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Somerset County Herald and Taunton Courier. Saturday 08 Mar 1941

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LOCAL NOTES & QUERIES

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NOTES

THE PENNARD CHEESE

In January last the Observer re-printed the following paragraph from its issue of January 10th, 1841:-

“The farmers and yeomanry of West Pennard, near Glastonbury, about 15 miles from Cheddar, are about to present to Her Majesty an enormous cheese, made from the united milk of 737 cows and weighing nearly 11 cwt. In commemoration of this cheese, a song entitled 'The Royal Cheese' has been composed by Mr. T. WILLIAMS.”

This paragraph raises several interesting questions. The cheese was made on Friday, June 28th, 1839, when seven of the largest cheese-tubs in West Pennard were borrowed for the purpose, and the best dairymaid in the parish was selected to make the cheese, at the farm of Mr. George NAISH. It is said that no less than 50 dairymaids assisted in the work, but this is probably an over statement unless every farmer's wife and daughter for miles around insisted in having a hand – however small – in the matter. A merry peal from the church bells and the firing of cannon before five o'clock in the morning ushered in the great day. It would be interesting to know why a cheese made for presentation to Queen Victoria in June, 1839, was still in the hands of the West Pennard farmers in January, 1841 – 19 months later.

Some very interesting facts about this cheese were given in the Somerset Year Book for 1928, where it was stated that on the Queen's wedding day (10th Feb., 1840) great festivities took place at West Pennard, and that a party from Ilminster was received by Messrs. NORRIS and DUNKERTON, the promoters of the scheme, and entertained in the most hospitable fashion in the room where the cheese stood. A song has been specially written for the occasion by Mr. T. DIBDIN and set to music by Mr. T. WILLIAMS, and this song was sung during the festivities to the great delight of the numerous company who had assembled. One verse of the song ran:

The Pennard men then built a cheese,

The like was never seen!

'Twas made and press'd, and fit to please

Our gracious lady Queen.

And wedded to her royal love

May blessings on her fall,

And Pennard cheese at dinner prove

The best thing – after all.

Can anyone supply a copy of the other verses? The correspondent of the Observer apparently confused the composer of the tune with the writer of the song. It would be interesting to know who Mr. T. DIBDIN was. There was living at that time a Thomas DIBDIN, who was born in London in 1777 and died in London September, 1841, who was the son of the famous song-writer Charles DIBDIN, and himself a song-writer and dramatist. Was he the “T. DIBDIN” who wrote the song of the Pennard cheese? and if so, how came he to be connected with the matter? Was he in any way associated with Somerset?

Paragraphs in various local newspapers make it clear that the cheese was publicly exhibited in September, 1839, and May, 1840 – and probably more or less throughout the intervening months – and that the generous contributions of the visitors were intended to be applied to the use and benefit of the poor of the parish. At Whitsuntide, 1840, after the usual church service, parade, dinner, &c., the members of the local “Club” again fell in, and, preceded by their two bands, marched to pay their devoirs to the royal cheese, where very little short of a thousand persons were liberally enabled by Mr. DUNKERTON to drink Her Majesty's health, the respective bands playing the National Anthem

Up to this time the local papers had contained many references to the cheese, but from this point onwards they became unaccountably silent, and no further mention of it appears to have been made in the news columns of any of the local papers; but an interesting announcement which appeared in the advertisment columns of the Sherborne Journal for March 4th, 1841, makes it clear that the cheese was presented to the Queen at Buckingham Palace on Friday, February 19th, 1841. The deputation who presented the cheese were Messrs. NORRIS, DUNKERTON, B. COTTON and TIBBOTS, and at the same time they presented the following memorial:-

“TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY.

The humble and dutiful Address of your Majesty's loyal subjects the Yeomanry of West Pennard, in the county of Somerset.

May it please your Majesty,-

We, your Majesty's loyal and dutiful subjects the Yeomanry of West Pennard, in your Majesty's county of Somerset, humbly beg leave to approach your Majesty with unfeigned expressions of our loyalty and zealous attachment to your Majesty's royal Person and Government, under which we are fully sensible of the many blessings we enjoy, in common with your Majesty's more exalted subjects, feeling that to every grade your Majesty's fostering and benevolent care has been always most graciously and equally extended; and that the Agricultural Interest of your Majesty's realms will never be lightly esteemed. We therefore humbly beg leave to offer to your most gracious Majesty a specimen of our exertions, which we hope and flatter ourselves may be deemed worthy of your Majesty's notice as an attempt hitherto unrivalled and unprecedented in the agricultural world, being the produce of our united dairies, amounting to seven hundred and thirty-seven milch kine.

We most humbly entreat that your Majesty may be graciously pleased to accept this production as the grateful memorial of our duty and devoted attachment to your Majesty's Royal Person and August Family. And we, your Majesty's faithful and loyal subjects, as in duty bound, shall ever pray.

To which Memorial the following gracious answer was transmitted to the Gentlemen of the Deputation:-

“The Lord Steward has received the commands of the Queen to signify to the Deputation from West Pennard - Her Majesty's acceptance of the great Cheese, prepared for the purpose as an unrivalled specimen of a very important manufacture, intimately connected with the Agricultural and Commercial interests of the country.

“The Lord Steward is to express Her Majesty's gratification in receiving this mark of loyal and dutiful attention and to acquaint the Deputation that her Majesty, taking a lively interest in the further object they have in view, assents, with pleasure, to a public exhibition of the Cheese in London for a charitable purpose in the neighbourhood of West Pennard”

After being exhibited in London the cheese returned to Somerset and was publicly shown in several of the largest towns in the county. It apparently never got back to Queen Victoria, but ultimately arrived at the Old Down Inn on the Mendip Hills, about six miles north of Shepton Mallet, where it was tried by experts and found bitterly disappointing, and it is said it was here given to the pigs!

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<NOTES: Robert CREED son of James CREED and Ann SWANTON, married Ann JACOB>