Hereward the Wake is one of those larger than life characters from the mists of English history where it is hard to disentangle fact from legend. We do not know the exact period when Hereward was hiding in the fenland around Ely. We do know that he was a Saxon noble who had fled after falling out with William the Conqueror. He was however far from the freedom fighter resisting the Norman yoke as depicted by later generations. Hereward worked with the Normans, a sort of early day collaborator, until he fell out with William. His immediate reaction was to lead a rebellion against his Norman overlord based from the Isle of Ely although it should be noted that he was to be reconciled with William once again after his rebellion was crushed. Nonetheless Hereward was clearly from the Fenland and he used his detailed knowledge of the landscape to his advantage repeatedly embarrassing the Norman army. Over the course of several years he fought a successful guerrilla war in the marshlands around Ely. And it seems he also "dropped in" to Somersham. The text below takes up the story following his capture in a Norman ambush ..........