Ottery St Mary's Tar Barrels: Devon Runs Flaming Casks Through the Crowd

Sat, 05 Nov 2022 09:00:00 +0000

Every fifth of November, in a small Devon town, a grown adult crouches, and a group of other adults lower a burning wooden barrel — coated on the inside with tar, fully alight, throwing sparks and smoke — onto their back and shoulders, and then that person stands up and runs into a crowd so tight there is nowhere for the crowd to go. This is Ottery St Mary’s Tar Barrels, and it is, by a distance, the most alarming fire tradition in Britain. I have never seen it. Having read everything about it I could find, I am not entirely sure I would keep my nerve if I did, and I have spent years in the front third of metal crowds specifically because I like it there.

Ottery-St-Mary on vo.rs

Ottery St Mary's Tar Barrels: Devon Runs Flaming Casks Through the Crowd