Bishop Wilton Local History

The Beacon Spoon

2011-07-06T12:13:00.001-07:00

At a recent local history exhibition someone who used to live in the village brought along a spoon that his father had found in the beck as a lad, in 1930. It was interesting because it was decorated with an engraving of a beacon. He let me take a photo of it and you can see it here.

It is tempting to see it as a souvenir from when Wilton Beacon was erected in the early 1800s. Although this is possible, the actual engraving does not seem to depict the correct form of our beacon which is described as having one upright post with pegs projecting from it which served as steps. The engraving seems to have an upright post with a separate ladder arrangement. Nevertheless, it is an interesting find. We continue to be amazed by what is found in the beck, usually by children these days.

Online Publications

2011-05-14T08:02:00.001-07:00

We are pleased to say that we have published two local history documents for on-line viewing on a website called Issu. You will find them by going to the Local History Group page of the website.
They are displayed using Adobe Flash so this might cause difficulties if you are using Apple hardware. Sorry!
One of them, Bishop Wilton in the 1940s, is only available in this format so it can be downloaded and printed. The other, about St Edith’s Church, is available in printed format at the Church in the village.

Recent Finds

2010-07-30T10:17:00.001-07:00

We have had reported to us: a medieval, metal arrowhead thought to be of a type used for hunting; a large ammonite fossil from beneath a stone wall that is being rebuilt as part of a new development; a medieval jeton plucked from the beck by a budding, young archaeologist. From the village, all three are to be reported on in the next (and last) edition of the Local History Bulletin, No 20 – publication date as yet undefined.

Football on the Playing Fields

2010-04-14T08:02:00.001-07:00

Is 2004 historic enough? We think so! Hopefully someone will recognise themselves.

The Foresters

2009-12-19T11:56:00.001-08:00

Although we have included information and memorabilia relating to the Foresters in past exhibitions, we have not written about it in our Bulletin or on our website. Until we can put that right, we provide this video which is made up of a number of elements which come to hand: two photographs supplied by the late Eileen Hopper, extracts from a press cutting dating from 1900 and memories recorded by a former resident of the village:

Major Swain at No. 73

2009-12-04T06:12:00.001-08:00

In Bulletin No. 15 we printed this photo of Rachel Frank (now Mrs J. Stringer) on a horse in the front garden of Major Swain’s house (now No. 73); he was teaching her to ride.

At a recent meeting of the Local History Group, the grand-daughter of Major Swain gave us a bundle of photos to copy, amongst which was this one that was taken at the same time as the one above. The bundle will provide material for a feature at our next exhibition. There is a story to tell about the Swains ….

Attention to Detail

2009-11-29T04:16:00.001-08:00

A current resident of the village gave us this old image to copy:

There are at least three items of interest worth looking at in detail.

Detail 1 (from the left of the full image):

There is a car outside the Agricultural Engineers which was owned by W. L. Fisher at the time. It is probably his car (the registration number ends in “8”). Someone is captured in this image, looking towards the photographer.

We recall being told that Mr Fisher was the first person to own a car in the village. Could this be the one?

Detail 2 (from the middle):

In the long grass there are farming contraptions that have been repaired or are awaiting repair (they might even have been made) by Fishers. You can see the metal seats poking up. This was a familiar sight right up until they closed in 1997.

Detail 3 (from the right):

The most evocative image. A woman is on the Everingham’s bus awaiting departure. She is talking to a man through an open window, saying her goodbyes, perhaps?

Bishop Wilton Beacon

2009-11-29T04:12:00.001-08:00

Bishop Wilton Beacon was in existence (or remembered) from around 1829 to 1854 because it is marked on maps of those dates. But it had disappeared by 1866 according to J. R. Mortimer who excavated its site.

We were contacted by a former village resident who was eager to find its location on current maps. He was able to flag its position on an aerial photograph that shows a crop discolouration which could mark the remains of numerous beacon conflagrations - see the Bing map and select the Aerial option to see the Satellite Photo.

Alternatively, using Google Earth fly to:

53 59 54.28N, 0 45 47.80W

i.e. copy the characters above into Google Earth’s search box.

Quite apart from the Beacon, this is an interesting area of the parish for pre-historic earthworks which can be spotted on the aerial photographs.

By a surprising coincidence, we have turned up a note to the effect that Wilton Beacon was blown down in a gale in 1863. This comes from the Notebooks of F. C. Heaven which are in the Hull University Archives (Ref: DX/37/3 – soon to be part of a new library in the centre of Hull)