Ralph Hutchings has now made a short video about the Broomfield House witch bottle finds. Though it happened over 30 years ago, other recent discoveries in the Town Hall have led Ralph to come forward to talk about the day he visited Broomfield House after the fire to help in the conservation work to save the Lanscroon murals
[youtube]https://youtu.be/h8ALFHrO2MA[/youtube]
For more information visit http://www.palmersscream.uk/
Following the discovery of a manuscript in the Town Hall, we understand that local furniture expert Ralph Hutchings has now also come forward with a story of an earlier find in Broomfield House thirty years ago during post fire work to recover the Lanscroon murals.
The last few days have seen local groups in uproar following the news that Enfield won’t be taking part in London Open House this year. Apparently, Enfield has pulled out because it was unwilling to pay the £4,000 contribution required for its participating venues to appear in the Open House guidebook.
However other sources are suggesting that the real reason is that the Council is concerned about the number of hauntings and strange occurrences in the borough, not least the appearance recently, after a long absence, of ‘Bandstand Bob’ in Broomfield Park, glimpsed by a lady walking her dog just before the park closed. Bandstand Bob was associated with Broomfield House and the area by the lake, but hadn’t been seen since the fire which reduced the structure to its present state in the 1990s.
A few weeks ago there was also the discovery of a manuscript during the Town Hall renovations which indicated that Palmers Green was one of the three haunted hamlets of Middlesex, and that local people participated in rituals to keep witches at bay – a kind of Palmers Scream. The document is currently being examined by Dr Susan Devereux, lecturer in Early Modern History.
A source close to the Council has indicated that the borough is concerned that recent developments, combined with the current showing of the Enfield Haunting on Sky Living, is ‘creating a backward image’ for the borough.
News is coming through this morning that Enfield Council has turned down an application for the Green Dragon pub in Winchmore Hill to be registered as an Asset of Community Value.
The pub closed a few months ago and the lease was put up for sale. Since then, a bargain shop has opened in part of the building.
There has been a Green Dragon on or near the site for nearly 300 years, and following the closure an online petition was set up on the website 38 degrees, attracting nearly 5000 signatures from local people. Apparently the owner of the site has told the Council that they will be putting forward a full retail and residential application in due course. It’s a frustrating outcome – is it the end for the Green Dragon, and are any of our landmarks safe from developers?
An application for The Fox to be registered as an Asset of Community was submitted to Enfield Council a few weeks ago. Will it fare any better? To read more about the application click here
Christ Church Southgate celebrates its 400th birthday this year.
The Weld Chapel was founded in May 1615 and was the first church in this area. Before that, churchgoers had to cross woods and fields to make their way to Edmonton.
Christ Church has set up a wonderful 400th year section on their website and Facebook pages in which they are exploring the history of Southgate, Bowes Park and Palmers Green as seen from the memorials and art in the church. If you haven’t set foot in the church, its a treasure trove of art and history.
This week saw the church celebrating the feast day of the poet Christina Rossetti, perhaps best known for writing the carol In The Bleak Midwinter. Her brother, Dante Gabriel Rossetti designed the beautiful windows of St James and St Jude, in Christ Church’s Remembrance Chapel. Installed when the church was consecrated, the windows are dedicated to Captain Timothy Smith and his wife Sarah.
Captain Smith was commander of HCS London, an East India Company vessel. He lived with his wife in a large house in Southgate called “The Wilderness”, which was later demolished and became the site of Southgate College. Captain Smith sailed to Madras (now Chennai) and China. We know from archive reports in The Spectator of 1833 that HCS London ran into difficulties returning from China, encountering a sudden gale near the Azores, on 31st March, cutting away her topgallant-masts, arriving in the Port of London on 9th April. Captain Smith resigned as Commander of HCS London in 1834 and the team at the church are hoping to find a portrait of Captain Smith or HCS London – if you know of one please let them know! Captain Smith and his wife Sarah are buried in a vault in the churchyard.
The church holds its 400th anniversary service on 24 May, and on 20 May Ruby Galili of Edmonton Hundred Historical Society will be giving a lecture on the history of the Weld Chapel, admission a very reasonable £1.
The church and churchyard will be open for tours throughout the May Day Fair, on Monday 4th May 11am-4pm. Its a great event – do go along.
For more about the celebrations, and the history of the area as told through the church, visit http://www.christchurch-southgate.org/history or ‘like’ their Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/christchurchsouthgate/
With our thanks to Christ Church Southgate for the information contained in this article
For hundreds of years the area round Enfield was notorious for witchcraft, the most famous being Winchmore Hill’s Elizabeth Sawyer, the so called Witch of Edmonton. Sawyer was accused of murdering by mysterious means a neighbour who had stuck her pig, and was hanged at Tyburn.
It wasn’t the first incident. A few years earlier, a group of men were accused of performing rituals in the woods in an area close to present day Hounsden Road. Closer to home, there have been sightings of black dogs reported down the ages, including at Palmers Green’s Deadman’s Bridge where cartsman Gibby Haynes is said to have drowned after his horse was startled by a black creature.
There were woodlands all around Palmers Green before the coming of the diggers inhabited by peasants and country folk, and not a few vagabonds. A document discovered in the Town Hall last week seems to show that the fear of witchcraft was very real in the fields and homesteads of what became Palmers Green.
While there has been no formal investigation as yet, the document is a stunning find which could reframe our whole history. It is believed to have been found in a box when workmen took down a partition wall, and may predate anything we previously knew about the Palmers Green area.
Photos of the script show a barely legible script, part of which, unsettlingly, seems to relate to instructions for an annual ritual to keep the Broomfield area safe from witchcraft. Enfield’s Local Studies and Archive are currently working on a full transcript.
Image with kind permission of Enfield Local Studies and Archive