Plaque on the Hawthorn Building, DMU.
Although folk football does not appear to have been played in Leicester on a large scale, there are records of games being played in county towns and villages. Instead, Leicester folk participated in Whipping Toms – a rather bizarre game even by Medieval standards. Every year, on Shrove Tuesday, a fair was held in The Newarke. Large numbers of people gathered to buy and sell goods. Crowds of mainly young men drank alcohol and sang traditional songs and hymns. Various games were played. The last of these games started at midday and was always a game similar to hockey. Played between two crowds of men and boys, both teams were armed with sticks that had a knob or a hook at the end and a wooden ball. The ends of the Newarke courtyard formed the goals. The game had little rules or stipulations and quickly became violent and injury was almost certain. At about 1 o’clock the game ended, and the “Whipping Toms” made an appearance; two or more men in blue smocked frocks, a handkerchief tied over one eye and carrying a long cart-whip. They were led out into the crowds by three men who each signalled their arrival by ringing a small, brass bell. At once the whipping started. They were not by custom allowed to whip above the knee, and anyone kneeling down was spared. You could also be spared of the whipping if you made a small donation of Two Pence (2d) to the “Whipping Toms”, which many gladly did. The Whipping Toms also liked to line people up and whip up and down the line. Often people attempted to avoid the whipping by wrapping material around their legs. However, the ‘victims’ would attempt to protect themselves with their hockey sticks and fought back. Unsurprisingly it often got a little out of hand. On the 16th February 1847 an Act of Parliament officially ended it and the last Whipping Toms put up a valiant fight – quite literally – but it was gone!