Ottery St Mary

Here there are two, apparently unrelated, customs for Bonfire Night, or November the Fifth. The most spectacular is the tar barrel rolling in the evening, in which blazing tar-barrels are carried on the shoulders of local men as they run around the village streets. The other is the firing of the ‘rock cannons’, which are ten partly hollowed metal bars filled with gunpowder and exploded at three points during the day, allegedly to commemorate the landing of William III in 1688 (Kightly, 1986: 131). Compare Fenny Poppers.