Local Legend: An Outlaw on the Doorstep

History is an intriguing and at times baffling thing, often encountered in unexpected places.

A snippet of news from decades ago on a piece of newspaper used as a draw liner, a wrought iron Edwardian gate post in a municipal park, snatches of a wartime song played by a busker: tiny fragments and slices of the past which both inform and inspire our imagination - things to transport us to another realm. And the beauty of history is that such snippets are all around us – physical reminders of a different world, of which there are enough (if we chose to think imaginatively and assemble them correctly) to create a flesh and blood picture of forgotten days.

And how good it is when those glimpses and fissures into forgotten times are close at hand. From traces of Victorian cobbles on a boom-town side-street to the GR post box on the corner, we all have plenty of inspiring history on our doorstep; and so I was particularly intrigued to find that a landmark not a million miles from my home – a very evocative place in its own right – was connected to the Robin Hood legend, and the setting of an outlaw ballad dating from 1735.

I had visited the Hermit’s Cave at Dale Abbey wood (Derbs.) on several occasions before spotting the name Depe Dale (the medieval name for the area) in J.C Holt’s classic study of the Robin Hood legend (1982) a couple of years ago. This lowly sandstone cell, hewn from the local rock – quite close to the site of the ruined Augustinian Abbey which had dominate the area in the Thirteenth Century – is an atmospheric gem in its picturesque setting, and it is not hard to see why the author of the ballad Robin Whood Turned Hermit cast the lonely ascetic who had dwelt there as the ageing outlaw in retirement.

Compiled by the Stamford antiquary Francis Peck, this lone ballad never appeared in the exhaustive compilations of Child and Ritson (chief preservers of the Robin Hood legend) and has a peculiar tone all of its own. Drawing information from the other ballads it is far from the common taste of the day and is something of a moral tale, clearly designed to teach an edifying lesson, in which after a career of nefarious adventures Robin comes to a hill called Lynderic near Dale Abbey (which Peck wrongly attributed to Lancashire) and after waking from a dream in which he sees glowing cross, informs his companions he will become a hermit and mend his ways – exhorting them to ‘repent and take to a better course.’

Retiring to Depe Dale he chooses the penitent thief as his patron and spends his days in penance and reflection. And here the tale reverts to its traditional form: Robin falls sick and journeys to Kirklees to have his blood let – a fatal mistake – for a vengeful friar cuts an artery; Robin quickly dies and is buried by the Abbess and her nuns. The story was clearly a blending of the well-known (fictional) deeds of Robin with the memory of an outlaw who is mentioned in the chronicle of the foundation of Dale Abbey written by Thomas of Muskham in the Thirteenth Century. Dating from a period in which the area between the Erewash and Derwent was royal forest, Muskham’s unnamed outlaw similarly dreams of the cross on Lynderic Hill, repents and dismisses his band before retiring to Deepdale.

Having Edited Makham’s chronicle in the early Eighteenth Century, Peck would have learned of the story and was no doubt inspired to graft it to the better known deeds of the nationally renowned outlaw. Yet the little-known ballad clearly did not prove popular and the story perhaps floundered in the face of an audience expecting retributive violence, horseplay and social order challenging trickery – not an exhortation to repent and be saved!

At any rate, the tale goes to show that you never know what hidden historical gems lie just around the corner – if only you are curious enough – though the last (and it must be said most evocative) word must go to Francis Peck:

To Depe-Dale come, most wisely Robin Whood,

Survey each Nook and Corner of the Wood,

At length he finds a lonely rocky cell,

And in devotion there resolves to dwell.

There he grows wise and for his patron taks,

The Thief repentant, and him thus bespaks

Happy Robin Whood! Happy Robin Whood.