Note 1. “Smashed,” in those days, was the familiar term for having broken one’s word of honour.
Chapter Eleven.
Outbreak to Charlton Fair.
Towards the middle of my second half-year two very stirring events occurred at the Academy, in each of which I played a subordinate part. The singular experiences I had in these two affairs are worthy of being recorded.
In the neighbourhood of Woolwich is a small village, called Charlton, which at that time was a thoroughly rural place. An old blacksmith’s forge stood in the middle of the village, and two old-fashioned-looking inns. At the entrance of this village was a field, termed “The Fair-Field,” where a large fair was annually held. This fair was termed “Horn Fair,” and was one of the sights of the time.
Fairs have now degenerated, and have lost their glory; but thirty years ago Horn Fair day was a kind of Derby day, at which all the élite of the neighbourhood were to be seen from about two till five on one particular day out of the three that the fair lasted.
From the entrance to the fair to the branch roads, where the cemetery is now situated, the carriages used to stand two deep during the time their occupiers strolled about the fair. Since those days, however, the railway has given such facility for the East-end of London to send down its unwashed hundreds, that first the fair was deserted by the ladies of the neighbourhood, next by the gentlemen, and finally was done away with as being detrimental to the neighbourhood.