Tag: Husthwaite

Haven’t heard a Peep

Kirkham Priory with Kirkham Bridge visible, top centre, where a nocturnal bird fair used to take place on Trinity Sunday followed by a festival in the abbey grounds. Do you know anything more about this fair? Picture: English Heritage

 

Following my piece a couple of weeks ago on Hamer Inn, also known as the Lettered Board and Hamer House, reader Howard Campion has been in touch.

He writes: “Thank you for the article on Hamer House…I have followed this area with interest since purchasing Bill Cowley’s book ‘Snilesworth’, and have recently located an article that appeared in 1989 as well as a paragraph in your dad’s book ‘Portrait of the North York Moors’ – you will no doubt be familiar with the last – but the newspaper article does not have an author’s name. Do you have an e-mail address to which I can send it?”

I replied to Howard with my email address, so I am hoping to receive a copy of the article soon and will report back as to whether it offers more information on the mysterious inn. Howard also asked me: “Any luck with the bird festival thing at Kirkham?”

Howard was referring to a message he sent me several years ago asking if I could find out more about this festival because he was struggling to track down much information. I looked into it briefly, but after getting waylaid by other stuff failed to pursue it. His new message prompted me to have another go and I found the following reference in a 2005 newspaper article:

Kirkham Priory “…is best viewed from the nearby bridge over the River Derwent. This bridge is associated with an interesting festival, the Kirkham Bird Fair. At two o’clock in the morning on Trinity Sunday, men and boys met on the bridge to exchange or purchase pet birds. At sunrise, the bartering stopped and a village feast with drinking and merrymaking commenced.”

A later article in 2006 mentioned that the merrymaking was held in the grounds of the nearby abbey, and that a band would arrive on a boat from Malton.

Trinity Sunday is the first Sunday after Whit Sunday (which is the seventh Sunday after Easter) and this year it will fall on 31st May. I wonder if any of you know more about the Kirkham Bird Festival, for how long it ran, and when it was last held?

If you can’t help with that mystery, you might be able to help with another. Reader Katherine Hill has been in touch after coming across a column I wrote in 2022:

“I have just read your beautiful poem about Peep o’Day Farm near Husthwaite, Easingwold. I am writing a family history booklet and I understood from my grandma that my grandpa was born at Peep o’Day Farm. His name was Samuel Bean and would have been born most probably in the 1880s. He was the fifth child in a family of eight. At some point the family moved to live at Grange Farm, Acomb, York. I would be delighted if you knew, or could confirm, that the Bean family lived at Peep o’Day.”

The poem went like this: ‘Rising Sun and Peep o’Day, Throstle Nest and Flower o’May,

Acaster Hill and Baxby Mill, Well Pots Green and Providence Hill.’

I couldn’t answer Katherine’s question, but looking in my files, I found a letter sent by Margaret Kilner at the time, who’d done substantial research about the farm.

The information Margaret gave me included that a ‘Peep o’Day, Easingwold’ was farmed by a Mr W Coates in the 1850s. In 1865, a ‘Mr John Coates of Peep o’Day Easingwold’, took part in a stag hunt. Bulmer’s Husthwaite Directory of 1890 lists William and John Coates at Peep o’Day. By the 1911 census, Peep o’Day was run by widow Hannah Winspear until her death in 1930 at the age of 80. She bequeathed it to her two surviving children and her nephew.

Unfortunately, there is no mention of anyone named Bean. Of course, back then, Margaret was not looking for him, so it’s possible she missed it. Perhaps Samuel Bean was the son of someone who worked at the farm, rather than the owner of it? Or is there another ‘Peep o’Day’ farm in the area?

I tried to contact Margaret but the email bounced back, so you are reading this Margaret, please get in touch! And if anyone else can help Katherine confirm her ancestor Samuel Bean’s link to Peep o’Day, do get in touch using the methods below.

Do you have opinions, memories or ideas to share with me? Get in touch with me using the ‘Contact’ button on the top right.

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on Friday 6th and the Ryedale Gazette and Herald on Wednesday 4th Feb 2026

Farming for verses

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A poem was written years ago featuring the pretty names of farms surrounding the village of Husthwaite, North Yorkshire.

In my dad’s 1981 archive of columns that I’ve been reading over the past few weeks, he mentions several times a particular verse that was associated with some farms in the Hambleton area of North Yorkshire.

It is a pretty rhyme made up of the names of those farms and I wonder if anyone else has come across similar in their part of the world? It went like this:

‘Rising Sun and Peep o’Day, Throstle Nest and Flower o’May,

Acaster Hill and Baxby Mill, Well Pots Green and Providence Hill.’

A slight variation of the same poem was sent in by a reader who lived at Bickerton near Wetherby, and it read:

‘There’s Rising Sun and Peep o’Day, Throstle Nest and Flower o’May,

Then lying in the mist so far, is Thornton Hill and Acaster.’

According to my dad, the farms were on land surrounding the village of Husthwaite, and the questions in my mind were: When was this poem written and by whom? And did these farms really exist? If so, were any of them still there now? Of course, I set out on a mission to find out.

I’m pleased to report that I have had some success. Listing them in the order of the poem, I found a Rising Sun Farm a mile and a half north-east of Easingwold, although it is some four miles away from Husthwaite. Is it the right one? Peep o’Day Farm is still there, a couple of miles south of the village, next to Peep o’Day Wood. Part of the address of this farm is listed as ‘Thornton Hill’. Is this the Thornton Hill mentioned in the second version of the poem? But if so, would they mention both Peep o’Day and Thornton Hill in the same verse if they were in fact the same place? I couldn’t find another Thornton Hill Farm in the area around Husthwaite. 

I found a Throstle Nest Farm, slightly south of the village, and in the course of my research, I came across two Throstle Nest Plantations (one near Norton-on-Derwent, and one near Darlington) and two Throstle Nest Woods (one near Giggleswick in the Dales, and one near Pocklington in East Yorkshire). Incidentally, my research led me to discover that ‘throstle’ is an old word for a song thrush (of course, my dad would already have known that, as I’m sure many of you reading this do too! But as I said when I first started writing these columns more than four years ago, compared to my dad, my knowledge of such things is scant indeed!).

Flower o’ May is still there, just south of Husthwaite, and Acaster Hill Farm is almost opposite it. ‘Castre’ is the Latin word for ‘camp’, so I wonder if there are any Roman connections?

As for Baxby Mill, I believe the mill itself is either no longer there or derelict, but its location, as you’d expect an old water mill to be, is on the Ings Beck in Husthwaite, at the bottom of the hill heading west out of the village. I drew a blank for Well Pots Green, but there is a Woolpots Farm, a short distance to the south. Is that the one they mean? Providence Hill is still there, to the south west of Husthwaite.

So, clearly, there are still some questions arising out of these two similar rhymes, such as when they were written, but it is clear that most of the farms mentioned do still exist. I will put money on the fact that a reader will be able to furnish me with a some clues as to how these farms got their names. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if someone can tell us more, and perhaps even share their memories of the farms in question?

One of dad’s readers drew his attention to the most unusual name for a farm that he had come across which was ‘Gateway to Happy Sparrows’! Dad doesn’t mention where it was, nor whether it still existed in 1981. Not entirely surprisingly, I could find nothing out about it either, but would love to hear from you if you know of it, or have tales about properties with unusual names and how they came about them. If you want to get in touch, either write or email this newspaper, or go to countrymansdaughter.com and use the contact page to sent me a message.

Contact me, and read more, at countrymansdaughter.com. Follow me on Twitter @countrymansdaug

This column appeared in the Darlington & Stockton Times on 17th and the Gazette & Herald on 15th September 2021