Stow Green Fair

Stow hamlet, a mile to the east of Folkingham, is little more than three properties, a farmhouse and two cottages, but in 1086, the year of the Domesday survey when Gilbert de Gand was lord of the manor, 35 families lived here with a church dedicated to St Mary with a priest to run it but the building has long since disappeared.

There was also a chapel, built in the mid-13th century, and its remains could be seen until as late as 1791. The Ordnance Survey gives its exact location as the south east corner of the triangular green and according to the will of Thomas Sygrave (1526) it was dedicated to St Etheldreda but by that time the chancel was in a ruinous state. W H S McKnight, author of Notes and Queries (1888-89) suggested that both the chapel and the fair were held just outside what he termed as Baal circles, in other words a pre-Christian sacred site, a purely coincidental connection with some of the unruly conduct that was subsequently reported here.

A market was first held on the green, some say for more than 1,000 years, since long before the Norman Conquest and so it was also mentioned in the Domesday Book when the 40s. profit it made was received by Folkingham's feudal lord, Gilbert de Gant. Two centuries later, in 1268, Henry III granted official permission to the prior and convent of Sempringham to hold a yearly fair at their manor of Stow to celebrate the feast of St John the Baptist, although an unofficial fair probably began earlier because the first historical reference to Stow Green Fair is in 1233 [Gazetteer of Markets and Fairs in England and Wales to 1516 - see below]. Thus began 800 years of annual merrymaking. In the beginning, the event was in two parts, a horse and a wool fair, both held in the middle of June, and of sufficient importance to settle the price of wool throughout the country, and a pleasure fair held in July and such was its popularity that it was responsible for a continuous round of merrymaking for several centuries.

In the early days, all carriages and carts going to the green were compelled to pay a toll and the traffic was so heavy that officials were employed to keep the peace. Until the early 19th century, these men were armed with halberds [long poles fitted with axe heads] and in Folkingham, three such weapons were kept in the blacksmith's shop until the eve of the fair when they were placed outside the houses of the three employees appointed to contend with the unruly mob. This custom, probably a survival of a manorial service, fell into disrepute since, when respectable citizens refused to serve as peace officers, the halberds often fell into the hands of those more likely to break the peace than keep it.

Disorderly and drunken behaviour at the fair, however, became so rife that it was the subject of an order by the magistrates at the Quarter Sessions held at Bourne in April 1838 when they authorised the appointment of constables to keep the peace and also restricted opening hours for public houses with the threat of prosecution for those who defied them.

The fair attracted many visitors, among them the Hon John Byng, later Viscount Torrington, who was touring England in 1790 when he wrote in his diary that he saw the skeleton frames of the booths by the roadside. By the middle of the 19th century, it still survived with a horse fair in June and a general or pleasure fair in July that had become a sort of saturnalia for the labourers of the surrounding countryside. It also attracted their children and log books of schools in Billingborough during the 19th century record the decision of the managers to close for a whole week otherwise face the prospect of empty classrooms.

William White, that enthusiastic gazetter and pedlar of antiquarian anecdotes, described conditions there in 1842: "Many publicans erect booths on the green for the sale of beers and spirits; and the fair has usually been visited by so many gipsies, pedlars and other disorderly persons that the magistrates have found it necessary to send a number of constables to keep the peace." The fair that year was reported in detail by the Stamford Mercury on Friday 8th July 1842 as follows: 

This being the annual resort from all parts of the country of the very lowest refuse of thieves, pickpockets, ruffians and prostitutes, the magistrates have been in the habit of planting a very strong body of constables, under the superintendence of their chiefs, for the protection of the unwary; and on Tuesday last, the day after the fair, the following persons who had been apprehended, were thus disposed of: Mary Ann Burns, who said she was of Dublin but came last from Gainsborough, and was well known to the police as a frequenter of fairs, and Caroline Cooper, who said she was a lace-maker from Bridge Street, Northampton, were committed to take their trial for hustling John  Hall, of Heckington, cordwainer, and robbing him of 12 shillings; Michael Meed was committed to take his trial for robbing Jacques Thurlby, of Little Hale, labourer, of 2s. 6d., and was also convicted as a rogue and vagabond of practising a pretended game of chance called pricking the garter, and was sentenced to three months' hard labour at Falkingham house of correction; Chas. Brown (nailer), John Atkin (from Lincoln), Sydney Smith alias Jonathan Burrell (from Wisbech), and Wm. Leeman (from Kirkby Malseard, near Ripon, Yorkshire), convicted of being reputed thieves, rogues and vagabonds, were committed for different terms to hard labour; and Jos. Irvine, from Stockport, in Cheshire, was discharged. As some young men of Sleaford were returning in a state of intoxication from Stow Green fair on Monday night, they amused themselves with displacing gates, and other mischievous tricks. While in the act of committing depredations of this kind upon property of Mr Baker, farmer, of Osbournby, they were detected by his man-servant, who remonstrated with them on their conduct, but which had no other effect than that of calling forth torrents of abuse, together with kicks and blows; indeed, the treatment this man received was so bad that his life is despaired of. The names of the parties will, in all probability, shortly appear before the public.

The same newspaper carried a report of the proceedings on Wednesday 6th July 1870 as follows:

This annual mart was held on Wednesday and two following days in last week. Gingerbread stalls, bazaars, shooting galleries, photographic booths, and other exhibitions of a minor character mustered in good force, whilst all branches of trade were well represented, and we understand a considerable amount of business was done. The company on Thursday, which is usually termed "head fair day", was very large, and the athletic sports on Friday were well attended, the weather during the whole time being all that could be desired. The services of the police were not called into requisition, and no cases of pocket-picking were reported. The butchers of Billingborough and Horbling exhibited some splendid beef which had been killed specially for the fair, and sold at 9s. 11d. per stone. The wood fair was very brisk, and all shown was soon sold.

After the opening of the Bourne to Sleaford railway line, annual excursions were run to Billingborough, the nearest station to Stow, for several towns in the Midlands, passengers first travelling in open trucks. Hundreds of horses were unloaded at Billingborough station and the green came alive with as many as forty booths at a time. So disorderly did  it become that the magistrates eventually ordered that all were to be shut down by 11 pm and none were to re-open before 5 am the following morning. The horse fairs were also the scene of many fights between gypsy dealers and locals who thought they had been given a raw deal. One man who went to the fair is reputed to have exchanged his old grey mare for a sprightly black cob only to find when he returned home that it made straight for the stable door, the gypsies having been busy at work behind a hedge with oils and black lead before craftily re-selling him his own animal.

There was talk of closing down the annual event but although regulated, it was not entirely suppressed. Instead, Stow Green Fair died a natural death during the middle years of the 20th century, most probably as a result of the Second World War from 1939-45 and the increasing mechanisation on the farms. By 1933, the decline was obvious because the Stamford Mercury carried the following news item on Friday 18th June:

STOWE GREEN'S 800-YEAR-OLD FAIR

The main feature of Stow Green horse fair on Saturday was the large number of ponies offered, most of which changed hands at prices considerably more than double than those prevailing before the war. This, no doubt, was due to the restrictions on motoring. For upwards of 800 years, the fair has been held annually on 12th June, except when the date fell on a Sunday, and at one time, it was one of the largest in the country. It was famous for its working horses of agricultural type, but these were more or less conspicuous by their absence. Practically all there were were sold the previous evening. Unbroken colts and fillies found ready purchasers at £50 to £60 for two-year-olds and up to £45 for yearlings. At one time, Stow Green was regarded as the opening of the wool sales in Lincolnshire but very few transactions were recorded on Saturday. The fair was largely attended and some of those present had not missed the gathering for more than half a century.

By 1946, the end was in sight because that year's fair was reported by the Stamford Mercury on June 14th as being held "on an isolated common two miles from Billingborough", evidence that its once well known reputation had gone and only nostalgia appears to have kept it going because the report added: "The fair attracted farmers and dealers from all parts of the district and some were there who had not missed attending for more than 60 years. Up to a few years ago, it was a famous mart for the sale of agricultural horses but the introduction of mechanised implements has made a marked difference to the size and importance of the fair and less than a hundred animals were offered for sale. At one time, the fair was regarded as the opening of the wool sales in Lincolnshire but in recent years, flockmasters have preferred to wait until the auction sales so that the true values can be tested. This year, the fair was the smallest ever since its establishment more than 800 years ago and it may now be said to be fast dying out."