Skating (1892)

Charles Goodman Tebbutt wrote the following about the sport of bandy in a book entitled Skating, published in 1892:

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BANDY

BY C. G. TEBBUTT

"THE game of bandy, otherwise known as hockey and shinney, or shinty, is doubtless one of the earliest pastimes of the kind ever known. In its most primitive form it is simply played down the middle of a village street by boys who, armed with bent sticks, make themselves warm on a winter's evening by knocking a 'cat' about, all against all. At other times sides are chosen and it becomes a more regular game, the hedges or houses forming the side boundaries, and a couple of stones, some hundred yards apart, marking each goal.

From this rough-and-ready frolic, however, the present games of hockey and bandy are derived.

The word 'hockey' is now given to a well-established game under definite rules, played with boundaries and goals as foot-ball is on grass, while 'bandy' has long been identified with a game played like hockey, but on ice; and it is with this game we are now concerned.

Some persons suppose that the origin of the word 'bandy' is to be found in the bent stick employed, the old English word being still retained, as in the expression 'bandy-legged', while others imagine that the term is derived from the verb - to bandy to 'bandy looks', for instance, the ball being 'bandied' about, or struck backwards and forwards.

Probably bandy was played on the ice before skates were in use, for the level and slippery ice would suggest a surface upon which a 'cat' could be easily and accurately driven. A very ancient form of this game which did not require skates, and vaguely resembles curling or bowls, existed centuries ago in Holland, and was played with sticks or mallets and balls. Polo, it may be added, is another branch of the same game.

But, when once the player was shod with skates, and could career over the ice at a great pace, could suddenly stop, and as suddenly start, could turn and dodge at full speed and maintain a pace impossible on land, then enthusiasm for bandy was assured; it became, in fact, to its devotees the most fascinating of games.

Bandy can be played on a comparatively small piece of ice, but a large expanse is desirable, and the Fen district in England is therefore specially suitable for the game. The uplands send their water after heavy rains down into the Fen rivers, which overflow and flood the washes and low-lying meadows; then, should a frost come, any quantity of ice is available.

Bury Fen is one of the ideal places for the game. Lying alongside the river Ouse, just above where it connects with the Old West River to Ely and the Cam, and the Old and New Bedford Rivers with the great washes between, Bury Fen is, during a frost, in skating touch with a great many Fen villages. After heavy rains the water confined within the river rises rapidly and soon becomes higher than the low-lying meadows comprising Bury Fen. The sluice gates are then drawn, and the river water, thick with rich alluvial deposit, soon spreads over the grass land. Once flooded and the gates closed, the still water drops its deposit on the grass beneath, and when frost follows, the still shallow waters are the first to bear. No better place for skaters could be chosen.

Bury Fen lies within the twin parishes of Bluntisham-cum-Earith, in the agricultural county of Huntingdonshire. As soon as frost sets in, work is at a standstill, and squire, farmer, and labourer indulge in skating. It was more specially from the bargemen and fishermen of Earith that the bandy players in times past were recruited, their occupation seeming to fit them better for active exercise than did the more laborious work of the agriculturist.

Concurrently with skating races, bandy matches have long been held in the fens. It is certain that during the last century the game was played and even matches were held on Bury Fen, and the local tradition that the Bury Fenners had not been defeated for a century may not be an idle boast. But it was not until the great frost of 1813-14 that tradition gives place to certainty. I propose to furnish a short account of the Bury Fen players; for, excepting a few games played on private waters in different parts of England, bandy has been confined to that district, and its history is a history of the game.

When the army of Napoleon, retreating from Moscow [actually the winter of 1812-1813], were starved and frozen to death by thousands; when, at home, Prof. Sedgwick had to burn his gun-case and chairs to keep himself warm; when the scarcity of coal at Cambridge was so great that the trees within the grounds of St. John's College were cut down for fuel, and in all the colleges, we are told, the men sat in their rooms two and three together for warmth; then the hardy watermen, gunners, and labourers were quickening their circulation by playing bandy on Bury Fen. It was then that that fine old Fenman, William Leeland, at the time scarcely eleven years old, remembers watching the matches and joining in the practice of bandy. Undoubtedly matches were played before this time, and Leeland had 'heard talk' of them; but we have no records…"

"[From about 1825] until well into 1850 Leeland captained the Bury Fenners, and only died in the autumn of 1891, in his ninetieth year [actually in his 87th]. An interview with this fine old player was made specially interesting by his pleasant memories of matches won at bandy..."

"[Of the players from the early part of the century] "only Mr. R. Brown (88), Jas. Searle (75), and Bill Christmas (71), still live at the time of writing (Christmas, 1891)…"