Methuen first edition - 1951
Cynthia Harnett's novel about sheep farming, the wool and cloth trades in fifteenth-century (1493) England gained her the Carnegie Medal and it was thoroughly deserved. As with the other three historical novels of hers I have read so far, the author projects an almost instinctive 'feel' for the period in question. This time, we join Nicholas Fetterlock, the son of a rich wool trading merchant, Master Thomas Fetterlock of the Fellowship of the Staple, based at the lovely small town of Burford (it still is, apart from the interminable traffic). Nicholas is friends with Hal, the son of Giles his father's shepherd, who has a plain good-tempered face. The story starts with both boys enjoying a rest above Burford, minding the flock, when they are disturbed by a tall gazehound attacking first a hare and then the grazing flock. It belongs to Master Antonio Bari of Florence, an agent of the noble banking house of the Medici. His humble round-backed secretary, is a nasty piece of work. His face was sallow and pock-marked, with little eyes that peered under heavy lids, and a large flabby mouth. He is nick-named toad-face by Nicholas. Clearly a 'baddie' from the first, then. More pertinently, Master Leach, Fetterlock's factor - or wool-packer - is clearly up to no good either. He was a cold, sour man. Cynthia Harnett's wrong-uns' are always painted in black. The two Lombards are scheming with Leach behind Thomas Fetterlock's back, to siphon off good wool (hidden in Leach's newly-built barn) and send it by pack-horse to a little used port, Lepe, rather than the official embarkation point of Southampton. Moreover, the wool is then taken across the Isle of Wight, picked up by the Lombards' galleys and sold, quite illegally in France rather than Italy.
A Sheep Street House today
Nicholas is to meet the Lombards again at his family home in Sheep Street, Burford, but not before his mother - a woman dissatisfied with being a mere merchant's spouse who would rather be linked to the nobility - has forced him to undergo a thorough wash and change of clothes. The father is much more sympathetically described, as is his mother's brother, John Stern a Bristol sea-captain, full of rich salty fun, and thrilling stories. All these characters, with other more minor ones, are effectively melded into a true-to-life story of skullduggery. In addition to the main tale of wool theft and the mal effect on Thomas Fetterlock's reputation (he even ends up in gaol at Calais) amongst his peers in the Staple, is that of the decision by Thomas to betroth Nicholas to a Newbury cloth-dealer's daughter Cecily. The Fetterlocks travel to the Berkshire town (home of the famous Jack O'Newbury) to meet Cecily's parents, Master and Mistress Bradshaw. Nicholas, worried about meeting a prim young mistress, is delighted to find a tom-boy eleven year-old instead. This sub-plot is handled very well and must have helped the author gain her Carnegie prize. The large Fair at Newbury, and the smaller one back in Burford, are well described; as is the confrontation with the bogus mendicant touting for alms at Radcot Bridge. By the time one gets to the denouement - which, in true Harnett fashion, sees the Lombards and Leach get their just deserts - the reader is fully immersed in the social life of the first years of Henry Tudor's reign.
Kirkus Reviews (whoever they are) wrote a fulsome report on the first American edition, and it is worth quoting in full:
An attractively bound and accurately illustrated novel of a young wool merchant's life in fifteenth century England. Nicholas Fetterlock's days are filled with the inns and outs of his father's Cotswold sheep business and its ally - the weaving industry, as well as a threatening mystery to solve. In the midst of plenty - his father's increasing output and reputable position, his betrothal to friendly Cecily Bradshaw that portends a good married life, Nicholas' world is disrupted by the arrival of two Lombard Italians who in nearly successful swindles, bring on Master Fetterlock's ruin. Nicholas, Cecily and a best friend catch them in the nick of time. I couldn't have summed up the story better myself!
The Wool-Pack was adapted by the BBC as a 90-minute film entitled A Stranger on the Hills, televised in 1970 as a three-part series for children. Those were the days!
The Carnegie Medal was set up in 1936 (the centenary of Andrew Carnegie's birth) by the British Library Association as a literary award for English-language books for children or young adults. Until 1969, the award was limited to books by British authors first published in England. The original rules prohibited winning authors from future consideration. Perhaps inevitably, a diversity review in 2018 led to changes in the nomination and judges process to promote better representation of ethnic minority authors and books. One can only hope that quality remains the criterion. Cynthia Harnett not only won the award in 1951 for The Wool-Pack, but was Commended in 1958 for The Load of Unicorn.
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