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Little Waldingfield History Society was most pleased to welcome William Tyler to the Parish Room on February 13th, where he regaled us with many of the stories on smugglers and poachers he has collected over many years study.
William began by noting that modern day smuggling (of people and/or drugs) and poaching (of endangered animals) was nasty, and that his talk would concern times past; from his many anecdotes we learned that:
- Poachers were originally driven by necessity to feed their families, with possibly many inheriting their craft, or tricks of the trade, from generations of forebears who purloined the products of the countryside as of their right;
- Village communities generally supported poachers, which activity William believed derived from and was encouraged by an ethnic split dating back to 1066;
- Poaching was however a criminal offence, and poachers had to watch their step - most or all of the village poachers were almost certainly known to the local community;
- From Victorian times to probably the 1950's, the village "bobby", who was often an ex-serviceman, realised the need for his fellows to live and for their families to eat. He knew every poacher in the village whilst they knew he went to one of the village pubs for a pint after closing time when he needed one - there was therefore a tolerance for the poacher as long as he didn't “push his luck”!
- Just about everyone in the community was involved in smuggling, including the clergy, if not in the act itself, then by the storage, distribution or purchase of smuggled goods;
- Locally, the counties of Suffolk, Essex, Kent & Sussex were particularly favoured by smugglers, with their long coastlines and proximity to (Norman) France;
- Favourite commodities included tea (with perhaps more being smuggled than bought legally), brandy and tobacco, as popularised in Kipling's famous smugglers song:
If you wake at Midnight, and hear a horse's feet,
Don't go drawing back the blind, or looking in the street,
Them that asks no questions isn't told a lie.
Watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!
Five and twenty ponies
Trotting through the dark -
Brandy for the Parson.
'Baccy for the Clerk;
Laces for a lady, letters for a spy,
And watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!
………..
Them that asks no questions isn't told a lie -
Watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!
Everyone had a fantastic evening hearing some of the more humorous ways of poachers and smugglers, and we now look forward to our next talk on March 13th - A pictorial history of the USAAF 486th Bomb group based at Sudbury, by Malcolm Osborn.
Andy Sheppard 14th February 2013