Oct. 25.]

ST. CRISPIN’S DAY.

In many places St. Crispin’s Day is a great holiday among the shoemakers, and the origin of it is thus explained:—Two brothers, Crispin and Crispinian, natives of Rome, having become converts to Christianity, travelled to Soissons in France about the year 303, in order to propagate the Christian faith. Being desirous, however, of rendering themselves independent they gained a subsistence by making shoes, with which it is said they furnished the poor at an extremely small price, an angel, according to the legend, supplying them with leather. They suffered martyrdom in the persecution under Maximian.

In Time’s Telescope for 1816 it is observed that the shoemakers of the present day are not far behind their predecessors in the manner of keeping St. Crispin. From the highest to the lowest it is a day of feasting and jollity. It is also observed as a festival with the corporate body of cordwainers or shoemakers of London, but without any sort of procession on the occasion.

Northumberland.

In the town of Hexham, the following custom is, or was, at one time observed:—The shoemakers of the town meet and dine by previous arrangements at some tavern; a King Crispin, queen, prince, and princess, elected from members of their fraternity of families, being present. They afterwards form in grand procession (the ladies and their attendants excepted), and parade the streets with banners, music, &c., the royal party and suite gaily dressed in character. In the evening they reassemble for dancing and other festivities. To his majesty and consort, and their royal highnesses the prince and princess (the latter usually a pretty girl), due regal homage is paid during that day.—N. & Q. 1st S. vol. vi. p. 243.

At one time the cordwainers of Newcastle celebrated the festival of St. Crispin by holding a coronation of their patron saint in the court of the Freemen’s Hospital at the Westgate, and afterwards walking in procession through the principal streets of the town. This caricature show produced much laughter and mirth.—Mackenzie, History of Newcastle, 1827, vol. i. p. 88.

Sussex.

In the parishes of Cuckfield and Hurst-a-point, St. Crispin’s Day is kept with much rejoicing. The boys go round asking for money in the name of St. Crispin, bonfires are lighted, and it passes off very much in the same way as the 5th of November. It appears from an inscription on a monument to one of the ancient family of Bunell, in the parish church of Cuckfield, that a Sir John Bunell attended Henry V. to France in the year 1415, with one ship, twenty men-at-arms, and forty archers, and it is probable that the observance of this day in that neighbourhood is connected with that fact.—N. & Q. 1st S. vol. v. p. 30.

WALES.

At Tenby an effigy was made and hung on some elevated and prominent place (the steeple for instance) on the previous night. On the morning of the Saint’s day it was cut down and carried about the town, a will being read in doggrel verse, purporting to be the last testament of the Saint, in pursuance of which the several articles of dress were distributed to the different shoemakers. At length nothing remained of the image but the padding, which was kicked about by the crowd. As a sort of revenge for the treatment given to St. Crispin, his followers hung up the effigy of a carpenter on St. Clement’s Day.—Mason’s Tales and Traditions of Tenby, 1858, p. 26.