THIS postcard commemorates Barnard Castle’s first planning dispute which, due to a South African field gun, shot the town to a fame that was only equalled 120 years later when a government adviser decided to test his eyesight in the town.
But Dominic Cummings’ antics were never immortalised in song in the way that Barney’s Fishy Tale was in 1905.
This battle in Barney was fought out in the double-fronted shop of fishmonger John Harris on Horsemarket, which is today a fish and chip takeaway. Mr Harris only had one display window, so he applied on three occasions to Barnard Castle Urban District Council for permission to add on a second.
Like the first, it would jut out a little onto the pavement. There was a small strip of land in front of his shop that Mr Harris felt he owned because for 20 or more years he had displayed baskets of fish and caskets of wares on it without issue.
But, even though some councillors supported him, each time he applied, the decision was no. No, no and no.
After the third no, seeing other shops had windows projecting onto the pavement, Mr Harris went ahead anyhow and installed his window.
And, on February 5, 1904, the council sent him a letter giving him 14 days to remove the windows, or else…
Of course, he did nothing.
So on the morning of February 19, the morning his deadline expired, he arrived in Horsemarket to find his shop under fire – literally.
“Barnard Castle is the happy possessor of a model of one of the Long Toms used at Ladysmith and this has, for some time, reclined peacefully in one of the three enclosures in Galgate,” reported the Darlington and Stockton Times, referring to a fearsome field gun used by the Boers against the British.
The Boer War had ended in 1902, and the replica gun had pride of place in the memorial in Galgate to the men of the 3rd Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry who had been killed during it.
The D&S Times explained: “Seeing a favourable opportunity for a lark, some persons with a considerable bump for fun ousted Long Tom sometime early in the morning, and, by ways that are dark and devious, bundled him down the street where in front of the offending window he was placed in full military array.
“Here the weapon was found by the more peaceful inhabitants having attached to the barrel the blood curdling demand: “Surrender or die, by order, W.D.C.” on the back of a Colman’s Mustard show card.”
Mr Harris found the Long Tom gun pointing straight at his controversial window. Defiantly, he wrote in large capital letters on the glass: “No surrender.”
“The spectacle caused quite a stir amongst the inhabitants and the local camera fiends, many of the latter leaving breakfast tables to be on the scene of the battle early,” said the D&S Times.
The story went viral, appearing in newspapers up and down the land. The Newcastle Chronicle said: “It was freely declared that this was one of the best jokes that had ever been played in the quiet and decorous little town.”
Postcard photographers turned up in Horsemarket to produce pictorial souvenirs of the amusing incident.
The council, though, stuck to its guns. It wanted the windows removed and it looked to the local magistrates to support it.
However, the magistrates, chaired by Major Hodgson, “had no difficulty in coming to a decision”, said the D&ST.
“They did not find that the projecting window was an obstruction to the safe and convenient passage along the street, and consequently dismissed the case. The decision was received with applause from persons in court.”
The council appealed. Upward and upward went the case, right up to the King’s Bench Division of the High Court in London where it was heard by the Lord Chief Justice on December 20, 1905.
Sitting with two fellow judges, the Lord Chief Justice dismissed the council’s case, ordered it to pay all the costs, and said that “the matter was a very trumpery one”.
These were the days before Donald, when, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, trumpery meant “something of less value than it seems”, something that is “trifling, paltry, insignificant; worthless, rubbishy, trashy”.
So the fishmonger of Barney got to keep his window and the ratepayers of Barney had to pay for the council’s two years of legal bills for pursuing a worthless, trashy case.
The ridiculousness of the proceedings was widely enjoyed, and a Newcastle poet immortalised them in a song called Barney’s Fishy Tale, which was to be sung to the tune of The Old Grey Mare.
The song began:
I’ll tell you a tale, it’s as good as a play.
Except that the ‘pipers’ are however made to pay:
A window was placed in a Fish Merchant’s shop.
And the Council of Barney made a serious ‘cop’.
And the song ended:
These Justices three, without much ado,
Said the case was trivial and trumpery too,
So giving decision, of course, Barney lost,
And in the New Year will be paying the cost.
When the news came to Barney before you could sneeze,
The flag ‘No surrender’ was free to the breeze,
And the Marketers gazed, with wonder amazed,
And ‘twas said that the council were nearly all crazed.
I now friends, have got to the end of my story,
And can’t, for the life, say whether Liberal or Tory
Has landed poor Barney in for the lashing,
But think you’ll admit, ‘twas a really good thrashing.
Nearly 120 years since the last shot was fired in this battle in Barney, Mr Harris’s two windows still remain, jutting out ever-so-slightly from what is now a fish and chip shop.
It is said that he also carved his defiant slogan “No surrender” into his doorstep in Wilson Street – can anyone tell us if it is still there?
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