Bonfire 2007 (2) Lewes, Fifth of November

Date: 07 November 2007 15:09:42

Late into town because of an apparently insanely intrusive policing policy at Brighton Station. Crash barriers and a huge snakey queue and passengers allowed on to trains in dribs and drabs by police or security staff at the carriage doors. I was queuing for over an hour, during which two trains left, one little more than half full, the other with at least some empty seats in every carriage, wile hundred of passengers were made to wait on another platform and watch them go. Then we finally got let onto a third train - and that was as crowded as the 08.27 to Charing Cross. Standing room only, aisles full of people, a dozen or more packed into every doorway. And we took over half an hour to get there because they were only letting people off the trains piecemeal at the other end - things were even more tightly controlled at Lewes, the Station Road being divided into four narrow paths by barriers forcing us to walk very slowly, and a complete line of police shoulder-to-shoulder at the bottom of Station Street by the Lansdowne Arms (which is where I would probably have tried to go on any night but Bonfire).

On the whole it was an astonishingly well-behaved crowd. Are people so passive in other countries? But I hate to think what it might have been like a few hours later when a lot more drink had been taken. What looks like a pointless bureaucratic irritation to a sober man at 6pm can seem a lot more like police provocation to the same man drunk at 11pm. Maybe next year I'll change at Hayward's Heath!

These things go in cycles. Apparently 1906 was a bad year. In the late 1970s and early 1980s things were quite tolerant. Then there were concerns about Cliffe's reputation, and too much drinking, and too many oiks like us coming from Brighton and crowding out the pubs, and the usual fuss about rookies and rousers (i.e. home-made, or at least home-repurposed, bangers and jumping-jacks, although rather louder than the little fireworks that most people associate with those names). So they started to close the pubs one by one until the only place you could buy a pint in the centre of town (without being invited to the landlord's private party) was the bar of Shelley's Hotel (in these more tolerant years its the only place you can't) Security became harsh in places, lots of police blocking the roads, barriers everywhere. Nothing very bad happened. So they relaxed a little in the 1990s and opened the bars again. Nothing very bad continued to happen.

Sometimes a clampdown is kicked off by a couple of Friday or Saturday Bonfires in a row, where the crowds are typically larger. Or by a change of guard at County Hall, or a new Chief Constable, eager to make their mark (that's the rumour about the current situation) But after a year or two of nothing very bad happening the police begin to notice that large numbers of locals think they are behaving like prats and pull back a bit. Or take part in the marches themselves and start having fun. And it is rare for bad things to happen. Sussex Bonfire people tend to look after their safety rather well and the marchers more or less always know what they are doing, as do most of the regular spectators - and they (we) are a lot more used to it than people from some other parts of the world.

Anyway, I was about two hours late, and there was a huge press of crowd (more or less surrounded by police) completely blocking the way to the High Street. So I worked my round it and along Grange Road and then up the hill by St Pancras and Rotten Row and the little twitten that goes by St Anne's Church, so I got into the churchyard just a few minutes after the Grand United Procession started.

St Anne's churchyard is just about the best place to see the GUP from in some ways. I rarely manage to get down that far - we're usually coming from the other direction, and have a few pints in one of the pubs further up the street. The church is at the top of the bottleneck in the High Street - a turn in the road, a steep place, a narrower than usual street - so its hard to get to other than from the back.

And while I was there I met an unexpected friend, a crystallographer who used to work at our college and whose parents live round the corner in St Anne's Crescent. So I not only got to see the procession but had some rather nice lentil soup and mulled wine - but I had to leave to get further up the hill in time for another drink with the friends I had been expecting to see (and was staying with) before we saw the Borough procession on their way to their firesite.

As always the Borough fire site was wonderful. A REAL BONFIRE! And because we are so high up the hill, with a view all over town, we get to see everyone else's fireworks as well, as three or four displays compete with each other and bangs and flashes echo off the Downs and the cliffs. I guess this year Borough was probably the loudest, and maybe the prettiest with at one point some sort of red and gold flares shooting across each other trailing showers of sparks in front of more or less continuous wall of pink flame. Cliffe as often the most spectacular with some huge aerial bursts that cast clear shadows in the crowd around me perhaps two miles away. And Commercial Square (I think - their firesite was in a close line of sight with another) maybe the flashiest, sending up rings and targets and a couple of times writing "2007" in the sky with bursting mortars.

(As usual lots more pictures if you select the links)