Mick Haywood's Song Wordbook

Leeds Years

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Down in Yon Forest
or The Castleton Carol

This traditional English Christmas carol seems to be a reworking of the much older ‘Corpus Christi Carol’ that was sung at for the ‘Feast of Corpus Christi’ which was held on the eighth Thursday after Easter. The original Easter carol was first noted down by an apprentice grocer called Richard Hill in early 1500 and the more recent ‘Down in Yon Forest’ appears to have been only collected in Castleton in the Peak district of Derbyshire since early 1900.

Brass band and singers inside a candlelit cavern

Peak Cavern Candlelight Carols at Christmas 2015

The composer and folksong collector Ralph Vaughan Williams in 1908 noted down a version of the song sung by a Mr. J. Hall of Castleton, and in 1929 the Vicar of Castleton related how the old lead miners of the village would gather in the mine on Christmas eve and sing the carol, and other local ones, by candlelight underground. More recently the ‘Candlelight Carols at Christmas’ has become big business for the owners of the Peak and Treak Cliff Caverns. For Christmas 2022 the Peak Cavern held a series of seven Christmas concerts, with mince pies and mulled wine. Each concert featured a different local brass band playing a variety of modern favourite Christmas songs and traditional carols. The opening concert on 3rd December 2022 featured the Castleton Silver Band and the final one on Christmas Eve featured the Fairfield (Buxton) Band.

A pub front at night with Christmas tree

The George Inn, Castleton

The traditionalists, the real upholders of the village singing tradition, still meet annually at Christmas in the
George Inn, Castleton to sing unaccompanied the original village carols.

Down in Yon Forest or The Castleton Carol

Down in yon forest there stands a hall:
The bells of Paradise I heard them ring:
It's covered all over with purple and pall
And I love my Lord Jesus above anything.

In that hall there stands a bed:
The bells of Paradise I heard them ring:
It's covered all over with scarlet so red:
And I love my Lord Jesus above anything.

At the bed-side there lies a stone:
The bells of Paradise I heard them ring:
Which the sweet Virgin Mary knelt upon:
And I love my Lord Jesus above anything.

Under that bed there runs a flood:
The bells of Paradise I heard them ring:
The one half runs water, the other runs blood:
And I love my Lord Jesus above anything.

At the bed's foot there grows a thorn:
The bells of Paradise I heard them ring:
Which ever blows blossom since he was born:
And I love my Lord Jesus above anything.

Over that bed the moon shines bright:
The bells of Paradise I heard them ring:
Denoting our Saviour was born this night:
And I love my Lord Jesus above anything.

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About Mick

Mick Haywood is a traditional folk singer & folk song collector who has run and organised folk clubs and festivals for many years. He now lives in Whitby, North Yorkshire.

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