Penny Loaf Day

During the siege of Newark, on the night of 11 March 1643, the alderman Hercules Clay dreamed three times that his house was on fire and got his family out. Soon after, a bomb from the parliamentary battery on Beacon Hill fell through the roof and every floor. In thanks he left money for a sermon every 11 March and for bread for the poor, and in Hone’s day penny loaves were handed out at the Town Hall to all who came. Newark still keeps Penny Loaf Day.