Walking in the ice age
Head to the Fens this winter for big skies, huge horizons, and the ghosts of a sport that once sent the country wild…
...among ghosts of a speedy sport.
IT OFTEN AMUSES PEOPLE to know that Country Walking, a magazine devoted to the limitless variety of landscapes Britain has to offer, is based in the least varied landscape that Britain has to offer. Yes, we’re in the Fens.
It’s a landscape that shouldn’t even be here. What land there is, in this vast circular space between Peterborough, Ely, Downham Market and Spalding, has been stolen from the water by Dutch people. It should be pestilent marsh and saline sea-inlet. Instead, in a heady, miraculous cocktail of 17th-century engineering and agricultural bloody-mindedness, it has been tamed, dried and cultivated. From barren wetland to crop capital of Britain: the Fens have a heck of a story to tell.
But while the waters may have been mopped up and regimented into straight lines, it can still be a challenging place for walkers. Water still rules this region, and circular walks are pretty damn hard to plan. If there isn’t a bridge handy, the average Fenland right of way will take you for mile upon mile in a straight line, along a cutting, culvert, ditch, drain or dyke, in search of the nearest crossing. If you do manage to create a circular walk, it’s usually more rectangular than circular.
But as with all things, it’s a matter of perspective. If you accept what the Fens are, and adjust your plans accordingly, they simply breathe with magic and freedom. Here you’ll find the biggest skies in the country; the emptiest watersides; near-infinite birdlife; the occasional seal… and peace. Perhaps a better definition of peace than anywhere else in the land. Where other landscapes might shout and roar and sing, the Fens are virtually silent. The only soundtrack is breeze and birdcall.
Then there’s the skating. Walk here when the frost is in and you might just be in with a chance of seeing a uniquely Fenland sport in action. And even if there isn’t a frost, it’s fun to walk
“Even if there isn’t a frost, it’s fun to walk here and imagine the scene a few hundred years ago, when a fen skating tournament had all the pomp and furor of an Final.” FA Cup
here and imagine the scene a few hundred years ago, when a fen skating tournament had all the pomp and furor of an FA Cup Final.
In these climatically uncertain times, it’s extremely hard to predict when the Fens will freeze. Sometimes they go whole winters without a single day’s ice. But go back a century and more, and the Fens spent a good portion of every winter utterly frozen over.
Against this backdrop, fen skating was born. It began in the 17th century, after Dutch engineers led by drainage genius Cornelius Vermuyden had arrived to show the natives how to reclaim land from water. They gouged out two parallel, artificial waterways to absorb and direct the bulk of the wet stuff: the River Delph and the New Bedford River.
A by-product of this was that in winter, the plain between the two rivers would flood, creating a perfect natural ice rink.
The skating evolved partly out of practicality: why walk from Chatteris to Welney when you could skate? Then it became sport, hobby, competition. Finally it became spectator event and even a sort of livelihood. When the ground froze hard, farm labourers were unable to work in the fields, and thus wouldn’t get paid. To assist them (and generate extra income from the visitor’s farthing), farmers and landowners would organise skating competitions, in which farmhands from across the Fenlands would assemble and compete for prizes that might include a loaf of bread, a leg of mutton or – most temptingly of all – hard cash.
Throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, fen skating was a phenomenon. Competition was intense; fleet-footed farmhands became national superstars. When the railways came, special services carted Londoners up to the Fens to watch the races, and have a go on the ice themselves.
Walking along the Delph at Welney, even when the water isn’t frozen, it’s easy to imagine the
scene. Beyond the river are the flooded meadows where this frantic sport exploded; where skaters raced in twos around frozen courses marked out by barrels or lamp-posts, or happy punters just skittered around for the joy of it. It’s peaceful now, but on a skating day, it was mental. A report in the Cambridge Chronicle in 1854 described a race day in the tiny hamlet of Mepal as ‘the St Leger on ice’.
It happened all over the Fens, in every oddly-named town and village from Crowland to Earith, from Emneth Hungate to Shepeau Stow. When a frost was forecast, farmers would pump extra water into their meadows, to be sure of the biggest possible arena.
Competitors were paired off in heats, with the winner of each heat going through to the next round. A typical prize pot in the mid-19th century might be £10; half would go to the winner, the remainder would be divided among the other entrants based on how far they’d got in the contest. To labourers earning about 55p a week in the fields, this was potentially big money to help see them through the winter.
As walkers, we might look at an iced-up waterscape and think: danger. But the risks aren’t as great as they seem. Firstly, in those colder winters, the ice tended to be reliably thick. Secondly, most races took place on flooded fields rather than the actual rivers, meaning that if anyone did go though the ice, it generally wasn’t more than knee-deep. (That said, obviously CW doesn’t recommend stepping out onto Fenland ice without some sort of expert by your side. Preferably they should be Dutch.)
The star skaters are still revered throughout Fenland. The Usain Bolt of the sport was William ‘ Turkey’ Smart, from Welney, whose winning spree ran from 1854 to 1860. His nicknamed derived from his style of skating: body bent forwards, arms flapping behind him like a turkey’s wings. It’s a style still used by speed skaters today.
Turkey once attempted to skate a mile in two and a half minutes; he missed out by just two seconds. Records meant money: Turkey’s close rivals, brothers Larman and Robert Register, from Southery, once issued a challenge that they could beat any skater in the country for £20.
Later came Cyril ‘Babs’ Horn, from Upwell: four times national skating champion through the 1920s and 30s. He was immortalised in cigarette cards that branded him ‘the fastest man on ice’.
There were women’s races too, although sadly, it appears the competitors didn’t merit being named. The Cambridge Chronicle’s report of a race in 1855 simply says: “The white-bonneted Mepal girl won 10 shillings easily, and beat the Lynn girl – a good race.”
Happily, the sport is still alive today – when globally-warmed conditions allow. Fen skating is still a recognised sport with its own rules and regulating body. What’s more, Cyril Horn’s greatnephew Adam Giles is a leading exponent, and follows in Cyril’s blade-tracks on his home ice of Berry Fen, near Earith.
“It’s a wonderful, uniquely Fenland thing to do,” he says. “And if you’ve done it once, you’re hooked. You’re always wondering, wishing and waiting for the next frost.”
Perhaps the most picturesque evocation of fen skating comes in Philippa Pearce’s 1958 children’s fantasy Tom’s Midnight Garden, which takes place in a gorgeous Fenland dreamworld, where youngsters Tom and Hatty get around by skating across the marshes.
And to us at CW, ‘dreamworld’ seems like a decent way to describe our curious backyard. It’s otherworldly and peculiar; full of strange aromas of peat and reed, and weird silver mists that come out of nowhere and drift quietly back there. Straightcut water channels recede into the distance, bisecting your horizon line so that it never quite joins up. You’ll never climb a hill or see a contour
“If you’ve done it once, you’re hooked. You’re always wondering, wishing and waiting for the next frost.” ADAM GILES, F EN SKATER
line – in fact you might be lucky to reach sea level, never mind rise above it.
But as we said earlier, it’s all about perspective. For a start, you don’t have to spend hours trying to make circular routes. There are still decent railway links around the Fens, so you can go linear, from station-to-station, instead of trying to make loops. As evidence, see Walk 13 in this issue, which uses the railway to bookend a beautiful walk through the classic skating grounds around Ely.
Secondly, it’s about how you look at things. Ask Brian Blessed, national treasure and mountain obsessive, and he’ll tell you he’s also a huge fan of the fen. As he puts it (quite loudly): “In East Anglia, it’s the skies that are mountainous, not the land. And I could get lost in those wonderful skies as easily as I could dream of the Himalayas.”
And he’s right. We might not be out there, skimming along the ice like Turkey Smart. But just wandering along the bank in this quiet, strange otherworld, under skies that would dwarf Everest, walkers can find as much sport and exhilaration as they will ever crave.