 Pack
Ponies in Kendal.
A Traveller's Diary.
At the turn of the 17th
to the 18th century, Celia Fiennes ("Fines")
made several journeys round England on horseback.
Explorers and actors of the same family have
earned
fame in the 20th
C, for example Sir Ranulph, Ralph and Joseph.
Celia was single, aristocratic,
and a forthright observer.
In her journals covering
the years 1685 - 1712, published as "Through
England on a Sidesaddle" she describes
packhorses carrying panniers in Kendal: "They
use horses on which they have a sort of pannyers,
some close, some open, but they strewn full
of hay, turff and lime and dung and everything
they would use." (ref).
John Ogilby, the map maker, "recognised
only four roads in Cumbria on his map drawn
in
1675. One road from Kendal to Carlisle
via Shap, and a second one from Egremont
through Whitehaven to Workington, Cockermouth,
Bothel to Carlisle. These two roads were
linked by a crossroad from Cockermouth to
Kendal via Keswick and Ambleside. Finally,
he denotes a road between Newcastle and Carlisle;
this route crossed the Eden at Corby and
continued eastwards through Castle Carrock.
It is unlikely, however,
that any of these roads were usable by
wheeled traffic at this time, and most goods
were carried across country by pack horses." (Williams)
The museum's panniers are
the "close" kind with lids. The
canvas covered lids would be dropped and
pinned shut for travelling. This style of
pannier was certainly used for bringing grouse
down from the moor in the early part of the
20th C, but they would have had many other
uses. More open varieties of panniers would
have been better suited to the carrying of "hay,
turff and lime and dung".
Other
patterns
were developed for peat and metal ore.
Copper,
for instance, mined near Coniston, was transported
by packhorse to Keswick for smelting. Lead ingots
or "pigs" went by pony from Alston Moor
and Allendale to the east coast, to be loaded onto
the sailing ships of the River Tyne.
Loading and
travelling
with the pack trains
was a skilled and tricky job, and one exposed to
all types of weather.
Quaker times.
One Fell pony earned fame
in an unusual way.
This is a high quality
pony, Tebay Vespa, working for the TV programme "Janet's
Progress" which dramatised the story
of a Quaker woman from the Howgill area,
whose small
grandchildren were taken away down
to London, went to find them with a Fell
pony. She brought them back in the pony's
panniers.
We have applied the Museum's panniers so
you can see how they would have looked. The
pony wears a breast collar to stop the load
sliding backwards (mouse-over to see where
this is.)
The panniers used for the
journey described would probably have been
open ones in which small children could have
sat and watched the countryside through which
they were travelling.
The packhorse men.
Packhorse men, who were
small independent businessmen, wore a distinctive
style of clothes: hodden grey coat, knee
breeches, woollen stockings with garters
and a ribbon hanging down from them; clogs;
and a low crowned "beaver" hat
made of rabbit skin.
They used similar routes
to the cattle drovers but called-in at different
places; on the whole they kept clear of them.
Their valuable and often perishable goods
were part of an entirely different trade.
Whereas the drovers in the main were just
passing through with their goods "on
the hoof" the pack men could buy and
sell as they went and were no doubt as important
to the rural economy as the "travelling
motor vans" were in the middle of the
20th century.
A bad time for men
and horses.
Carlisle was a Royalist
stronghold in the Civil War between the supporters
of the Monarchy (Cavaliers) and those who
supported Parliament (Roundheads).
Isaac Tullie recorded in
his journal many details of the Siege of
Carlisle, which was occupied by Sir Thomas
Glenham, the Royalist northern commander,
with his forces in July of 1644. In October,
Carlisle was besieged by the Parliamentarian
General Lesley with a detachment of the Scottish
army. Lesley was more determined than a previous
commander who had given up after a few weeks;
he sat it out all winter, and life was hard
within the walls of the city.
(Lysons)
Tullie records that foraging
parties from inside Carlisle were able to
capture cattle from around the outskirts
of the city and bring them in as meat for
the soldiers and townspeople, until the end
of April 1645; but from April 3 "they
had only thatch for [food for] the horses,
all other provisions being exhausted."
May 10: "A fat horse
taken from the enemy sold for 10s a quarter."
June 5: "Hempseed,
dogs and rats were eaten." The horses
had been kept alive as long as possible,
in case the army needed them for battle,
though what help they could be once both
men and horses were starving, is difficult
to see.
June 17: "Some officers
and soldiers came to the common bakehouse
[where roasting of meat and baking of bread
took place for those who had no oven] and
took away all the horseflesh from the common
people, who were as near to starving as themselves."
June 22: "The garrison
had only half a pound of horseflesh each
for four days."
June 23: "The townsmen
petitioned Sir Thomas Glenham that the horseflesh
might not be taken away, and said they were
not able to endure the famine any longer
... " With tears in his eyes, he told
them he was unable to help. However, on June
25, when all provisions had gone, he admitted
defeat, and the city was honourably surrendered
to the Commonwealth forces. The siege was
lifted, the city officially fell to the Parliamentarians,
and the inhabitants were well treated after
their long defence.
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