Fordingbridge Museum column

Column by Fordingbridge Museum is sponsored by Adrian Dowding

Detectorists

By Julian Hewitt, Fordingbridge Museum

If, like me, you are a fan of the BBC programme Detectorists, you will already know something about people who use metal detectors to find historic artefacts.

In the past, some detectorists have had a bad reputation amongst the academic archaeological community as mere treasure hunters. These days, archaeologists and the majority of detectorists invariably work closely with each other. The National Council for Metal Detecting has its own code of conduct and the British Museum and the National Museum of Wales have developed the Portable Antiquities Scheme to record objects found, not only by detectorists but also by walkers, gardeners and other members of the public. The Treasure Act of 1996 requires that objects defined as treasure are reported to the coroner and must be offered to a museum at a price set by the independent Treasure Valuation Committee. The money is then shared between the finder and the landowner.

Fordingbridge Museum has recently been given some Russian lead seals that were found by Paul Greenwood, a local metal detectorist. They were used for identification, regulation and quality control when importing flax plants from Russia. For much of the 18th and 19th centuries, Russia was the world’s greatest exporter of flax through ports like Archangel, Riga and St Petersburg. Each bale of flax plants was sealed with a lead seal that contained information about tax paid, port and region of origin and a host of other information.

The blue flowered flax plant grows to about a metre high and is then pulled out whole to ensure the maximum fibre length. The plant is then soaked in water and the fibres are detached from the central woody stem. When woven, the linen produced can be coarse, for sacking or sailcloth, or fine, to be used for bed or table linen or shirts collars and cuffs. Flax linen is two or three times stronger than cotton, although it wrinkles easily. It is also a better conductor of heat than cotton which makes it cooler.

In 1688, a document records that Fordingbridge was renowned for the weaving of bed ticking and sailcloth that were both made from flax. In 1792, the Universal British Directory says that, ‘The chief manufactory is ticking, for which it is in high repute; nearly five hundred looms being constantly employed in the trade.’ Sail cloth made in Fordingbridge supplied the ships built at Bucklers Hard at Beaulieu. At Stuckton there is still an area called Flaxfields. The main mill weaving flax in Fordingbridge was East Mills which in 1840 employed 200 people. The mill was founded by Edward, John and Samuel Thompson and continued to manufacture sailcloth, canvas and sacking until 1905.

The pith and woody tissues that were left after the fibres had been removed were mixed with human excrement collected by ‘night soil’ men and were spread on the fields as fertiliser. These often had the bale seals still attached to the plant stem. These, and seals discarded when the plants were planted, are now found by detectorists and give a wealth of information about a trade with Russia that bought prosperity to areas like Fordingbridge.