North Yorkshire Folk Tales Read online

  CONTENTS

  Title

  Story Locations

  Introduction

  1 People

  2 Giants

  3 Dragons

  4 Creatures of the Night

  5 Hobs and Such

  6 Mysteries

  7 Witches

  8 York Stories

  Notes

  Copyright

  STORY LOCATIONS

  INTRODUCTION

  What are folk tales? Tales told by working people and recorded by those with enough leisure, education and income to go around collecting them. The concept of ‘folktale’ is relatively recent. Before that, there were just stories that lived or died on the tongues of local people. It was only when they began to disappear that they suddenly became precious enough to be given a name.

  In Yorkshire, as in the rest of England, there is no longer a direct line of oral storytelling tradition as there still is in Iran, Morocco or the traveller communities of Scotland. We still pass on jokes or urban myths – the buds of new folk tales – but to tell stories and develop them requires time, and time is singularly lacking in our age. The poorest agricultural worker of the past spent more time chatting to his friends and family than most of us do now (if you exclude the barrier method of the Internet).

  We can no longer rely on the oral tradition, but fortunately, in Yorkshire at least, we can get some idea of the richness of that lost heritage from the work of a few men (and a couple of women) who were sufficiently interested in the common people around them to record their tales with some sympathy. They were no Brothers Grimm: collecting stories was an interest rather than a passion, however, they realised just in time that reforming clerics and the growth of schools and literacy would eventually lead to the disappearance of folk tales just as they were leading to the suppression of folk customs.

  It is inevitable then that most of the stories in this book have been collected by people, mostly vicars, who were not themselves storytellers; and some bear the heavy hand of Victorian ‘improvement’. I have treated them in the way any modern oral storyteller does by taking the often sketchy outline of the stories and making them my own by adding colour and details. Some people may object to my occasional use of Yorkshire dialect phrases, but Yorkshire dialect was the pithy, muscular form of speech in which the stories would originally have been told; to leave it out altogether would be to insult those old tellers. (On the other hand, if you are an expert in Yorkshire dialect I apologise for any mistakes.)

  Some people do not consider historical stories, or ones about historical people, to be folk tales; I have only included ones that have a genuine folk element (i.e. they are what folk wanted to believe was true; so Archbishop Lancelot Blackburne becomes a pirate and the squalid Dick Turpin a hero).

  North Yorkshire is a very large area and it has many stories, some of which are very similar (See Dragons). I have tried to give a broad range of the most lively ones, but there are plenty more. Folk tales are still growing out there, though slowly nowadays, rather like yew trees.

  Sources for further reading can be found at the back of the book, along with notes for most of the stories.

  Ingrid Barton, 2014

  1

  PEOPLE

  SOMETHING TO HIS ADVANTAGE

  Hambledon Hills

  There was once a man living at Upsall in the Hambledon Hills who had a dream. In it he heard a voice saying, ‘If you stand on London Bridge you will hear something to your advantage.’

  The man was as poor as a church mouse so he had nothing to lose. He was also a Yorkshireman and knew better than to blab to anyone, so one day, without telling his friends or neighbours, he locked the door of his little cottage and with half a loaf of bread in his pocket, set off for London.

  It was a long way so he hitched rides on passing carts, and sometimes stopped off for a day or two carrying out odd jobs to pay for his next few nights’ board and lodging, but slowly he got nearer to the capital. At last he fell in with some drovers who were driving cattle to the London markets and they took him right into the city. He did not tell them about his dream and they thought him just another amiable idiot going to gawp at the sights.

  For a while he did indeed enjoy walking by the mighty River Thames, impressed by the size and wealth of the buildings and the splendour of the clothes and carriages of the gentry. Then he thought, ‘If I was to hear something to my advantage I could be living as high as these folk! Now where is that bridge?’ Guessing that if he kept along the river he would eventually get to it, he hurried on.

  His first sight of the famous London Bridge was inspiring, for this was in the days when there was only one bridge across the river and it was always crowded. There were people and horses and wagons and cattle, and even a flock of geese with tarred feet trying to cross the bridge. Those coming from the south were supposed to keep to the left, and those going out of the city to the right, but not everyone obeyed the rules and every so often a struggle would break out. There were shops and houses too, old ones, built right onto the bridge itself, leaning out over the river on both sides, so that our man was actually on it before he had realised.

  ‘I mun be a reet gormless gavrison to have come here in first place,’ said our man. ‘But now I’m here I mun mak the best on it.’ He pushed and shoved his way along, among all the other pushers and shovers until he had crossed the whole bridge. ‘Now what?’ he wondered, for though he had kept an ear out hoping to hear ‘something to his advantage’, he had learned nothing except some interesting new southern swearwords.

  He turned back and once more crossed the bridge, but once again nothing out of the usual happened. He was losing hope now and cursed himself for an idiot as he thought of the long road home. ‘Still, third time pays for all!’ he thought and set off again. This time he stopped in the middle, where there was a narrow gap between one house and another. He leaned on the parapet looking out over the river.

  ‘A fine prospect!’ said a voice at his elbow. A respectable, though not richly dressed, young man stood there. ‘Might I join you?’

  ‘I suppose,’ said our man suspiciously. He had heard many tales of the tricksy nature of Londoners and how they cheated poor Yorkshiremen out of their money. ‘I’ve got no brass, tha knows,’ he added bluntly.

  The young man laughed, ‘I assure you I have no designs on your pocket. We’re not all thieves here! I can tell that you’re a Yorkshireman, by your talk. I spent many years in York as a boy. It’s a pleasure to hear the old accent again.’

  ‘Oh aye.’

  ‘Yes indeed. Fine horses, fine ale and fine lasses there. I remember it well.’

  Our man was a little mollified to hear his county praised, so he moved over to let the young man lean beside him. They looked out over the river in silence for a bit, enjoying the sight of so many boats, little and big, crowding the waterway.

  Finally, the young man said, ‘They’re talking of knocking all these old shops down and building a new bridge. It’d be a shame, don’t you think?’

  ‘Mebbe.’

  ‘So what has brought you down to this den of iniquity from God’s own county?’

  Our man hesitated. ‘I – well, I dreamed I should.’

  ‘And you followed your dream. Oh my dear fellow, do you realise how fortunate you are! How I envy you!’ the young man sighed, thinking of the dreary counting house where he worked and from which he dreamed of escaping. ‘How I wish I might follow your example!’

  ‘You have dreams, then?’

  ‘Don’t all men dream that life might be better?’

  ‘An’ do their dreams come true?’

  ‘True? Alas, no. What joy to have one’s dreams come true!’


  ‘I reckon all that about dreams coming true is just shite,’ said our man gloomily.

  ‘Oh, don’t say that!’ spluttered his companion. ‘The world would be such a terrible place if we didn’t have dreams, don’t you think?’

  ‘Have you ever dreamed and it come true, then?’ our man pressed on.

  The young man hesitated. ‘Oh, you mean dreams in your sleep? No – though, now you mention it, curiously enough I had one the other night that I hope might do so.’

  ‘Did you now!’

  ‘Yes, I dreamed I found a treasure!’

  Our man turned and fixed him with a piercing eye.

  ‘Oh aye?’

  ‘I dreamed that I was in an old castle courtyard, and there was a big elder tree there.’

  ‘That’s nowt special.’

  ‘Wait! When I dug beneath it I unearthed a huge pot of gold!’

  ‘Now that’s more like!’ breathed our man. ‘Pity you don’t know where it was!’

  ‘Ah, but I do – well, I remember the name, but unfortunately I’ve not the slightest idea where it is.’ The young man sighed sadly.

  ‘What was the name? Happen I might know it.’

  ‘Up – something. Oh, I know; Upsall. You ever heard of it?’

  ‘No.’

  Back in Upsall his friends teased him about his prolonged absence.

  ‘He’ll have a fancy woman down there!’ said one.

  ‘No, more like he’s being chased by some lass he’s fathered a bairn on!’ said another.

  ‘No, no. He’s been away in Pudding Pie Hill – wi’ the fairies!’ said a third.

  Our man sat quietly and smiled. He could take jokes; he knew that they would soon be laughing on the other side of their faces.

  That night he left his cottage just as if he was going for a walk – if you ignored the spade over his shoulder. The old castle of the Scropes had been abandoned since the Civil War and its gates had rotted away long ago. He peered into the courtyard with its roofless stables and piles of rubbish. Ivy was claiming the place, shooting up the keep walls and concealing in many humps and bumps the fallen stonework. It was very dark and our man had heard tales of ghosts. He clutched his spade and thought of the golden treasure.

  As he looked around he thought he could see a lightness in one corner. He peered closer: white blossom. A large elder tree stood there. He strode bravely across and thrust his spade between the cobblestones beneath the tree. They put up a good resistance for a while but he was persistent and soon he was able to pull several out. Beneath them he thought he could see a dark hole. Our man thought of giant worms and poisonous toads, but he gritted his teeth and reached into it. Almost at once he touched something cold and smooth – a box, or perhaps a pot or something. He glanced around quickly but no one was around. Swiftly he pulled it up – it was heavier than he expected and he had to use both hands – and then shoved the stones back into place. Standing up with difficulty, he hid the pot as best he could under his coat and staggered home.

  In the dim light of his rush-lit cottage, our man excitedly brushed the soil off the pot. He could to see that it was ancient. On its lid there was writing. Our man was not too good at reading, but even he could see that the letters were not like the ones he had learned at dame school. He briefly wondered if it was a curse. ‘In for a penny, in for a pound,’ he muttered to himself with a shrug and wrenched the lid off.

  There was a moment’s pause, then he leapt to his feet and did a silent dance, for the rush-light now sparkled on gold; coin after coin of solid gold!

  The news of our man’s sudden wealth was a nine-days’ wonder in the village. Some folk were pleased at his good fortune, especially as he did not move out but spent his money locally. ‘He’s careful, but he’s not mean,’ they said. Some, inevitably, were jealous, but that is the way of the world since time began, and you can be sure that the jealous ones were just as keen to be bought a pint of ale by our man as the others were. People speculated about where he had come by his fortune (was he secretly a highwayman? An alchemist?), but he said nothing, only smiled, and, as no one local had been robbed recently, in time the gossip died down.

  He showed the empty pot to the vicar, hoping that he would be able to read the strange writing, but though the learned man hummed and hawed it was clear that his learning wasn’t great enough. ‘Some pagan druidic language, I expect,’ he said.

  There had seemed to be plenty of gold when our man first opened the pot, but it cost a great deal to set up the house of a wealthy man, and the same again to set up a carriage. Our man was careful, but even so the time came when the money began to run out. Needless to say he kept the fact to himself, but soon he was living on tick and began to worry. He was going to have to borrow money and he only knew one way to do that, much though he hated the idea.

  One day he surprised his coachman by giving him the day off and driving himself out alone in a little pony trap. He headed into Thirsk. Down a narrow street, he drove and knocked on an unremarkable door. A maid answered it.

  ‘Is the Jew in?’ demanded our man.

  ‘Mr Isaac is within,’ she replied coldly. ‘Do you have an appointment?’

  ‘Damn it!’ spluttered our man. ‘I need brass!’ She led him to a comfortably furnished room where the moneylender was sitting at his desk.

  ‘This person has come to see you,’ announced the maid disdainfully. Mr Isaac saw his new client was upset, but he did not lend money just for the asking. Politely but firmly he delved delicately into his visitor’s history. It was a sign of our man’s desperation that, for the first time, he found himself telling the whole story.

  Mr Isaac was fascinated. ‘God has been good to you,’ he said. ‘Do you still have the ancient pot with the strange writing on it?’

  ‘Aye, but vicar could mak nowt on it.’

  ‘I tell you what,’ said Mr Isaacs, ‘I will lend you enough money to pay your immediate debts – I regret that your collateral isn’t good enough for more – but the one condition is that you will show me that pot. I am a collector of antiquities in a small way. It would give me a great deal of pleasure to see it. Perhaps you might be persuaded to part with it for a suitable sum?’

  And with that our man had to be satisfied.

  A few days later, he returned with the pot. The old man took it to the window and inspected the writing with a large magnifying glass. He gave a short laugh. ‘Very interesting!’ he said.

  ‘Oh, aye!’ said our man. ‘But when shall I have the money?’

  Mr Isaacs put down the glass. He went back to the fire and sat down. He put the pot on his desk. ‘You can’t have it,’ he said.

  Our man’s face went as red as a turkey cock. ‘What? But you said! It were a bargain, spit and shake hands, you said!’

  ‘You can’t have it,’ said Mr Isaacs, ‘because you don’t need it.’

  Our man was not stupid, but at that moment, he really did look like a gormless gavrison. Mr Isaacs smiled. ‘The writing is Hebraic script. Would you like to know what it says?’ Our man nodded.

  ‘It’s a verse:

  Look lower!

  Where this stood,

  Is another twice as good,

  You are indeed favoured by God!’

  ‘Keep the pot!’ gasped our man, when he could speak. ‘And say nowt to anyone!’

  Mr Isaacs inclined his head. ‘I can assure you that all our clients’ affairs are treated with the upmost secrecy,’ he began to say, but our man was already out of the door.

  The second pot turned out to be, indeed, twice the size of the first. Our man had to take the pony trap with him when he went to get it. It had enough gold in it to last him – but who knows how much gold will be needed in a whole lifetime? Especially when you marry a willing lass and start fathering children a little late in life. Our man did not have to worry, though, for on the second pot was more strange writing – exactly the same as on the first. He knew what it meant now. He said nothing. A true Yorkshireman always
likes to have a little something put away for a rainy day.

  THE WHITE DOE

  Wharfdale

  It is Sunday. Folk are coming out of Bolton church when they see a white shape under the trees of the churchyard. At first they hang back, fearful of ghosts. Then, stepping lightly among the hoary gravestones, a snow-white doe comes towards them. It stops at a safe distance and regards them with its great brown eyes, poised to run.

  The churchgoers give it a wide berth, but the next Sunday it is there again – and the next. Sunday after Sunday, it returns, now standing further back, by the graves of the Norton family. Folk agree that it is no natural deer, with its sad eyes, but appearing as it does on the Lord’s Day, neither can it be evil. No one attempts to drive it away.

  Soon the gossip had a sighting at Rylstone church too. There is speculation as to whose ghost it might be, some favouring one deceased candidate and some another, but most agree that it is the fetch of Emily Norton, come to mourn at her brothers’ grave. ‘A sad tale,’ they agree.

  Richard Norton had nine tall sons, archers and swordsmen all. They lived at Rylstone Hall and had a hunting lodge, Norton Tower, near Rylstone Fell where they stayed at times to hunt the red deer. He also had one daughter, Emily, who was quiet and pale and devout.

  Among so many boisterous men Emily was often forgotten or neglected, left behind when they went hunting (for she would not join them) and silent as a mouse at the table where they talked loudly of their exploits. She loved them fiercely though: their easy grace on horseback, their rough playful ways and their good spirits. Best of all she loved to see them when they all knelt together at prayers in the evening, silent and respectful for once; a row of brothers united by their religion, a strong wall protecting the family.

  She had a particular fondness for her eldest brother Francis and he returned it in the careless way of young men. He often brought her little presents, but one day he surpassed himself by bringing out from under his cloak a little fawn: a white one. It was tiny, bleating feebly.