DICK TURPIN RELIC.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XIX, Issue 2051, 4 December 1924, Page 6

DICK TURPIN RELIC.

OLD SMITHY TO GO. •AFTER, THREE CENTURIES. A relic of the days of Dick Turpiu, the highwayman, is 'to be swept away -by tine removal of a three-centurics-oki smithy at Eltham, Woolwich. The building projects into High Street at a busy point, and is to be demolished for ' road-widening. Despite its age it is so substantially constructed and heavily timbered tiiat it might well have lasten for another 100 years, "Tkoro is not the least doubt thai Dick Tiarpi'n (whose exploits brought him to the scaffold in 1739) called at the old forge, and it is quite likoly that he has had his famous Black Bess shod there," said Mr A. J. Blackney, who recently sold the premises, to a newspaper man. "We have no actual records of any such visits, but there is the fact that Turpdn frequented the old King's Anns by the church, and it is a reasonable deduction that business would take him occasionally to the neighbouring smithy. "The story goes that to this day there; is fiastened to a ttree on Shooter's Hill a staple and ring to which he used to tie Black Bess on some of his adventurous baits on the road." Bom at the historic smithy, Mr Blackney lived there for 67 years,- continuing the work in which his faulty have been engaged at different places foil- 300 years. He has taken to his new premises a horse shoe, found many years ago in a garden, which is believed to date from Roman times. "King Edward, when Prince of Wales, used to visit Eltham in my boyhood days," added Mr Blackney. "He not only atended; the races on the old Eltham course, where he had always a great reception, but he went fairly regularly to the sales of thoroughbreds at Middle Park. "In these far-off days the race meetings were particularly lively. Cadets came from Woolwich in large numbers ; and although they were as good as good all day, they set a hot pace as soon as the last race was over. "They upset booths and tents, tore up cocoanu* sticks and sent them flying among tho crowds, got at loggerheads with people, and, had their share in free fights. The crowning upheaval was the last. The authorities intervened and (the fixture was transferred to Greenlaue, between Eltham and Chislehnrst, but it survived for onlv about four seasons."