They with yᵉ Stanley howte forthe went.”
There is no necessity to recapitulate the stirring incidents of the Civil Wars, the bivouacking and plundering in the neighbourhood or the frequent demands for recruits by the royal and parliamentary generals, but it will be sufficiently convincing of the earnestness and loyalty of the inhabitants to state, that most of the local families of influence risked their lives and fortunes in the service of the king, leaving little doubt that those of humbler sphere would be actuated by a like enthusiasm.
About a century ago it was customary amongst the gentry and more wealthy yeomanry to hold their interments at night by the light of lamps or lanterns, and during the passage of the funeral procession through the town, each householder illuminated his windows with burning candles. The last person to be buried with this ceremony was the Rev. Thomas Turner, the vicar, who died in 1810.
Of the domestic habits of Poulton at that period, and rather earlier, it need only be said that they presented little variation from those of other towns or villages similarly situated; removed from the enervating and seductive temptations of a city, and forced, for the most part, to earn their bread under the broad canopy of heaven, it is not surprising to find that the people were a long-lived and vigorous race. Their feastings and merrymakings took place at fair-times, and at such other seasons as were universally set apart in rural districts for rejoicings and festivity, notably harvest gatherings and the first of May, the latter being especially honoured. On that day the causeways were strewn with flowers, and all things suitable for the festival were lavishly provided; wine, ale, and sweetmeats being freely contributed by the gentry and others. The peasantry were clothed in sober suits of hodden grey, the productions of the “disty and wharl” or spinning wheel, without which no household was considered complete, whilst their food was of the plainest kind, consisting mostly of barley and rye bread, with boiled parsnips and peas eaten in the pod, wheaten bread being reserved for the consumption of the more wealthy classes. The present station at the Breck, a name of Danish origin, and signifying an acclivity, stands either on, or in close proximity to, the site of the old ducking-pond, or rather brook, where the scolds of Poulton were wont in former days to have the
“Venom of their spleen”
copiously diluted and cooled by frequent immersions.
A native of Poulton thus wrote of the town more than fifty years since, and if the present generation but emulates the virtues of its forefathers as herein stated, there are many places which would form, notwithstanding its protracted inertitia, less agreeable homes than the ancient metropolis of the Fylde:—
“Hail happy place, for health and peace renown’d,
Though not with riches, yet contentment crown’d.
Riches, the grand promoter of each strife,