‘I'm 18 and I'm a town crier': Meet the youngsters keeping up ancient British traditions

Telegraph

05-05-2025

Many people view the likes of town crying and Morris dancing as dying British traditions, uniquely performed by bearded men of a certain age.
If most of us are asked to picture a Morris dancer, an image of an older gentleman dressed head-to-toe in white, bells jingling as he waves two handkerchiefs around with abandon, may spring to mind. Not so much a 12-year-old schoolgirl wielding a stick with attitude.
Yet, far from dying out, a new generation is taking up the baton to keep our ancient traditions alive. The medieval village blacksmith has been reinvented as a social-media-savvy student selling his wares internationally, while a town crier, once used to spread breaking news to townsfolk, now conveys a message of empowerment to young women.
Here, we speak to three young people about their unusual pastimes.
The teenage town crier
There are a few key skills a good town crier should possess: an outgoing personality, confidence to speak in front of a crowd and, of course, a great set of lungs.
Luckily for the people of Tenby, Erin Morgan has these skills in spades.
'I'm a performing arts student, so I'm very used to performing in front of large crowds, and I can project my voice quite easily,' she explains. 'I thought it's an excellent way to bring the community together, and by having a young person in the role, it changes the view of what a town crier is.'
Last year, Erin became the first female and the youngest person ever to take on the ceremonial role in the Welsh town, aged just 17. Her appointment was met with surprise, but overwhelming positivity.
She said: 'I did get comments from people, but they were all positive.
'My friends were a bit shocked, to say the least, and there's been continuous banter about it, but there's always going to be. They have been really supportive and always want to know what I am up to.'
Town crying has been around since at least 1066, with two bellmen depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry. Traditionally, their job was to inform the townspeople of the latest news, proclamations and bylaws – a little like a medieval version of X. Now, town criers primarily perform ceremonial duties at civic functions and events.
Although she is used to performing, Erin's first engagement was a baptism of fire as she led one of the most important events in the calendar: Tenby's VE Day commemorations.
'It was only two days after I had got the role, so I was extremely nervous. It was outdoors and there were a lot of people there, so I was given a microphone,' she said. 'But I grew more comfortable as I got into it, and by the end of the evening I loved it.'
The first year has been a busy one, with Erin turning out in her ceremonial robes to everything from the town's Christmas lights switch-on, to the annual RNLI pancake race.
Erin has had to juggle her engagements with her studies at Pembrokeshire College. As a performing arts student, Erin takes part in two major shows a year in the summer and at Christmas – peak seasons for a town crier.
Erin is also a leader for Tenby Guides and Rangers and hopes her role will inspire the girls and young women in the unit to engage with their community.
'The best thing is seeing people's reaction when they realise the town crier is an 18-year-old woman. It changes their perspective on it and what it can be,' she said. 'It's important to get the next generation to engage with traditions like these. I would love people my age or even younger to get involved.'
The social-media-savvy blacksmith
Most teenage boys would probably want to find the latest PlayStation waiting for them under the Christmas tree. For 14-year-old Ben Perkins, his favourite present was something rather more low-tech: a blacksmith's anvil.
The gift was a sign of his family's support for his new hobby, which eventually grew into a fully fledged business, with Ben selling his creations across the globe.
In the Middle Ages, every village had a blacksmith, but the craft almost disappeared after the Second World War with the advent of mechanisation on the land. But thanks to young people like Ben, blacksmithing has survived into the 21st century.
Growing up, Ben had always enjoyed DIY with his father, but when he reached his teenage years, he wanted to try something new.
Ben, now 21, says: 'Making things has always been a passion of mine. I loved bushcraft, and when I was 14, I thought it would be fun to make a bushcraft knife.'
After watching some tutorials on YouTube, Ben successfully made his first knife.
He says: 'It was very rudimentary and nothing to shout about, but hammering some red-hot metal was a lot of fun.'
Ben constructed a makeshift forge at the bottom of the garden at the family home in Guildford, Surrey, using whatever equipment he could lay his hands on.
He says: 'I started using my mum's old hairdryer, a hole in the ground and some coal. And that was enough to create a forge, which is essentially where you put the metal in to get it red hot. I had to use an old fence post as an anvil, because anvils are quite expensive to buy.
'As time went on, I got the anvil for Christmas, and tools for my birthday, meaning I had a proper setup, rather than using things that aren't actually that safe when you're playing around with metal that's over 1,000 degrees.'
After a few more YouTube videos, and a bucketful of failed projects, Ben started to create useful items such as coat hooks and bottle openers, and decorative whales and snails.
He was sharing his creations on Instagram, Facebook and Reddit, looking for feedback, when someone asked if they were for sale. It was a lightbulb moment for Ben.
'I hadn't even thought about selling products; I was just having fun making them,' he says.
'When I realised I could sell them, I was quite excited, as I was spending a fair bit of my savings. Now I could actually cover the cost of my hobby.'
Ben's first sale came aged 16, when someone in the United States purchased a snail for £25 via Reddit. A second sale to Germany quickly followed before Ben's business, Ben Makes, took off in the UK.
Now studying business and digital marketing at Falmouth University, Ben continues to enjoy blacksmithing during his university holidays.
But the entrepreneur has branched out into jewellery making and crafts luxury pieces in his student accommodation. His creations include rings and necklaces containing gold flakes, crushed opal and Cornish sand as a romantic memento, while others incorporate ashes and fur from customers' pets. After university, Ben plans to scale up his business.
'I've been slowly doing more social media marketing and looking at business collaborations as well. It's exciting to see where it might go,' he says.
The tween folk dancer
The arrival of May Day heralds the start of a busy time of year for 12-year-old Morris dancer Charlotte Lindsay.
To get ready, Charlotte, a member of the National Youth Folklore Troupe of England (NYFTE), spent a week of her Easter holidays at an intensive residential training camp at Denstone College in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire.
There, she joined a group of young people aged between 10 and 18 with a passion for English traditional song, music and dance in learning and perfecting new routines to take out on the road to folk festivals across the country this summer.
'The training can be quite tiring, but we have a lot of breaks for cake,' smiles Charlotte.
The origins of Morris dancing are debated, but it is believed to have started in England sometime in the 15th century. Historically, the dance may have been a fertility ritual, and it has even been linked to pagan worship, although there is limited evidence to support this.
Charlotte discovered a passion for folk dancing when she started going with her family to monthly cèilidhs in her home village of Kennington, Oxfordshire. This inspired her 16-year-old sister Bella to join NYFTE, while a then 10-year-old Charlotte went on the waiting list. In the meantime, Charlotte began to hone her skills with Cry Havoc, a Cotswold Morris dance side based in Botley, Oxford.
'I'm the youngest dancer there, but everyone else is very friendly, so I don't really mind at all,' Charlotte says. 'It's very relaxed. We practise during the winter, and then in the summer, we go to different pubs and sometimes festivals, like the Oxford Folk Festival.'
Charlotte is dancing with Cry Havoc at the Appleton Fair on Bank Holiday Monday. The group also performed at the May Morning celebration in Oxford on May 1, with dancing starting in the botanical gardens at 5am. Unfortunately for Charlotte, a 4am start isn't really compatible with a full day at school, so she had to give this particular event a miss.
Despite young Morris newcomers like Charlotte, the 2023 Morris Census shows that the age distribution of UK Morris dancers is still skewed towards older age groups. Just 9 per cent are aged under 30.
Groups such as NYFTE are bringing folk to young people in a bid to keep traditional dances, including stave, clog and broom dances, alive.
NYFTE dancers come from across England, from Devon to Durham, and perform at festivals all over the country, which means a busy summer for their families.
Charlotte's mother, Rachel, says: 'All the families camp together, so we have to pack the car with tents, sleeping bags and all the camping gear, and then get to wherever it is and put the tent up – often in the middle of the night by the car headlights.'
Despite the early starts, hours of travelling, and the amount of time Charlotte's hobby consumes, Rachel says it has benefited the whole family, adding: 'We were never really a 'folky' family, but we have discovered folk festivals, found new music, tried new dances and had lots of fun.'
Speaking about Charlotte's hobby, Rachel says: 'I wouldn't have expected it when she was younger, but since she had to come along to NYFTE events before she could join because we were all going with Bella, she saw what fun they had and was keen to get involved. As a parent, I think it's a really nice thing to get into.'