A bit of local colour - keeping up traditions.

 This morning I woke up and listened to the rain on the skylight windows. So I decided not to run and rolled over and went back to sleep for a little longer.

Later the weather had improved and I set off to walk to the local Tesco. It did rain on me briefly but I had my trusty waterproof in my bag.

Shopping completed, I went to catch a bus home. According to the timetable in the bus shelter I had missed a bus by about 8 minutes. I resigned myself to waiting for the next one and settled down to check my phone for messages. Some sixth sense or maybe peripheral vision made me look up: there was the early bus, running late. Fortunately the driver was one of the understanding kind who spotted my feeble waving and stopped maybe 20 yards past the stop. 

He was late, he explained because he had had to make detours and would have to make more, missing out Delph altogether. Rude words went through my mind! I had two large bags of shopping and didn’t fancy walking all the way home with them. But he was going to the crossroads, which suited me fine, and then turning left towards Oldham. Delph village was, he informed us, full of Morris dancers and the Saddleworth rushcart.

I knew today was rushcart day and had tried to find a schedule for when they would be in each village, all to no avail. There was a family on the bus hoping to see the fun and games in the village and fearing they might be late. But the Delphers on the bus reassured them that the rushcart and the dancers would parade down the hill from the village, turn left, then right and head up the next hill into Dobcross village. It’s quite likely they would stop at the Old Bell Inn next door to our house for a drink and then again at the Swan in Dobcross before continuing to Diggle and then back to Uppermill.

Tomorow they will take the rushcart up the hill from Uppermill to Saddleworth church, where tradition has it they will spread rushes on the church floor. I’ve been doing a bit of research.

“Back in the day, many churches had only rudimentary floors made of earth. So, to make them more comfortable and inviting for special occasions, it was common to cover them with hay, straw or rushes.

As towns and villages expanded, the rushes had to be carried from further afield, so they were often piled on sledges and dragged to the church.

Then at some point, someone obviously remembered the wheel had been invented and had the bright idea of stacking the rushes on a cart – the rushcart was born.

In areas like Saddleworth, every village would have its own and it soon became a bit of a contest to see who could make the biggest stack with the most elaborate decorations.”

Nowadays, as far as I know, we have only the one rushcart and whether they dismantle it to strew the church floor with ashes I really do not know. They usually have a rushcart on display in Saddleworth museum in Uppermill.

I read that the timing of the festivities coincided with the local textile mills closing for Wakes Week maintenance (much later than in Oldham and Rochdale) and local people took the opportunity to make a party of it, especially as in later years it coincided with the August Bank Holiday weekend. Nowadays it seems that Saddleworth is now one of the only places in the country which has a traditional cart – many others around the UK are wooden structures. There’s always a Morris man sitting on the top, sort of guiding proceedings.

Then I read that Sowerby Bridge in Yorkshire also has a rushcart. Their Rushbearing Festival will be held on the weekend of the 7th and 8th of September. And the father of the family on the bus told me they always had one in the village where he grew up in the Lake District. The Sowerby Bridge people are just as proud of tradition as Saddleworth, telling us:

“Rushbearing is a centuries-old tradition – a late summer opportunity for community merriment and revelry. Our Sowerby Bridge Rushbearing Festival is one of only a few instances of this singular English custom still being celebrated annually.

Rushbearing itself dates back several centuries to the time when church floors consisted of little more than stone flags or beaten earth and rushes were used as a winter covering. Each year, in late summer, the old and rotten rushes were cleared out and new ones taken to the churches in carts. Human nature being what it is, this annual traditional custom developed into an excuse for celebration involving revelry, music, dancing and much drinking of strong ales.

A team of ladies take turns to ride on top of the cart as it is pulled by sixty local men dressed in Panama hats, white shirts, black trousers and clogs. Accompanying them are a group of supporters in Edwardian dress along with some of the region’s finest musicians and morris dancing teams to provide entertainment for the crowds.”

There you go. A bit of northern tradition.

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!