All over England, many old towns and villages had annual fairs, fayres, festivals, or fétes, some such as the Rothwell, (pronounced Rowell or Roll by the locals) Trinity fair or Proclamation, as it is often called have traceable origins. The Rothwell Proclamation, has fairly recently celebrated 8 centuries,as has another olden hand me down, the vicious Atherstone Football match. Whereas others, such as the Straw Bear of Whittlesey festival, have lost their origins and violent nature to time as they have been reinvented in more recent times.
Most, if not all of these festivals have, aside from their central focus. an almost religious sacrament to the consumption of large amounts of alcohol, primarily beer or ale. Public drunkenness not just tolerated, but expected. The Clive and Dee festival is no exception, centred around a football like game played between the village of Emmingford and the small town of Emmingwell.
The annual Emmingford and Emmingwell Fayre shares another similarity with other old festivals, its original reason for existence has been lost and forgotten, perhaps some have had their existence fade into obscurity, others have survived, bolstered by one reason or another. Clive and Dee festival is one of the latter, it was resumed and reaffirmed in 1763.
The reason for its renewal is partly because of local arrogance and partly due to an otherwise unknown Welshman, a man some presume to be a scholar, others just a say he was a wanderer or traveller, but whatever his occupation, it matters not, but has much to do with the name of the flat topped hill the festival is held on, CLIVE AND DEE HILL.
Clive and Dee hill is not really a hill, just on the edge of a larger piece of land with greater elevation than the immediate area. The "hill", if the land were flooded would be a peninsula, only joined by a sliver of land to the next "hill" a sliver no more than thirty yards long and twenty feet wide at its narrowest point.
Opposite, across the flat grassy area is the "steep" side, to the right is the "slope" and to the left, the "woods" beyond which, is the girls dormitory of the Emming valley boarding school.
The reasons for the Welshman being anywhere near Emmingford or Emmingwell are not recorded, neither are the actual events. Only legend and rumour point to the truth.
Little is known of the travelling Welshman other than his name and the thing he said.
Daffydd Ewes had walked into the village of Emmingwell on the twelfth of November 1763. He took lodgings at the Inn for a couple of days. The local community, as was normal for the time were a very close-knit people and with English, not being his first language and his strong Welsh accent made for a difficult time for him.
One man, the local Priest took it upon himself to make the time and effort to get to know the outsider and together they began to make headway. Three days and three nights they talked, they talked without malice and some say the beginnings of trust or even friendship were developing. Until the traveller learned of the name of the hill, Clive and Dee hill. The Welshmen had been astounded with the knowledge and immediately began to insist that the welsh must have travelled there and that the hill was not Clive and Dee hill, insisting it was welsh for plateau, Llwyfandir, (Cloyfandee).
Legend says the clergyman tried to quieten him, but to no avail and within the hour, en masse, the villagers took him to the hill and hoisted his beaten and unconscious body by the neck from the solitary oak that stands in the centre of the hill.
Today, before the football match, an effigy of the hanged man is hung from the tree and beaten with sticks by children until the teams are almost ready to play.
The annual Emmingwell vs Emmingford "football" match is played between midday and five o'clock. The game has few rules.
1. Only men over the age of 15 may play
2. Only men born and bred from each village may play and only in their own village team.
3. Goals are scored by striking the tree with the "ball". The scorer must then drink 1 pint of ale before game restarts
4. No weapons allowed
5. Team with most goals wins
6. In the unknown to now event of a tie, the team with least injuries will be names winner.
7. *discrepancies between team player numbers to be a maximum of four.
*rule number 7 added after the 1897 massacre where Emmingwell fielded 38 players to Emmingfords 15.
The game is little more than a four hour brawl, the object is to gain possession of the wooden ball and knock it on the tree. The teams either protect, or try to gain possession from the ball holder. There are no fouls, although outright violence, especially intentional breaking of bones is discouraged. On the other hand, friendly drinks, before and after the match are encouraged while not obligatory are expected.
Modern, politically correct individuals are regularly trying to call a halt to the tradition, labelling it as barbaric, violent and dangerous. In 1976, concessions were made to mark off the playing area, for the safety of spectators and the growing number of side attractions and stalls. However, in the year 2000 the local (public) school recorded the reported injuries from the match and compared them to their own statistics for their women's rugby teams. The results were surprising, showing that although the Clive and Dee match revealed more injuries in total, Women's rugby had the greater number of serious injuries.
The study showed that minor injuries, scrapes, bruises, grazes and minor cuts were only slightly greater in the Clive and Dee match compared to the average injuries in women's injuries when balanced against five hours playing time. No serious injuries were recorded for that year for the C&D match but two serious concussions occurred in the rugby, although both from one match and one accidental head collision.
The hill itself is not a steep hill and the area around the old playing area is between twenty and forty feet with only a drop of five to ten feet. On the other side of the road passing the hill, a marquee to contain a bar and music. This however, is not the sole purveyor of alcoholic beverages, many of the stalls lining the road adjacent to the marquee, primarily selling food, local produce and crafts,although most sell homemade beer ciders or wine and one solely for honey and mead. Over recent years, attendance of non-locals has grown dramatically, resulting in the necessity of the attendance of medics from both St John's and the Red Cross. The irony of having to provide a medical presence for spectators and not the participants of the sometimes violent game has provided many hours of mirth and derision to many drunken gatherings.
Vendors and officials begin arriving at approximately 06:00 to set up and survey the field, the first patrons generally begin arriving about 10:00.
At 11:30 players report to the officials, At the final count, Emmingwell fields 32 entrants and Emmingford offers 26, meaning Emmingwell has to drop two players. No one volunteers to drop out, so straws are drawn. Peter Simmons a young lad of fifteen, and John Smith, a twenty nine year old that has played all but one year since his fifteenth birthday lose their places.
Peter's disappointment is obvious to all and with a long face and a half drunk beer he begins to make his way from the congregation, when one man speaks up.
Douglas Collin, calls out, "Hey, hang on boy, you take my place, I'll stand and watch for a change. After all, it will be better if I'm needed for an emergency."
He did not expect to have to leave, such emergencies are not unknown, but are rare. Although he has always enjoyed playing, the look of glee on the young lads face compensates for his own disappointment.
