Victorian
In the summer of 1872, the quiet Kentish village of Leigh found itself in the pages of the Tunbridge Wells Journal for all the wrong reasons. On 4 July that year, the paper carried a report headed 'Drink and Riotous at Leigh', describing a series of charges brought before the local magistrates. The story behind those charges, however, reaches back further than a single evening of misbehaviour, and it says a great deal about the changing attitudes of the Victorian age.
Leigh's annual fair was an old institution. It took place every year on 16 June, and it had been a fixture of village life since at least the turn of the nineteenth century. By the 1870s, though, not everyone looked upon it with affection. Parliament had introduced the Abolition of Fairs Act in 1871, giving communities a legal route to bring such gatherings to an end. In Leigh, two influential local figures moved to take advantage of it: Samuel Morley, who lived at Hall Place, and the Reverend John Maxted, the village's non-conformist Minister. Together they applied to have Leigh's fair suppressed, arguing that it was a source of grievous immorality.
Whether the fair truly deserved such a reputation was hotly contested, and the events that came before the magistrates in 1872 show how heated feelings on both sides had become. The trouble arose on fair day itself, at around half-past eight in the evening. Three villagers stood in the dock: Edmund Smith, William Franklin and Martha Franklin, each accused of being drunk and riotous at Leigh.
Edmund Smith admitted the charge, pleading guilty. The Franklins, by contrast, pleaded not guilty and fought the accusation vigorously. Both men had been employed on the building works then under way at Hall Place, where Samuel Morley was engaged in rebuilding the house. Smith, it seems, departed the scene before the Franklins did, and when he came before the court he expressed deep regret, saying he was very sorry indeed for what he had done.
The case against the Franklins rested heavily on the testimony of PC Irwin. He told the court that Mrs Franklin had come up Leigh Street cursing and swearing, and that she had threatened to tear him from limb to limb before attempting to strike him. Her husband was no gentler in his conduct: William Franklin, the constable said, threatened to knock his head off. One witness went so far as to claim that Franklin's roaring could be heard half a mile away.
The defence answered with a string of local witnesses. Martha Franklin suggested that the whole prosecution had been stirred up out of spite rather than genuine concern for order. Henry Hills, a stonemason by trade, told the Bench that William Franklin had shown no signs of drink up to half-past nine, and he added a pointed detail: he had heard the constable accuse Franklin of stealing a rabbit, which casts an interesting light on the relationship between the officer and the men he was charging. John Morgan, a Leigh bricklayer, gave evidence that by eleven o'clock the Franklins were perfectly sober. Another witness, George Reeves, dismissed the idea of any riotous behaviour, insisting there had been no shouting at all, only a bit of jollification.
William Franklin himself explained that he had simply been enjoying an evening in the company of his fellow Hall Place workers. The picture that emerged was less of a drunken riot than of a workplace celebration, and a memorable one at that: the foreman was said to have danced a polka with Martha Franklin, who firmly denied having been drunk.
Faced with this evidence, the Bench dismissed the case against all three defendants. Even Edmund Smith, despite having pleaded guilty, walked away without punishment. The magistrates' reasoning was not hard to fathom: had the defendants faced a simple charge of drunkenness alone, a conviction would very likely have followed, but the addition of the word 'riotous' demanded conduct the evidence simply did not support.
This account is drawn from an article by Joyce Field, published in Leigh Parish Magazine in September 2026. Readers who wish to explore the background will find an earlier piece on the campaign to abolish the fair in the June issue.