July in Particular

See Glow Worms at Badbury Rings (Dorset) during July

First Saturday in July

Banbury Hobby Horse Festival Banbury, Oxon. A new festival, established in 2000, a wild gathering of hobby horses and other beasts from across the country indulging in racing, dancing and performing all because of a nursery rhyme. Read more here, or look at the festival's web-site.

Admiralty Court, Rochester, Kent - On the first or second Saturday in July, a court is held on a barge to regulate the governing and improvement of the oyster fishery on the River Medway. Contact the Paddle Steamer 'Kingswear Castle', +44 (0) 1634 827648.

Midsummer Cushions, Helpston, Cambs. Celebrating the Birthday of poet, John Clare. Because of his love of local wild flowers, nearly 100 trays of turf studded with flowers are placed around his grave. At 2.30pm local children process from the John Clare School to the churchyard, circle the grave and lay the trays. The John Clare Festival is held around John Clare's Birthday, 13 July, with lectures, exhibitons and tours. In Clare's day, midsummer cushions were molehills or clumps of grass which had set seed and were scooped up and laid on window ledges as an ingenious sort of window box. Contact Mr Moyse, Hon. Sec. of the John Clare Society, +44 (0)1733 252678, e-mail moyse.helpston [at] talk21.com or see the society's web-site.

Second Saturday in July

Thames Barge Sailing Match. This race was first organised 1863 by Henry Dodd as a sporting event but also to promote sailing barges and to highlight "what a sailing barge can do in the way of speed". There will be more than a dozen Thames Sailing Barges starting at the Lower Hope between 0700 and 0730 and ailing east to finish at the Clarendon Royal Hotel, Gravesend in the afternoon. See the match's web-site for detailed maps of the course, advice on where to see the match from land water, and a history or the match, or contact +44(0)1227 265568.

Third Week in July

Rushbearing, Grasmere, Westmorland - This is held on the 3rd Saturday in July, or the Saturday after the last day of school summer term. At 3.30pm a band accompanies the procession of children carrying 'bearings', frames of rushes and flowers, from the school to St Oswald's Church. There is a service at 4.10pm followed by rushbearing gingerbread. The 'bearings' remain in the church for several days. The procession commemorates the renewing of the rush floors in the church keeping it warm and dry. Contact +44(0)15394 35326.

Whitstable Oyster Festival and Blessing of the Waters - Whitstable, Kent. Held over the period which includes St James Day (25th July) - St James being the Patron Saint of Oysters and Oyster Fisheries. On the first Day of the Festival, Landing the Catch is carried out by Whitstable Sea Cadets - the first catch of oysters is blessed and presented to the Mayor. The catch is then paraded through town accompanied by the civic party, shire horses and Dray, and musicians, and delivered to restaurants, pubs, and cafes. There is also music, workshops, oysters for sale, boats in the harbour to board and trips on a sailing barge. On Thursday evening of the Festival, the Men of Kent and Kentish Men present the annual ceremony , the Blessing of the Waters on the seafront. The festival ends with fireworks over the sea on Sunday night. Contact the Festival Office on +44(0)1227 265666 or look at the web-site.

Black Cherry Fair, Chertsey, Surrey. On the third Saturday in July. Henry IV gave permission for a fair to celebrate the Feast of St Ann in 1440. It became a trading fair and is now a fun fair. Contact the organisers by e-mail: blackcherryfair [at] hotmail. com.

Wem Sweet Pea Show, The New Town Hall, Wem, Shropshire. In the 19th century, Henry Eckford bred the grandiflora strain of sweet peas that were until then small and on weak stems. As the home of the sweet pea, as we know it, Wem celebrates the flower and Henry Eckford annually on the third Saturday and Sunday in July. As well as the flower show, there will be a panel of experts for advice on growing sweet peas, trade stands, a raffle, refreshments at the show and in local shops and churches which will be decorated for the event. Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 10am-4pm. Admission £1, children free. Contact the Show Manager on +44(0)1948 840779.

John Knill celebrations, Halsetown nr St Ives, Cornwall. An odd ceremony takes place on 25th July once every five years at the pyramid-shaped Knill Monument. Both monument and ritual were provided for in the will of John Knill, who died in 1811. Headley and Meulenkamp describe it in their book "Follies, Grottoes and Garden Buildings" (Aurum, 1999): "ten girls, each ten years old and dressed in white, climb up to the monument accompanied by two widows, a clergyman, a fiddler, the Mayor of St Ives and the local Customs and Excise man. There they sing the 100th Psalm, after which the girls dance around the monument for a quarter of an hour to the tune of the fiddler, singing an old song which begins 'Shun the banter of the bay Hasten upward, come away ... ' For performing this inexplicable ceremony the young girls, the fiddler and the two widows receive ten shillings each, while the parson, the Mayor and the VAT man get £10 each, which they must use to give a dinner party to which they can invite two friends." Although Knill planned the monument, which he had built in 1782, as a mausoleum, he died in London and is actually buried in Holborn. The ceremony took place in 2001 - one of Knill's descendants has a web-site with information about him and details of the ceremony.

WOMAD (World of Music and Dance) festival, which has established itself as an annual event at Rivermead, Reading, usually in the last weekend in July. Contact +44(0)1225 743188.

St Wilfrid's Feast Procession, Ripon, N. Yorks, float parade on the Saturday before first Monday in August - which in some years is the last weekend in July - commemorating St Wilfred who was bishop of Ripon in the 7th century. Contact Teresa Baier, +44(0)1765 601730, or read more on Ripon's town web-site.

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