The Lead Cross and Other Stories

Lead Cross made during the time of the plague

This object has stayed with me from the very first visit we made to the collection.  It is a lead cross with a handwritten label which says

‘Rough lead cross. Made during the time of the Black Death, 1349, when owing to the rapid deaths there was not time to make crucifixes’

In the dingy light of the stores the cross itself appeared much darker, almost black, and I was struck by its soft, graphic quality set against the flat regularity of the card. A black cross acting not only as a symbol of belief but also death. I think I want to explore this further.

Interestingly, when I was reading the letters I came across a reference to this very object.

Written by Mary to Batho and dated 1st August 1922, she writes

….the lead cross, which I believe was of the time of the Black Death – 1349, not the plague in 1667.  I find a number of enthusiasts came to England from Hungary during the progress of the Black Death and passed through the country lashing themselves till the blood ran down their shoulders in order that the plague might be stayed – these people were called flagellants….

archive letter detailing the story of the lead cross

She goes on to talk about displaying the lead cross next to a flagellette also in the collection and placing a label alongside both to convey the story.  Mary very much liked the stories attached to objects and in some cases it may have been the story that led to her acquiring the object.  Such as Henry the Eighths spur!

In itself this is a curious addition to her collection (more often that not Mary collected a number of the same thing and there is only the one spur) and it stands out as an oddity.  I think she was seduced by the romance of the story of the spur , it’s royal connection and historical significance, rather than by the object itself.  Perhaps there is a hidden thread through the Bygones where the story is the reason for the objects acquisition.

Of course nobody really knows if the stories are true.  Was that really why the lead cross was made?  Is the spur authentic?  What evidence is there?  Has either object ever been carbon dated to ascertain the true dates?  Does it really matter?  Is an object’s value only intrinsic, academic, artistic?  Are meaning and narrative not just as important?  Who decides where value is placed?  If value is the result of context and knowledge, as time shifts does also the value of the object?

the spur

Are museums holding on to things that are no longer of any value?  How do we judge?  And what if we dispose of things today because of  a perceived lack of value and tomorrow reveals new found knowledge or cultural shifts that mean we have gotten rid of irreplaceable treasures?  The modern curator carries a significant responsibility.  But that’s another story! Sharon

William Ruskin Butterfield

You might remember Mr. W. R. Butterfield, a curator from Hastings museum who writes to thank Mr. Batho for recommending that Mrs. Greg send her staff of office with the arms of Hastings to them. It seems that he too like many of the other museum professionals of the time was an interesting character.

Piltdown Man

He was involved in the Piltdown Man Forgery Case, which was perhaps the most famous paleontological hoax in history. The find consisted of fragments of skull and jawbone in the village of Piltdown in Sussex in 1912. It was the ‘discovery’ of Charles Dawson a collector, archaeologist and co-founder of the Hastings and St Leonards Museum Association. The fragments were considered to be remnants of early man and a vital missing link between humans and apes. However, in 1953 the remains were deemed to be a forgery as they discovered it was the jaw bone of an orangutang combined with the skull of a modern human.

Paleontologists had doubts from the beginning and tests concluded it to be a forgery yet most of the scientific community did not acknowledge it for over 30 years. The forger has never been revealed however, Wiliam Ruskin Butterfield is one of the suspects!

Melanie

Thomas Alfred Coward

T. A. Coward, acting keeper of Manchester Museum writes to Mr. Batho in 1922 thanking him for the ‘very nice specimen of Platypus from Mrs. Greg’. I emailed the museum to find out more about him. He was an ornithologist and in the 1980’s George Fildes compiled notes on his history.

Thomas Alfred Coward, M.Sc

T.A Coward was a famous Cheshire Naturalist and author of popular ornithological books and had a long and influential association with the Manchester Museum. He served 19 years on the Museum Committee. He was born and died in Bowden, not far from the River Bollin where his house still stands marked with a blue plaque in his honour.

Coward was in his time President of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society and a fellow of the Zoological and Entomological Societies.

His books include…

Birds of Cheshire 1900

The Vertebrate Fauna of Cheshire and Liverpool Bay 1910

Birds of the British Isles and their Eggs 1919.

Melanie

Arthur Knowles Sabin

In searching for the relatives of the correspondents I’m discovering all sorts. Mr Sabin, Mary’s friend from Bethnal Green Museum, now the V&A Museum of Childhood was a poet! His works include The Death of Icarus. He also was an  early founder of the Samurai Press.

http://www.barnes-history.org.uk/printer.html

Ernest Oswald Fordham

I have documented the letters on to the database and now I’m dealing with all the copyright issues surrounding them so I am searching for correspondents dates of birth and death. This afternoon I’ve been looking into Mr. Fordham and haven’t found anything yet, but in a strange turn of events I have found some photographs of his wife taken by Bassano in 1920, that are in the National Portrait Gallery.

 Melanie

Thomas Bateman

Thomas Bateman, pioneer archaeologist

Whilst reading Mary’s letters held in the Sheffield Archive I came across a couple of references to a Thomas Bateman. In a letter dated Jan 14th 1944, Mary writes about a revolving circular table (that she wants to donate to the Guild of St George) “…which belonged to my grandfather T. Bateman the antiquarian whose collection of antiques I believe is at Sheffield“. In another letter there is a further reference to a Thomas Bateman of Middleton Hall, Youlgreave, who this time Mary say’s was her great uncle.

I was alerted by this on two counts. Firstly, there are some objects in the Bygones with a label adhered to them saying Bateman Collection. And secondly we have already identified the Rebekah Bateman of the passport (another item in the Bygones) as being Mary’s sister. I just had to find out who Thomas Bateman was and whether there was any possible connection! AND I think there is!!

A quick search took me to a site about Thomas Bateman – Pioneer Archaeologist (do read it, it’s fascinating!)

A “..nationally famous controversial pioneer archaeologist and Squire of Middleton Hall“. Apparently Thomas Bateman was regarded as a “scholar and a scoundrel” in Victorian times for his groundbreaking work in the field of archaeology in Derbyshire in the mid 1800’s.

Although his methods were crude he is responsible for some significant archaeological discoveries and his two published volumes of notes and records were instrumental in the development of modern methods of recording archeaological finds.

But how was he related to Mary? This is where it gets a bit tricky as there were THREE Thomas Batemans’, all part of the same illustrious family, so it’s a question of establishing which one! I have tried to draw a map of the link as it is too longwinded to explain in writing.

Mary's connection to the Bateman Family

The connection to Mary is (I think) quite simple. Taking another look at the Hope family tree, and cross-referencing this with other records confirms that Samuel Hope (Mary’s grandfather) married a Rebekah Bateman from Middleton Hall, Derbyshire in 1816. This makes her Mary’s grandmother (and the namesake of the Rebekah Bateman in the passport!). Taking her birth date and date of death into account I am surmising that she is the daughter of Thomas Bateman Sr (potentially making this Thomas Mary’s great grandfather). His son William is the father of Thomas Bateman the archaeologist (but what relation would he be to Mary? -we really need a genealogist on the project!).

The Thomas Bateman Museum

As well as being a pioneering archaeologist Thomas Bateman amassed a collection of artefacts at his home at Lomberdale Hall which grew so vast the Hall was extended to accommodate it and it became a museum of antiquities.

Why is any of this relevant to our research? Well, it could explain the origin of some of the objects in the Bygones collection and how they came into Mary’s hands, as the third Thomas Bateman (the archaeologists son) squandered away the family’s fortune in the late 1800’s and was forced to sell the family estate and the entire collection to pay off his debts. Did she acquire these objects then?. It also establishes a passion for collecting in Mary’s side of the family (and a maverick streak!). Who knows, perhaps she even visited the Bateman collection in her formative years! Perhaps her acquisition of objects from her family’s collection drove her to build her own.

And one final note. William Bateman moved to Derbyshire from Manchester in 1820 at the age of 32 having just married “… Mary Crompton, a Lancashire lass“. Is it too much to hope that she was somehow related to Samuel Crompton?!….. Sharon

Hazel’s Sketchbook

Keys and other found things

I thought I should add a few recent pages from my sketchbook, I am still working on some ideas based on the roll of paper that was trapped in a metal tube which we found in Mary’s collection. This is my working sketchbook, it sits next to my workbench and everything gets put into it:- Quotes from radio 4, paper templates,collaged and found bits,as well as thoughts and ideas. It isn’t really meant to be looked at by anyone apart from myself. Although it is an important link in the ideas chain(Part answer to the the question..”where do all your ideas come from?”).

Mary’s Nature Note Books

We had a fantastically productive day at Sheffield. The nature diaries are fabulous, not only revealing Mary’s accomplished drawing skills but also a keen eye for detail and a diligence and commitment to collecting that is abundantly evident through her Bygones collection (I wish I could post some images but we still need to receive copyright permission). Here she is collecting information about the flora and fauna of the Westmill area in Hertfordshire, but particularly in and around the garden at Coles, the family residence.

Coles residence, the main site of the nature diaries

Dating from the early 1900’s every page is a delight with a number of comprehensive drawings in a variety of media (she was very good at bugs and spiders) and handwritten notes which are both analytically incisive and heart felt. Writing of these books to the Guild of St George (to whom she donated the note books in 1940) she says “..I have two nature note books done at various times… They are…amateurish, I had no lessons. I tried to paint little things which I thought of interest or beauty – this Ruskin had taught me to aim at.…”. The drawings are very much in the Ruskin tradition.

One of my favourite inclusions is a series of rubbings taken from a rough pole across a stile at Church Stretton. These show the galleries produced by the female beetles and larvae of scolytid beetles and demonstrate her attention to detail and genuine curiosity for the world around her. The books are also full of little anecdotes such as the mole that Hazel mentions “…found in the potting shed. Sorry to say (I/we?) killed it fearing its ravages in the garden“. But she drew it afterwards so all not lost then! She sometimes tried to save things too, like the baby chaffinch that fell out of the nest whilst she was taking tea, she gave it a meal of chopped egg!

Perhaps the notebooks also reveal the origin of one of the objects in the Bygones collection! In November 1917 she wrote “… I’ve found a group of the smallest funghi I have ever seen. I looked at a piece of this plank and looked at them through a microscope…”. There is a microscope in one of the cupboards at Queen’s Park. I wonder if it was the one she used?

Also stuck into one of the books is a wonderful photograph showing “the artist at work“. Mary is sat at a table full of drawing equipment in the garden at Coles (if only the microscope had been there!).

These notebooks are packed full of the most delightful, charming and meticulous information and deserve to be published in their own right. They are certainly as good if not better than anything else published of this ilk. One is currently on display at the Graves Art Gallery in Sheffield. If you get the chance go and have a look, you won’t be disappointed! Sharon

A trip to Sheffield

Sheffield Archive

Mary Greg is leading us to many places. Sharon and I joined Alex in Sheffield last Wednesday to visit the Graves Art Gallery and see Mary’s Nature Diarys. (Awaiting permission to add photos). She had painted some wonderful bugs and made very detailed notes of the weather and animals. Lovely stories of finding moles in the potting shed. Alex has also arranged for us to go to the Archive where another bundle of Mary’s letters were waiting for us to see.

Monkey on a Stick

Whilst I was researching objects, Sharon asked me to find out about a strange item: Monkey on a stick, handmade by a Mr. Carrington of Oldham and given to the gallery by Mary as a gift. At first I couldn’t find it but I found it just by chance today. (Always the case, you never find it when you’re looking for it!) However their appears to be two ‘monkey on stick’ toys, it was clearly popular. I have found two photos the second looks more home made so I think it could be this one that was made by Mr. Carrington.

Monkey on a stick 1922.542

Monkey on a stick M104155

Also I think I found the miniature school bought from Debenham and Freebody’s Antique Galleries that was mentioned in a letter dated 26th January 1928. However it was accessioned in 1922 so it might not be relevant
Melanie