Simon Parsons, manager of the Rye Heritage Centre, and Paul Goring town crier for Rye, masterminded a wonderful pageant to celebrate the Fletcher family and their influence on the people of Rye and beyond on Saturday, August 17.
A little background history about Richard Fletcher and his son John.
Richard Fletcher, who served as the vicar of Rye, is a notable historical figure primarily known for his later role as Bishop of London and as the father of the playwright John Fletcher. Fletcher was born around 1544 and had a successful career within the Church of England during the Elizabethan era. John Fletcher became one of the leading playwrights of the Jacobean era and a collaborator of William Shakespeare. Fletcher’s time as vicar of Rye was just the beginning of a distinguished but turbulent career in the Church of England during a critical period in English religious and political history. The spotlight on Saturday was on these two keys figures.
Simon explains. “When the Rye Heritage Centre charity was first set up in early 2020 we laid down, as all charities must, our aims and objectives. In a nutshell our objective is to educate visitors and residents about our town’s history and to interpret how its significance continues to influence our past, present and future.
“One of the ways we aimed to do this was by taking our heritage out into the community rather than always expecting people to come to us. From this came our free community events, last year commemorating the well-known visit to Rye of Queen Elizabeth I, this year the less well known story of the Fletcher family.
“When I first took on the role of manager one of my many ambitions was to work towards joining up the dots between the amazing community groups and other heritage assets within the town. The result can be seen by the coming together of a wide range of groups, organisations and businesses to provide an event which we hope is entertaining but will also stimulate people to find out more about our amazing town’s heritage and its place in the country’s wider history.
“We’ve had amazing enthusiasm, energy and co-operation from those involved and from the feedback we’ve received it seems to be a popular thing to do – it certainly brings people together. What will we do next year? Watch this space: plans are afoot!“
Pat Driver from Rye Players summed up the day in her inimitable style: “Fletcher Day was sensational! Huge congratulations to everybody involved…and there were so many! Let’s attempt this. Gulp. Simon Parsons and his merry crew at @ryeheritage who organised the day; the Sing it Out Choir who went full Tudor outside and inside the church; Andy Stuart, the mayor of Rye; Fr Paul White, for the loan of the beautiful St Mary’s and for writing a masterpiece script for our fire and brimstone vicar, Richard Fletcher; Martin Bruce who cried so convincingly to open the event; Arabella Ansar, the deputy town crier who oyez’ed her socks off; the iconic Ryebellion Drummers; Kt Bruce who was, as usual, everywhere for Rye News and who else? Hmm. Oh, us! Rye Players.”
Sing it Out Choir also commented on the day: “Well that was fun, commemorating the 450th anniversary of the arrival of the influential and significant Fletcher family in Rye, led through by the Rye town crier! Rye’s Sing It Out Choir performed a song written by Henry VIII himself at the Buttermarket. We then moved to St Mary’s church, pausing at Fletcher’s House to hear of the birth of Shakespeare’s collaborator – John Fletcher. Performances by Rye Players accompanied by our choir in the church followed. Led as always by Rebecca Lodge Birkebæk making this a fun, unique performance.”
The whole day has been captured in this video and you can truly see the fun that those who took part, and those who watched, had. A huge thank you to the organisers led by Simon and Paul, Arabella, and to the stewards led by the amazing ever-present Sophie Stonham, who kept the pageant rolling safely.
Rye proves once again that it understand tradition, it understands pomp and ceremony and it delivers. “God Bless Olde England and the Ancient Town of Rye.”
Image Credits: Kt bruce .
What a delightful day and a brilliant performance! Thanks and congratulations to all involved!
Well done Rye Players and the Heritage Centre!
Sorry to have missed this, wonderful to see England, is still our home. Please do another show soon, and advertise in advance. Good luck to all well done. X
Hi Anne, thank you-a lot of hard work goes in to these things so it’s good to receive your positive comment, sorry you missed it but hopefully the photos made up for that in a small way. We have a limited budget for advance advertising but this event was listed on at least three event websites, with local flyers and posters and an intensive social media campaign for some weeks before the event. Please follow Rye Players or Rye Heritage on Facebook and Instagram and keep a regular eye on Rye News to make sure you don’t miss our advance advertising.