How Darlington roasted an ox to commemorate the crowning of a king

In Darlington, that was the Market Place, where great events had been commemorated by an ox roast ever since the coming of age of the eldest son of Lord Barnard, the Earl of Darlington, on August 16, 1809, when a large bullock was roasted whole and portions of meat along with flagons of foaming strong ale were offered around the thousands gathered in the Market Place.

The 1902 coronation ox being roasted in Darlington Market Place. Behind the spit are the pubs, including the Dolphin, that were replaced by the leisure centre in the early 1980s. All of today's pictures are courtesy of the Darlington Centre for Local Studies

In 1832, to celebrate the passing of the great Reform Bill, three large oxen were roasted by the town centre's innkeepers. This time the oxen had been tastefully prepared, and the joints were served from tables 20 to 50 yards long, with bread, vegetables and plum pudding.

The next recorded ox roast is in 1897 to commemorate Queen Victoria’s diamond jubilee. A £22 ox bred in Cleasby was paraded through the streets decorated with red, white and blue ribbons, before being slaughtered and roasted.

The Darlington and Stockton Times noted: "It is believed that Darlington is the only town in which the old-fashioned bullock roasting will form part of the celebrations. Residents near the Market Place look forward with considerable misgiving to this ceremony, owing to the smell of burnt flesh and coke smoke."

But, perhaps because the Gravy Making Society had done such a good job, the 1897 roast was judged such a success that the celebration was repeated in 1902 for Edward VII’s coronation.

The ox roast committee selects the beast to be roasted to commemoratre the 1902 coronation. Committee chairman William Snaith is on the right

Three days after the Westminster Abbey ceremony, the body of a huge bull from Baydales Farm, complete with head and horns, was skewered by a 16ft spit which was connected to a steam-powered traction engine for rotation.

It was hoisted above six huge braziers, and the roasting began at 7pm on Tuesday, August 11. Immediately, the steam-powered traction engine threatened to run amok, and then at midnight, the carcass nearly slipped off and had to be chained back on.

The spit and braziers outside the covered market in 1902

After 15 hours, the beef was deemed done. At 10am the fires were allowed to die down and at 6pm the slicing began.

The 1902 ox roasters preparing sandwiches in Darlington Market Place 

Darlington, proclaimed the mayor with his hands over a bulging belly, had rediscovered a forgotten art.

"Our success is all the more unique in the fact that it was performed under the severest criticisms and the most trying circumstances, not least the unpropitious weather," he pronounced.

Not everyone was so impressed.

George Algernon Fothergill's drawing of the ox being roasted in 1902

The artist, George A Fothergill, wrote: "The beast, roasted dry, so to speak, yellow and shiny in appearance to start with until he became brown and more or less shrivelled up, presented a grim, weird aspect, which those who saw in the final stages will never forget to the end of their days."

A few days later, a jaunty poem appeared on the Echo’s letters page:

"Now realize, Mr Editor, my opinion is this,
That this frizzling and this frying we really ought to miss.
This ox of sterling value will not hunger pangs avail,
When charred and marred and shrivelled from its headpiece to tail."

Nevertheless, for George V’s coronation on June 22, 1911, Darlington organised an Ox Roasting Committee which had six sub-committees beneath it each with a specific task – there was a spit sub-committee, for instance, and another devoted to the hoardings.

George Algernon Fothergill's drawing of William Snaith, of High Coniscliffe, who led the 1902 ox roast

The beast was donated by the Snaith brothers, who were farmers at High Coniscliffe and whose late father, William, had chaired the 1902 roast committee.

Darlington was not alone in its roasting habits as Hartlepool, Thornaby and Middlesbrough all had their own coronation roasts.

The 1911 ox roast in the Market Place with the pubs behind that have now been replaced by the Dolphin leisure centre

On the south side of the Market Place at 5pm on coronation eve, the fires were ignited in four large firepans, with steel walls erected to throw the heat back onto the carcase, and “a gaily decorated wooden superstructure” was erected to keep the worst of the weather off.

The sight impressed a visiting poet from Gateshead, who wrote:

"The crowning of our gracious King on Coronation Day,
The various towns all celebrate each in its different way.
But mention really must be made of Darlington-on-Skerne,
So ardent are the Quaker folk with loyalty they ‘burn'.
The emblem of their loyalty stands in the Market Place,
The carcase of a mighty ox made ready to cremate."

The 1911 set-up in the Market Place

At 7pm, the ox, “already spitted, was lifted into position by half a score stalwart men”, and at 8pm, before an “immense multitude of spectators” the mayoress, Mrs GR Young, ceremonially set the spit turning – they employed an electrical engine rather than repeat the uncertainty caused by the steam traction engine.

The beast turned for 13 hours before the mayor and mayoress fell on it with the ceremonial carvers.

“There was great demand for steaks of the beef and the huge carcase, which originally weighed about 50 stones, was quickly disposed of,” said the Echo.

Above and below: The 1911 ox roast committee and its supporters in the Market Place outside the Bull's Head Hotel, which was on the north side next to the Pennyweight. All of today's pictures are courtesy of the Darlington Centre for Local Studies

The committee had ordered 2,724 “platters”, at 5s 9d-a-dozen from a pottery in Stoke. These china plates were adorned with pictures of the dignitaries involved in the roast, and they still adorn many local homes.

Proceeds from the sale of the plates and the sandwiches funded a daytrip for 1,000 poor children to Redcar the following day, so the ceremony wasn’t wholly about gluttony.

The 1911 souvenir ox roast plate. Many houses still have one. This one belongs to Mark Cooper

George Theakston, secretary of the committee, wrote in his final entry in the minute book: "The general opinion was that the meat was exceedingly well cooked and that it would be impossible to roast an ox better."

After the ox had been roasted and the poor children sent to Redcar, the ox-roasters had a commemorative dinner in the Bull's Head Hotel in the Market Place, which overlooked the scene of their roasting triumph

But times were changing. In 1935, when it was suggested that George V’s Silver Jubilee should be celebrated in the time-honoured ox-roasting fashion, the idea was dismissed as “barbarous”, and so when George VI was crowned in 1937, there was not a sniff of an ox roast anywhere in the region.

However, in its coverage of the 1937 coronation, The Northern Echo noted that in Nairobi in Kenya, two hippopotami from Lake Victoria were roasted over a coronation bonfire. Roast hippo, apparently, tastes like mild beef but has a rough texture.

The last celebratory public ox roast in our area was held in Richmond in 1929 to commemorate the centenary of its borough status, although Darlington held a nostalgic roast in 2013, complete with souvenir plates, to commemorate the 150th anniversary of its covered market complex.

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