Charity, so the expression goes, begins at home. In England, however, giving once stretched into some peculiar places. In Glentham in Lincolnshire, for example, money was set aside for the yearly washing of the tomb of one Molly Grime; and in Newmarket in 1801, £21 was budgeted annually to encourage the marriage of local couples (if unclaimed, the money would go to the local fund for the encouragement of horse racing).

These examples are from A Collection of Old English Customs, and Curious Bequests and Charities. Published in 1842, it consists of excerpts from reports made by the Commissioners for Enquiring into Charities in England and Wales. This group was established in 1818 and initially tasked to inspect the condition of charitable trusts for the education of the poor, but its remit soon expanded to include all types of trusts. The first Parliamentary-appointed survey to examine charities, its primary aim was to investigate the most effective use of such funds, a role its institutional descendant, the Charity Commission, still largely holds today.

Using the commissioners’ material on the details of wills and legacies, the author — “Henry Edwards of Hoxton” — attempts to trace how certain local customs of giving were established. The text is essentially a digest of examples, shaped around types of charitable actions. It begins with examples of the giving of food, often linked to seasonal festivities and occasions, such as “in aid of Christmas”, Easter, and “for the poor in Lent”, then widens out to societal concerns. Donations for “maimed and old soldiers” and “for redeeming Christian Slaves from African Captivity” follow. The promotion of education (“stimulants to learning and good behaviour”) is covered, too, as are examples of donations to reward decorum and respect (“for upholding loyalty and patriotism” and “for the encouragement of Servants and Apprentices”). Unsurprisingly, given this moral tone, the book’s compiler provides plenty of details from religious life, ranging from donations for the creation of sermons of thankfulness in times of national emergency (e.g., the Great Fire of London, Nelson’s Victory at Trafalgar) to smaller scale acts of benevolence (e.g., “to keep church and churchyard clean” and “keeping boys quiet in church”).

Such content might seem rather dry, but as this last example suggests, the author intends to “combine instruction with amusement”, as he states in his introduction. For example, John Nicholson, a London stationer, leaves in his will of 1717 money to be given to any poor person in England with the name of Nicholson so they can advance themselves; Sir Robert Cocks’ will grants money to the poor of New Woodstock, Oxford, a promise he made shortly before buying a winning lottery ticket in 1719. Edwards provides intrigue, too, telling of the parish of Upper Holker in Lancashire, where five acres of land were “bought by the inhabitants with the sum of 185 ½ guineas, which were found in the pocket of a travelling beggar” who had died in a lodging house in the parish in 1799.

Despite his desire to entertain, the author never forgets the improving message he wishes to impart. It is hard not to read this Collection as a work celebrating the beneficence of the well-to-do upon the “deserving poor”. Inadvertently, however, it also offers glimpses of charitable efforts going awry as a result of the poor’s seeming unwillingness to play their part. He recounts, for example, the death of the custom of “Stephening” in Drayton Beauchamp, Buckinghamshire, where “all the inhabitants used to go on St. Stephen’s Day to the Rectory, and eat as much bread and cheese, and drink as much ale as they chose, at the expense of the Rector”. Stephening was discontinued by the Rector, as the event “gave rise to so much rioting”. While many perceive the English countryside as the unchanging home of ancient customs and rituals (a myth that can still entice in the twenty-first century), the examples in A Collection also illustrate how mutable customs can be, and how often they are altered through shifting social ideas and economic forces.

Published in the early Victorian era, A Collection dates from a time when the word “folklore” did not yet exist, but the practices we now associate with that term (i.e., the gathering of accounts and descriptions of customs and beliefs) was starting to generate increasing interest in the publishing world. Four years after this work was printed, the antiquarian William Thoms, contributing to a discussion in The Athenaeum, would come up with the composite term “Folk-lore” to describe what had previously been known as “popular antiquities”. Sadly, it seems that the publication of A Collection went unnoticed by Thoms and his correspondents. The oversight might have been down to pure bad luck, or Edward’s relatively brief appearance on the literary scene; this seems to have been his only book. However, if Thoms was aware of Edwards’ work, it might not have been to the taste of a man who saw tradition arising from the “folk”, rather than the indulgences and whims of the wealthy.