A 17TH CENTURY CHRISTMAS AT ASTON HALL, BIRMINGHAM...

Boar’s Head Spooked…

I hoisted the platter of fibre glass 

Onto my shoulder, the boar’s head glistening its own horror to appal

The eyes of boisterous children;

Then checked, in role as Sir Thomas Holte of Aston Hall,

For the crowd was milling around an exit from the Long Gallery,

Onto the cannonball-damaged main staircase,

Causing me to turn and edge along an oak panelled wall.

I hurried and slipped through another door,

Onto the alternative family stair,

In an attempt to reach the roaring Entrance Hall’s fire

First, before toasting the Yule Log, where

The crowd would be milling around the hearth:

But hesitation at once halted my progress, 

Causing me to stop one step down, then stare...

I tingled and shivered, yet quite ridiculous I felt,

Looked down at my rooted, unwilling Jacobean shoes,

Straining to shift one downwards but in vain

And I began to feel pressure, all progress to lose,

Holding me back, chilling me motionless:

Panicked, flustered, I somehow twisted my frame,

Hauling the weighty boar’s head platter round

For, cold and shaking I felt unable my own route to choose.

I scrambled onto a landing and quickly turned tail,

Hustling along the gallery’s oak floor

To follow the throng’s massed decline:

White faced, dysfunctional, I appeared at a door…

Heart raced, I had seen nothing, nothing at all,

Carried on regardless but bereft of part of me.

I sang carols, drank wassail, the quintessential Lord of the Manor

But quite literally spooked, haunted, terrified to the core...

PETE RAY

ASTON PARK: ON THE WAY TO WASSAIL A TREE...

This happened at Aston Hall in Birmingham during the mid-1980s. 

THE WELCOME AT ASTON HALL...

YAWNING FOR A CHESHIRE CHEESE: A GOOD GAME, SURE TO MAKE PARTICIPANTS FEEL TIRED LATE AT NIGHT IN THE 17TH CENTURY...

I had attempted to reach the ground floor before a large group of schoolchildren but alongside a closet, housing the electrical and alarm controls, once converted from a store cupboard into a lavatory for Queen Victoria to use on a visit, which she hadn’t needed, I failed to negotiate more than one step… 

THAT PESKY BOAR'S HEAD...

WASSAILING IN REAL SNOW, ASTON PARK, BIRMINGHAM...

All went silent around me. 

I was unable to descend. 

STIRRING THE PLUM PORRIDGE...

...AND MAKING A WISH...

I was forced to turn about and scramble across the superb Long Gallery and follow the children down the main staircase, where two security guards remarked on my ashen face. 

EVALUATING A REALLY ODD YAWN...

I was truly shaken... 

Children also presented Sir Thomas Holte with a kissing bough and entertained him with a Mummers' play...

A Yule Log was dragged into the Entrance Hall, mince pies and frumenty were tasted, races on hobby horses took place down the Long Gallery and carols were sung around the fire...

Loved playing that role which Radio Birmingham actually recorded one morning and featured it throughout their Christmas Eve programme that year...