FAIRS

Greenwich Fair

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May Day and Whitsun fairs were held in Greenwich from 1730 to 1857.

Hampstead Fair

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Vale of Health has a site that receives touring fairs.

In the 19^thC the Abbots family acquired the site.

The May Fair

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The May Fair that gave Mayfair its name took place during the first half of May. Originally, it was established in 1660 as a cattle market that was held in the Haymarket. In 1686 the event was moved to a site that Shepherd Market and Curzon Street now cover. The fair soon became general in its character. In 1764 it was suppressed.

Location: Curzon Street, W1J 5PA (red, turquoise)

Haymarket, SW1Y 4UY (blue, red)

Shepherd Market, W1J 7QF (red, blue)

The Notting Hill Carnival

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The different islands developed different carnivals often at different times of year.

Carnival originated in France and was taken to the French West Indian islands, where it creolised with African traditions amongst the free Blacks. In 1783 the Spanish allowed non-Spanish people to settle in Trinidad. Carnival is believed to have been introduced to Trinidad by French exiles who had fled the French Revolution and the slave revolts on the Francophone islands in the region. The whites tended to celebrate in houses and the Blacks in the street. Following abolition of slavery in the British West Indies in 1834 it became an overwhelmingly Black event.

In the wake of the Notting Hill race riots of 1958, an indoor carnival was held at St Pancras Town Hall. The prime mover behind this event was Claudia Jones, a Trinidadian-born, American activist and newspaper editor.¹ Funds raised at the event contributed towards the cost of legally defending people who had been arrested during and after the riots. She organised a series of subsequent carnivals.

Following Jones's death in 1964 other people started to influence the character of carnival. In 1966 the community worker Rhaune Laslett organised the first Notting Hill fayre and pageant in association with the London Free School and John Hoppy Hopkins. By having the district's different social strands interact with one another they hoped to make the community more harmonious. Laslett invited the musician Russ Henderson to have his small steel band perform for the children attending the event. Initially, the group performed statically in Portobello Green. He then suggested to the audience and the band should parade around the neighbourhood. They did so and repeated the act the following day. Leslie Teacher Palmer broadened carnival out beyond the Trinidadian community to people from the other islands and Black Britons. Music became a larger element, sound systems were introduced. Attendance grew. In 1965 one was held outside in London for the first time.

The 1975 carnival was the first one where attendance was well into the 10,000s. The following year the Met policed the event excessively. A riot was triggered.

In the late 2010s over a million people were attending but arrests were running in the low hundreds.

Location: The Coleherne, 261 Old Brompton Road, SW5 9JA. From 1962 onwards Russ Henderson had a 25-year-long Sunday residency at the pub. (orange, yellow)

252 Portobello Road, W11 1LL. Ms Jones's home. (blue, purple)

Website: www.nhcarnival.org

¹. Miss Jones's political activities had led to her being deported from the United States in 1955. She had then settled in Britain.

St Bartholomew's Fair

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St Bartholomew's Fair was founded in 1123 along with the Priory & Hospice of St Bartholomew. The event ran for several days around the Feast of St Bartholomew (24^th August). A royal charter granted the priory the tolls from it. The fair became England s principal cloth fair. In 1445 the Corporation of the City of London, which held an associated cattle market, became the joint lord of the fair. In 1538 the right of the dissolved monastery was granted to Sir Richard Rich. In the 17^thC the event became less focussed on trade and more leisure-oriented. The Puritans allowed it to continue. The event was extended to a fortnight during King Charles II s reign. In 1830 the Corporation took the fair into its full ownership by buying out the rights of Lord Kensington, Rich's heir. In 1855 the event was suppressed.

Location: Smithfield, EC1A 9LA (orange, brown)

David Backhouse 2024