_“Rare doings at Camberwell.”--“All holiday at Peckham.”_
I do not know Mr. Capper’s authority for saying in his “Topographical
Dictionary,” that the fair, held at Camberwell from time immemorial, is
suppressed.
Although much has been done towards accomplishing this end, it does not
seem likely to prevail. It commenced formerly on the 9th of August, and
continued _three weeks_, ending on St. Giles-day. Booths were erected in
the churchyard, for the sale of “good drinke, pies, and pedlerie trash:”
but these doings were suppressed by a clause, in the statute of
Winchester, passed in the 13th of Edward I., which enacts “que _feire_,
ne marche desoremes ne soient tenuz en cimet pur honur de Seinte
Eglise.” In the evidence adduced before a petty session at Union-hall,
on the subject of putting down the fair on the 4th of July, 1823, it is
said that “Domesday Book” speaks of the custom of holding it. I cannot
find that this statement rests on good grounds, but something like it
seems to have obtained as early as 1279, for in that year Gilbert de
Clare was summoned before John of Ryegate and his fellow justices at
Guildford, to show by what right he claimed the privilege of holding the
assize of ale and bread in “his Vill. of _Cam’well_.”[262] Mention is
made in the following reign of “eme’das in Stoke et Pecham.” Camberwell
fair was held “opposite the Cock public-house” till the Green was broken
in upon.
Peckham is said to be only a continuation of Camberwell, and not a
district fair, though there is a tradition that king John hunting there
killed a stag, and was so well pleased with his day’s sport, that he
granted the inhabitants a charter for it. It may be inferred from the
“right merrie” humour of this monarch at the close of his sport, that it
was somewhat in different style to that of Henry the Fifth: for he, “in
his beginning thought it meere scofferie to pursue anie fallow deere
with hounds or greihounds, but supposed himselfe always to have done a
sufficient act when he had tired them by his own travell on foot.”[263]