Eaten almost to the very core

Throughout Victorian times, hundreds of acres of land around the historic core of the Faithful City were covered by bountiful orchards producing considerable quantities of tasty apples and pears, together with their cheering by-products - cider and perry.

In those times too, Worcester was the birthplace of more new varieties of apples and pears than perhaps anywhere else in the kingdom, notably the Worcester Pearmain. The city was also the home of a vast commercial nursery, claimed to be the world's largest.

Even in Edwardian times, the city still had many large orchards, particularly over much of what is today Worcester's Westside and also in the north around Perdiswell and in the east at Astwood and Warndon.

Testimony to the city and county's long history of having extensive orchards is to be found in Worcester's Coat of Arms with its three black pears and in the official Worcestershire crest dominated by pear tree on a hill.

Sadly, however, the unrelenting growth of Worcester over the past 90 years has seen most of those abundant orchards dug up so that their acres could yield a very different harvest - housing!

It is calculated that in the last 50 years alone, the city and county have lost at least 70 per cent of their orchards to development, though even this is thought to be a considerable under-estimate.

Little wonder, therefore that the Faithful City is now left with only about 20 small remnants of those once proud orchards.

Thankfully, however, the city council is determined that these tangible reminders of Worcester's fruit growing past should be conserved and carefully nurtured. This is in order to preserve and promote their yields and their accompanying wildlife (birds, beetles and butterflies) and also to ensure that due regard is now given to an important but long neglected facet of the city's heritage.

Over the past year or so, a comprehensive Orchard Survey of Worcester has been undertaken. It was commissioned by the city council on the recommendation of its project greenspace officer Rory McClure, and I've been learning all about its findings from him and from the council's wildlife consultant, Will Watson.

The Three Counties of Worcestershire, Herefordshire and Gloucestershire have always been renowned for their fruit production, and the Faithful City can rightly claim to have been at the heart of this world-famous fruit growing region.

The first fruit orchards were mainly planted in monastic times, for instance by monks from Worcester Cathedral and from the abbeys and priories of the county. In fact, by the reign of Henry III (1216-1272), one Richard of Gloucester was singing the praises of "the fruit of Wircestre."

By the 19th Century there were hundreds of acres of fruit nurseries in and around Worcester. By far the largest was that first developed at St John's in the 1820s by Richard Smith, who was succeeded, in turn, by his son and grandson, also both named Richard. In 1829 alone, this nursery sold more than 10,000 fruit trees.

It grew to cover 157 acres on Worcester's Westside and, with its 18 miles of walkways, its 2,300-yard long central drive and with its 200 employees, it was said to be the world's largest commercial nursery.

In Victorian and Edwardian times, Worcester was the birthplace of nine new varieties of apple - the Worcester Pearmain, the Pitmaston Pine, the Pitmaston Golden Pippin, William Crump, Madresfield Court, Pitmaston Nonparpeil, Edward VII, May Queen and King Charles I.

During the same period, two new varieties of pear were also raised in the Faithful City - William and the Pitmaston Duchess - both complementing the Worcester Black Pear of much earlier vintage.

There are references to the Black Pear from the 14th Century, but anyone who has ever tried one - I've not had that dubious privilege - will know that the fruit is virtually inedible raw, being so hard! A monk, centuries ago, warned that it was wise to bake the Black Pear rather than eat it raw, "so it is not to be misliked".

It is said that the Worcestershire Bowmen at the Battle of Agincourt, in 1415, carried banners featuring a fruit-laden pear-tree and also had with them quantities of Black Pears which they had brought from England as part of their food provisions. This was because of the long-lasting properties of the Black Pear, though legend has it that the county's bowmen used some of the hard fruits as missiles to throw at the enemy!

The Black Pear is of particular historical significance to Worcester as Queen Elizabeth I planted a Black Pear tree on her royal visit to the city in 1575, as did the Prince of Wales (later Edward VIII) when he came to open the reconstructed Worcester Bridge in 1932. That particular Worcester Black Pear tree still stands just inside the main entrance of Cripplegate Park.

Rory McClure has met a former Worcester woman, who well remembers the time when Worcester Black Pears were "force-fed" to pupils of the Alice Ottley Girls' School. "She described them as being disgusting," says Rory, though he has spoken to other people who consider Black Pears to be delicious "when properly cooked and marinated."

Back in 1807, a J Boughton of Lower Wick Nurseries and another Worcester nurseryman named Biggs both advertised they were producing "the new Blenheim Orange apple".

But probably the most advanced of Worcestershire's fruit growers in the first half of the 19th Century was John Williams (1773-1853) who built Pitmaston House in Malvern Road, Worcester.

He laid out orchards in its grounds and went on to distribute three new varieties of apple - the Pitmaston Nonparpeil, the Pitmaston Golden Pippin and the Pitmaston Pine Apple. The last two had first been raised by a Mr White, steward to Lord Foley at Witley Court. The Pitmaston Pine was described as "a connoisseur's apple with a distinctive flavour."

John Williams was also responsible for introducing two well-known and commercially successful dessert pears - William and the Pitmaston Duchess.

But the best known of all locally raised apples is, of course, the Worcester Pearmain, first found in the market garden of William Hales at Swan Pool, St John's in 1872. Richard Smith "the second" of the huge Westside nursery paid £10 to Hales for the exclusive right to remove grafts from the tree. Smith's went on to produce the Worcester Pearmain on a large scale and it still remains one of the most important commercial varieties in the UK today.

Another local distributor of new varieties of apple was William Rowe, whose nursery was at Barbourne and who sold his produce from a shop at 65 Broad Street, Worcester and from outlets at Claines and Droitwich.

His foreman, J Carless was responsible for raising the William Crump apple, a cross between the Worcester Pearmain and the Cox's Orange Pippin, and Rowe's nursery also introduced the Edward VII apple in 1908.

Another international variety raised in Worcester was May Queen, developed by a nurseryman called Haywood in 1888.

And city directories show that during the 19th Century, Worcester had other nurseries including those of Richard Hayes at Henwick, John White at Rupert Villa, Lower Wick, and Joseph Hill-White at Comer Gardens.

Historic names such as Perry Wood and Purry Court also continue to bear testimony to Worcester's ancient association with pears.

The 20th Century dawned with Worcester's orchards at their peak. A 1905 map of the city shows vast swathes of land covered by orchards including much of St John's, Perdiswell, Astwood and Warndon. With good transport connections and an expanding market in the industrial Midlands, there was a great demand for fresh fruit.

However, the city's orchards gradually fell victim to Worcester's industrial prosperity and success. The trees were cut down to make room for new houses and, as recently as the 1990s, the city lost two more orchards as part of the Warndon Villages development.

Thus it is that the city is now left with only a few surviving pockets of its once expansive fruit orchards - around 230 trees in all. Even the Worcester Black Pear is now represented by only a few remaining trees in the city.

Nevertheless, 32 individual varieties of apple, nine of pear and five of plum are still to be found in the 20 remnants of former orchards, the largest of which is at Aconbury near Newtown Hospital.

This site, together with one adjacent to Astwood Cemetery, is council-owned and is therefore to be included in the authority's grounds maintenance programme.

Other fragments of former orchards are to be found at Claines Lane, Nunnery, Whittington Road, Warndon, Rainbow Hill, Henwick Road, Malvern Road, Fort Royal, Hanbury Park, Thorneloe and at Lark Hill and, where these are in private ownership, the council will offer maintenance advice.

Rory McClure stresses that all future plans will seek "to heighten awareness of these important landscape features and prevent further losses of their trees." He believes Worcester people should be proud of the significant role their city once played in fruit growing, producing apples and pears "with 10 times the taste of anything to be found in our supermarkets today!"

A group of volunteers called the Worcester Orchard Workers (WOW) has also been formed to care for the remaining fragments of orchards citywide. This year they harvested some of the fruit at Aconbury and are producing perry from it.

Rory McClure is keen to hear from anyone who would like to join the Worcester Orchard Volunteers, or who is interested in the history of the city's fruit orchards ,or who has any information or anecdotes to relate about them.

Please contact Rory on tel. 01905-722500.

An exhibition on Worcester's orchards, past and present, drawn up by Rory McClure, is to be mounted at the Guildhall from Monday until Friday, January 19. Admission is free, and members of the public are warmly invited to take a look.

6 Background information for this feature was drawn from the Orchard Survey of Worcester report by Will Watson.