A spicy mix of Oxford stories from a house once belonging to a city sausage maker.
In the summer of 1847, Frank Buckland attended a party held by the British Association for the Advancement of Science at Oxford’s Botanic Garden, a stone’s throw from where he…
On one of those blisteringly hot days we have had recently when the summer air is suffused with heat, I head downstream along the river from Folly Bridge in search of a secluded watery spot to cool down. I am not normally a wild swimmer, but I’d been tipped off by a kind reader that such a place was to be found this way, a couple of miles along the towpath. Through clouds of meadowsweet mixed with cornflowers and purple knapweed, past Iffley Lock, and under Kennington Railway Bridge. An eyot called Rose Island – on which stands a lovely privately owned residence, accessible only by foot over a narrow, wooden, arched bridge.
And so it is that many years later I find myself cycling up Headington hill to see what has become of the old place. Besides I’d long wanted to learn something of the history of an area that had for centuries supplied the stone and later bricks to build much of the city below – it’s not called Quarry for nothing.
Benches do that to people. They are meeting points, places to come together, to converse, to commune. They serve as special seats to rest and remember.
New College has got to be one of my favourite Oxford colleges. It’s not actually new. For it was founded in 1379 by William Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester, a pile of…
Tugs and tankers, paddle steamers and powerboats, sailboats and skiffs, barges and battleships – they have all graced these waters. Smaller versions of the real thing, naturally. Some built to race (yachts and speedboats), others replica scale models lovingly constructed over many years in a back room or attic. Today Terry has brought his beautifully crafted classic steam launch Edwina, a copy of an elegant Edwardian day boat that once upon a time might have been employed to host summer picnics or as private viewing for sporting events on the river. Every so often a mischievous smile creeps over Terry’s face and he fiddles with whatever it is on his remote control that sends a jet of steam shooting from the central funnel. ‘Toot, Toot.’ I can honestly say that is the sound it makes. Provoking a joyous reaction. And for a moment we are all children again.
I was delighted to discover the above recipe for Oxford Sausages from 1883. It is taken from the Victorian Recipe Book ‘Consult Me on How to Cook’, and more recently illustrated by Mollie Picken. The butcher looks a jolly fellow in his bowler hat, and blue stripey apron, garlands of sausages strung around his neck. The ingredients are pretty much the same as specified by the famous Mrs Beaton in her tome of ‘Household Management’ published in 1861 and announced as her ‘ideal sausage’. For this was the heyday of the Oxford Sausage. A time when an Oxford Alderman when asked in a Parliamentary committee whether there was anything manufactured in his city, had answered, “yes, parsons and sausages.”
And it sparked the inspiration to set off around the city with my camera on a chimney pot pilgrimage. A chimney crawl if you like. Choosing one of those cold but clear May days we have had recently, to gaze upwards to check how fine a fare of fancy flues remain today. Chimneys have after all some competition when it comes to our city skyline. What with its spires and towers, grotesques and gargoyles, crenelations and crocketed pinnacles all vying for attention. But I’d like to think they hold their own.
But my eye was quickly drawn to something far from ordinary. For inside two ceiling-high, grey cabinets, internally lit and lined in red gauze, were shelves filled with an amazing array of ornately decorated receptacles; reliquaries as I later learned they are called. That is special showcases (caskets crafted from silver and gold, and made to look like churches, hollow crosses, statues and the like) designed to display the physical remains or objects used by those who have been canonised by the Catholic Church.
I had been invited to join the congregation of the Church of St Michael at the North Gate (SMNG) in an age-old custom called ‘beating the bounds’ or sometimes ‘perambulations’ or ‘going a ganging’. In the days before maps and title deeds, when the parish was the basic unit of taxation and local government, it was important that people knew which parish they lived in and where the boundaries began and ended.