Drama beyond theatre stage
In response to the closure of live theatre across the country, Horsham Museum and Art Gallery’s heritage and museum manager, Jeremy Knight, has explored the history of theatrical entertainment in Horsham. In his retelling of the story, The Dramatic Tale of Horsham Theatre, which we will feature over two weeks, he reveals an attempted murder, soldiers, drama and a dose of mystery. In the lead role will be Sir Michael Caine, though at the time he was a bit part actor at the start of his career.
Act One – The Case of the Missing Theatre: On Twelfth Night 1823, posters appeared on buildings around Horsham, telling residents that the bailiffs and burgesses had allowed a performance of She Stoops to Conquer at The New Theatre, Horsham.
Jeremy said: “To have a New Theatre we must have an old one. But where was the Old Theatre? That is the mystery.”
Until 2003, when the diaries of 18th century businesswoman Sarah Hurst were published, little was known about the earliest plays performed in Horsham. Sarah records that she saw five plays in Horsham in 1759, six in 1761 and two in 1762. Sarah’s comments suggest seeing plays in Horsham was part of everyday life.
Jeremy said: “Not only is there no excitement in the diary, no effusiveness regarding the players’ arrival in town, but also when on June 26 she records ‘go & see The Busy Body, last time of our players performing’, there is every expectation of a return with no comment on the loss. Her reference to ‘our Players’ suggests they were either itinerant performers resident in the town for so long as to be seen as part of
Horsham society, or perhaps, based in Horsham but touring other towns in the summer season.”
Some 10 years later, the diary of John Baker, a local man, records him seeing a play on July 10, 1772, that included ‘some rope dancing, singing and Midas and Harlequin Skeleton’.
Jeremy said: “What makes the account interesting is that Mr Baker records in the diary in French a deliberate comment about Mr Shelley and his ‘duchess’, thus making the spectators the spectated and highlighting the role of the playhouse as a space in which to watch and to be watched.”
Comments made by the impresario
Charles Osborne, who had his own troop of actors, show what the good folk of Horsham really wanted.
He wrote in 1785: “I intended to have… the Town Hall as a theatre tomorrow, but the arbitrary oppressive manner, as well as the violent threats that have been made... induced me to decline my intentions, instead, I propose to open an Histrionic Academy for three nights only…”
Jeremy suggests there was not a market in Horsham for actual theatre, more for burlesque.
He said: “At the time of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars, if you wanted to perform theatrical performances, you had to ask permission of both the town management and the local military commander. The museum has a few examples of such requests, yet none identify a theatre.”
An Interlude – Drama in Court: At the 1801 Easter Assizes, held at Midhurst, the court heard a drama worthy of a theatrical production, with a lover, an actress and an infatuated ensign.
The lover was George Stanton, a part-time actor. The actress was Mrs Leach, ‘a lady possessed of youth and a handsome person and not destitute of dramatic talents, but like many of her sex on the stage fickle’. Mr Stanton fell in love with Mrs Leach, though when he proposed marriage, she wanted only friendship.
The ensign, William Bunn, stationed at Horsham Barracks with the 64th Regiment, also fell violently in love with Mrs Leach. On December 21, 1800, William attempted to murder George, with a pistol in each hand, in the Carfax at around midnight. He only grazed him but, thinking he had killed him, William fled. The morning after, having realised that George was only injured, William and Mrs Leach told the magistrate it was actually George who launched the attack, seeing him arrested.
At the trial in Chichester, neither William nor Mrs Leach turned up. George then filed an assault case and William was eventually captured on board a ship in Portsmouth Harbour, under a hen coop. George later told the court he would not prosecute if William agreed to pay his expenses and the jury, declared him not guilty.
Jeremy said: “We have since found out that Bunn did eventually agree to pay Stanton’s fees.”
The drama continues next week...