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WHY FROME? People often ask us ‘why are there secret tunnels in Frome?’ This is a very good question and is not easy to answer, although we have formed some opinions. Also it would appear that Frome is not that unusual in having such stories, since many older towns and cities in the UK have similar stories and a few still have access to them. What seems unusual about Frome is that the stories involve such a complex and extensive network in such a relatively small place. Although the history of Frome reputedly begins in the 7th century AD - about 685 AD the Abbot of Malmesbury, St Aldhelm, founded a monastery here and it is supposed that settlement grew up around. In fact, traces of settlement have been found dating from the bronze age and the Romans left many traces in the surrounding area. In the 9th century Alfred the Great created a network of fortified settlements across his kingdom. In the event of a Danish attack all the men in the area would gather in the local burgh to fight them. If Frome was a burgh a ditch and an earth rampart would have surrounded it with a wooden stockade on top. In 934 the king held a meeting of the Witangemot (a kind of Saxon parliament) at Frome. (Source: wwwlocalhistories.org) THE CRUCIAL PERIOD However, the period that we are particularly interested in would appear to be after Frome became a very successful town in the 14-1500’s, After Frome became famous as a wool town. Many of the rumours of secret tunnels seem to be based from buildings and parts of Frome that were built in from this period up to the 1700’s. Our belief is that even if half of the stories and tunnels exist, that building such a thing requires a great deal of effort and therefore probably has more to do with religion or politics than say, smuggling. This would point to the 150 years of serious religious and political crisis that we know of today as the Reformation (Catholic and Protestantism in conflict – seeded by Henry 8th); The Civil War and the more local Monmouth Rebellion in 1685. Since WW2 and the rise of private property, municipal services like water, power and telecoms under our streets, most of the original entrances to the tunnels have been blocked in, and many other access points such as cellars have been filled in or paved over during renovations. This makes our job a slow and difficult one! |
