838, it stood in an elevated position on the eastern outskirts of the town. Built to a standard design by Gilbert Scott, it looked rather like a prison, with separate wings for men and women, and could house up to 260 paupers, including children. It was run by a Board of Guardians representing the sixty-eight parishes of the Poor Law Union.

The Guardians did their best for those who had fallen on hard times and found themselves having to take refuge in the 'big house on the hill' which had an infirmary and a school. And they were supported by local benefactors, not least at Christmas when reports in the local newspaper present a picture rather different from the harsh Dickensian image.

'The Guardians provided an ample supply of good English roast beef and plum pudding, and several townspeople added mince pies, cakes, sweets, oranges and dried fruits, nuts and tobacco with toys and dolls for the children. The dining hall and chapel were decorated with evergreens and mottoes and there was a tall Christmas tree in the schoolroom.'

We even know the quantities of food: 12 stones of well-boned beef and 112lbs of potatoes, and the plum puddings used three stones of flour, one-and-half stones of raisins, 26lbs of currants, one-and-a-half stones of sugar, 30 eggs, 14 lbs of suet, two gallons of milk 3 lbs of lemon peel and a variety of spices. And the Phoenix Brewery supplied an eighteen-gallon cask of ale.

'When all had taken their places at the table, their clean attire and happy smiling faces coupled with their seasonable surroundings formed quite a picture; the children, without exception, looked remarkably healthy and comely. Young and old alike did ample justice to the beef and vegetables and other good things, keeping the carvers and others (Guardians and leading townspeople) waiting upon them very busy. The bringing of the puddings on large dishes was the signal for a hearty cheer, and of these rich edibles the diners partook freely. After the meal the men were supplied with pipes and tobacco, while oranges, sweets and dried fruits of different kinds were freely distributed amongst the women and children.'

That was in 1897. In 1930 Lindsey County Council took over from the Board of Guardians and three years later, in a bold move, brought all 'workhouse' children to Horncastle - thirty-two infants in the infirmary block and seventy-two boys and girls in the main block of the former workhouse. This was the beginning of Holmleigh, where two pairs of 'cottage' homes were built on adjoining land in 1934, and three more in 1937. Each had bedroom accommodation for twelve children with a day room on the ground floor, together with rooms for a housemother. There was a separate house for the superintendent on a new entrance drive from Mareham Road. The whole gave security and protection for 150 children including those orphaned and abandoned. Few other local authorities had such modern and generous provision.

Discipline, uniform and household chores there had to be, and the daily two-by-two crocodile walk to and from the Cagthorpe School; I well remember the latter, passing our front gate, and sitting with them in school. (Coincidentally, I was born and grew up in a house built for a retired Master of the Workhouse.) However, as a reunion of former children and housemothers in 1989 showed, lifelong friendships were formed in the days of the Holmleigh Children's Homes.

Come the 1960s policies changed again to dispersing children to smaller units and fostering out. The kindergarten section in the old workhouse closed in 1965 - to be taken over as offices for the social services, an example of historical inertia - and by 1968 the five pairs of 'cottages' were redundant. In another bold and innovative move Lindsey County Council decided to convert the cottages to study bedrooms and to build a teaching, conference and communal block to create an adult short-term residential centre - the Horncastle College. In due course, the houses were given names - Lindsey, Kesteven, Holland, Tom Scholey and Ralph Bennett, the last two after the chairmen of the County Council and Education Committee respectively.

To those names has now been added mine for the Conference Hall, having been a governor of the college from its inception in 1969 and chairman for thirteen years to dissolution of the governors last year as part of changes in County Council management structures. The College now has a multipurpose function - from Children's Links to a more traditional adult education and day conferences, and is still highly regarded nationally.

This year the Horncastle Civic Society celebrates its fortieth anniversary, holding a conference at the College, 'Celebrating Roman Horncastle' which reviewed latest research on the Roman fort and the village settlement which lay to the south. This demonstrated the spread of interest of the Society from its original aims of concern with the built environment, following the demise of the local history group. At the Millennium the Society published a book, 'Horncastle Now and Then' to celebrate 2,000 years, which included reconstructed prospects of the town through the ages by David Vale. Now, and recently released, is the Society's latest venture, a ninety-minute video/DVD 'Horncastle Yesterday and Today' which includes social history, documentary and computer graphics as well as drama, interviews and re-enactments, directed by Tony Kirby and with the help of a Heritage Lottery Fund grant.

The film record of people, buildings, industry and education includes aerial views, light industries, twentieth-century memories of shops, the Victory Cinema (formerly the Corn Exchange) with the double seats at the back under the balcony (I remember them well!), the War Memorial Hospital and the October 1960 flood using previously unseen archive film footage.

Narrator Ash Buckingham interviews historian, archaeologist and former teacher in the town, Pearl Wheatley, about the origins of Horncastle, and I tell of the horse fair and the Civil War. The story of the navigation canal is told through a dramatised meeting of shareholders in the Bull Hotel with treasurer Richard Clitherow and chaired by Sir Joseph Banks. The primary school does projects on the Second World War and pupils of the secondary schools look to the future. As a celebration of Horncastle's historic heritage, it is one of the best local films. (Available at £9.99 from Perkins, Market Place, Horncastle.)

The grandsons of Richard Clitherow - Richard and Robert - were in the 1840s clerk and treasurer of the Horncastle Old Association for the Prosecution of Felons. In my archives I found a copy of a handbill they issued in 1845 offering £25 reward for information leading to apprehension and conviction of the person or persons who broke into the warehouse of Mr W Kent and stole 60 lbs of black and 20 lbs of green tea - not in cheap bags, but foil-lined tea chests and a highly valuable commodity. How valuable can be judged by the fact that the reward was the equivalent of £1,000 today.

That might have been the talk of the town then, but today it has been about the successful completion of the long-awaited restoration of 7-13 Bridge Street. These properties had been unoccupied, boarded up and becoming increasingly tumbledown over a number of years and controversy and procrastination about their future. Eventually Heritage Lincolnshire was able to secure the necessary grant-aid and undertake a tricky restoration programme carried out by Taskers Builders. An archaeological survey showed that No 11, built about 1700, was one of the earliest surviving timber-framed and brick clad structures in central Horncastle, many buildings having been destroyed by fire in 1660. Six building phases were identified in the two blocks with extensions and alterations over three centuries.

Ownerships and business uses had changed a number of times over the years. No 7 was occupied in 1872 by William Brown, plumber and gasfitter, succeeded for some years as Brown & Buxton, combining nos 7 and 9. By 1937 they were in use by George Danby, hairdresser. No 11 had also been a hairdresser (Alfred Cammack) in 1872; by 1900, Frank Belton, stationer and tobacconist was there. James Marshall was in business as a draper in No 13 in 1872, and William Otley as clothier in 1909, but by 1937, Nos 11 and 13 were occupied by fried fish dealer, Alfred Spencer.

Restoration work involved replacing doors and windows, rejoining walls, replacing floors and re-roofing, while retaining original features and faithfully replicating critical architectural features which gave the properties their character. It was one of the most delicate and complicated projects carried out by Heritage Lincolnshire, not least because of the confined working spaces. Great credit is due to the skill of the workforce. I knew the shops when they were in use and had the opportunity to tour them during restoration and adaptation for modern use. After so long under wraps they now have pride of place in the streetscape of Bridge Street.