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Tags >> Chris Wildridge

Fancy a ‘Full English’?

Posted by: Blog Administrator on Apr 17, 2012

We were delighted to learn last week that the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS) have successfully secured a grant of £585,400 from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) to help catalogue, conserve and digitise materials from six archives nationwide. These include the Alfred Williams collection owned by Swindon Borough Council and held at the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre. The project, which is also being supported by the National Folk Music Fund, will enable free public access to over 58,000 digital images through a new web portal.

 

Alfred Williams and his wife

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Wiltshire in Song

Posted by: Blog Administrator on Oct 26, 2010

 Wiltshire was largely ignored by the 19th century collectors of folk songs and it was left to a South Marston man, Alfred Williams, the hammerman poet of Swindon Railway Works. He was self educated, fluent in several languages, translated poetry from Asiatic languages and published several books, despite remaining a poor working man all his life. Between 1914 and 1916, owing to poor health he collected 600 songs from people in the Upper Thames Valley before joining the Royal Field Artillery.

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Illustration of Score (truly local carol)

 



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A Wiltshire Christmas Past

Posted by: Blog Administrator on Dec 18, 2009

Tagged in: ‘Wassail’ Harvey , www.wiltshire.gov.uk/community/folk_play_search.ph , with Christmas carols , Wiltshire Community History , Wiltshire , We Wish You a Merry Christmas , wassailing , wassail bowl , villagers , verses , Thomas Ernle , The Britford First Carol , Tha Girt Big Figgetty Pooden , stories , spiced ale , songs , skating , seasonal decorations , school , Sarum Missal , sang , Salisbury Cathedral , rural Wiltshire , Rector , Rector , punch , poems , poems , plays , performed , New Year , mumming , mummers’plays , Monkton Park Community Primary School , minor gentry , Medieval , Limpley Stoke , late night parties , John Chandler , John Britton , John Aubrey , History Centre , heathenish custom , games , Francis Kilvert , folk tradition , Folk Arts , fertility ceremony , Felicity Gilmour , farm labourer , Everley , Evening Prayer , Edward Slow , dialect , dancing , crops , Cricklade , clergy , church , Christmas masses , Christmas Festivities , Christmas Eve , Christmas Day , Christmas , Chris Wildridge , celebrations , butcher’s meat , Britford , boy bishop , Boar’s Head , animals , Alfred Williams , Ales , A.G. Street , A. Lemoine , A Wiltshire Christmas , .Civil War

We have just been entertained by the children of our local school, Monkton Park Community Primary School, with Christmas carols and songs for History Centre staff and users. They ended with We Wish You a Merry Christmas and we would like to wish all of you a Merry Christmas and a Peaceful New Year. That set me thinking about earlier Christmas times in our county.


            Adverts in Wiltshire Newpapers, 1909
Adverts in Wiltshire Newpapers, 1909

For glimpses of Christmases past in Wiltshire you need to look in the writings of Francis Kilvert, Alfred Williams and A.G. Street. In Kilvert you will find the entertainments and activities of the clergy and minor gentry – dancing and games, late night parties, skating, and seasonal decorations in the church. Williams presents us with a view of the farm labourer’s Christmas while Street provides a mixture of famers’ and farm workers’ celebrations. To find out more please 'read more'...




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