Mysterious marks of the gipsy callers
8:45am Tuesday 13th May 2008
SIR - With reference to my previous letter about gipsies leaving signs to their fellow travellers concerning the friendliness or lack of it in households they had visited, Roy Oseman of Worcester telephoned me to say that from his experiences, gipsies did indeed leave chalk marks on the gate or fence of houses they had visited. He remembers it going back as far as before the Second World War.
The marks were a circle with a dot inside it, or a circle with slashes across it. He recounted the story of a gipsy wanting to sell white heather to his parents. They said no thank you. Mr Oseman went out when the gipsy had gone and found a mark on their gate.
John Phillpott has generated a very interesting subject for further research.
JANET RAUSCH, Malvern.