home page   what's new?   email bobtrubs@indigogroup.co.uk to request updates (please mention Rutland Village by Village) or to offer new information   Rutland Village by Village only WWW Village by Village Ashwell Ayston Barleythorpe Barrow Barrowden Beaumont Chase Belmesthorpe Belton-in-Rutland Bisbrooke Braunston-in-Rutland Brooke Burley Caldecott Clipsham Cottesmore Edith Weston Egleton Empingham Essendine Exton Glaston Great Casterton Greetham Gunthorpe Hambleton Horn Ketton Langham Leighfield Little Casterton Lyddington Lyndon Manton Market Overton Martinsthorpe Morcott Normanton North Luffenham Oakham Pickworth Pilton Preston Ridlington Ryhall Seaton South Luffenham Stoke Dry Stretton Teigh Thistleton Thorpe by Water Tickencote Tinwell Tixover Uppingham Wardley Whissendine Whitwell Wing This site sponsored by   Heart of Albion

Travellers in Rutland The source for the following information is a series of twenty booklets compiled by A.R. Traylen in the mid-1970s and published by the Rutland Local History Society. Please note that Traylen's terminology reflects the time he was writing. 'Gypsy' and 'didicoy' are now accepted as derogatory terms. In quoting him exactly I am in no way endorsing any derogatory sense of those words. Traylen distinguishes between gypsies and didicoys. 'Gypsy' seemingly refers to people who would identify as one of the various branches of the Roma/Romany/Romanichal traditions. This suggests that he used 'didicoy' to refer to travellers who were not gypsies. Presumably including the many Irish travellers who were essential to pre-mechanised farming. But not including tramps, who he usually described as 'milestone inspectors'. At Barrowden on the lane to Turtle Bridge: … the didicoys would camp, and one night after a terrible fight had broken out among them in 1880, it is said that one of them had been killed and buried under the hedge on the right side of the lane. No one knew of this until a didicoy told a villager sometime later, but the matter was never pursued. Another didicoy woman in 1919 was seen approaching Stubbs wheelwrights pushing a pram with two legs hanging out over the side and moaning 'Poor Johnny's gone, poor Johnny's gone. He's in the pram. Make me a coffin. I can't pay much, I've only got a pound.' The local doctor appeared, certified a natural death, and the man was duly buried under the wall of the churchyard – at night, so that no one should know the position. At Bisbrooke 'Up to 1912 Gypsy caravans would stay for three months in Pond Field to help pick the fruit crop. The Fosters were the leading family and would sell horses on the side; they even ensured their children went to the local schools.' (Seemingly younger children went to a school in Bisbrooke but older ones, who could walk the distance, went to Glaston.) In Cottesmore Rogues Lane, on the way to the airfield, was originally a cart track heading to South Witham railway station. It 'earned its name because the road verges were often occupied by gypsies.' In South Luffenham at Christmas 1793 a tribe of gypsies were camping in The Follies near Foster Bridge. The Gypsy king, named Edward Boswell, had a very beautiful daughter known as 'Rose the Princess'. Rose 'was just seventeen and dying of consumption (tuberculosis). When the time came to move on she was too ill to travel in a jolting caravan, and so the gypsies stayed a further two months on the cold bleak heath. When she died the churchwardens of South Luffenham would not have her buried in the parish because she was not Christian. The Curate, Rev Bateman, finally overruled his parishioners and she was buried in the south aisle.' A few weeks later a marble slab arrived from London, and placed over her remains. It is thought subscribed by the many gypsies who converged from afar to express sympathy with [their] king. The inscription is still faintly discernible and reads: In memory of Rose Boswell, daughter of Edward and Sarah Boswell, who died February 19th 1793, aged 17 years. What grief can vent this loss, or praise tell, how much, how good, how beautiful she fell. As of 2010, posies of flowers are still placed on this memorial from time to time by unknown visitors. At Uppingham the principal horse dealer in the middle of the nineteenth century was John Britain, also known as 'Gypsy Jack'. Although he brought fine horses and Welsh ponies, 'many animals brought by his compatriots were highly questionable. A great deal of swearing seemed to be necessary to carry out the sales.' If you want to read more about Gypsies in England (though no mentions of Rutland) then I recommend Jeremy Harte's exceptionally well-informed yet eminently readable book Travellers Through Time: A Gypsy history (Reaktion Books 2023) Back to top of this page     Back to home page   This website does not gather or store any visitor information. Copyright Bob Trubshaw 2026 No unauthorised copying or reproduction except if all following conditions apply a: Copy is complete (including this copyright statement). b: No changes are made. c: No charge is made. www.hoap.co.uk/rutland

Rutland's history home page what's new? glossary bibliography Rutland's geology Rutland's boundaries Rutland's rivers long, long ago prehistoric Rutland Roman Rutland long ago Anglo-Saxon Rutland Rutland's place-names waterborne transport around the sixth century Rutland's early churches Anglo-Saxon sculpture in Rutland The Matter of Rutland what the Normans did for Rutland Romanesque sculpture in Rutland Rutland's royal forests Rutland in medieval times Rutland's scratch dials Rutland's medieval carvings Rutland's sepulchral effigies Rutland's saltways Rutland in Tudor times Dissolution in Rutland not that long ago Rutland in the 17th century pinfolds and pounds in Rutland dovecotes in Rutland Rutland in the 18th century turnpiking Rutland Rutland's springs and wells changes in Rutland's agriculture since 1800 seems like yesterday Rutland's dialect Rutland's folk customs travellers in Rutland watermills and windmills in Rutland breweries in Rutland gasworks in Rutland ironstone quarrying in Rutland Zeppelins over Rutland redundant telephone exchanges in Rutland Second World War in Rutland WWII airfields and pillboxes in Rutland the making of Rutland Water Rutland Weekend Television free online history resources Victoria County History: Rutland volume one Victoria County History: Rutland volume two free PDFs of Rutland Record issues 1 to 50 old OS maps Historic England Listed buildings database Sepulchral Effigies of Leicestershire and Rutland Open Domesday English Place-Name Society database Wikipedia list of places in Rutland (with links to village entries) Wikipedia list of people from Rutland researching and writing local history getting started free advice from 2005 asking curious questions (YouTube video) local history groups in and around Rutland Belton-in-Rutland History Society Cottesmore History and Archaeology Group Langham Village History Group Lyddington Manor History Society Rutland Local History and Record Society with free PDFs of over forty issues of the Rutland Record Uppingham Local History Study Group you may also be interested in free PDFs written by Bob Trubshaw Earliest Churches in Nottinghamshire How Anglo-Saxons Found Their Way Anglo-Saxon Leicestershire Conversations in Churchyards Little-known Leicestershire and Rutland Bob Trubshaw's YouTube channel Introduction to medieval carvings Anglo-Saxon and Romanesque carvings How Anglo-Saxons found their way Anglo-Saxon shrines at fords Meetings at triangles Rota's Land and Franni's Land Reading Romanesque fonts Church and manor The significances of square headdresses Early churches and waterborne trade Charnwood slate gravestones and C18th trade routes Ironstone quarries of Leicestershire Roman roads in north-east Leicestershire Salt ways in Leicestershire Why Melton Mowbray needed to called 'middle town' Evolving Anglo-Saxon agriculture Nottinghamshire's earliest churches Ploughs not piety? Economic regeneration in the C7th Were Anglo-Saxon weaving huts women-only places? Vale of Belvoir Chronicle Barrowby Until Now website