Yale Center for British Art and British Studies

A BIT OF Old Bristol -. showing Redoliff Churoh.
By permission of Mr. John Sycr.

BRISTOL

PAST AND PRESENT

BY
J. R NICHOLLS, F.S.A,
Chief Librarian Bristol Free Libraries
AND
JOHN TAYLOR
Librarian Bristol Museum and Library

VOL. I.-CIVIL HISTORY

BRISTOL
PUBLISHED BY J. W. ARROWSMITH, ii QUAY STREET
LONDON: GRIFFITH AND FARRAN, ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD
l88l

BRISTOL
PRINTED BY JAMBS WILLIAMS ARROWSMITH, QUAY STBEET

P^EB^CE.

0-^
RISTOL : Past and Present has been -written to supply a want in our local literature. All
previous histories of Bristol are out of print, and a demand has arisen for one that should be
written in a style adapted to the age, and in the light which time and recent discoveries
have thrown upon the past.
The field has been well ploughed by Barrett, Seyer, Evans, Corry and Evans, Heath, Chilcott,
and Pryce, who in varied styles, and each with more or less of excellence, have left their views
on record. We have not scrupled to cull freely from their pages (Seyer's great work being our
most reliable authority), but whilst we thus acknowledge their merits, we have striven to avoid their faults.
We have endeavoured to guide the pen with an impartial hand, to freshen the book with little known but
dependable facts, and to enshrine within its pages many a picturesque bit of the city. Errors there may
be, but we hope they will not be found to be serious in character or large in number.
Our aim has been to trace the origin and growth of Bristol as an integral portion of a mighty nation,
in whose onward progress she has often led the van, and to whose greatness she has materially contributed ;
aud our readers will find in the following pages abundant proof that the development of a maritime port,
from an insignificant beginning into the proud position which for centuries Bristol held as the second com
mercial city in the kingdom, cannot be dissevered from the national history.
We acknowledge with pleasure the assistance which in various ways we have received from a large
number of our fellow-citizens and others ; nor are the thanks less hearty which we tender to those whose
offers we have been unable to utilise. We are unable to place upon record the names of all those who
have helped us, but there are some whose services have been so constant and so generous that it would be
ungrateful on our part to leave our readers ignorant of their kindness. To H. C. Coote, Esq., F.S.A. ,
London, A. S. Ellis, Esq., London and Bristol, J. A. Cooke, Esq., P.S.A., Berkeley, Canon Norris, of
Bristol, the late James Knight, Worcester, for their careful reading of proofs, corrections, and supply of
new material, and to J. D, Weston, Esq., (Mayor of Bristol whilst these sheets pass through the press),
J. B. C. Burroughs, Esq., C. Pooley, Esq., C. T. Jeffeeies, Esq., Col. Kington, and the Society of
Antiquaries, for the loan of drawings, blocks and engravings, our special thanks are due.

TO THE
REV. GEORGE WEARE BRAIKENRIDGE,
M.A., F.S.A. SCOT.,
Of Win Ash House, BrisUngton, and Claremont, Ckvedon,
WHO, BEING THE POSSESSOR OF THE LARGEST AND MOST VALUABLE COLLECTION OF
RARE BOOKS, DRAWINGS, ENGRAVINGS, AND ANTIQUES
RELATING TO BRISTOL,
GATHERED THROUGH MANY YEAES BY HIS FATHER,
HAS GIVEN UNRESERVED ACCESS TO THE SAME FOE THE USE OF THIS WORK,
AND BY SO DOING HAS EXCEEDINGLY ENRICHED ITS PAGES
AND INCREASED ITS VALUE,
AS A SLIGHT APPEECIATION OF SO GENEEOUS AN ACT
BY HIS OBLIGED FRIEND, J. F. NICHOLLS, F.S.A.

^ (5EI^E^:ai; •)• II|DEX. •<•

Abona, Antonine's, Sea Mills, 19.
Aborigijial inliabitauts. 2 ; camps of,
2.
Acts a^inst drunkenness and foul
swearing. 272.
" Addled Parliament," the, 276.
Admiralty, court of, mayor and re
corder of Bristol constituted judges
of the, 195.
Agriculture under tbe Anglo-Saxons,
41.
Aid, British appeal to the Romans for,
29.
Albion, Caesar's landing in, 16.
Alchemists, palmy days of the, 137.
Aldebery of Knolle, 95.
Aldermen, shires ruled by, 33.
Aid gate, 49, 78.
Aldrych gate, 63.
Aldworth's quay (Alderskey lane).
docks at, 274.
Ale, unwholesome, 225.
All Saints (Al-Hallowen) church, 132 ;
conduit, 139 ; rebuilt, 265.
Almondsbury, 21, 23.
Almshouse, Gift house, 240 ; White's,
275.
Amalgamation of races, 11.
" Angels, not Angles," 35.
Angles, 31.
Anglo-Saxon merchant's occupation,
41 ; ships, 41 ; towns, customs of,
28 ; work in jewellery, 41.
Anglo-Saxons, agriculture under the,
41; not town dwellers, 27.
Anne, wife of James I., visits Bristol,
275.
Anthropophagism, ancient, 3.
Antona, river, the Bristol Avon, 19.
Antonine, itinerary of, 20.
Aquas Solis, 4, 18, 21, 26.
Archery, 150.
Annada, Spanish, 263.
Armour, Norman. 62 ; soldiers', 45,
Armoury square, monoliths in, 13.
Arthur, King, buried at Glastonbury,
31 ; Prince, murder of, 110.
Artificial hills, 26.
Artillery yard in Bristol castle, 285.
Ashton, 2i.
Augustine, St., abbey of, 51 ; Fife-
hide Magdalen, in Dorset, given to,
by Harding, 56 ; monastery of, 85.
Augustine's, St., conference with the
British bishops, site of, 35 ; miasion
to Britain, 35 ; rejection of by the
British bishops, 36.
Aniius Plantius in Britain, 18.
Aurelius Ambrosius slain, 31.
Aust, 20, 23; supposed site of St.
Augustine's conference, 35.
Avon, river, 6, 22, 34, 49, 54, 64, 74,
78, 91, 96; aboriginal inhabitants
of the district of, 2 ; castle at the
mouth of the, 37 ; diverted into a
temporary channel, 124; navigation
of the, 142 : obstructions in the,
196 ; valley of the, hut-circles and
pit-dwellings near the, 2; tumuli
and aboriginal fortifications near
the, 2.

Ay Iward, descended from King Alfred,
38 ; gate, 63 ; lord of the honour of
Bristol. 38 ; street, 49.
Aylwards, magistrates of Bristol, 38.
Back hall, 72 ; street, 73.
Badbury, 31.
Bail for a lord, 96.
Bakers, strike of, in Bristol, 277.
Baldwin street, 49, 55, 58, 72, 84.
Baldwin's gate, 49.
Banwell, 26.
Barons. Norman, 60 ; war, Bristol iu
the, 135.
Barrows, long-chambered, 2 ; round,
3.
Barstaple, John, 196.
Bartholomew's hospital, 232.
Barton hill, 61; manor (Barton Regis),
50, 61, 68 ; of Bristol, king's, 51 ;
regis hundred, 74, 96 ; rental of
the, 65.
Bath. 4, 21, 2i, 34, 80 ; abbey, 69 ;
military route from Caerweut to,
20.
Bear aud ragged staff, 74; baiting,
235.
Bedminster, 22, 50, 68.
BelgEe a maritime I'ace, 12 ; invasion
of Britiln by the, 4 ; origin of the,
4 ; the Kymrii, 4.
Belgarum, Venta, 15.
Belgic camps, 4 ; race, 11 ; tongue, 4,
12.
Beli, son of Dyfnwal Moelmyd, 5.
Belinus, Latin name of Beli, 5 ; effigy
of, in St. John's church, 5.
Bell lane, 24, 49.
Bells, passing and burial, 293.
Beomicia, 31.
Berkeley, 51; castle, 100; Edward II.
a prisoner in the, 163 ; family,
Robert Fitzhardinge founder of the,
58, 85, 98 ; lords of, and burgesses
of Bnstol, petty civil war between,
147 ; Roger de, half hanged before
Dursley castle, 86 ; Thomas, lord de,
marches against Owen Glendower,
194 ; witch of, 101.
Berkeley's share in the commerce of
Bristol, 194.
Bernard, St., G6.
Berry hill, or Moorend, camp, 9.
Bewell, 95.
BeweU's tump, 26.
Bible, authorised version of the,
ordered to be translated, 272.
Billeswick manor, 51.
Bishopric, Bristol made the seat of a,
239.
Bishport, 68.
Bitton, 18, 21, 96.
Black monks, 71.
Blaize, 37 ; camp, 5 ; castle, 8, 18, 20,
24.
Blanket weaving in Bristol, (.68.
Blind gate, 49.
Boadicea, insurrection under, 19.
Bones, ancient, 3.
Bookland, 33.
Booksellers first mentioned, 70.

Boucher and Teoraaus, execution of,
305.
Boucher's house, 64.
Boundaries of Bristol iu the 5th
century, i9.
Bower walls, 4. 6 ; camp, 7, 20.
Boyd, river, 22,
Brachycephalic race, the Kelts, 3.
Brandon hill, 23, 49, 61 ; purchased
by the Corporation, 284 ; hermitage
OD, 174.
Brean down (Adaxium), 18.
Brennus and Belinus sacked Rome,
5 ; founded Bristol, 5 ; effigies of in
St John church, 5; Latin name ot
Bryn, 5.
Brictric, lord of Brightstowe, 38 ;
lord of Bristol, 58.
Bridewell, 63 ; built, 243.
Bridge, Bristol, old, 90, 91,92; over
the Avon, probable, 91 ; street, 24.
Bridges over the Avoa, 124
Btigantii, 19.
Brightnee bridge, 95.
Brisliiigton, 35, 66, 70.
Bristolians a "disorderly multitude"
and "prize-fighters on foot," 86;
manners of the, in Stephen's time,
81.
" Bristowa, war of," 87.
British appeal to thtj Romans for aid,
29.
Britons, conquest of the, by the
Romans, 18 ; description of the, 17 ;
not exterminated by the Anglo-
Saxons, 32.
Brittani, first appearance of the name
in history, 16.
Broadmeacl, 50.
Broad quay, 49 ; street, 20, 27, 40, 72 ;
weir, 61.
Brunswick, Duke of, visits Bristol,
274.
Brut TysUio, 5.
Brutus, colonisation of Britain by, 5 ;
great grandson of iEneas of Troy, 5.
Bryn, or Bran, son of Dyfnwal Muel-
myd, 5.
Building in 1472, cost of, 204.
Buildings, Norman, 50; pre-Norman,
50.
Building labour and materials, value
of, in 1624, 281.
Burgage, 96.
Burhgerefa (borougli reeve), 50.
Burial beU, 293.
Burrington, IS.
Burton, Simon de, six times mayor of
Bristol, 149.
Bury bill, 18.
Cabot, Sebastian, 243.
Cadbury, 18, 26, 37 ; camp, 9, 14.
Caer Brito, 19, 20, 24; Odor, 19, 20;
built by Dyfnwal Moelmyd, 6 ; nant
Baddon, 6 ; re-named Caer Brito, 19.
Caerleon, 19.
Caerwent, or Venta Silurum, 19, 21,
22 ; to Bath, military route from,
20, 21.
Cassar, 12.

Ctesar's first attempt to conquer the
Britons, 17 ; landing in Albion, 10 ;
second attempt, IS.
Caldecott castle, 4S.
Calvinists in Bristol, 301.
Camalodunum, 19 ; captui-e of, IS,
Camp, Bower Walls, 20 : Clifton, 22 ;
Stoke Leigh, 20 ; Sudbrook, 21 ;
Roman, on Clifton down, 19 ; on
Lansdown, 20.
Camps, Belgic, 8 ; British, 6, 7, 8, 9,
11, 18, 19, 20, 27; Danish, 8; of
aboriginal inhabitants, 2 ; Roman,
7, 18, 19, 20.
Cangi, 19.
Cannibalism in Bristol, 156.
Canoe, first ever seen in Great Britain
257.
Canons' marsh, 51.
"Canterbury Tales," 182.
Canute, and Edmund Ironsides, Eng
land divided between, 41 ; avows
himself a Christian, 42 ; becomes
sole King of England, 41, 42 ;
defeated by Edinuud Ironsides, 40 ;
defeats Edmund Ironsides, 41 ; in
vades England, 40 ; letter from, to
his subjects, 43.
Canute's body, discovery of, Winches
ter college, 44 ; reign, prolonged
peace during latter part of, 43,
Canynges, will of John, 191 ; William,
184.
Capture of Bristol by the royalists
under prince Rupert, 307.
Cassivelaunus, 17.
Castle, Bristol, 64, 68, 108 ; aud town
granted to Hugh de Spencer, 159 ;
annexed to the city and county of
Bristol, 2'SS ; armour house in,
built, 289; building. 74; captivity
of Llewellyn's sons in, 145 ; circa
1544, 239 ; confinement of Stephen
in, 83 ; description of, 74 ; ditch,
67, 75, 79 ; Duke Robert and Geoffrey
at, 68, 69 ; early importance of, 65 ;
Eleanor de Montfort a prisoner in,
142 ; Geoffrey constable of, 65 ;
granted to Robert Fitzhamon, 70 ;
green, 74, 78 ; heir to earldom of
Mar seat to, 119 ; held iu William
the Conqueror's own possession, 65 ;
hill, 23 ; ichnography of, 75 ; im
prisonment of Duke Robert in, 72 ;
intended as hostile to tlie town, 74 ;
keep built by Eaii Robert, OS; mill,
79 ; moat, 75 ; not of Saxon origin,
6i; omitted from Domesday Book
65; precincts, 75; relics of, 67, 75,
77 ; recovered by Robert, earl of
Gloucester, 79 ; Robert, earl of
Gloucester, the reputed founder,
74 ; Sir John Sayntlowc constable
of, 69 ; surrender of, 135 ; surren
dered to Henry II. by William, earl
of Gloucester, 93; taken by Prince
Edward, 137 ; time of foundation
of, 64 ; very strong, 65 ; walls of,
65, 67.
Castle Gary, 79.
Castle street, 74, 78.

VI

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

Cathedral, Bristol, 24.
Catheriue wheel (Cat and Wheel),
74.
Cattle fort near Sea Mills, 8.
Cecil, Robert, elected lord high
steward of Bristol, 273.
Census of Bristol in 1606-7, 273.
Cereals, ancient absence of, 3;
Champion, the Bristol potter, 77,
Chapel of St. Maiy, 74.
Chapter house in cathedral, 35.
Charles I. proclaimed at the High
cross, 284 ; visit of, to Bristol, 311.
Charles II, at Bristol, 315.
Charles II. residing at Bristol, 294.
Charter, Bristol au example to other
towns, 95 ; celebrated, granted to
Bristol by Prince John, 93, 94, 95 ;
earliest Bristol, 91 ; granted to
Bristol by Henry III., 97 ; of
Robert Fitzhardinge, 91 ; privileges,
Bristol, 91 ; relating to the forest
laws, 133.
Charters, 90, 91, 92, 147, 159. 166, 16S,
172, 175, 177. 185, ISS, 192, 223 ;
early, of Bristol, 61 ; for building
or repairing the walls, 131 ; of ex
emption from payment of "cus
toms," 131 ; of Henry II. and Robert
Fitzhardinge, 125; restoration of,
146.
Chase of Bristol, IIS.
Chattel-ton's "Song to ^lla," 37.
Checquer lane, 78.
Chesil beach, 21.
Chew Magna, 69.
Chippenham a refuge for the Danes,
36.
Chittening street, 21.
Christian tombstone, 29,
Christianity avowed by Canute, 42 ;
in the neighbourhood of Bristol, 28 ;
profession of, by the Danes, 37 ;
Roman Catholic, introduction of,
into Britain, 35,
Christmas street, 63, 64.
Churches built on the sites of the
ancient gateways, 49 ; in the thir
teenth century, Bristol, 130,
Churl, a freeman, 33.
Churl's wergyld, 34.
Cirencester, IS.
City school, 61.
Civil war, the, 297,
Clare street, 49.
Claudius, the emperoi', in Britain, IS.
Clifton, 18, 37, 96 ; camp, 6, 22 ; down,
2, 5, 19, 24 ; Roman camp on, 19 ;
manor, 51 ; rights of commons in,
144.
Cock and Bottle lane, 75.
Cock squalling, 224.
Coin, curious, of Stephen's reign, 88 ;
first made sterling, 37.
Coinage, cojiper, alteralion of, 142 ;
of money m Bristol, 146, 149,
Coining gold and silver, 240.
Coins, Bristol. 44. 48, (',2. 73, 88, 1;'.7,
149, 215, i;41, 245 ; pennies, US ;
sdver penny of Ethelred II,, 39 ;
Roman, I'J, 2.j ; discovered in or
near Bristol, 24.
Coins, Bristol, of Charles I., 315,
Coins, Bristol, of the Commonwealth,
316.
Cold Harbours, 22.
College green, 23 ; site of St. Augus
tine's conference, 35 ; ujiper and
lower, Norman gateway between,
56.
Colonisation of Britain, 5 ; of New
foundland from Bristol, ^70.
Combe Dingle, 35.
Commerce ennobling merchants, 41;
treaty of, first foreign, 150.
"Common raker," or town sc;LVci)y.er,
salary of the, 288.
Commons, Crown and, disputes and
quan-els between, 281, 2N-I, 287, &c.
Conduit, All Saints', rebuilt, 205;
Quay, rebuilt, 2(J5 ; Temple, re
moved, 252.
Conduits, Bristol, 139.
Conjuration aud sorcery in Bristol,
251.
Conquest, Bristol a well-known and
wealthy commercial mart at the
time of the, 42.
Corn grinding, 96 ; market built in
Wine street, 282 ; street, 20, 49.

Corsairs m the Mediterranean, depre
dations of, 2S4 ; in the Severn, 293
Coroner, charter of authority to chose
a, 134.
Cotswolds, 22, 31 ; strongholds of the
Kelts, 5.
Cotton, Bristol, 168,
Council house built, 243.
Counterfeit tokens, 316.
Countess-slip ferry, 78, 124.
County, Bristol made a, 127, 167, 177 ;
courts established in Bristol, 167,
177.
Court of the county, 33.
Crafts' guilds in Bristol, 206.
Craftsmen, rise of the, 152.
Cranmer, Archbishop, in Bristol, 236.
Cromwell and Fairfax capture Bristol,
296,
Cross, BeweU's, 226 ; market, 226 ;
stallenge, 226; stone, in Old Market
street, 145.
Crosses, 26 ; Bristol, 180,
Crow lane, 49.
Cro^vn and Commons, disputes and
quarrels between, 281, 284, 287, &c,
" Crushing to death " in Bristol, 277.
Cucking stool, 75, 225, 243,
Curfew, 62 ; abolished, 74.
Danegelt, 39.
Danes, Biistol a refuge for the, 36 ;
defeated at Brent by Alfred, 36 ;
at Exeter by Alfred, 36 ; descents
of the, 36 ; profession of Christianity
by the, 37 ; sack of Bristol by the,
37.
Danish attack on Bristol, 31 ; con
quest of England, 38.
Dearth in Bristol, 134, 269.
Deaths of three aldermen of Bristol
iu one week, 253.
Deed of William, earl of Gloucester,
97.
Deeds, ancient, 132,
Defences of Bristol during the civil
war, 298.
Defended city in England, Bristol
the best, 80.
"Defender of the Faith," 228.
Deira, 31.
Deualague assigned to the Danes by
Alfred, 36.
Departure, final, of the Romans from
Britain, 29,
Dennot Macmurragh, king of Leinster,
takes refuge iu Bristol, 92.
"Devil's cathedral" at BrisUngton,
67.
Devizes, raid from Bristol on, 82.
Devon, 31.
Dioceses, British episcopal, 29.
Dispute between Archbishop Lan-
franc and Bishop Odo, 68.
Dissensions among the Britons, in
ternal, 31.
Dobuni, 4.
Dof;ks at Alderskey (Aldworth's quay)
lane, 274,
Dolberry camp, 9.
Dolebury, 18.
Dolichocephalic race, supposed repre
sentatives in South Wales, 3.
Donjon tower, 75.
Dove's tower, 49,
"Drowth, Great," 275,
Druidism, 12.
Druids, influence of the, 13.
Drunkenness, acts against, 272.
Dublin, connection of, with Bristol,
92, 137; gift of Bristol men re
warded by, 92.
Durdham down, 2, 6, 8, 21, 22,
Duties to the commonwealth, 33,
Dwellers, town, Anglo-Saxons not.
Dwellings, earliest description of, 2.
Dyfnwal Moelmyd, earl or king of
Cornwall, built Caer Odor, 5
Dyriiani, 22 ; battle of, 5, 32.
Eadric, treachery of, 40.
Ealdorman of Gloucestershire, 50.
Earliest dwellings, 2,
Earl's mead, 48.
Earthquake, great, 257; in Bristol, 73.
East Angles, 31 ; Saxons, 8],
Easton, 24,
Ecclesiastical corporations, gifts to.

Edgehill, battle of, 299.
Edmund Ironsides, Canme and. Eng
land divided between, 41 ; defeated
by Canute, 41 ; defeats Canute, 40 ;
slain, 41.
Edward I,, death of, 149; visits of,
to Bristol, 142, 143.
Edward II. and Piers de Gavestou
visit Bristol, 151 ; death, contro
versy concerning, 164 ; escapes from
Bristol, 161, 162 ; murder of, in
Berkeley castle, 105, 164; visits of,
to Bristol, 151, 159, 160.
Edward IV, 's visit to Bristol, 207.
Edward, Prince, escape of, from
Bristol, 135 ; joins the Crusade, 141.
Edwai d the Confessor, 45,
Edward VI. 's descent from a Bristol
merchant, 247.
Effigies of Brennus and Belinus in St.
John's church, 5.
Elberton, 18, 26,
Eleanor, Princess, in Bristol, 118 ;
death of, 121.
Eleanor de Montford in Bristol castle,
142,
Elizabeth, Queen, in Bristol, 254,
EUbroad street, 79.
England divided between Edmund
Ironsides and Canute, 41.
English Combe, 4.
Erse, or Gaelic, language of the Kelts,
4.
Essex, 31.
Estate, third, rise of the, 70.
Ethelfrid of Bernicia, defeat of the
British by, 36,
Ethelred the Unready, 39,
Euskarian, or Turanian, race, 2,
Evesham, battle of, 136.
Exchange, brass pillars in front of
the, 261.
Extermination , alleged, of the Britons
by the Anglo-Saxons, contrary to
historic evidence, 32.
Faggots, bearing, as penance, 225.
Fair, St. James, 182.
" Faire Maide of Bristowe," 107.
Fairfax street, 63.
Fairy land, 8.
False money, coining, iu Bristol, 246.
Famine, murrain and, 173, 273.
Farthing tokens, Bristol, 267 ; peti
tion to stamp, for Bristol aud Glou
cester, 2S4.
Farthing tokens, counterfeit, 316.
Piennes, governor of Bristol, cowardice
of, 310.
Figures, Arabic, first used, 74.
Filton, 25.
Filwood, 25.
Fined, Bristol burgesses, lOS.
Fire, brigade, first, 257 ; terrible, on
the Quay, 257.
Fish plentiful in the Avon, 204 ;
strange, caught in the river Avon,
274.
Fitzhamon, Robert, Bristol town and
castle granted to, 70 ; death of, 70.
Fitzhardinge, Robert, 72, 86, 100 ;
charter to his men iu Bristol, 91,'
125; descended from Harding, 58;
founder of the Berkeley family,
58, 85 ; intimacy between Henry
II. aud, 84, 85 ; pedigree of the
family of, 57.
Flat Holm, ;J7.
Fleet, Bristol, defeat of Simon de
Montfort's, 130; of 1441-2, Bristol's
contribution to the, \W.
Flemings settled in England, 74.
Floating harbour, 25, 49.
Flood, disastroUM, extending from
Bristol to Gloucester, 273.
Folldand, 33.
Ford over Avon, from Clifton hill to
Nightingale valley, 8.
Forest laws, charter relating to the,
133.
Forest of Dean, privileges of the
tenants withdrawn, 280.
"Forestallers," statute against, 143
Fort, at Heubur)', 8 ; cattle, near Sea
mills, 8.
Fortifications, aboriginal, 2 ; British,
8,
Foundation of Bristol, 6,
France, first political connection be
tween England and, 41.

Franciscans, choir of the, 63 ; church
of the, 63,
Frankpledge, system of, 50, 65.
Free trade, Whitson pleads for, 280.
Free women, 60.
Friars, monks aud, 129.
Frome bridge, 63 ; ditch, 78 ; gate,
64 ; river, 22, 26, 49, 61, 63, 68, 74,
80 ; ancient course of the, 122 ;
cutting a new course for the, 123 ;
wall, 62, 65,
Frost, unparalleled for intensity and
duration, 274,
Fulford, Sir Baldwin, execution of,
207.
Gaelic the language of the Kelts, 4.
Game laws, 60, 74, 111.
Gaol, city, 78.
Gateway, Norman, between Upper
and Lower College greens, 56.
Geoffrey, Bishop of Coutances, in
timately connected with the history
of Bristol, 66 ; Bristol chief resi
dence of, 68 ; families descended
from, 67 ; lord of Bristol, 68 ; Robert
de Mowbray and, at Bristol castle,
68, 69.
Geoffrey of Monmouth, 5.
George's, St., 22.
Gerefa (sheriff), 50,
Gift house, almshouse, 240,
Gift of Bristol to Prince Edward and
his wife, 133.
Giles', St., church, 49 ; gate, 63.
Glevum, 18, 22, 26.
Gloucester a royal burgh, 70 ; and
Bristol the head-quarters of Maud's
army, 83.
Gloucestershire, south, 31,
Godwin, earl of the West Saxons, 42;
death of, 46 ; defends the rights of
Englishmen, 45 ; flees to Bruges, 46 ;
restored to rank, 46.
Grammar school, founding of the,
232.
Gregory, pope, 35.
Griffith, king of Wales, conjectured
palace of, at Redland, 48 ; defeated
by Harold, 47 ; inroads of, 47 ;
treacherously slain, 48,
Growth of Bristol, 96.
Guard-house passage, 264.
Guildhall, 235.
Guilds in Bristol, 96 ; trade, or craft,
153.
Hallen, 23.
Hamdon, 18.
Hampden, John, refuses payment of
ship money, 289 ; trial of, 290.
Hampton down, 4.
Hanham, IS, 20, 22.
Hardicanute chosen king, 45 ; death
from epilepsy, 45.
Harding chief magistrate of Bristol,
55, 58, 72 ; not earl of Gloucester,
56 ; of the blood royal of Denmark,
56.
Harold and Leofwyne laud in Porlock
bay, 46 ; retire to Bristol, 46,
Harold builds a large strong house at
Portskewet, 48; defeats Griffith,
47 ; fits out a fleet at Biistol, 48.
Harold I, , elected king, 44 ; death of,
44,
Harold II, killed at Senlac, 48.
Harold's sons laud at the mouth of
the Avon, aud march upon Bristol,
54 ; repulsed from Bristol, 55 ; re
treat to Shirehampton, 55.
Harptree castle, 79.
Harrington, George, benefactor to
Bristol, 278.
Hautville's quoit, 13,
Henbury, 8, 21 ; lands at, endowed to
Worcester cathedral, 33.
Henry Huntingdon, 0,
Henry of Lancaster seizes Bristol, 1S9,
Henry, Prince, conveyed to Bristol
for safety, 84 ; Bristol the head
quarters of, 87,
Henry L, contest between Duke
Robert and, 70.
Henry II, and Robert Fitzhardinge,
intimacy between, 84, 85 ; charter
of, 125 ; visits Ireland, 92.
Henry IIL crowned at Gloucester
116; holds a council at Bristol 117-
resides at Bristol, 117. * '

GENERAL INDEX.

Vll

Henry IV., plot against, 193 ; visits
Bristol, 200,
Henry VII. visits Bristol, 221.
Heraldry, lOS.
Heresy in Bristol, 225.
High cross, Bristol, 180, 181 , en
larged, 292.
High steward to be one of the privy
council, 253.
High street, 20,
Highbury, 27.
Hops introduced, 225.
Hore wood (Horfield), 60, 61 ; chase,
118.
Horsefair, 50,
Horton, 18.
Hospital, Bartholomew's, 232; Queen
Elizabeth's, 61, 260 ; Trinity, 196.
Hospitality, profuse, in the twelfth
century, 152,
Hotwells, 8,
House, thane's, 34.
Hundred, Bristol, 96.
Hundreds, 50.
Hungroad, 73.
Huntingford chase, 118.
Hut circles, 2.
Hwiccas, 31.
Iceni, 19.
Implements, ancient, 3.
Independent church in Castle green,
78.
Independent state, Bristol an, 155,
Insurrection, great, in Bristol, 153.
Invasion of Britain by the Belgas, 4,
Inventory of Roger the Dyer, 141,
Ireland, Bristol men and money
helped the invasion of, by Strong-
bow, 92 ; rebellion in, 297.
Irish crown assumed by Henry II.,
93.
Isle of Wight, 18.
Itinerary of Ajitonine, 20.
Jack Cade, Bristol, 174,
Jacob's wells, 61, 141.
James I. proclaimed at the High
cross, 269.
James, Thomas, M.P, for Bristol,
begins a successful opposition to
purveyance, 270.
James', St. , back, 63 ; church, 50, 65 ;
fair, 109 ; monastery, 74 ; priory,
63, 65, 71, 86.
Jehosaphat, valley of, 8,
Jew of Bristol, 112,
Jewellery, Anglo-Saxon work in, 41,
Jewry, 64; lane, 61.
Jews, arrest of all, for treason, 142 ;
arrival of, in Bristol, 61 ; in Bristol,
97; 16,000 banished from England,
143.
Joanna of Navarre, Bristol granted
to, 194.
John, king, marries Hawise, lady of
Bristol, 108 ; divorced from Hawise,
110; struggle between thepope and,
111; succeeds Richard L, 109; suc
cumbs to the pope, 113 ; visits
Bristol, 110.
John, prince, earl of Mortain, lord of
Bristol, 90.
John's, king, chapel, 115 ; house, 72
115 ; hunting lodge in Kingswood,
115.
John's, St., church, 49 ; effigies of
Brennus and Belinus in, 5 ; con
duit, 139 ; gate, 63.
Jordan, St., buried in College green,
35.
Julius Frontinus, 19,
Jutes, 31.
Keltic and Belgic strife, 4, 5 ; race,
11 ; tongue, 12,
Kelts first colonisers of Britain, 5 ;
language of the, 4 ; or brachy
cephalic race, 3 ; originally from
the continent, 3 ; rude and barba
rous habits of the, 3,
Kendelan, Llywarch Hen's elegy on
the death of, 5,
Kenmoor, 24.
Keynsham abbey, 71.
King David inn, 103.
King street, 63.
King's barton, of Bristol, 51, 74 ; mill
on the Avon, 49 ; wood (Kings-
wood), 60,

Kingscot manor, 73.
Kingsdown, 23,
Kingsland, 61.
Kingswood, 34, 60 ; monastery of, 99,
Kitchen, Abel, benefactor to Bristol,
276.
Knole, 18 ; camp, 9,
Kymric race, 11.
Labour, value of, in 1624, 281,
Labourers, statute of, 173.
Land, Saxon division of the, 33,.
Landgable service, 96,
Language, interchange of, 11,
Lansdown hill camp, 9 ; Roman camp
on, 20.
Lastage, 95,
Latimer, Hugh, in Bristol, 236.
Laurence, St., churchyard of, 64.
Lawrence Weston hill, 21.
Lead, discovery of, in river Frome,
26.
Leigh down, 24.
Leonard, St., lane, 49.
Lewin's mead, 48, 51, 63.
Library, city, ancient manuscripts in
the, 129 ; the calendars', burned,
205.
Library, first free, established in
England, 277.
Ligurians identical with the Belgee,
5.
Linen first made in England, 137.
Litany first sung in English, 240.
Little Peter street, 78.
Little Salisbury, 18.
Llywarch Hen's elegy on the death
of Kendelan, 5.
Local jottings, Tovey's, 183.
Locke, John, the philosopher, 295,
London always a free city, 32 ; an
exemplar for the men of the west,
32 ; Bristol rivalling, 32.
Long Ashton camps, 9,
Lordship of Bristol a dower of the
Queens of England, 59.
Lower Castle street, 67, 75, 79.
Lundy castle, 120 ; island, 120 ; cap
tured by Spaniards, 121 ; forfeited
to the king, 121 ; plundered by
French privateers, lal ; receptacle
for convicts, 121,
Lynch law in Bristol, 59,
Mad Parliament, 134.
Maes knoll, 4, 18, 26 ; camp, 11 ;
tump, 25, 27.
Maesbury, 18, 26.
Magdalens, nunnery of the, 103.
Magna Charta, 114.
ManiUa hall, 24,
Manor, Bristol, 68.
Manufactures and exports, Bristol
prominent in, 39.
Manuscripts, ancient, in the city
library, 129.
Marisco, William de, lord of Lundy,
120 ; hanged, drawn and quartered,
121,
Mariners* guild in Bristol, 96, 200,
Marlborough, 26, 27,
Marriage, royal, in Bristol, 146,
Marsh of Bristol. 51, 90, 122, 235; St.
Augustine's, 123 ; street, 49, 80.
Marshfteld, 22,
Martin's, St., church, 76.
Martyrs, Bristol, during reign of
Queen Mary, 248.
Mary-le-port churchyard, mooring
ships in, 133.
Mary's, St., chapel, 74,
Massacre of twelve hundred monks,
36.
Materials, building, value of, in 1624,
281.
Maud and Robert, earl of Gloucester,
at Bristol, 82; and Stephen, strife
between, 79.
Maud's army, Bristol and Gloucester
the head-quarters of, 83.
Mayor, charter to the burgesses of
Bristol to choose a, 117.
Mayors, Bristol, 165, 176, 178, 190 ;
calendar, 178 ; dues, earliest men
tion of, 166.
Measuring land, Roman method, 26.
Megalithic structures connected with
Druidical worship, 13.
Mendip, 22 ; hills, 26,

Merchant street, 92 ; venturers,
society of, incorporated, 243 ; rules,
&c,, of the, 244.
Merchants, Bristol, grant a tax to
Henry III,, 90; guild in Bristol,
Q6, 152.
Mercia, 31 ; kingdom of, 34,
Michael's, St,, hill, 23.
Military route from Caerwent to
Bath, 20, 21 ; service, 33.
Military establishment in Bristol, 312 ;
pay in 1644, 312.
Millerd's view, 76.
Mint of Bristol, 27, 38, 246,
" Miskenning," 95.
Monasteries, suppression of, 228, 237.
Monastery of Kingswood, 99 ; St.
Augustine, 85 ; St. James, 74.
Monken bridge, 63.
Monks and friars, 129.
Monoliths — Armoury square, 13 ;
Hautville's quoit, 13 ; Stanton
Drew, 13 ; Stoke Bishop, 13 ; Wick,
13.
Monopoly, trade, 288.
Montpelier, 23.
Moorend, or Berry hill, camp, 9.
"Mortmain," 132; first statute of,
143.
Mount Badon, 31.
"Murage," 131 ; imposed upon Bris
tol, 119,
Murrain and famine, 173, 273.
Nailsea, 24.
Name of Bristol, derivation of the,
15 ; first use of the, 73 ; synonyms
for the, 15 ; variations in spelling
the, 14,
Names of Bristol, original, 14 ; other
places having similar, 15.
Narrow quay, 49.
Narrow Wine street, 49, 78.
Navy, origin of the royal, 40.
" Needless bridge," 63.
Nelson street, 63, 73.
Neptune, statue of, 140.
Netherways, 25.
New cut, 28,
Newfoundland, colonisation of, from
Bristol, 279.
Newgate, 49, 67, 74, 73 ; hill, 63,
Nibley green, battle of, 209.
Nicholas, St., church, 49, 62 ; site of
the first, 130 ; street, 49, 73.
Night watches, 254.
Nightingale tower, 49 ; valley, or
Stoke Leigh slade, 7, 24.
Nomenclature, Keltic, 14.
Norman wall of Bristol, 63.
North camp, 9 ; gate, 49 ; Stoke, 5,
18 : WraxaU, 22.
Northumbria, 31.
Old Market street, 68, 75.
Oldbury, 18 ; camp, 9.
Oldland common, 23,
Ordovices, 19.
Origin of Bristol, 15 ; Latin, 27.
Parliament at Bristol, 145 ; dispute
between Charles I. and the, 297 ;
division into Lords and Commons,
167 ; first summons by writ to
Bristol to send representatives to,
166 ; in Bristol, writs for summon
ing a, 194 ; members of, paid, 151,
227 ; Simon de Montfort's, 135 ;
the " Long," 292.
Passing bell, 293.
Patent of earldom, first specimen of,
83.
Patriots, leaders of the, 270.
Pay, military, in 1644, 312.
Penpark hole, 26,
Penpole, 35,
Perambulation of Bristol, 178.
Peter street, 74.
Peter's pence, 93; St., church, 49, 70,
74 ; parish, 50.
" Petition of Right," the famous,
287,
Philadelphia street, 79.
Philippa, queen, heads in Bristol
representing, 175.
Philip's, St., church, 78; national
school, 75 ; parish, 50.
Phosnicians trade to Cornwall, 12.
PHI pirates, 257,

Pillars, brass, in front of the Ex
change, 261.
Piracy in the Severn, commission to
Bristol men to suppress, 276.
Pirates in the Bristol channel, 207 ;
Pill, 257,
Piratic habits of old seaport towns,
146,
Piratical attacks upon Bristol com
merce, 120,
Pit dwelling, contents of a, 11 ;
dwellings, 1, 10,
Pithay, 49 ; bridge, 63 ; gate, or Ayl-
ward's gate, 38, 63 ; lower, 64 ;
nether, 63 ; or Aylewarde street,
38, 63.
Plague in Bristol, 173, 269, 292.
Plate, church, seized for the king's
use, 247.
Poll tax, 1S5,
Pontage, 95.
Pope's, the, supremacy in England
thrown oflf, 236.
Porlock, 37 ; bay, 47,
Portbury (Portchester), 24, 37, 73 ;
camps, 9,
Portishead, 4, 37.
Portskewet, Harold builds a large
strong house at, 48.
Postern gateways, 49,
Precedence in town council, dispute
concerning, 279.
Prehistoric records of Bristol, 1.
Priests forbidden to marry, 74.
Printing in Bristol— the first book,
310, -
Privateers, French, plunder Lundy
island, 121.
Privileges, ancient, of Bristol citizens,
27, 90, 91 ; Roman surviv.ils, 96.
Protest, thi^ celebrated, of the Com
mons, 280,
Provisions, prices of, in 1314-15, 155,
Publius Ostorius Scapula, IS.
Pucklechurch, in the king's wood, 38 ;
king Edmund killed at, 38.
Puritans not to be confounded with
the Nonconformists, 269.
Purveyance an acknowledged griev
ance, 269 : denounced by John
Whitson, 270 ; successful opposi
tion to, begun by Thomas James,
M.P. for Bristol, 270.
Purveyors' exactions, 275.
" Quartering," first infliction of the
punishment of, 121
Quay, 49 ; conduit rebuilt, 265 ; pipe,
139 ; street, 61.
Queen Elizabeth's hospital, 61, 260 ;
square, 51, 81 ; street, 75, 78.
Quo warranto, statute of, 144,
Rackhay, origin of the name, 170.
'• Recognitio," 95,
Recorder to be a " Bencher," 250.
Red book, little, 170.
Redcliff, 50; disputed jurisdiction in,
147, 161, 167 ; hill, 23 ; men of, 91 ;
pipe, 140 ; street, 63 ; united with
Bristol, 122, 125, 127 ; vill, 127.
Redland, 21 ; conjectured palace of
Griffith, king of Wales, at, 48.
Relics of old bridge, 91,
Religion, ancient British, 12.
Religious foundations of Bristol in
the thirteenth century, 130; houses
of Bristol in the thirteenth century,
129,
Rent account, ancient, 64.
Rental of Bristol, 65 ; in Domesday
book, 61 ; rents of Bristol, 70,
Representation direct, of the people,
135,
Revenues of the town farmed out to
the burgesses, 119, 131,
Ribalds of Bristol, 134,
Ricart, Robert, 5, 214.
Richard I., 107.
Richard II, visits Bristol, 186, 189.
Richard of Cirencester, iter of, 20,
Ridgeway, 21, 25,
Rights of Englishmen, earl Godwin's
defence of the, 45,
Risings in Bristol and throughout the
west country, 242,
River, tidal, frozen to Hungroad, 252.
Robert de Mowbray and Geoffrey at
Bristol castle, 68, 69.

VIII

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

Robert, duke, blindness of, a monk
ish invention, 72 ; contest between
Henry and, 70 ; contest between
William Rufus and, 68 ; imprison
ment of, in Bristol castle, 72,
Robert, earl of Gloucester, capture
of, 84 ; death and burial of, at
Bristol, 86 ; exchanged for Stephen,
84 ; marriage of, 71.
Robert the Rhymer, 6,
Robes, aldermanic, of office, 264,
Roman camp on Clifton down. 10 ;
camps, IS ; prEctorium, Bristol
castle the site of a, 64 ; towns,
customs of, 28; wall of Bristol,
63.
Romano-British fortresses, IS.
Romans, conquest of the Britons by
the, 18 ; final departm-e of, from
Britain, 20.
Rome and Bristol, resemblance be
tween the physical geogi-aphy of,
23,
Rowing from London to Bristol by
sea in a river wherry, 263.
Royal fort, 24,
Rupert, prince, siege and capture of
Bristol by, 306.
Salisbury plain, Roman camp on, IS.
Salt, value of, 260.
Sanctuary, breaking, in Bristol, 145 ;
privileges of, in Temple street, 239.
Sandbrooke, 95.
Sanitary condition of Bristol, 288.
Saxon in\'aders, 31.
^cotiih princesses at Bristol, 112.
Sea mills, S. IS;, 23, 26, 2S ; Antonine's
Abona, 19, 20 ; conjectured escape
of Griffith, king of Wales, from
48.
Seal, Bristol, alleged origin of the,
142 ; for the mayor of the staple,
170.
Seals, use of, 62.
Seizure of Bristol for the Parliament,
300,
Sepulchre, making and keeping the,
203.
Severn, 18, 34 ; bore, or " hygra," 85 ;
valley, flooding of the, 134.
Shakespeare's company of actors in
Bristol, 235
Shambles, butchers', on the quay, 49,
Sheriff", the king's representative, 33.
Ship and warriors presented by God
win to Hardicanute, 45.
Ship money, 290 ; origin of, 40.
Shipping, Bristol, 171. 177.
Ships, seizure of, by Bristol men, 140.
Shipward, John, pedigree of, 217.
Shire meeting, 33,
Shirehampton, 24, 55,
Shires ruled by aldermen, 33.
Shooting matches, early, between
Bristol and Exeter, 278.
Shoots on the Severn, 21.
Sipge of Bristol by 20,000 men, 156;
by the royalists under prince Ru
pert, 306, 307.
Silbury, -20, 27.
Silurcs, IS.

Silurum, Venta, or Caerwent, 19, 21,
22.
Simon de Montfort, earl of Leicester,
134 ; death of, 136
Sixhynde man, or townsman, 34,
Skadpulle (Scatterpool) street, 49,
Skeletons, ancient, 3.
Skulls, ancient, 3.
Slave trade in Bristol, 42, 59,
Slaveiy, Bristol and Somersetshire
men redeemed from, 284.
Slingers' platforms, 2, 10.
Small street, 49, 63.
Sneyd park, 73.
Snow, heaviest fall of, on record, 269,
Soap, Bristol, 121.
Soapmakers, Bristol, 108.
Socmen, 60.
Sodbury, 18,
Somerset, 31.
SorceiT, conjuration and, in Bristol,
251.
South Saxons, 31.
Sports, ancient, 109 ; and pastimes iu
Tudor days, 224,
Spenner, de, the elder, hanged at
Bristol, 162; Thomas, execution of,
at the High cross, 194.
Spyccr's house at the Welsh back,
174.
Stage players in Bristol, 235, 276.
Stallenge, or Market cross, 78,
Standing of Bristol, early important,
35,
Stanton Buiy, 4 ; camp, 11 ; Drew,
13.
Staple, mayors of the, 170.
Statute of Westminster, 144,
Step pill, 21.
Stephen and Mand, strife between,
79 ; called the " War of Bribtowa "
87.
Stephen exchanged "for Robert, eail
ol Gloucester, S4 ; seizes Bristol,
79.
Stephen's, St., street, 49.
Steward of the court of the tolzey to
be an under barrister, 250.
Stigand, archbishop of Canterbury,
43,
Stoke Bishop dolmen, 13.
Stoke Leigh, 37 ; camp, 4, 6, 20 ;
slade, or Nightingale valley, 7, 24.
Stone bridge, 63.
Stone curiously sculpturfd, in low
relief, found in chapter house, 35 ;
found at Sea mills, Roman incised,
28, 29.
Stralford, execution of, 207.
Streets of Bristol, plan of the, 27.
Strikes first acknowledged, 173.
Submcjging of Bristol proposed, 70,
81.
Sudbrook camp, 19, 21, 48.
Supplies, sole right of raising vested
in the peojile, 150.
Suniamos, 62 ; universal use of, 151.
Surveys, trigonometrical, 26,
Suspension bridge, 7.
Sussex, 31.
Swearing, foul, act against, 272,
Sweating sickness, 243,

Sweyn, Canute's eldest son, lord of
Bl istol, 44 ; elected king of England,
40,
Swineshead hundred, 96.
Talbot, Geoffrey, takes refuge iu
Bristol, 79,
Temple, 50 ; (conduit, 140 ; removed,
252 ; fee, 161.
Teutonic race, 11 ; settlements in
Britain, 31,
Tewkesbury abbey, 70.
Thane's house, 34 ; Saxon, 60 ; the
king's fellow freeman, 34 ; wergykl,
34,
Theatrical representations in Bristol,
first mention of, 234.
Thomas, St., 50 ; parish, 51.
Tliorne, Nicholas aud Robert, 241 ;
sir Robert, 231,
Tliralls, serf-born, 152.
Tickenham, 24.
Tokens, counterfeit, 316.
Toll, Bristol citizens claim to be free
of, 27 ; on fish brought into Bristol,
imposed by John, 113.
Tolzey built, 240.
Tombstone. Christian, 29.
Tournament at Bristol, 166.
Tower between the Blind gate and the
Pithay, 49 ; lane, 49, 63.
Towers, dimensions of various, 75.
Town clerk to be an under barrister,
250,
Town council, precedence in, dispute
concerning, 279.
Town dwellers, Anglo-Saxons not, 27.
Towns and cities, number of, found
in Britain by the Anglo-Saxons. 31 ;
British, 8.
Townsfolk, 60.
Townsman, or sixhynde man, 34,
Trade monopoly, 2S8.
Trajectus, Roman station, 20.
Trial by wage duel, 95,
Trin mills, 123.
Trinity hospital, lf'6,
Trym, river, 8, 22.
Tumps, 26.
Tumuli, 2, 11.
Turanian, or Euskarian, race, 2.
Turkish pasha, visit of Ali Galigha,
to Bristol, 284.
Turkish pirates iu the Severn, 293.
"Turtles" in Bristol, 166,
Tyndale at Sodbury, 229.
Tyndale's Testament, 231.
"Tyne," 96.
Tythings, 50.
Uniformity, act of, passed, 252.
Union of Scotland and England, 272.
Union street, 49, 63,
Values of articles paid as part of the
Danegelt, 41.
Venta Belgarum, 15 ; Silurum, or
Caerwent, 19, 21, 22.
Vespasian in Britain, 18,
Vessels, ancient, 3,
Villeins, GO.
Vincent's, St., rocks, 6, 22, 79.

Vineyards in Gloucestershire, 85.
Vitrified fort, 7.
Walcombe slade, 8.
Wales, conquest of, 144 ; prince of,
first English, 145.
Wall of defence at Redcliff", 128 ; on
the Marsh, 128.
Wallace, sir William, death of, 149.
Walls of Bristol, 62, 63 ; founders of
the, 27 ; plan of the, 27.
Wansdyke, 4.
" War of Bristowa," 87.
Watchet, 37.
Water supply, Bristol, 139,
Watling street, 36,
Weapons, ancient, 3.
Wedmore, peace of, 36,
Weir, 79,
Welsh chronicles, 5 ; triads, 5,
Werburgh, St., 34; church, 34; gate,
49,
Wergyld, 34,
Wessex, 31.
West, Bristol the metropolis of the,
85 ; Saxons, 31,
Western part of the kingdom, Bristol
the capital of the, 87,
White's, Dr, Thomas, almshouse,
275.
Whitson, John, denounces the exer
cise of purvevance, 270; mayor of
Bristol, 269 ; M.P. for Bristol, 270;
monument and tomb to, in St,
Nicholas church, 286 ; pleads for
free trade, 280 ; stabbed by Callow-
hill, 235,
Wick, IS, 21, 22,
William, duke of Normandy, visits
England, 46.
William the Conqueror, 53 ; death of,
62 ; dii-ect line of dynasty ended,
90 ; receives the lordship of Bristol,
54 ; visits Bristol, 59.
William Rufus at Bristol, 70 ; contest
between duke Robert and, 68 ;
death of. 70,
Wiltshire, West, 31.
Windmill erected on Brandon hill,
253,
Wiue at Bristol, 110, 112.
Wine street, 20, 49, 63,
Wishart, George, in Bristol 236,
Witanagemot, 33, 34 ; grants of early
fleets by the, 40,
Witch of Berkeley, 101.
Woollen cloth first manufactured in
England, 108,
Worle camp, 9, 74 ; hill fortified by
the Danes, 36,
WraxaU hill, 24.
Wulfstan, bishop of Worcester, 42 ;
preaches against the slave trade, 59.
Wycliff"e, John, 186.
Wi cliffites in Bristol, 190,
Wyrcestre, William, 6, 214.
Yeomans and Boucher, execution of,
305,
Yeomeu versus knights, 172.
Zigzag, the, 8,

^ LIST ^ OB + ILMSTPTIGIIS. ^

Page
A Bit of Old Bristol. From Painting by Syer. Frontispiece,
Gorge of the Avon, with Pit-dwellings on Downs ... 2
Transverse Section of Long Barrow at Stoney Liitlbton 3
Entrance to Uley B arrow, Gloucestershire ... ... 3
Camps of the Avon ... ... ... ... ... 7
Woblebury City and Fortress ... ... ... 10
The Megalithic Circles at Stanton Drew ... ... 13
The Stones in the Orchard, Stanton Drew ... ... 14
Roman Galleys ... ... ... ... ... 17
Roman Soldier ... ... ... ... ,,. 18
Coin of Vespasian ... ... ... ... ... 19
Site of Ancient Bristol ... ... ... ... 23
Site of Ancient Rome ... ... ... ... 23
Nightingale Valley, Leigh Woods ... ... ... 24
Cromlech at Stoke Bishop ... ... ... ... 26
Roman incised Stone, found at Sea Mills ... 29
Saxon Arms and Armour ... ... ... ... 33
Anglo-Saxon Ship ... ... ... ... ... 34
Anglo-Saxon Writing of the 6th Century ... ... 36
Fragment of a Copy of the Evangelists in Latin, from
AN Anglo-Saxon MS. of the ICth Century, with
Illuminated Initial Letter
Bastion and Tower of the Second Wall
Bristol Silver Penny op Canute
Danish Arms ...
Plan of Early Norman Castle
The Neighbourhood of Bristou about the time of the
Norman Conquest...
Ruins of the Castle of Rougemont, Exeter ...
Norman Ship ...
Seal of P.obbrt Fitz H.ardinge
Norman Soldiers— Archer and Crossbowman ...
Bristol Penny of William I. ...
Silver Penny of Willi .iM
MoNKEN, OB Bridewell, Bridge
Supposed Effigy of Bishop Geoffrey ...
Supposed Effigy of Robert Fitzroy ...
Supposed Effigy of King Edward HI...
Supposed Effigy of King Edward I. ...
Old House in Baldwin Street
Great Dungeon Tower of Bristol Castle
Ground Plan of the Ancient Castle of Bristow
Water Gate to Bristol Castle
Houses built on the Frome Wall
Remains of supposed Latrine on the Frome Wall
Entrance to Old Berkeley Castle

37
40
4445475153 55
57 60
626264
6565666673 75
7678808384

Silver Penny of Stephen
Robert's Penny
Bristol Bridge
The Walls of the Burgh of Bristol in the Time of
John, Earl of Mortain ...
Seal of William, Earl of Gloucester
Bristol Penny of Henry II. ...
The Witch of Berkeley. From the Nuremberg Chronicle,
1493 
Berkeley Castle in the I7th Century
" Dominus MEUS Mauricius " ...
Effigies from the Altar Tomb St. Mark's
Ships of the 13th Century
Fac-simile of Magna Charta ...
Lundy Castle in the 17th Century ...
Old Bristol Bridge ...
Map of Bristol in the 13th Century, showing the whole
of the Walls, and the sites of the Ancient Churches
and Religious Houses
Simon de Montfort
Newport Castle
Dr. White's Almshouse and Statue of Neptune
Bristol from Brandon Hill, 14th Century ...
Four-leaved Mouldings. From Spycer's Hall
Ball Mouldings, 14th Century
Lecture on Anatomy. From an ancient MS. on Sur
gery, preserved in the City Library, Bristol,
circa 1380—1400 ...
Bandaging a Fractured Limb. Ibid ...
Newgate at the close of the 18th Century, showing
THE AlMSBOX for PoOR PRISONERS ...
Chepstow Castle
Tome of Edward II. in Gloucester Cathedral
Details of Roof of the Hall of Spycer's House
Initial Letter from old Bristol Charter
High Cross, as altered in 1633
Silver Street and Entrance to St. James' Fair
"With Powles wyndowes corven on his shoos"
Fac-simile of Wycliffe's Bible
Head Dresses...
The High Cross in 1697
17th Century House in St. Mary-le-port Street
Juyn's Chapel, at his House near Bishopworth
Old Merchants' Hall. From Millerd's Map ...
Cannon, circa 1420 to 1460
Costume Henry V., circa 1420...
Costume, circa 1410 — 30

Page

91
94
97 98
102 104
105106
109 115120
125

129 136137
140
145 149 149

152153 157
163 165174
175 181182183 186
188189 196 198
200201202 203

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

Cook and Kitchen, circa 1430...
Bedstead, circa 1450 ...
Interior and Furniture, circa 1450
Thobnbury Church and Castle
Knight and Horse, in complete Armour, circa 1480
Costumes, cii-ca 1460 ...
Costumes, c(>crt 1475 ...
William Wyrcestre ...
Bristol Gold Noble, 1465
Bristol Light Groat, 1464
Bristol Gold Noble, 1470
Carriage of the 15th Century
Chapel to Three Kings of Cologne — Foster's Almshouses
Richard III. and his Qt^een
The Guild Hall in Broad Street. From Millerd's Map
The Pithay, looking upwards from the Gate
The Old G.ate in College Green. From Millerd's Map
Fac-simile of a page op Tyndale's New Testa:ment, in
the Baptist College, Brlstol
Ye Custom house upon ye Back of Bristoll. From
Millerd's Map
King David Inn, on the Site of the Priory of St. Mary
m.agdalen
Monogram of Sharington's Initials ...
Bristol Shilling of Henry' VIII.

Page 205208 208
210 212212
212 214
215215216
216 218220223228230231
234239241
243

The Tolzey ... ... ... ... ... ... 243
Specimens of Decorations in the Mint, now St. Peter's
Hospital ... ... ... ... ... ... 246
Arms of the Seymour Family... ... ... ... 248
Highbury Congregational Church ... ... ... 249
Queen Elizabeth at St. John's Gate ... ... ... 255
Lobby and Door in the Red Lodge ... ... ... 259
Brass Pillars in front of the Exchange ... ..261
Guard House Passage... ... ... ... ... 264
Bristol Farthing, 1594 ... ... ... .. 267
Mural Decorations of i Dormitory in the Deanery.
Temp. James I. ... ... ... ... 270, 271
Prince Rupert. From an old print ... ... ... 277
Rogers' Hox'se (Eedcliff Street). From Millerd's Map 281
John Whitson 's Arms... ... ... ... ... 286
Drawing-room Door OF John Langton's House. Temp, 1614 287
Col. Fiennes. From an old print ... ... ... 295
Sketch of the Outworks of Bristol in 1644 ... ... 298
Robert Yeomans ... ... ... ... ... 302
Wine Street, with the Entrance to the Guard-house,
17th Century. From an old print ... ... 303
Church and Griffin Lanes, from Park Row ... ... 308
Sir Ralph Hopton. From an old print ... ... 311
Fac-simile of Letter from Sir Ralph Hopton.. .. 313
Prince Maurice. From an old print... ... ... 315

^kdA

Civil History.

CHAPTER I.

I. Introductory. 2. Camps, Hut-circles and Pit -dwellings. 3. Long Barrows. 4. Round Barrows.
5. TAe Kelts. 6. TAe Belgce and their origin. 7. T/fey invade Britain, 8. awi 6mj7^ i/je Wansdyke.
g. iiTe/ijc a»^ Belgic Camps. 10. £fl;rZ)/ Traditions of the origin of Bristol. 11. Inferences deducible
from them. 12. Earliest Names. 13. Seyer's conclusions from Traditions and Histories. 14. Clifton Camp.
15. Burgh Walls Camp; 16. 7^s singular construction. 17. 5to^e LeigA Camp. 18. Pit- dwellings on
Durdham down. ig. Difficulty in identifying and assigning the Camps. 20. Blaize Castle. 21. ifwo^e
Camp. 22.' Berry ilj7^ (Moorend). 23. Oldhury Camp. 24. iVori^ Sto^e Camp. 25. Portbury, Cadbury
and Dolberry Camps. 26. lYor^e iJi7? ; zYs /oose stowe Ramparts, Slingers' Platforms, and numerous Pit-
dwellings. 27. Curious discoveries when excavated. 28. Maes Knoll, zg. Why these Camps were raised.
30. Amalgamation of races. 31. Influence of Commercial Intercourse. 32. Druidism. 33. 7fe supposed
Temple at Stanton Drew. 34. Conjectural uses of the Megaliths. 35. Bristol, origin of its name. Saxon.
36. Possible Chaldean derivation. 37. Arguments which have been adduced for its antiquity.

HE preHstoric records of tlie neighbour
hood of Bristol are neither few nor
insignificant. Many able writers have made its ar
chaeology their study, their researches
have been continuous and skilful, much
knowledge has been acquired, and new
theories have supplanted ancient opinions.
Ethnology, philology, and the study of castrameta-
tion have each thrown light into the misty past ; tradi
tion has been analysed, and earliest references in history
have been noted by these diligent students.
We approach the subject with diffidence ; never was
the adage "Many men, many minds" more applicable
than in this domain of science, in which no man knows
sufficient to warrant his being dogmatic.
[Vol. I.J

Our business will be to narrate ascertained results,
to collate inferences, to attempt to put together the
parts of the curious prehistoric puzzle, rather than to
enter into detail, or to pronounce emphatically. We
may theorize occasionally, but having brought forward
the known facts and prevalent ideas we shall leave our
readers to draw their own conclusions.
Further than this no writer on the prehistoric ages
can go with safety.
Comparisons of the forms of the camps, the earth
works and tumuli; the shapes and sizes of the skulls,
the positions of the skeletons, the weapons, utensils,
ornaments, that have been discovered ; the names that
cling to the locality, time-worn traditions and scanty
references in early writings, are the only materials
available with which to rehabilitate peoples whose

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

existence has been almost obliterated by the trailing
foot of time.
The study need not be a wearisome one ; our aim
will be to make it clear, brief, pleasant and profitable.
We pass by the paleolithic man and his rough un-
poUshed implements of flint, whom modern scientific
research assigns to the interglacial or preglacial period,
and begin with the supposed Turanian or Euskarian
race. 2. On the belt of lulls that surrounds the valley of
the Avon, remote from the activities of commerce, and
on ground too rocky for the ploughshare, may be seen
partially effaced groups of the hut-circles and pit-
dweUiugs of the aboriginal inhabitants of the district,
together with not a few tumuli and many of their forti
fications.

Gorge of tlie, Avon, v:ith Pit-dwellinga on Downs.

The camps, in the area of which the ancient dwell
ings are as a rule most abundant, are situated on the
hills, in spots where they are the most difficult of access,
every gorge bristles with ravelins, and each winding
ravine that leads up to the summit is guarded like a
covert way with pits for the archers, that have low
ramparts thrown u.p towards the valley, together with
platforms levelled in the hillside for slingers.
From the large number of these pits for archers,
&c., and from the suitable selection of their positions, we
naturally infer that the people who constructed them
were numerous and tolerably skilled in defensive warfare.
Two of these elevated plateaus are within the par
liamentary bounds of the city of Bristol —Clifton down,
which is 230 acres in extent, and Durdham down.

which consists of 212 acres. These huts and pit-dweU
ings were not continuously tenanted, but were reserved
for homes of refuge during times of trouble. The hut-
circles are mere stones and marks on the surface. The
pit-dweUings, however, are recognised by depressions
in the Soil, like the mouth of a well that has been filled
in. The Mandan Indians to this day construct their
habitations in a similar manner. A hole generally cir
cular in form and a few feet in depth is dug, the earth
thrown out is heaped in form of a low wall around its
edge, poles and branches are laid reaching from the
wall to a common centre so as to form a flattened dome
roof, on these reeds, hides, earth and flat stones are
placed ; this platform from daUy use soon becomes co
herent and waterproof. Access to the interior is by an
opening low down in the side.
!'''(• Such were the earliest dwell
ings of which we have existent
and recognisable remains. The
more usual abodes were frail, tem
porary huts, easily constructed, as
readily removed, or with little
scruple abandoned ; leaving as
faint a trace in the lapse of ages
as do the movable tents of the
Bedaween or the kraals of the
Zulu. For these aborigines were
a nomadic race, who shepherded
their flocks in the pastures of the
valleys, herded swine amid the
fallen mast of the forests, followed
the chase in the hanging woods
on the hillsides, or waded in the
marshes and snared wild fowl and
beaver for food ; and, we should
add, speared fish in the tidal Avon,
for although Dio Nicseus teUs us
" they never tasted fish although they had innumerable
multitudes of them in their rivers," ^ the statement
seems to us to be incredible.
It would be only when tribal difficiLlties arose, when
the beacon fires blazed an alarm and the shout of the
invader was heard, that collecting their scattered herds
they would drive them hastily to the hills and seek
shelter in their terrene abodes within the ramparts of
the camp. These temporary refuges were most of them
without water, and hence incapable of standing a siege.
3. Those curious mounds of sepulture known as the
long-chambered barrows are now generally supposed to
be relics of these aborigines. They are of great length
(80 to 120 feet), double horned at one end, and divided
1 Xiphilin ex Dioue Nicaeo in Sever. Henry, cap. vii., 291,

LONG AND ROUND BARROWS.

in the interior into cells by flat slabs set on edge, or
low walls of loose stone. In these mounds seldom more
than two persons apparently were interred ; the skele
tons are usually found in a sitting or lying in a cramped
position, the knees pressed to the chin and the hand up
to the mouth.

Transverse section of Long Barrow at Stoney Littleton,
No trace of metal is found (except where the tumulus
has been used by a later race), but weapons of stone,
implements of bone and flint, bones of swine and oxen,
and food vessels of rude pottery have been discovered.
From the absence of cereals it is conjectured that
the people who built these sepulchres did not cultivate
the soU, but were probably addicted to anthropophagism,
cleft skulls and half-charred human bones being often
found ia these tombs.
Owing to the great length of the cranium these men
are termed by ethnologists the Dolichocephalic race, and
are thought to have been of Iberian origin. They were
short in stature, with boat-shaped skulls and small
straight features, low in the intellectual scale, tenacious
of life, as is proved by the ossification of what would
now be deemed fatal fractures in some of the crania.
They evidently believed ia a future state, for they
did not burn their dead, but provided for them cells of
much the same character as the huts they had lived in.
Then with often a sacrificed slave in the antechamber
to wait upon them, and food for the unknown journey,
they left them to their repose. They were certainly an
aristocratic people ; these immense tumuli prove that
the many laboured for the few, and that the privileges
of rank were upheld even iu death.
These Dolichocephalic men (of whom the Basques
are, it is supposed, a remnant) were followed in process
of time, apparently conquered, and either absorbed or
exterminated, by other races, chiefly Brachycephalic, i,e,,
men with subquadrate skulls, of somewhat loftier sta
ture and more powerful frame.
4. With this people we ascend in the social scale ;
their warriors were armed with kelts and swords of
bronze, their food vessels and drinking cups of pottery

were rudely but prettily ornamented, they had coloured
glass beads for personal adornment, and we find in
their barrows remains of wheat, of woven baskets, ring
money, and other proofs of a higher level in civilization.
Their sepulchral barrows are round and far more
numerous than those of their predecessors. They pos
sibly represent two races of men, and are certainly
spread over lengthened periods of time, inasmuch as at
the first their dead were buried in a similar manner to
those of their predecessors, but in later ages we find
skeletons partially cremated, and later stUl many urns
containing nothing but burnt human ashes.
Their camps were of a somewhat diEEerent shape to
those of their precursors, but they often utilized those
which the others had left, as well as their terrene
homes, which they increased largely in number.

Entraiice to Uley Barrow, Gloucestershire.
5. Now the share the first of these races, the Doli
chocephalic, had in our ancestral pedigree is remote and
shadowy, yet eminent ethnologists contend that the race
has its representatives amongst us, especially in South
Wales. But the round-headed men were the Kelts, who
came originally from the Continent, the precise date
being imknown. The Veneti described these men to
Csesar as "an aboriginal people upon whom some of
their nation had a century or so before that date in
truded themselves, and in whose seats they had gradu
ally fixed their abodes ; as being peculiarly rude and
barbarous in their social habits, going almost destitute
of clothing, painting and tattooing their bodies with
blue woad ; having a regular community of women,
living chiefly on milk and flesh, disliking manual labour,
averse even to the toil of fishing, dwelling apart, or
congregating in hovels which had a wooden stockade
around them and were screened by woods, morasses
and mountains, but possessing nothing worthy the name
of a city."' 1 Cebs. B. G., v., 12—21 ; and Dion., Ixxvi., I2i

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

Their language is undetermined ; probably it was
some form of Erse or Gaelic, the most ancient names in
Wales and England being Gaelic. Equally undefined
is the period ia which they enjoyed apparently undis
turbed possession of the island, untU invaded by the
Belgse. 6. Now who were these Belgee ? The most probable
theory is this, that they were a people driven from the
shores of the Euxine by the Scythians, seven centuries
before the Christian era, who travelled in a north
westerly direction, crossed the Danube, and about b.c.
400 reached Denmark ; in the third century B.C. they
made a further migration across and down the Ehine,
and were so delighted with the fruitfulness of the land
between that river and the Seine that they settled there
in large numbers. Caesar"^ describes them as twelve or
fourteen tribes of German race ; Strabo^ says they were
Gaulish, although differing widely from the Gael, i.e.,
we think, a variety of the Keltic race, neither Iberian,
Gaelic nor Teuton, but High Kelt.
The probability is they soon amalgamated with the
inhabitants, and may for our purpose be best described
by a later appellation as a Kymric race with a consider
able Keltic admixture. A taU, fair people, henceforth
to be known as the Belgse, or, from their home in the
Kymric peninsula, the Kymrii.
In the course of their migrations they had acquired
some Hngual additions, and had left behind them colo
nies of their race ; their course may in fact be tracked
from the Euxine up to and along the Danube, by the
names of the localities and the rivers, &c.'
7. An eminent French authority terms them "a
vagabond race, always seekiag for a better country and
better conditions." They soon, as we have seen, crossed
the Channel. Csesar says, " The interior part of Britain
is inhabited by those who are reported to have been
origiaaUy formed in the island itself ; the maritime parts
by those who crossed over from Belgium, for the sake
of plunder and warfare ; most of whom are called in
Britain by the names of the states (in Gaul) from whence
they came ; and after carrying on war with the natives
they remaiaed there and began to cultivate the land."
He further describes the parts known to him as ' ' con
taining an infinite number of inhabitants."
Ptolemy (a.d. 120) describes Britain by its nations,
amongst whom he specifies the Belgse, naming as their
1 Cses. B. G., i., 1. " Strabo, iv., 3.
0 Dr. Margoliouth in the Journal of the British Arch. Assoc,
vol. XXXV., part 2, pp. 169—173, contends that the word Kymri is
of Hebrew origin. Kymary oniri, "idolatrous priests robed in
black vestments." Hence Taliesin sings, "My love has been de
clared in Hebrew in the Hebraic tongue."

chief towns Venta Belgarum (Winchester), IschaHs
(Hchester), and Vdala Therma or Aqum Solis (Bath).
Marcianus (a.d. 250) says "the number of nations in
Britain was thirty-three."
The wave of Belgic invasion roUed on from the
shores of Hampshire and Dorset until it reached the
Avon, and most probably the Severn. We do not think
that it crossed the Severn, although we are assured on
competent authority that a dialect of the Belgic tongue
was spoken there during the Eoman invasion.*
8. From their terminal poiat in North-^rt^est Somer
set, which has been variously placed as Maes KnoU,
Portishead and Stoke Leigh camp, these invaders eirca
B.C. 250 threw up the huge rampart known as the
Wansdyke, with its ditch on the north side, towards the
tribe of the Dobuni, as their northern frontier.
[In a later age under their great general Divitiacus
they crossed the Thames and conquered Essex, and
portions of Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire.]^
Dr. Stukeley derives the name of this mighty bul
wark (the Wansdyke) from " guahanu," an ancient
Keltic-British word denoting a line of demarcation.
Others, as is well known, derive it from Woden the
Saxon Mercury (Wodensdyke). This is possible, but,
if so, it must have been a second appellation, arising
out of a similarity of sound, for that the structure is
pre-Eoman is proved by the fact that in several places
that people utUized portions of it as a road, and it
would seem that in a subsequent era it was heightened
and made the boundary between the West Saxon and
the Mercian kingdoms. Two separate sections which
have been cut through it show by the soQ and the
chalk the height of the original agger and its subse
quent elevation.
This great boundary line is. Sir Eichard Hoare says,
" singularly irregular in its course; it does not continue
its track along the strongest ridge of the hOl, but often
descends into the valleys, and on the open downs where
no obstacle impeded its taking a straight direction it
frequently makes the most unaccountable angles; but
in one respect it is invariable, viz., in having the ditch
to the north and the bank to the south, which proves
from what quarter the attack of the enemy was to be
expected." 9. Bower Walls and Stoke Leigh, Maes Knoll,
Stanton Bury, EngHsh Combe and Hampton down are
Belgic camps, constructed to watch over and to
strengthen this mighty barrier. On the chalk downs
of WUtshire, also in Berkshire, near Andover, and
Savernake forest, the Wansdyke still retains its original
form and has diminished but little, we should imagine,
' Dr. D. Davies. ' CoUinson, Hist. Somerset.

EARLY TRADITIONS OF THE ORIGIN OF BRISTOL.

in size. The camps on Blaize, Clifton down. North
Stoke, &c., &c., show that the natives north of the
Avon were upon the alert, and had strengthened their
defences ; whilst down in the west, sheltering amidst
the tors of Dartmoor and the bleak uplands of Exmoor,
they remained long unconquered. The Severn was an
effective barrier westward, and we admit the probability
that the Cotswolds were for centuries strongholds for
those Kelts who would not readily fraternize with the
Belgse. Some historians consider that the strife was carried
on until late in the sixth century, and the Cotswold
hills, with the neighbouring cities, remained Keltic
until then. The chief ground for their argument is
that Ptolemy says that in a.d. 120 Bath was a Belgic
town, and yet, say they, we find that 457 years later it
was British. Ceawlin, the West Saxon, in a.d. 577, at
the battle of Djrrham, killed, those historians inform us,
three British princes and took the cities of Bath, Ciren
cester and Gloucester. The question is, what is here
meant by British? Does not the name simply mean
the amalgamated race left behind in the country by the
Eomans ? Llywarch Hen in his elegy on the death of
Kendelan, one of the princes slain, affirms that the
Lloegrians assisted the Saxons in that battle. Mr.
Coote, whose opinion is entitled to the highest consider
ation, identifies the Lloegrians (Ligurians) with the
Belgse.' Now Ostorius had swept the Cotswolds long
before that date, and some of his strongest camps were
pitched on that range of hills. It can scarcely be sup
posed that the conflict of the races survived the Eoman
era, if, indeed, the peoples had kept themselves separate
and distinct up to the second century.
10. Let us now briefly gather out of the early his
tories the traditions that refer more immediately to our
own neighbourhood.^ The best known of the Welsh
chronicles is that of Geoffrey of Monmouth, who trans
lated the History of the Kings of the Britons from
British into Latin. He was made Bishop of St. Asaph
in A.D. 1152. His story runs that a great grandson of
.^neas of Troy, named Brutus, at the head of his
Keltic Gauls, crossed from the Continent to Albion and
landed at Totnes. From him the country was called
Britain, the Kelts being the descendants of himself and
his followers.
Although little reHanee can be placed upon Geoffrey's
statements in general, this story is slightly corroborated
by an earlier historian. Ammianus MarceUinus wrote
A.D. 370 thus : — " Some say that a few persons having
* Coote's Romans of Britain, 24.
' The argument here is derived chiefly from Seyer ; our
readers must take it for what it is worth.

escaped from the destruction of Troy, seized on Gaul,
then void of inhabitants." "This account," he adds,
"I took from Timagenes, a Greek historian."
Nennius ("eirca a.d. 858) relates the same story with
such variations that Seyer thinks he must have had
several British chronicles from which to copy.
From the above sources, the Welsh Triads and the
Brut TysUio,' our historian concludes that an Earl or
King of CornwaU (i.e., West Wales, or the country
from Gloucester and WUtshire to the Land's End, eirca
B.C. 400), one Dyfnwal Moelmyd, made himself master
of aU Britain,'' constructed four great roads, executed
other useful works, and buUt, amongst other places,
Caer Odor.
Geoffrey gives him the Latin name DunwaUo MiU-
mutius. Eobert Eicart, our early Bristol historian
(a.d. 1479), gives his name as Doneband. Eicart
ascribes the foundation of the town to Bran, or Bryn,
the son of Dyfnwal ; he and his brother Beli are both
far better known by their Latin names, Brennus and
Belinus. These brothers, on succeeding to their father
in the kingdom, crossed over to the Continent, and led
an army of Britons and Gauls into Italy, where they
sacked and burned Eome b.c. 391. The story of
Brennus throwing his sword into the scale as the gold
for ransom was being unjustly weighed, with the in
sulting cry, " Vie Victis" (woe to the vanquished), has
become one of the romances of history. Enervated by
sensual indulgence and unwonted luxury, and after
wards with his army decimated by pestUence and famine,
Brennus, with but the shadow of his great host, re
traced his steps to Britain. Polybius says: — "They
were caUed home to defend their own country against
the Veneti, or Belgse, who had invaded it." Eicart's
words are: — "After they had this doon, the saide two
brethern retorned home into this lande of grete Bre-
taigne, with their Bretonnes, and dweUed here togeder
in grete joye. And then Brynne first founded and
bUled this worshypfuU towne of Bristut, that now is
Bristowe, and set it upon a Uttel hill ; that is to say,
betweene Seint Nicholas Yate, Seint Johnes Yate, Seint
Leonardes Yate, and the Newe Yate, and no more was
bUled not many yeres after, and then Brynne repared
home over sea," &c. This tradition was current in
Bristol before Eicart's day (1479). In the tower of
St. John's Church, facing Broad-street, are effigies of
Brennus and Belinus, which are generaUy considered
to be of older date than the buUding (1370), and to
' All written in the 1 4th century, therefore very doubtful as
history. ' He means all England, we suppose. James I. was the first
King who ruled over "all Britain."

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

B.C.

have been removed from a previous structure to their
present site.
11. The inferences we are expected to draw from
these traditional stories are these : — First, that Dyfnwal
gathering his hordes out of the west and from across
the Severn, previous to sweeping with conquering arm
over the east and north, those men would naturaUy
construct their earthen dweUings on our downs, and
thus Caer Odor would become a local habitation and
a name ; secondly, that Brennus, on the other hand,
returning from civiUzed Eome forty or fifty years later,
where his Britons had rioted in luxury, would be far
more likely, in consideration of his newly-acquired
habits, to look out for a situation more in accordance
with the commercial tastes which foreign travel had
awakened ; hence his foundation of a town below the
hUl at the confluence of two tidal rivers.
We must confess that we place no confidence in
these "vain traditions," but no "History of Bristol"
would be complete without relating what our forefathers
firmly believed to be indisputable facts, and which are
repeatedly given as such by early historians.
12. The consecutive alterations in the name are
slightly in favour of the theory of the growth of the
town downwards from the hiU-top. In the Chronicles
we have it simply " Caer Odor," the city of the chasm ;
then "Caer Odor nant Baddon," the city of the chasm
in the vale of baths ; again, " Caer Odor nant," the
city in the vale of the chasm, or, as the Welsh more
poeticaUy render it, " the city in the rent vaUey."
The transition in a later age to Clifftown (Clifton)
from the first is obvious. An eminent modern autho
rity, however, says the most natural origin of the name
would be Caer-y-deor ; in Welsh, " the city of. the
water," or "on the water," pronounced Caer-i-door.
In a compound word made into one, the accent, accord
ing to an invariable rule, faUs on the penultimate.
That Bristol was founded in the British era was a
very early and commonly received opinion is evident.
Eobert the Ehymer gives us the foUowing verse : —
' ' The first lordes and masters that in the land were
And the chiefe towns they let arear
London, and Everwyk, Lincoln, and Leycestre,
Colchestre, and Canterbyre, Brystoe, and Worcestre."
WiUiam Wyrcestre (1478) says:— "The town of
Bristol, otherwise caUed Bristuit, was founded by
Brennus, i,e,, Brenne, as it is written in the book of
the chronicles of Alfred, King of England, which I
saw in the French language, which begins thus : — ' En
la cite de graunt Troye etoit im noble chevalier et puis
sant, de grande puissance qui oiUa non Eneas.' "
Leland also says : — " Brennus conditor Bristollise."

John Eowse (1491) corroborates this statement, and
Grafton's chronicle quotes Polychronieon to the same
effect. It is mentioned by name as "Caer Odor yn
nant Baddon," or as " Civitas Odera in vaUe Badonica"
by John Twine, and also by H. Llwd; and Henry
Huntingdon, quoting the title, adds, i,e,, " Bristou," '^
13. Seyer's conclusion is as foUows : — " The British
foundation of Bristol appears to be a fragment of real
history, transmitted to us by registers and chronicles
from the earliest age ; and I consider it probable that a
British King of the Dumnonii, or Earl of CornwaU,
Moehnydd, or one of his sons, for the sake of strength
ening his frontier, or, it may be, for the defence of the
neighbourhood, founded a town caUed Caer Odor, either
at Bristol or so near it that the Welsh antiquaries have
interpreted one name by the other ; and this happened
between the years b.c. 390-350, about the time when
the Belgse first arrived on the coast of Hampshire.''
Thus was founded a British town on OUfton hUl, the
original settlement, from which Bristol was derived;
and when this latter town began to flourish and the old
hill fortress to be neglected, it was easy and natural to
caU the new town adjoining by the old name, as hap
pened at Salisbury, Winchester, Colchester, and other
places." He then adds a few words which, if true in
1822, are infinitely more so at the present date. " It is
curious to observe how Clifton, after having transferred
its inhabitants to Bristol, and continued an unfre
quented viUage for more than a thousand years, is now
receiving back its population and reasserting its claim
to eminence." 14. " The fortress on CUfton hUl was not (Seyer re
marks) the whole of the British station on the Avon.
It consisted of three separate camps, Clifton camp.
Bower or Burgh WaUs, and Stoke Leigh camp," and,
we would add, the fortified plateau of Durdham down.
CUfton camp is in shape an irregular circle, containing
about 3i acres on the highest point of St. Vincent's
rock, and overhanging the river Avon by a sheer per
pendicular precipice of 285 feet to high water mark.
This camp is surrounded on the sides not protected by
the cliff by two ditches, which form three ramparts.
The inner one measures 293 feet in length ; it has an
average height of four feet above the area. The other
vaUa are of much greater relative elevation ; they can
readUy be traced, although they are now intersected by
paths and have become a fashionable promenade.
1 Seyer, I., 192, 206.
» Dr. Guest, the best modern authority, admits the possible
existence of Dyfnal Moelmydd, but places him circa a.d 600
a slight difference ot only about one thousand years. Such is
monkish history.

B.C.

CAMPS OF THE AVON.

The inner area is about 115 yards wide, and tokens
of Eoman occupation (to which we shaU have again to
refer) and of the earlier pit-dweUings may be easUy
traced. Exactly opposite to this camp on the Somerset
side of the Avon is a deep and beautiful combe or glen.
Stoke Leigh slade, now known as Nightingale vaUey.
On each side of this glen, abutting on the river, the
rocks rise nearly as high as those of St. Vincent and
almost as precipitously. These bluffs or spurs of the
hiU were also occupied as camps. The Suspension
bridge is swung at its southern extremity from the
rocks of Burgh WaUs to the opposite rock of St.
Vincent, bringing into close juxtaposition and striking
contrast the rude earthen vaUa and fossse of a primi
tive people and the most graceful of aU the skUled
erections of the modern engineer.
15. This camp of Burgh
or Bower WaUs has within
the last decade been almost
entirely destroyed; the love-
Uness of the site, its quiet
repose and enchanting scen
ery, in which rocky height,
frowning precipice, soft
woodland, winding river,
expanse of sea and distant
mountains are aU happUy
blended, have offered temp
tations too strong for resis
tance ; its vaUa have been
burnt into Ume, its ditches
leveUed, modern vUlas have
replaced the hut -circle of
the savage, and flowers from
every clime bloom in an area
that had remained desolate
and uninhabited save at dis
tant intervals for upwards of two thousand years.
Such changes must inevitably come in the course of
the ages, and perhaps none but an antiquary regrets
them ; to him it seems an irreparable loss to blot out
the last reUcs of a period when time was young and of
a people that have vanished. The camp of Burgh
WaUs was a table-land containing about seven acres.
It was enclosed by three ramparts. On the hUlside
these were in the form of a segment of a circle, and the
innermost and highest measured 455 yards in length.
The precipice facing CUfton was 280 yards, and that
on the N.W., which overhung the combe (Nightingale
vaUey), about 160 yards long.
16. The innermost of the three vaUa was upwards
of 22 feet in height from its ditch ; it was buUt of loose

limestone and was a fine specimen of what is known
in Scotland as " the vitrified fort," with this excep
tion, the material used here being limestone, instead of
fusing, it calcined under the intense heat.
As shown in the engraving below, this carbonized
core of the top waU, measuring from eight to ten feet in
height, was then banked up on both sides with loose
unburnt stone.
The charcoal of the wood used to calcine the mass
was revealed beneath and on the sides at every section
made when this vaUum was destroyed. This innermost
vaUum was most probably a Eoman addition to the
ancient fortification. The second rampart was much
lower, and was strengthened by a low waU of loose
stone. The third or outer agger was as usual of little
height or strength, and was in many places 40 feet or

Camps of the Avon. {Copied by permission from the Somerset Archceological and Natural History Society's Journal. J
more from the second ditch. The winding entrance on
the S.E. between two waUs of earth, faced and covered
by a mound like a barbican, is essentiaUy British and
of early date.
17. The third of these camps is situated also on the
Somerset side of the Avon, and Ues on the N.W, of
Burgh WaUs camp, being divided from it by the
Nightingale vaUey. Stoke Leigh camp is a promon
tory of high table-land of an angular form, with the
apex pointing towards Clifton camp, which is exactly
opposite to it, on the other side of the river. On the
side of the combe facing Burgh WaUs (S.E.), Stoke
Leigh has a front of 280 yards in length, which is
difficult of access in aU parts, but towards the river
it is precipitous.

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

On the N.W. its defence is a craggy precipice 220
yards long, which overhangs another deep combe. A
curvilinear vallum, now overgrown with forest trees,
was carried from one of these cliffs to the other on the
western side of the camp, which is on a level with the
hiUtop. This rampart is 225 yards long, and it has a
waU of loose stones four feet thick buUt on the top.
This earthwork is elevated about 12 feet above the
area of the camp, but its fosse is very deep, the
slope being about 40 feet from the top to the bottom
of the ditch.
Beyond this inner Une of defence, at a distance of
about 40 feet, there is another fosse 12 feet in depth,
with a low rampart of earth. An intervening ditch
appears to have been at one time begun but was never
finished. The other ramparts and ditches reach to the combes
on both sides. There were entrances at both ends close
to the ravines ; these had the usual winding vaUa and
outer defences that characterise early British work.
At the N.W. end of the outer ditch is a smaU pond
fed by a spring, and on the inner side of the huge
rampart there are traces of habitation on an extensive
scale. The area is free from trees, and the soU, natur
aUy red, has become black and friable, a certain sign of
early, continuous, and dense population. Traces may
also be found of a larger enclosure on the down adjoin
ing, evidently fenced in by a fosse as a fold for cattle.
These three camps are connected by a roadway, now a
grass-grown glade, on Clifton hUl, upon the N.W. side
of that camp. This led to a ford, founded on a natural
ledge of rock, which, before the deepening of the Avon
bed, was not more than knee deep at low water. Seyer
conjectures that this ledge was raised artificiaUy, so as
to aUow of the passage of men and horses for an hour
or two every tide. From this ford a road was carried
up the combe, known as Nightingale vaUey, between
Burgh WaUs and Stoke Leigh. This road can be
plainly seen in its upper portion ; the lower is hidden
beneath a moraine of limestone from the heights. A
curious triangular guard-house or pit, with its sides of
loose stone without mortar, defends the pass midway up
on the Somerset side.
18. Durdham down, the cattle lair and temporary
residence probably of the camp followers of Caer Odor,
had its ravines of approach jealously guarded.
In what is now known as Fairy Land, above the
winding carriage road from the HotweUs and the new
Zigzag, between Proctor's fountain and the high cliff,
there are the remains of a rampart and of many guard-
pits. They occur also in large numbers on Walcombe
slade, the ravine which is known to moderns as "the

vaUey of Jehosaphat," and which runs down to the river
between the above spot and the Sea WaUs.
The generaUy received opinion of competent anti
quaries is that these several portions formed one large
fortress, and were probably a national rendezvous.
They, in position and method of construction, answer
to Csesar's description : — " The Britons caU it a town
when they have fortified any woods difficult of access
with a ditch and a rampart, where it is their practice to
take refuge in order to avoid the assault of their
enemies." Again, on his second landing in Britain in a.d. 56,
he says: — " They retired into the woods and took pos
session of a place exceUently fortified by art and nature,
which they had provided before apparently for the pur
pose of domestic war."
19. Iberi, Kelt, Belgse, Eoman, Saxon, Dane and
Norman have so- buUt, occupied and altered the MU
forts of the locality and destroyed its woods that, with
the exception of the camps constructed by the Eomans,
it is difficult to distinguish those erected by any one
nation. GeneraUy speaking, we think that the larger
fortresses, with the inner rampart the highest of
several, and with signs of abundant habitation within
the waUs or upon the adjoining downs, belong to the
two first-named people. The Belgic camps are mostly
circular. The Danish are often pear-shaped and less
strongly fortified. The Eoman is buUt on low eleva
tion, and is rectangular as nearly as the shape of the
hUl would aUow. But this people and the Anglo-Saxon
utUized to a large extent the fortresses of their pre
decessors. Without attempting minutely to distinguish as to
the construction, we shaU briefly note as early British,
by whichever people originaUy founded, the principal
camps near to Bristol, leaving the Eoman alterations of
such fortresses and those confessedly buUt by their
legions to be described hereafter.
20. Overlooking the vUlage of Henbury (the ancient
burgh or fortified place), in the charming grounds of
Blaize castle, on a hUl precipitous upon the southern
and the eastern sides and of considerable height, is a
very strong fort. Upon the west and north it is less
difficult of access, and is therefore defended by a double
fosse and triple rampart. The area embraces about six
acres. The proximity of this camp to the Eoman station
known to us as Sea MiUs induced them to occupy and
greatly to strengthen it.
About a musket shot distant to the S.W., across a
deep gorge, through which fiows the little river Trym
is a cattle fort. This has merely a vallum and ditch

KNOLE, PORTBURY, CADBURY AND DOLBERRY CAMPS.

cut across the MU top, with a smaU entrenched camp on
the extreme corner of the MU.
21. Seven mUes from Bristol to the north, in the
parish of Almondsbury, upon a knoU of the ridge of
MUs that run paraUel to the Severn, is Knole, the seat
of Mr. Sholto Vere Hare. Beautiful and commanding in
situation, tMs fortress stands out boldly 60 feet above
the aUuvium. It was fortified upon the plateau by a
rampart of earth, and the charming serpentine walks
midway along the natural escarpment of the MU were
evidently constructed on the site of the ancient fosse.
The spur of the hill on wMch tMs camp stands was cut
off by a deep ditch and vaUum, apparently about 30
feet Mgh. The many-gabled mansion, with its octagon
tower, is a strikingly beautiful and conspicuous object
from the fertUe plain that skirts the Severn.
22. Another remarkably strong fortress of pre-
Eoman construction is that of Berry hUl, in the hamlet
of Moorend, near to Winterbourne. It is very nearly
circiUar, with diameters of 180 x 140 yards; its inner
rampart, of about 560 yards, encloses an area of four
acres, in which are the remains of a long barrow and
a good weU of spring water : the outer vaUum is by far
the Mgher, averaging perhaps 20 feet. The hUl on the
eastern side is nearly level with the camp area ; here
the artificial defence is strongest. The river Frome
encircles the south and part of the western sides, wMch
are steep, the latter yielding good stone to the quarry-
men. On the north-west, finishing the ditch, is a large
mound. Camden ascribes the erection of this camp to
Ostorius, but it certainly is not originaUy Eoman ;
Seyer thinks tMs mound was tMown up by the Eomans
in their assaiUt upon the camp.
TMs is evidently a mistake : it is a defensive work to
cover the entrance. Cadbury, Dyrham or BurrUl, and
other camps yet to be mentioned, have their gateways
defended in the Uke manner.
23. Oldbury is another British fortress very similar
ia construction to Moorend or Berry MU. It stands on a
low insulated hUl about three-quarters of a mUe from
the Severn. The area, about 80 yards in diameter, is
now occupied by the churchyard and church. The
edges of the hUl are scarped and portions of the ditch
remain. On the N.W. point of Lansdown hill, above the
viUage of Dyrham, is aU that remaias of a fine camp
of 20 acres in extent; it has a Mgh rampart and a
very deep ditch. The serpentine entrance with defen
sive mound would alone testify to its being early
British. History corroborates the statement, for Bur-
riU (Bury MU), Dyrham, is the spot where CeawUn,
A.D. 577, defeated and slew three British princes.
Portions of the vaUum are leveUed and the whole
[Vol. I.]

area is cultivated. Many years since an ancient labourer
informed us that he helped to level the rampart, and
that large quantities of flint arrowheads and cMppings
were found therein.
24. Four mUes N.W. of Bath, on a spur of Lans
down, projecting boldly over Kelston Beacon MU and the
vaUey of the Avon, is the camp of North Stoke. Two
of the sides are steep, and strengthened greatly by art.
On the hill top the defences are a curved trench and a
Mgh vaUum of considerable strength. Its area of 15
acres has been divided and the camp Eomanized.
There are two long barrows in tMs fine camp.
WitMn a few hundred yards there is a smaU rect-
angiUar Eoman camp, probably thrown up when that
people attacked and carried this large fortress.
25. On the Somerset side of the Avon there are a
great many of these fortresses. At Portbury and on the
range of MUs above Long Ashton they are smaU, with
sUght ramparts and of no great strength. Cadbury
camp (above Tickenham), seven mUes from Bristol, is
much of the same form and size as Berry hill. It has
two vaUa formed of loose limestone, 12 feet high and
distant 45 feet from each other ; the curved hornwork
for defending the entrance is a marked feature.
Dolberry camp, on the Mendips, measures 540 x 220
yards in the area. On the S.E. the natural escarp
ment of the hUl rendered artificial entrenchments unne
cessary ; on the other side the aggers are from 1 6 to
30 feet in height from the fosse.
Dolberry is stiU known to the peasantry by the
name of "the city." The pit-dweUing remains are
very numerous, especiaUy below the ramparts on the
eastern side. This great fastness is undoubtedly very
early British. The foUowing tradition Ungers yet
amongst the hUl folk : —
" If Dolberi digged were
Of gould should be the share."
26. But the grandest of these "British cities" is
that on Worle MU, a narrow insulated ridge that
stretches from Anchor head on the sea at Weston-
super-Mare to Worle on the Great Western railway.
Every portion of tMs ridge was fortified ; aU its weak
points are defended by arrow pits and ramparts. The
MU is repeatedly crossed from side to side by earthen
waUs and ditches forming enclosures for cattle. The
city, which is of amazing strength and construction for
a prehistoric age, is in the fort at the western end
overhanging the sea. The camp, wMch is double, covers
about 20 acres. Seven ramparts contiguous to and
rising above each other defend it on the hiU level.
The first four of these consist merely of the earth and
stones thrown up from the ditch ; the fifth bears marks
B 2

10

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

B.C.

of an added waU upon its top of later date. Behind
tMs is another fosse, from whose edge rises the first of
the singular vaUa by which this fastness is surrounded.
Pieces of dry uncemented grey limestone, clean in the
fracture and angular, are pUed up to a height of twelve
or fourteen feet, having a base of double that width.
Within this vaUum is the seventh fosse, and from it
rises. the innermost rampart, 20 feet in height, com
posed of simUar fragments of loose limestone. This
mighty waU is more than a mile in circumference, and
in some parts is 100 feet in thickness at the base. The

rampart, they themselves being protected by its shelter.
We, conceiving the purpose of this shelf-like forma
tion, sought for and found oh these ledges the round
pebbles for the slings, a kind of ammunition which,
amidst the myriads of angular fragments that compose
the walls, cannot be found in any other part of the
camp. This stronghold is divided into two parts; The
more eastern is the stronger in its defences : this con
tains about four acres, and is cut off by a deep ditch
from the other part of the enclosure, which measures
about eleven acres.

Worlebury City
stones vary in size, and are chiefly from 4Ib to 12tb in
weight. On the top of this huge vaUum a dry wooden
stockade was apparently erected. Strange as it may
sound, the places in which the posts stood and the
watch pits in the waU can be plainly traced. Yet more,
in many spots, especiaUy where the access on the hiU-
- side was easier than elsewhere, and around the serpen
tine entrances to the fort, the inside of the vaUum in
several places retains its perfectly perpendicular form,
and a leveUed ledge runs around the waU about tMee
feet below the top for the archers and slingers to stand
-upon, so that they could deliver their jnissiles over the

and Fortress. On the northern side the precipitous cliff would
appear to be a sufficient defence ; nevertheless, at its
foot the camp is additionaUy protected by another loose
stone rampart. This was probably a defence to the
path to the spring at the bottom of the hiU, from which
the water for the camp was necessarily fetched.
Upon the south front (facing Weston) the hUl was
defended by entrenchments, short vaUa in weak spots,
and innumerable platforms for slingers buUt up like
brackets upon its steep accUvity. In the larger area
there are UteraUy hundreds of the pit-dweUings pre
viously described.

WORLE HILL AND MAES KNOLL.

11

27. Some of these were opened in 1851, and their
contents carefuUy noted. One in particular is deserv
ing of remark. It differs from the others in form,
being square for a depth of three feet six inches, then
it has a circular opening like a weU, built up carefuUy
with stones without mortar. TMs weU is two feet deep
and four feet three inches in diameter ; it was, in fact,
the famUy lounge. TMs strange dweUing in 1851
revealed a fearful history. In the grassy sod around
its mouth Eoman coins were discovered (no imcom-
mon occurrence) ; but three skeletons were found in
the pit lying across each other, and evidently tM-ust
in by violence. One of these had two deep gashes at
the base of the skuU, which must have been inflicted
with a short, heavy, clean-cutting sword ; another had
a stone embedded in the fractured skuU, and the coUar-
bone was driven up into the jaw ; the third had a
wound in the tMgh, and an iron spear -head was found
sticking in the vertebral column. Others of the pits
contained skeletons and fragments of rude pottery, beads,
spear-heads, and one had a short sword or dagger.
Slaia in defence of the spot, these men had, it is pre
sumed, been hastily tumbled into their homes, were
then rudely covered over with stones, and time,
assisted perhaps in the ages by thrifty farmers who
sou-ght to save their flocks from accident, had fiUed up
the cavities. The men whose skeletons were discovered
were not, however, the original occupants ; they were
not even a second, but were men of a tMrd race, who
probably feU before Eoman or, it may be, Saxon
prowess. Below the skeletons were layers of broken
stones alternated with earth. When these were re
moved the lias slabs were found that had f aUen in from
the roof ; there were also fragments of the burnt
rafters, impressions from a kind of basket-work of
twigs, wheat charred black, traces of a kind of mat or
bag, scorched barley, &c. AU these tMngs were burnt
most on the upper side, showing that the fire had
faUen from above. Below tMs debris were more earth,
marks of fiire again, &c., &c. ; then smaU bones of
birds and rabbits, sUng stones, flint knives and arrow
heads lying upon the primitive rock floor. It seems to
us that the inference is clear. Here are the marks of
at least three distinct epochs in the history of the spot,
epochs divided by long periods and peopled by men of
widely different arms and habits.
28. We can only flnd space to name two other of
these British fastnesses, Stanton Bury and Maes KnoU,'
on the eastern end of Dundry HiU, both on the Wans
dyke. TMs latter has two deep ditches and ramparts
on the eastern brow, and several on the southern. To-
' Battle Hill, Keltic British.

wards the north the edge of the steep hUlside was pro
tected by a vaUum. A huge tumulus or mound, 390
feet long, 84 feet broad and 60 feet high, stands between
the camp and the adjoining hiU. In the area, and
indeed outside it, are a great many depressed hoUows
or pit-dweUingg, wMch prove it to have been an early
British stronghold ; but, as we shaU show hereafter, it
was much altered by the Eomans.
29. From their contiguity, form and position we
ascribe the origin of many of these forts to remote
ages, times of great tribal strife. Others, from their
great size and indubitable proofs of population, were
UteraUy cities of refuge for a whole people ; whilst
some undoubtedly mark out the Unes of offence and
defence between a powerful foe advancing westward
and a slowly retreating people. The Kelts coiUd make
no effectual stand against the Belgse, but were driven
backwards untU with the Bristol Channel and the
Severn in their rear they were able for a whUe in a
smaUer area successfuUy to withstand the aggressors.
The two nations were thus brought front to front with
each other in Somerset, and probably also upon opposite
sides of the Avon. Now although the Kelts preferred
to remain a separate and distinct people, yet the nations
could not be always at war, and the population of Caer
Odor would necessarUy be subject to influences that
were unfelt by their kinsfolk who dwelt amidst the
western mountains.
30. Peaceful intercourse at intervals, would tend to
convince them that the Belgse had by traffic and contact
with continental nations become more civUized and
attained to a higher degree of knowledge than them
selves, and the natural law of diffusion would graduaUy
work out its inevitable result, either the weaker race
that remained subject to its influence would be absorbed
or would die out.
We are aware that ethnologists have drawn a broad
line of demarcation between the Keltic and the Teutonic
races, and their union has by some been pronounced
"impossible." It appears to us that Mstory scarcely
supports tMs view, and if so dogma must yield to facts.
A large minority of these conquering Belgse were
themselves Keltic; the races had amalgamated on the
Continent and become one nation, and assuming a
common origin for the human race, a divergence that
should render a reunion of Teuton and Kelt incom
patible is a greater anomaly to us than that, with such
an element of affinity, these nations should eventuaUy
coalesce and become a homogeneous people.
The Basque blood had amalgamated with and be
come lost in the Keltic, and now overlying tMs mixed
race was that of these latest invaders, the Kymiic.

12

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

B.C.

The distinctive characteristics of these races are not, we
admit, altogether obUterated; they crop out at times.
We have stUl amongst us the people with flat head,
forehead low and broad, face round, approaching to
square, with Mgh cheek bones, cMn prominent, nose
smaU, often retrotcsse, and the figure stout and of but
moderate height. TMs type, found in Ireland, Wales
and England, is a cropping out of the ancient strain.
The other type reveals to us the head long, oval,
with high forehead, somewhat narrow, the nose curved
downward and pointed, the chin smaU and projecting,
almost meeting with the nose in old age, the figure taU
and slender. TMs type is found largely in Wales, and
is, we judge, Kymric. It is the type of the WaUoons
and Picards. Csesar observed " that the connection
between those whom he termed the Teuton-Germans
and the Keltic-Belgians on the Continent was more
close than that between the different races of the same
Keltic famUy." " Csesar's view," says Dean Merivale,
"may be erroneous; but the fact that so accurate an
observer shoiUd have made the mistake may suffice to
convince us how powerfuUy the accidents of intercourse
and proximity may operate in sundering kindred, and
in amalgamating independent elements." '
31. Hence we conclude that the causes we have
named, combined with the civUizing influences of a
navigable river, the proximity of a quiet roadstead, and
a sheltered arm of the sea, must have had a material
effect upon the Keltic population on the northern shore
of the Avon, even if they remained unconquered.
The Belgians were a maritime race ; the extraor
dinary rapidity with which the seaports in their pos
session sprang into commercial greatness proved their
aptitude for such a career.
They had left the wUd habits of their roving forest
life, and we cannot conceive that a people with such
procUvities and possessing faciUties so favourable as
were offered them by the shores of the Bristol Channel
and the Avon woiUd rest supinely on their arms, stiU
less that they woiUd retrograde to a savage life.
NotMng seems to us more natural than that smaU
Belgic settlements shoiUd arise on the river and sea
shores, and that in due course their neighbours should
fraternize, join in their pursuits, and so lay the rude
foundation of that maritime greatness which the sub
sequent history of our city reveals.
Some Mstorians contend that the whole eastern
border of the Channel and Severn continued Keltic
untU A.D. 577. If this were so, stUl the Phoenicians
traded to CornwaU for tin, and were not unUkely to
-Visit the shore of the Mendips for lead, and whether
1 Meri vale's History of the Romans, I., 204.

the intercourse was with them direct or with the Belgse
the argument remains intact ; social influences must
have ameUorated the condition of the Keltic inhabi
tants, and unless human nature was very different in
that age from our experience of it in the 19th century,
these would tend to create a taste for a commercial and
maritime life in those people with whom the foreigners
came into contact. Indeed there is no evidence to prove
that there was much and continuous fighting between
the Belgse and the previous inhabitants of the island ;
war there was undoubtedly, but the case seems to us to
be this : a more advanced Continental people came and
squatted down in steadUy increasing numbers amongst
a sparse, uncultivated, and possibly not a very un
friendly people, untU they eventuaUy altered not only
the language but the very type of the earUer race.
TMs is by no means a singiUar resiUt. By the
fortunes of war a complete interchange of language
between two nations has in recent times been known
to have occurred in Africa.' Besides, the Keltic and the
Belgic tongues, although now so different, were both
evidently derived from a common sub-Aryan source,
but the Belgse had in their continental migrations
acquired many lingual additions, not a few of wMch
would necessarily be German or Teutonic.
32. The reUgious ideas prevalent in Britain at tMs
epoch demand a brief consideration. The theological
system known as Druidism was claimed by the Kymru
of Britain to be their own invention. In its mysteries
their priests were preeminent. "Those who wish to be
more accurately versed in Druidical rites go over to
learn in Britain." ^ The claim to original invention
cannot be sustained ; the system was essentiaUy
Oriental, and its path westward may be traced by its
megaUtMc structures from beyond the Euxine, from
whence also its ramifications extended eastward to the
borders of TMbet and even into Japan.
"It taught," says Dean Merivale, "the purity of
the Godhead as a metaphysical abstraction, and the
eternity of the soul's existence by transmigration ; it
had its mysteries and initiatory rites by which the
mind of the votary was withdrawn from the contempla
tion of the manifold energies of the Godhead to that of
His essential unity ; it abounded in symbols, inculcated
retirement and meditation, and upheld the character
of its priesthood as mediators between earth and
heaven. Again, it made use of natural phenomena
as means to elevate the mind to the comprehension of a
First Cause, gUded from thence unto the frivolous delu
sions of astrology, and finaUy degenerated into the
impieties and horrors of a beUef in magic. Hence an
' Ca3s. B. G., vi., 13.

1 Dr. Beddoe.

DRUIDICAL TEMPLE AT STANTON DREW.

13

addiction to human sacrifices, the last resort of super
stitious terror endeavouring to extort the secrets of
futurity from a reluctant power, and to control the
course of destiny." ^
The influence, social and poUtical, of the Druids was
immense ; they were the lawgivers as weU as priests,
the bards, teachers of the young, arbiters in disputes,
and supreme judges in the criminal courts. Assuming
that the megaUtMc structures were, as is generaUy
supposed, connected with Druidical worsMp, we have
in our immediate neighbourhood the most venerable
of their temples, compared with. wMch Abury is but as
a youth, and Stonehenge an infant of days.
33. Stanton Drew (supposed
to mean the stone town of the
Druids) stands in the fertUe val
ley of Chew, on the south side
of Maes KnoU. It consists of
about 60 stones of great size,
wMch measure from five feet to
upwards of 15 feet in height,
not a few being, it is calculated,
of the weight of from 20 to, 30
tons. Eighteen of these are
standing ; 42 others have faUen,
some of wMch are almost buried
by the accretive soU, whUst many
have been broken up and the
materials used for building pur
poses. These huge monoUths are
with two exceptions of a kind of
travertine, containing siUphur (a rock not found in
situj ; the exceptions are of Dundry stone. They bear
no tool mark, but were raised unwrought from the
quarry. Their arrangement is that of three separate
circles of different sizes, two portions of avenues, and a
"cove," thought to be an altar, but more probably a
judgment seat.
The largest of the circles is in a meadow ; 1 8 stones
may be counted, and the places of six or eight others
that are buried may be traced. The circle is irregular,
its diameters being 345 feet and 384 feet. On the
eastern side of tMs, about 50 yards distant, and con
nected at one time by an avenue of wMch seven stones
remain, is a smaUer circle of eight stones. The diameter
of this is 96 feet.
StiU further to the east are seven other stones, aU
but one of them prostrate ; these formed, it is thought,
a serpentine avenue of approach, a kind of portal to the
holy of hoHes. ' Merivale's History of the Romans, I., 231.

To the south-west of the large circle, and about
150 yards from its centre, is another circle of twelve
megaliths, having a diameter of 129 feet; here the
stones Ue prostrate, broken, and some of them so deeply
buried as scarcely to be traceable ; they have evidently
been used for the fence of the orchard, the angles of
wMch intersect the periphery of tMs circle.
In the same orchard, 70 feet to the north-west, is
the "cove." This is formed by three large stones,
each about 18 inches thick; they are respectively 5
feet, 11 feet, and 14 feet in height, and are set in the
form of a seat, or chair ; the back stone has been
broken off, and about 13 feet of it lies supiae between

Tlie Megalithic Circles at Stanton Drew,
the other two. TMs chair-Uke opening is about 10 feet
wide and 8 feet deep.
Two-thirds of a mUe to the N.W. are two other
huge stones of the same kind, and on the N.E., on the
other side of the river Chew, Ues one known as Haut-
vUle's quoit, from wMch in the early part of tMs
century large quantities were broken wherewith to
mend the roads.
At Wick, between Bristol and Bath, in a field
known as the " ChesUs," are three monoliths; two are
standing, the tMrd has faUen, and fragments of a fourth
may be traced.
At Stoke Bishop, in the parish of Westbury, adjoin
ing Bristol, is a dolmen, or table stone, lOJ feet x 5 J
feet X 2^ feet in thickness. It originaUy rested on
four pUlar stones ; one of these has disappeared and
the table has slipped.
In Armoury Square, Stapleton Eoad, there were
two monoUths. These have disappeared, and their site
is now covered with buUdings.

14

BRISTOL : PAST AND PRESENT.

34. All of the above-named megaUths are generaUy
considered to be Druidical remains. Some suppose
them to have been solar, others lunar temples. We
rather incUne to the belief that those at Wick and
Armoury Square were Eoman land marks, erected by
the " affrimensores," or land surveyors.'-
In fact it is aU conjecture as to the purpose for
wMch, or the people by whom, these stones were
erected. Council haU or temple, grave or altar, gross
serpent worship or Druidical rite, have each their advo
cates; nay it is contended by some to be witMn the
range of possibility that the stones at Stanton Drew
were erected by the primitive non-Aryan race who in
habited Europe before the Gaul.

¦C'-s

St-

The Stones ia the Orchard, Stanton Drew.
AU we can positively claim for them is tMs, that
they evidently prove the early existence, in this locaUty,
of a population which must have been famUiar with
the rude mechanical arts, which enabled them to move
to a distance heavy masses such as these ponderous
stones. Keltic nomenclature aboimds in the neighbourhood
of Bristol, often pure, more frequently with a Teutonic
affix to the old name, as Durdham, Euanham, Cotham,
Hanham, Aldeburyham, Conham, Henbury, Westbury,
HaUen, Penpool, Bertonne, FUton, Bra,ndon, Bras-
tuilton." ^ Coote's Romans of Britain, 98,
- An eminent local antiquary has an elaborate, aud we think
unanswerable argument, showing the early foundation of Bristol,
from the fact that this village (Brislington) was derived from
and named after Bristol. See Journal British Arch. Assoc,
June, 1875, Kerslake, 176.

35, The distinctive name Bristol has been the cause of
much speculation, Seyer gives forty-two variations in
the speUing, to which we could add upwards of twenty.
In the coins of the Saxon and Danish kings from a.d. 978
to 1016 it is variously spelt Bricstow, Brygstow, whilst
WUUam the Norman on Ms pennies spelt it Bricstol.
The earliest form in the Saxon ChroMcle 1087, gives it
Bricgstowe, which, with sUght variations, is repeated in
1114, 1126, and 1204. Seyer, however, quotes an
authority, Hoveden, for an earUer date, 1064, for
Brikestow, On the coins of Henry I,, circa 1110, it is
spelt as now, Bristol. In the twelfth century the
general Norman French spelling was Bristuit, -with
variations. Camden is in favour of Brightstowe, "the
famous place;" he says, "in the catalogue of ancient
cities it is caUed Caer Brito, and by the Saxons
Brightstowe." This name, wMch he quotes from
Nennius, is fairly conclusive evidence, of the existence
of the fortified town in Ms day, so caUed by the Cambro
Britons. Seyer quotes the opiMon of a learned friend,
who says, "The Saxons in giving a name to the town
would attempt a translation of the original. Caer they
would express by Stowe ; Odor they would translate
into Brie, as in Lye's Saxon dictionary; also Somner,
Brie, Briea, ruptura, fractio, a break or breach ; so that
Bricstow would be an exact translation of Caer Odor,
it being the practice of the British language to prefix
Caer, and of the Saxon to suffix Stowe." TMs hypo
thesis gives additional proof that Bristow was Caer
Odor nant Baddon, the town in the rent vaUey of the
baths. Another derivation wMch he gives is Brito,
which he prefers as being the most ancient, and as
having Mstorical support,' Bricstowe, as being origi
naUy built on the breach of the rocks, may be right, he
tMnks, but the Saxon translation of Caer Brito into
Brito Stoic, Britstow, would soon become Bristow, the
common EngUsh name of the place down to the middle
of the seventeenth century.
36, We wiU give one other authority. The Eev, S.
Lysons, an eminent antiquary, says: — "I have a strong
conviction that our British ancestors were actuated, in
giving local names, by their acute observation of the
features of the places and countries to which they gave
these names. And this wUl be more and more apparent
the gi-eater number of examples we can bring together
showing the great fitness of the adaptation, ' A more
striking instance can scarcely be brought forward than
that of Bristol, where the name traced back to the
original Chaldee describes precisely the geological posi
tion of that town. Prits-tol— the B and P being inter-
' Nennius, whose date is variously given from a.d. 620 to 858,
the latter being more probably correct.

B.C.

ANTIQUITY OF BRISTOL.

15

changeable letters, as we see from Marcian, the geo
grapher of the fourth century, who writes both Britain
and Britain as meaning the same thing — Pritstol or
Britstol means a ' burst-through hUl or vaUey,' i.e., a
vaUey formed by the bursting through a hUl by force,
especiaUy by water. Pritsi or Britsi in Chaldee means
' breaches,' ' craggy rocks formed by the action of the
water, as on the sea shore, chasms," &c,
" Without meaning a pun, Bristol and Burst-dale,
Burst-deU are words 'idem sonantia, idem signifieantia.^
Seyer, in Ms admirable history of Bristol, teUs us that
the Britons caUed the place Caer Odor, and that the
modern Welsh stiU, or until recently, so caUed it ; and
he explains the meaning as ' the City of the Chasm.'
But if it be modern and ancient British, it is also
Chaldseo-Hebrew ; Caer or Kir, or Car, as in Kirjath
and in Carthage, means a city, and Odor means a
fissure, chasm, separation, division or partition. Caer
Odor and Bristol are only synonyms for the same
tMng. Cliff-ton, the cleft place or place of cliffs, is
another synonym for the same ; and we must re
member that old Bristol was situate at Clifton, where
there are stiU the traces of British occupation. The
word Clifton is the Saxon way of expressing this geo
logical fact, and equaUy derived from a common
Hebrew or Chaldee origin; Clef and CMef (whence
our words half and to halve) means to cut in twain
by violence.^ " There are three other places in England having
the name of Birstal, two in Yorkshire and one in Lei-
cestersMre. As far as indifferent maps wUl lead me to
judge, somewhat of the same geological features pre
sent themselves as in our Bristol, namely, that of a
river bursting through a narrow channel. I see that
at Birstal, in Yorkshire, there is a cUff overhanging
it, caUed Brunicliff — Barnicliff, in Hebrew the Barren
cliff, or BarecUff.
"I' suspect that the monkish derivation of Bristol
from Brutus or Brennus had no other origin than in
^ When it is said in Judges v^ 17, "Asher continued on the
sea shore and abode in his breaches," the word Britsi is used ; it
means those creeks formed by stream and tide, into which, as at
Bristol, it is convenient to run up ships. Again, when read as
Ph or F (for the letters again are interchangeable with the B), we
have the words Fresh and Freshet, Firth or Frith, which every
dweller on a tidal river recognises, and so the word Brits, or Frits,
or Frits in Hebrew is translated in 2 Sam, v. 20, I Chron, xiv. II,
Job xxviii, 4, "A breaking forth of waters, a torrent, a rushing
headlong stream,"
2 The river Oder, in Germany, means the same thing. It is
the river of separation.

the fertility of brain of Geoffrey of Monmouth and
his compeers,"37. Early English antiquaries down to Camden had
always supposed Bristol to be the city described by
Ptolemy a.d, 120 as Venta Belgarum. " Bobunis vera
subjacent Belgee et urbs IschaHs, Aqum Calide, Venta."
"Under the Dobuni lie the Belgse and the cities of
Hchester, Bath and Venta," Camden contends that
Winchester is the Venta which is meant by the old geo
grapher. Our most recent Bristol historian, Mr. Pryce,
foUowing out the argument of Mr, Hooke (who com
menced a History of Bristol in 1748), contends that
Winchester was not seated under the Dobuni, but many
miles eastward of their frontier, as well as distant from
the other places mentioned ; that Bristol is so situated,
ergo Bristol is the Venta, The argument is untenable.
Ptolemy evidently only meant that the Belgse possessed
these places south of the frontier of the Dobuni. (We
greatly doubt whether Bath was Belgic, but must
admit that the Belgic frontier extended to the river
Avon, and from Bathampton it certainly overlooked the
city,) It is, we think, clear, from the distances given
and the towns in the line of route named in Antonine's
Itinerary, that Winchester is the Venta that is meant
by the Eoman geographer,
Mr, Pryce further argues that the name was changed
from Caer Odor to Caer Brito shortly before the time of
Nennius, because it is so named by that writer, who,
it is contended, "was only the translator of a more
ancient history written in the old British language by
another person of a simUar name, but who lived 80 years
before the Christian era.'"
Mr. Pryce contends on the above hypotheses, that as
these names, Venta and Caer Brito, mean Bristol, there
fore from the slow growth of a city under ordinary cir
cumstances "Bristol must probably have been founded
long before even the age of Brennus and Belinus,"
We have thus adduced, we believe, the principal if
not the whole of the reasons given by different authori
ties, together with our own conclusions, which tend to
show that in prehistoric times a town or city, the pre
cursor of modern Bristol, was even then existent, first
upon the MUs, and that subsequently (as at Salisbury,
Winchester and other places) the inhabitants settled for
convenience upon the present site, until from " Caer
Odor nant Baddon," the city of the chasm down in the
valley of the baths, it attained its present designation —
Beistol, 1 Pryce, 7,

CHAPTER II.

^ TP •!• WW^ ^ Ep.

-^

I. C Cesar's First Invasion. 2. Condition and Characteristics of the Briton. 3. CcBsar's Second
Invasion. 4. That of Claudius under Plautius and Ostorius. 5. Roman Fortified Camps. 6. Which
of the Avons was indicated by Tacitus. 7. Quietude under Roman Rule. 8. Roman Camps at Clifton,
Sea Mills and Blaize Castle. g. Seyer's opinion as to who built the First Wall. 10. The Iter of
Antonine. 11. Its probable Route. 12. A partial alternative of the Route. 13. Roman roads on
Durdham down. 14. Site of Abona changed to Bristol. 15. Geographical resemblance to Rome.
16. Walled by Constantine the Great. 17. Discovery of Roman Coins at Clifton, College Green, sundry
Places in Bristol, Easton, Filwood, Ashton, &c., &c. 18. Roman Coins dredged up from the Floating
Harbour. ig. Pigs of Lead with Roman Inscription found in the Frome. 20. Plan of the City
decidedly Roman. 21. This portion of the Country surveyed by the Romans. 22. Maes Knoll and
other Tumps, Roman Landmarks. 23. The First Wall of Bristol on the Roman plan. 24. The most
Ancient Privileges of Bristol Freemen identical with those of Roman Citizens. 25. Reasons why these
could not have been derived from the Anglo-Saxons. 26. Roman incised stone found at Sea Mills;
27. Probably a Christian's tombstone of the Third Century. 28. Episcopal Dioceses in the early Fourth
Century. 2g. The Roman Legions recalled.

.iESAE'S latest conquests in the north-west of
GaiU were retarded by the assistance ren
dered to the Veneti by the Britons, The
name of the Brittani,' now appears for the
first time in the pages of history, b,c. 57.
"Who are these people," he asks, "who
stretch out an invisible arm to succour the
enemies of Eome?" Csesar had felt their
prowess on the sea ; their sMps were weighty, strongly
built, and withstood the attack of the Ughter Eoman
gaUeys, until their opponents, with hooks fastened on
long poles, cut the halyards, brought down the saUs,
and rendered them unmanageable.
Csesar determined to punish these Brittani for show
ing such sympathy with his foes ; it was politicaUy
1 Cks, B.G,, iii., 9.

necessary to chastise a nation that flaunted its freedom
in the face of his legions, and deemed itself safe in "the
great waU of ocean by which it was surrounded ;" its
example might become contagious, and so the terror of
the Eoman arms was destined to be carried westward,
over the last barrier that Nature had raised against
them. He therefore sent out and surveyed the coasts of
Albion, and began to coUect ships and to gather his
legions for an expedition thither in the ensuing season.
On the 26th of August, b,c, 55, he landed near
Hythe with 12,000 men, but never lost sight of the
sea shore, and after remaining three weeks he quitted
the island, being without a supply of grain for the
winter, and many of his ships having been injured by a
storm. There possibly were other reasons wMch, as

B.C. 55,

CONDITION AND CHARACTERISTICS OF THE BRITON.

17

Ms own Mstorian, Csesar preferred to leave untold,
Lucan says, " he showed Ms affrighted back to the
Britons whom he had invaded," It -(viU be advisable,
perhaps, before we proceed further, for us to -glance at
the people whom he came to conquer.
The first invasion, as we have seen, was justified by
Mm on the ground that Ms GaUic enemies had repeat
edly recruited their armies and repaired their losses by
the aid of their kinsmen from Britain. The merchants
of the coast, who found a market in the island, fur
nished him (reluctantly, Csesar admits) with the infor
mation upon wMch Ms plan of invasion was founded, '
2. Macaulay, like Hume, foUowing the generaUy re
ceived opinion that the then inhabitants were altogether
savage, ignorant, communistic and destitute of aU the
arts that tend to make tMs life enjoyable, says, "NotMng
in the early existence of Britain indicated the greatness
she was destined to attain,"
But what are the facts wMch we gather from the
Eoman Mstorians ? Properly considered they seem to
us not only to describe a people containing within them
selves the germs of greatness, but a race fairly advanced
in a career that only lacked cohesion of their tribes to
make them a noble nation, Tacitus says, " The nations
of Britain were formerly subject to kings, but they were
miserably divided by the factious cabals of their leading
men," The natives are said to have been courageous,
amenable to discipUne, obedient to authority, yet impa
tient of subjection ; and herein lay their weakness ; it
was because they were broken up into tribes or petty
kingdoms that they were, as is weU known, taken in
detaU and subjugated. They exchanged commodities,
Strabo says, " They exported corn, cattle, gold, sUver,
iron, skins, slaves, basket-work, chalk, ^ and a large
species of dog.' They were practical miners in tin,
lead, and, we tMnk, also copper ; they worked in metals,
coined moneys of brass and sUver, " Utuntur aut cere
aut numtno aureo aut annulis ferreis ai cerium pondus exami-
natis pro nummo,"* They marled their land for corn
growing, had spears, swords, and chariots of war armed
¦with scythe blades at the axles ; hence they must have
possessed considerable skill in mechanics. They knew
how to stake a ford so as effectuaUy to impede the
march of cavalry, and had a system of roads paved with
stones on the tops of hills; these had lateral branches
1 Bell, Gall. IIL, 8, 9, and IV,, 20,
^ At Domburgh, in 1647, there was a remarkable inscription
found dedicated to the goddess Nehalennise, by Secundus
Silvanus, a chalk merchant of Britain,
^ "There is a kind of dogs of mighty fame for hunting; by
painted Britons bred," Camden, I., 140,
* Hawkins's "Remarks on British Coins," in Monumenta
Historica Brittanica, cii. ; Knight, 15,
[Vol. I.]

which led to their towns. We read that Cassivelaunus
could rapidly bring together from aU parts 4000 chariots
with wMch to oppose the Eomans, They buUt fortifi
cations wMch for hugeness and strength of defence are
to this day a marvel to engineers. They braved the
dangers of the ocean in strong home-buUt ships ; pos
sessed many towns ; Tacitus teUs us their buUdings
were numerous ; ' they had begun to practise the fine
arts, could design, and paint upon shield and body weU-
known and famUiar objects ; Csesar himself brought
away and exMbited a corslet made of British pearls ;
and they had a system of religion that was immensely
in advance of heathendom in general.
It would be wrong to suppose that the whole land
was thus civUized ; we learn the contrary from the
varied sources from which we have cuUed the above
facts. Differences of race and tribal jealousies kept
them asunder, so that the inhabitants of some parts of
the interior stiU roamed in primitive barbarity through
marsh and wold and tangled forest.

Roman Galleys.
Enough has been said to show that the foe Csesar
had to encounter was not a mere nation of savages, and
the Eoman -writers who have told the stirring story of
their conquest — and have with admiration recorded some
heroic examples of their defence of their island home —
describe the people "as an energetic race, whose cold
and uncertain climate compeUed a laborious persever
ance to secure the means of Uf e ; * *" * * as being
impatient of restraint, fond of Uberty, warUke, industri
ous, fierce and imperious, ingenious and Mgh-spirited,""
Strabo teUs us " they exceeded the Gauls in stature ;
I saw young Britons in Eome who were taUer by half a
foot than our taUest men.""
Csesar's first attempt to conquer these islanders was
undoubtedly a faUui-e ; but he, the greatest general the
world ever saw, was one whom difficulties did not daunt,
1 Tacitus Ann., xiv,, 33,
^ Ptolemy De Judiciis, lib, II. , o. 3,
» Lib. v., 200,

18

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 44,

and upon whom faUure acted as an incentive to renewed
exertion, 3, The next year, b.c, 54, he coUected a second and a
larger fleet, at Portus Itius (Witsand), consisting this
time of 800 ships, in which he embarked five legions,
and upwards of 2000 Gaulish cavalry ; these he suc
ceeded in landing near Deal.
After a brief stay of tM-ee months, and a somewhat
equivocal success, he withdrew again from the country,
upon receiving a promise of tribute. From this period
the island became better known to the civUized world,
and trade with it increased rapidly,
4. Ninety-seven
years passed before
another attempt was
made upon Britain by
the Eomans, In the
year a.d. 43 the Em
peror Claudius sent
an army under AuUus
Plautius, who, after
fighting several suc
cessful battles in the
Thames vaUey, sent for
his emperor to come
over and win a cheap
renown by the capture
of Camalodunum (Col
chester), which he had
reduced to extremity.
Clau.dius " came, saw,
and conc[uered," and
having been sixteen
days in Britain re
turned to Eome in
triimiph, leaving Plau- ¦'*°™"" Soldier.
tius governor of the conquered province In the same
.year (a.d. 44) Vespasian was sent into Britain with the
second legion, and the work of subduing the southern
portion of the island was entru,sted to him by Plautius.
He fought thirty battles, took more than twenty towns,
made prisoners of some British kings, reduced the Isle of
Wight, threw up on Salisbui-y plain a huge camp that
stUl bears his name, founded Cirencester, and conquered
the whole of the south and a considerable portion of the
west of Britain, as far north as the Severn.
When Publius Ostorius Scapula arrived in the island
as successor to Plautius, he found the SUm-es (the in
habitants of Central and South Wales), who had never
been conquered, endeavouring by their incursions across
the Severn to recover for their kin.smen and aUies the
country which had been seized by the Eomans.

5. The propraetor immediately took the field with
some Ught-armed troops, although the winter had begun,
drove back the invaders and pursued them to the borders
of their own territory. Tacitus informs us that then,
"lest the enemy should again coUect themselves, and by
a dangerous and faitMess peace give no repose either to
the general or his army," he began to disarm the inhabi
tants of those towns and districts whom he suspected,
and to secure the banks of the Severn and the Antona,
either by constructing new fortresses or by occupying
the ancient camps, " einctos castris," of the natives.
That the Une of defence ran northward, east of the
Severn, on the Cotswolds and their outlying spurs, is
certain. Sea MiUs, Blaize castle, Knole, Sodbury,
Oldbury, Horton, Elberton, Glevum, &c., &c., are aU
either camps of Eoman foundation or bear unmistakable
marks of having been occupied by Eoman soldiers,
6, But historians differ as to wMch of the Avons it
was wMch is described in Tacitus as being thus forti
fied and held, Seyer (very doubtfuUy) inclines to the
opinion of Camden that it is the Warwickshire Avon
which is meant, the reason aUeged being this : that tMs
part of the country (around Bristol) had been reduced
to quiet submission by Vespasian, But the men of the
West — the Kimbri, Damnonii, and Karnabii — had not
been conquered ; they were only driven into the corner
of the land.
It is even doubtful whether the Eomans had at that
period possession beyond the Mendips and Brean down.
We have proof of their occupation of the lead mines on
these MUs in the time of the Emperor Brittanicus, a.d.
49, but nothing to assure us of a more westernly occu
pation of North Somerset and Devon so early ; Exmoor,
Dartmoor and CornwaU were as yet unconquered.
Om- own Avon is remarkably strong in its Eoman
and Eomano-British fortresses. Dominating the river
we have Sea MiUs, CUfton, Blaize castle, Maes KnoU,
Bury hiU, Hanham, Bitton, Wick, North Stoke, Little
SaUsbuiy, Aqiice Solis, &c., &c. ; fm-ther west we have
Brean down ("Adaxium"), Cadbuiy, Hamdon, Bur
rington, Maesbiuy, Dolebury, &c., &c , guarding the
Mendips; whUst the WiUshire Avon, wMch almost
meets om- river at nearly a right angle, is similarly
guarded on both sides even to the EngUsh Channel.
These forts, in sight of each other, garrisoned -with
a small but discipUned soldiery, formed a complete waU
of secui'ity from the undiscipUned hordes that lingered
in the west, and secured his rear for Ostorius,
We do not think the WarwicksMre Avon could be
meant by Tacitus. The SUures were on the left flank
of the Eomans ; this Ostorius had effectuaUy guarded
by the Severn and its camps. His rear must be secured

A.D. 69,

QUIETUDE UNDER ROMAN RULE.

19

before he could march northward and then turn the
flank of the most numerous, aggressive and incursive of
Ms foes. The fortresses we have indicated, -with many
others unnamed, would suffice to hold the men of West
Wales in cheek, as weU as to dominate the recently
conquered territory, Ostorius could scarcely afford
soldiers sufficient to man a second line on the northern
Avon, and from it to lengthen a chain of forts to
Camalodunum, a distance of more than a hundred
mUes, A few camps to keep in awe the people who
had just witnessed the march of Ms conquering legions,
with a stronghold and a Eoman colony founded by Mm
at Camalodunum, to secure the Ikeni, and then his way
was clear to attack the Cangi and Brigantii in detaU,
faU back on the west of the Severn and swoop down
upon and crush, in the country of the Ordovices (or
North Wales), those inveterate foes of Eome, the
SUures, who had carried the war up into that quarter,
TMs he did, defeating them and taking their king,
Caradoc, prisoner.
If tMs reasoning be correct the Bristol Avon must
be, it seems to us, the Antona of Tacitus.
We learn further from him, that the plan of gar
risoning detached forts was a Eoman practice. In the
insurrection under Boadicea' in the year foUo-wing the
death of Ostorius, the Ikeni first stormed and took the
garrisons stationed in the neighbouring forts, and then
assaulted and carried Camalodunum itself, putting to
the sword the whole colony. We are also told that at
a later date, when the second legion was stationed at
Caerleon, detachments were quartered in the most con
venient of the ancient British forts.
Indeed, in no other way can we account for the
added Eoman work and the great number of Eoman
coins that are almost invariably found in these earth-
waUed castles.

Coin of Vespasian.
7, Under the Emperor Vespasian, a.d. 69, Julius
Frontinus, who was then governor of the Eoman pro
vince in Britain, attempted to complete the task in
^ Tac. Agric, 16, In the Bristol Fine Arts Academy there is
a very fine cartoon of Boadicea haranguing the Ikeni, which ob
tained the prize of £100, It is by H. C. Selous.

which Ostorius had faUed, Crossing the Severn he
formed the camp at Sudbrook, took the capital city of
the SUures, Caerwent, fortified it as a Eoman city,
naming it Venta Siku-um, founded Caerleon and estab-
Ushed there the second legion. But although he suc
ceeded in holding by main force a narrow strip of the
coast, the hardy SUures defied him in their mountain
fastnesses and remained unsubdued.
From the sUence of Mstory henceforth for centuries
concerning this portion of Britain, and from the numer
ous remains of viUa residences wMch have been dis
covered in Somerset and Gloucestershire, we conclude
that it had become Eomanized, and had settled cjuietly
do-wn under civiUzed law. Government was adminis
tered in a regular manner ; the whole land was
measured, aUotted, di-yided, fenced and cultivated.
Ancient British towns, such as Gloucester and Bath,
were fortified, and became Eoman cities ; these were
colonized by the Lseti, the Limitani and others, old
soldiers, who received grants of land, and the in
habitants enjoyed the municipal privileges of Eome,
London, no more than Bristol, could boast of being a
colony. " Suetonius marched to London, a city famous
for its wealth and the great number of its merchants ;
though it was not distinguished by the title of a
colony,"' Sites that commended themselves to the
tastes and judgment of these " possessor es" and " coloni"
were soon taken up and occupied with viUas, or grew
into " civitaies," to each of which was assigned a terri-
torium, i.e., a to^wn -with a territory around it comprising
vUlages, hamlets, &c.
Thus the territory of Glevum became Gloucester-
sMre, nor is it at aU improbable that Caer Odor (re
named Caer Brito) became a smaU Eoman settlement,
¦with a limited territorium wMch it holds to this day.
If the exact site of the ancient burgh were not the first
spot chosen by the Latins, we know that the ueighboui--
hood commended itself to their judgment, as one suit
able both for commerce and defence. Speedily on the
hUl at CUfton there arose a " castrum stativum," -with at
least one handsome Eoman -viUa witMn a few hundred
yards of it;^ to be foUowed at no distant period by the
establishment of a " castrum hibernum," on the slight ele
vation that overhung the confluence of the rivers Avon
and Trym ; which spot, known now by the name of Sea
MiUs, Seyer has identified, we think correctly, as the
Abona of the iter of Antonine.
8. The traces of Eoman occupation in the camp on
Clifton down are stiU -visible. The square of the prse-
torium at the western end, although out through by
modern paths, may be distinctly traced. This, and the
1 Tacitus IIL, cap. 33. ^ The site of Manilla hall.

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 140.

inner rampart of stones cemented by mortar, are appa
rently the only additions made by the Eomans to the
ancient British fort pre^dously described. Similar waUs
were added at Bower WaUs and Stoke Leigh camps,
on the opposite side of the Avon. These tMee camps
formed, we think, one grand Eoman fortress. The
camp at Sea MUls, ' most probably the Abona of
Antonine, stood on a low MU at the mouth of the river
Trym; its area is exactly 50 acres, and it is 510 yards
in length on the northern side, which is defended by a
vaUey having a brook in the bottom. The eastern side
is the Mghest, being about 40 feet above the meadow ;
here on the rampart there are two projecting circular
bastions, which Seyer considers were buUt upon a more
ancient work ; from tMs spot the ground slopes graduaUy
towards the west and the river TrjTn, which front was
probably fortified "with a rampart, of which no remains
exist. The southern side, which has a steep natural
faU to the river Avon, is in itself a sufficient defence,
although from appearances we judge tMs also to have
had a low agger.
The Eomans in their day trusted more to the valour
and discipline of their troops than to huge ramparts of
defence. On Lansdown may stiU be seen their camp of
attack, but a hundred yards or so from the huge British
fortification of North Stoke, and the difference between
the two works in height and artificial strength is some-
tMng extraordinary. The " thin red line " of Balaklava
is an Mstorical repetition of the power of brave hearts in
manly breasts behind the weakest natural defences, or
entirely ¦without them, to repel undiscipUned hosts,
whose chief strength in attack consists in a sudden sur
prise by overwhelming numbers, and who for defence
rely upon the height, soUdity and number of their sup
posed impregnable bulwarks.
Blaize castle, at Henbury, we also know to have
been in the occupation of the Eomans; at Hanham they
had a smaU camp ; and Seyer says that Constantine the
Great waUed around the site of the ancient city of
Bristol. His words are as foUow : —
9. " The first settlement on the Avon was Caer Odor,
or Cliffton, founded about 391 b.o. ; and there was at
that time a ferry across the Avon, where the bridge
now stands, and a smaU to-wn or village near the ferry.
' During the visionary days of the South Sea bubble, a dock
was projected and built here, chiefly, we believe, for the South
Sea whale fishery. Large sums were expended, warehouses were
erected, but the bursting of the bubble brought on litigation,
which ruined the scheme. A mill at the mouth of the Trym^
erected for the manufacture of Says, a kind of serge cloth, has
given the name to the locality, which should be Says MiU,' and
not Sea Mills ; the latter appellation being, however, so well
known we shall use it in these pages to designate the place.

When the Eomans conquered tMs part of the country
their general, Vespasian, founded Abona, at the same
time keeping garrisons at Clifton, Henbury, &c. When
thus the country became safe and peaceable the most
respectable part of the neighbouring inhabitants settled
at Abona for the sake of commerce, society and safe
government. Meanwhile the inhabitants of Clifton
feeUng the same security graduaUy extended themselves
down the hiU, occupying the banks of the river as far
as ' Trajectus ' (Bristol), ' insomuch that the whole way
was one long town, called by the original name ' Caer
Odor.' Things were in this situation when in the reign
of Constantine the Great the Eoman government thought
fit to surround with a waU and gates the area now occu
pied by High street. Broad street. Corn street and Wine
street, which then became a to^wn and was caUed Caer
Brito ; stUl, however, the whole settlement continued to
be caUed Caer Odor, and is so caUed by the Welsh to
this day," ^
10, The names of the Eoman stations Abona and
Trajectus are derived from the " Itinerary of Antonine,"
a book of routes throughout the whole Eoman Empire,
published apparently for the use of the military, to
enable the officers to direct theu- soldiers on the march.
The book contains merely the names of the stations
upon the Une of road, and the distances between them,
AU that relates to Britain is contained in fifteen journeys;
the one we have to consider, wMch is the fourteenth, is
UteraUy as foUows : —
"Item aUo itinere ab Isca CaUevnm m' p' CIII, —
Venta SUurum m' p' IX,— Abone m' p' IX. — Trajectus
m' p' IX.— Aquis SoUs m' p' VI." &c.
The remainder is unnecessary to our argument.
From this we learn that the military route from Caer
went to Bath passed if not tM-ough, at least near to
Bristol, Seyer's argument on this mUitary road is faUacious,
being founded chiefly upon the forged iter of Richard of
Cirencester,'' who transposes the position of station Tra
jectus from between Abona and Bath to Aust,* which Ues
at a considerable angle between Abona and Caerwent,
To help his theory, Eichard is obUged to alter very
* This is a mistake; Bristol was not the station Trajectus,— Ed.
= Seyer, L, 214,
= Seyer, in common with all the antiquaries of the age, was
misled by this clever compilation, which was the work of one
Bertram, of Copenhagen, who foisted it upon Dr. Stukeley, and
he published it in 1759. Mr. Woodward, the Queen's librarian at
Windsor, in 1866 exposed the cheat, and proved that the whole
book was compiled from a lot of different but well-known works.
Unfortunately nearly the whole of Seyer's Roman chapter is
founded upon this farrago, and must therefore be rejected.
' Seyer, L, 136.

A.D. 140,

THE ITER OF ANTONINE.

21

materiaUy the several distances. Nor is he alone in tMs
respect. Antiquaries, from Camden do-wn to our day,
have differed widely as to the course of this iter and the
situation of the stations named, changing the numerals
at wiU and gi^ving most fanciful derivations to names
of places in support of their views.
It would be a mere waste of words, and lead to no
definite conclusion, were we to quote at length the
different theories or to point out what we deem to be
the erroneous conclusions arrived at.
11. We shaU briefiy give our o^wn opimon as to the
route from Venta SUurum (Caerwent) to Aquse SoUs
(Bath). We must premise that a great military road,
carried as straight as practicable between distant camps,
did not necessarUy run tMough the centre of every
station upon its Une of route ; but just as the Great
Western raUway between Bristol and Exeter has
stations for Clevedon, Weston-super-Mare and Tiverton,
although neither of these to^wns is upon the main road,
so did, we beUeve, short lateral roads connect different
stations with the cMef Eoman miUtary iter. We give
the distances in a straight line as measured upon the
map, irrespective of obstacles such as the water passage,
twists in the roads, &c,, &c.
Antonine's iter for Venta SUurum (Caerwent) to
Abone, IX, ; Abone to Trajectus, IX. ; Trajectus to
Aquis SoUs, VT, ; wMch we explain as meaning Caer
went vid Sudbrook camp to Blaize castle, nine mUes;
Blaize castle to Wick, nine mUes ; Wick to Bath, six
nules — total, twenty-four mUes; or, by an alternative
route, Blaize castle to Bitton, nine mUes ; Bitton to
Bath, five mUes — total, twenty-tMee mUes, Sudbrook
camp, on the Welsh shore of the Severn, is the smaU
remainder of an undoubted Eoman fortress, wMch, from
its situation, must have been speciaUy buUt to guard a
landing-place or a ferry ; tMs of course implies a road
on both sides of the river. Opposite to it at the ebb
tide the Severn roUs tMough the Shoots, being there
less than five hundred yards in width to the EngUsh
stones, a reef of rocks that is laid bare from low water
to almost half tide ; at high water, the fuU breadth of
the river here is nearly three mUes, On the English
shore, facing Sudbrook, is. a beach retaining its Eoman
name, Chesil beach, from which a pitched road runs
tMough the marsh up to the high land under Blaize
castle. This road also, singularly enough, bears a
Eoman title, " Chittening-street," Close to tMs road
is a pUl, or opening into the land from the river. Step
pUl, or CMttening pUl, -which, beginning at ChesU beach,
and running paraUel with the street to the Mgh land,
has been converted into a dyke or drain. The only
objection to this route for the iter has been that it was

over marshy ground, which, if not embanked, would
be subject to overflow by the spring tides.
There is no record of the time when this dUu^vial
land was first protected from the waters by a bank, but
in 1409 commissioners were appointed "to view and
cause to be repaired aU those banks, &c., between
Gloucester and Bristol wMch were broken by the
violence of the tides,'" These ancient banks, then, might
possibly have been Eoman, and CMttening-street would
under those circumstances at ordinary times have been
a soUd mUitary road, Herodian informs us that the
Eomans "made the marshy places stable by means of
raised causeways, that the soldiers might easUy pass
them and fight to advantage, for many parts of Britain
being constantly flooded by the tides of ocean become
marshy." The case we are considering is so much to
the point that one can almost beUeve it to be particu
larly referred to by the Mstorian, But even supposing
that at times the water did cover the roadway, then
CMttening pUl would become a canal-Uke cutting,
avaUable for transport by water from the source of
its stream, La^wrence Weston hUl. If tMs were, as we
beUeve, the identical route of this great mUitary road,
how singular it is that Mstory should so markedly repeat
itseU, for the tunnel under the Severn which is being
constructed for the Great Western raUway starts from
Sudbrook camp for the English shore, and the line
of road in the nineteenth century is but foUowing that
marked out by the conquerors of the world in the
second century.
It is very evident that the station Abone, or Abona
(wMch is merely Avona Latinized), must have been upon
the river ; we heartUy endorse Seyer's opimon that it
was at Sea MUls. Several coUateral pieces of e^vldence
support tMs view. "In La-wrence Weston, on the line
of road between Sudbrook and Sea MUls, mention was
made in the rent-roU of Sir Eichard Sadler (temp, 36
Henry VIII,) of an acre of land in Campo Abone town,"^
Again, an ancient road led from Sea MUls to Henbury
for Caerwent, and another, we contend, vid Almonds
bury, to the Eidgeway (i,e,, the Eoman road to Glou
cester), which crossed the great iter at Westbury.
A portion of this road, which ran from Dm-dham
Do-wn to Sea MUls, has only lately been destroyed, but
some relics of it remain on the do^wn itseU, pointing
northward from Durdham lodge. It lay between the
edge of the do^wn and the Clifton Cricket Club ground.
12, Another road from Sea MUls, which forms a junc
tion with the iter for Bath, is very plainly to be seen :
it runs from Durdham lodge towards Eedland — the
¦¦ Dugdale on Embankments, 114,
" Barrett, 12.

22

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 200.

water reservoir stands upon it, A third — the road to
CUfton camp — is shown by the avenue of trees, which,
starting also from the same point (the lodge), runs
straight for that fortress. Thus it wUl be seen that
whUst one road, foUowing pretty closely the course of
the river Trym, connected Abona with the iter at Hen
bury, and so was in direct communication with Venta
SUurum, another led up the vaUey to Durdham down,
where it trifurcated on reaching the level, and so by
the shortest practicable routes Abona was placed in
direct communication with Gle^vum, Aquse Solis and
Clifton camp.
13, The central of these tMee roads would join the
main iter, we consider, at Eedland, and, lea^ving the site
of Bristol on its right, woiUd pass on to St, George's,
running thence to Trajectus, which we consider to have
been the Eoman camp of seven acres or more in extent
at Wick, and which is just the requisite distance to
Bath — -sdz., six mUes, One strong bit of evidence in
favour of tMs -view is this : — There are three Cold Har
bours, or Eoman shelters, along the Une of route, a
name indicative of Eoman occupation ; moreover, a
continuation of this road from Wick, through Marsh-
field, completed the network of roads by forming a
junction -with the great Fosse road at North WraxaU,
An alternative portion of this iter has found favour
with many exceUent judges — -viz., that from St, George's
it ran vid Hanham and Bitton to Bath. We do not
demur to the assertion that this also was a Eoman road;
on the contrary, we know from a map of the seventeenth
century that a portion of it was even, then kno^wn as
" Auguste causeway," There was also at Bitton a smaU
Eoman camp. But we can scarcely conceive that the
passage of the little river Boyd at Bitton warrants the
name of Trajectus being given to such a station.
It may be said that the same argument is equaUy
cogent with regard to Wick, it being on the same river ;
but the whole vaUey of Dyrham (Dwr, water) above
Wick, catches as in a basin the watershed of the south
west Cotswolds, so that the course of the river on both
sides of the rocks on which the camp was situated was
evidently through marshy land ; in fact, this part of
the country must not be judged by its present appear
ance, especiaUy the Golden VaUey, which in Antonine's
time would better befit a name that implies a water-
passage. But is it not possible that the word Trajectus in this
case means the passage of the river itself tMough the
riven gorge of limestone rock, which, indeed, forms the
fosse of the Eoman camp on the height above, and
tMough wMch the river has forced a passage, the
chasm being similar in character, and only inferior in

depth and grandeur, to that of the Avon at St, Vincent's
rocks ?
The chief difficulty in accepting Sea MUls as the
site of Abona has been not so much any difference in
its relative distance to other stations as the fact that
there are no existing remains that betoken an important
place of trade or anything more than the ordinary reUcs
of a camp. No thane's wic, baron's castle, or EngUsh
to^wn rose on the spot to cover up or destroy the traces
of any former structures ; indeed, there has been but
one discovery on the spot worthy of especial remark,
and that is perfectly consistent ¦with the theory that it
was never any other than a camp.
14. A very brief residence woiUd con-nnce the in
habitants of Abone that the low MU a little to the east,
at the confluence of the rivers Avon and Frome, offered
far greater facUities for commerce and was better fitted
for defence. This (if not pre^viously inhabited, as. we
suppose it to have been, by Kelt or Belgse) became in
the second century a Eoman settlement of sufficient
importance to be kno^wn as the Caer Brito of the early
historians. TMough it another line of road, not named
in the iters, was carried from Gloucester, wMch is kno^wn
to tMs day as the Eidgeway, and is continued from Bristol
over the marsh meadows of Bedminster by a causeway
to the lead mines of Mendip, Another road (the alterna
tive one before mentioned) also was constructed, gi-ving
shorter access to Bath, via Hanham and Bitton. The
intersecting point of these great roads being at the con-
fiux of two na^vigable rivers, with a sheltered roadstead
in the adjoining sea, and weU defended by neighbouring
camps on every side, is a sufficient reason to account
for the choice of it as a settlement. That Caer Brito
thus sprung into note on the decadence of the less suit
able station of Abone is the conclusion of Barrett, who,
supposing that station to include the camps of Clifton,
continues: "As it was then from the Eoman camps in
its neighbourhood, and the road bet^wixt Bath and
Caerwent passing this way, Bristol may be said to have
deduced its first origin, the Britons li-ving there under
their protection and government, .^ ^ .^ If it should
be further asked at what particular period of time it was
founded it can only be said to have taken its rise
beyond doubt from the Eoman station of Abone, grow
ing up by degrees from it, and at last blended with it,
whUe the Eomans used to pass the Severn to Caer
went." '
We may add, for the information of those who are
curious in such matters, that the divergence of opinion
in by-gone years between antiquaries as to the position
of Abone upon the iter is very remarkable.
^ Barrett, 30,

A,D, 336,

GEOGRAPHICAL RESEMBLANCE TO ROME.

23

" * * * * Bristowa stands
Like Rome, on seven* hills, proud and strong.
While, through her rich and varied lands,
Avon, like Tiber, flows along
Between such banks as bravely ¦vie.
With Rhine's own gorgeous scenery,"
Bakham (Ingoldsby) New Bristol Guide, ISlfl,
* There are eight hills shown in each map, but Redcliff, like the Janieulum, was an accretion to the original city. By mistake our artist
has mapped Bristol on a much larger scale than Rome, hence he has been unable to show the reach of the Avon to Hanham, which still more
strongly adds to the resemblance.

Dr, Gale thought it was at Hanham, Stukeley names
both Henbury and Oldland Common ; Horsley, Al
mondsbury ; Eeynolds, HaUen ; Bishop StiUingfleet,
Aust ; Barrett fluctuates between Sea MUls and Clifton,
and Seyer places it, correctly we think, at Sea MUls,
15, Some of our historians have detected a resem
blance between the physical geography of Eome and
Bristol, wMch they suppose may possibly have influ
enced the choice by the Latins of the latter as the site
for a town, and certainly on paper the Ukeness is far
from being merely a fanciful one. The yeUow Tiber
flows by an obtuse angle around the transpontine district
of Eome, the base of wMch is the Janieulum hUl, By
an angle of simUar form the turbid waters of the Avon
cut off from the ancient city proper of Bristol, the dis
trict of wMch Eedcliff hUl forms the base Une. Eome
was buUt on seven MUs, say they ; Mens Palatinus is
represented by the bill on wMch our waUed burgh was

buUt, Aventinus by the Castle hill, Capitolinus by
College green, Quirinalis by Brandon, Viminalis by St.
Michael, Exquilinus by Kingsdown, and Cselius by
Montpelier. The idea, is without doubt, an after
thought, arising from the palpable resemblance of the
maps of the two cities.
16. During the first part of the 4th century this
site, so admirably fitted for trade, was reckoned of
sufficient importance to be surrounded by a waU, and
a fosse where such was necessary. This was done,
Seyer teUs us, by Constantine the Great ; it must
therefore have been before a.d. 336,
Fortified so near the close of the Eoman era in
Britain, and having a city (Aquse Solis) graced with
beautiful temples and possessing every luxury, within
half a day's march, it is not surprising that Bristol
cannot — Uke her sister city — point to her architectural
relics as proof of her Eoman origin.

24

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 336.

Pent up -witMn narrow waUs, every inch of ground
has been repeatedly buUt upon, so as effectuaUy to
obliterate the remains of the cottages which were the
ordinary residences of the Eoman populace. The smaU
houses exhumed at Pompeii bear no resemblance to
the vUla residences of the opulent magnates. Several
famUies inhabited one Eoman house, "insula"; those
in which only one household resided in a town were
termed " domus ve mdes privates. "
Aquse SoUs, with its baths and temples, would, as
the more ancient and wealthy city, be in aU UkeUhood
the chosen residence of those who could afford such a
dweUing as the last named, whUst the more fragUe and
humble structures of Caer Brito, the work, too, of a
later and rapidly deteriorating age, would perish amidst
the changes of fifteen centuries of active business Ufe.
But we have other and more sufficient reasons to testify
to the Eoman occupation of the site of Bristol,

NUjhtiii'jidc VaUey, Leigh Woods.
17. The whole of the neighbourhood has been, and
stiU appears to be, rich in deposits of Eoman coins.
Barrett mentions many discoveries prior to his day, and
Seyer devotes twenty pages to the enumeration and
description of them, together with others that came
under his own personal observation. For the cata
logue of these we refer our readers to his pages,
vol. I., cap. ii., 154, 174. We shaU, however, briefiy note
the sites within the city boundaries, or in their immediate
neighbourhood, where the largest dejiosits were found.

At CUfton down, near the camp, when Sir Wm, Draper
leveUed the site of a Eoman vUla in order to buUd
ManiUa HaU, coins of Nero, Domitian, Trajan and
other Eoman emperors were discovered, together with
a curious Eoman urn ha^ving two handles, tUes, bricks
and broken Eoman ware. More recently, at the Eoyal
Fort, on Kingsdown, in CoUege green, Bridge street and
Bell lane (part of the inner pomerium), aU within the
boundaries of the city, coins in considerable quantities
have been found in digging the foundations for buUd
ings. The places in the neighbourhood enumerated by
Barrett and Seyer in which coins had been found are
Portchester (Portbury), Shirehampton, Sea MUls, Hen
bury, Blaize MU, CUfton, Leigh down (four lots),
WraxaU hUl, Tickenham, Cadbury camp, NaUsea and
Kenmoor (tMee urns fuU), but the largest discovery
named by Seyer was in January, 1817, on Leigh down,
in the parish of Ashton, adjoining the road wMch ran
through Nightingale VaUey, Sir Hugh Smyth in that
year was engaged in leveUing a piece of ground which
had recently been enclosed, when one of the labourers
drove his pickaxe through a heap of coins, wMch lay
in a hole about six inches below the surface, Seyer
accounts for 500 pieces, but as the workmen had seized
upon the spoU, and the greater part of them were sold
for more than double their value, he considers that there
were altogether more than a thousand pieces. They
appear with one exception to have been sUver denarii,
Seyer gives 242 different types obtained by himself.
They ranged from coins of the EepubUc of Eome to
Constantius II,, and varied in weight from 56 to 28
grs., besides which the coins of the later emperors
were greatly debased, the proportion being 1^ of copper
to I of sUver,
As only one coin of Constantius II, was found in the
lot, this hoard was probably deposited a.d. 338-40.
In 1865 a number were discovered by the labourers
employed in lowering the ground on the north side of
the Cathedral, and within the last five years immense
deposits have been unearthed, which to a very large
extent have been personaUy inspected by ourselves.
In the year 1875, in the suburb of Easton, on the
site of iter xiii, leading to Bath, some labourers, en
gaged in laying water-pipes, dug up a hoard so numer
ous that they shared the coins by the double-handsful
instead of counting them, and bore their prizes away in
three bowler hats fiUed to the brim.
Out of 732 of these coins in our possession, exactly
600 are of the reigns of Constantius CMorus and Con
stantine the Great, about 70 to the former and 530 to
the latter, 1 8 are coins of Crispus, the son of Constan
tino, 58 of Licinius, 5 of Diocletian, 13 of Maximianus,

A.D, 306,

DISCOVERY OF ROMAN COINS IN BRISTOL,

25

24 of Maximin Daza, 4 of Maxentius, 3 of Probus, 1 of
Carausius, 1 of Carinus, 2 of Claudius II,, and 3 of
GaUienus, They are therefore aU included within a
period of 350 years of the Lower Empu-e, They con
sist of 251 separate types, are aU beautifuUy oxidized,
but not any of them worn by use — even those of Gal-
lienus have the bust and exergue sharply defined, whUst
the later specimens are fresh as if buried from the mint.
None of them have ever apparently been used for cur
rency, and they were probably hidden about a.d, 336.
In 1874 another buried hoard was disturbed by the
spade of a ditcher, who was paring the banks of a
little watercourse which runs by an ancient footpath in
FUwood that leads from Bristol up to Maes Knoll tump,
and close to an old road of communication between the
latter place and the iter xii. The man unwittingly
cleft the jar containing the coins, and a large number,
apparently about two thirds of them, were scattered
¦with the clods over the grassfield, where many were
eventuaUy found. The discovery was made by a
lad, who saw some curious roUs in the bank, which
upon inspection proved to be first brasses, chiefiy of
the early empire, but ranging from Claudius to Maxi
mianus. These were oxidized into solid masses, and
when severed were found to have been much worn by
constant use as currency, many of them being so smooth
that neither bust nor inscription could be traced ; where
they could be deciphered those of Hadrian were by far
the most plentiful. In the remaining portion of the
jar, wMch was of common pottery, there were some
thousands of smaUer irregularly shaped coins, varying
in diameter from the eighth of an inch to tMee-eighths.
Comparatively few of these were circular, but there
was in aU of them a rough approach to that form. On
the obverse was more or less (according to the capacity
of the coin) of a head in profile wearing a spiked crown ;
they bore many different types on the reverse. Of the
coins of Constantine, so abundant in the locality, there
was not one. The fair inference is that this hoard was
deposited before his reign, that the large brasses had
long been in circulation, and that the small coins were
those of one of the British emperors, either Carausius
or AUectus. This bank deposit therefore was made
before a,d, 306,
In April, 1880, one of the largest hoards yet dis
covered, and very much akin in character to that
unearthed at Easton, was found near to a lane and
footpath which crosses the fields from the Eidgeway
to the site of the before-named iter. The spot was
between Netherways and Filton, These coins had
been buried in an earthen jar of common half-baked
pottery, about fths of an inch in thickness, in the bank
[Vol, I.]

of an old watercourse, out of the bed of wMoh a con
siderable number were gathered ; the rest were oxidised
in lumps in the broken fragment of the vase found in
the bank. Upwards of 3000 of them are third brasses
of Licinius, Constantine the Great, and his son. They
are of the London and Treves coinages chiefiy, and are
of great variety of type ; many of them are sharply
cut and in good preservation, none of them show signs
of wear, but like those of the Easton deposit they
appear to have been buried soon after they came from
the mint. In addition to these, there remained with
the broken shards nearly a thousand of the smaUer
coins to which we have before alluded in the discovery
at FUwood ; these have also for the most part a rayed
crowned head on the obverse. From their position the
discoverer inferred, and we think justly, that a far
greater number of these smaU pieces at least, and
some also of the larger, had been washed away at
times of fiood and lost, when at some remote period
the vase was broken. Altogether there seem to have
been between 4000 and 5000 pieces recovered, and
possibly quite as many have been irrecoverably lost.
It is quite conceivable that the undiscovered treasures
of the soU equal those that have been found. Eemem-
bering that aU the cases cited are those of hidden and^
lost moneys (a very smaU portion of the general cur
rency) the thought naturaUy arises, what, then, must
the bulk have been within the circle in which these
spots occur ? And if so much money were buried and
lost in the locality, witMn two centuries, what an
amount of trade must have been carried on therein.
18. The dredge that scoops up the mud from our
Floating Harbour (the old bed of the river Avon)
empties its contents at a sluice which opens into the
New Cut. Here at low water the mudlarks may be
seen busily at work, and, although by far the larger
number of such light articles as silver farthings and
pennies of the English kings and second and third
brasses of the Eoman empire have most certainly been
swept away by the rush of the waters from the sluice,
sufficient coinage is found to prove that a very large
trade must have been carried on here in the Eoman
period. Of an immense number of coins thus coUected
through a long series of years, which we have been
privUeged to examine, about one-fifth consisted of the
latten money of the Hanse towns and the Low countries,
three-fifths English, ranging from Henry I. to modern
days, those of Edward I., III. and IV., Elizabeth, James
I., Charles II., being of the ancient English coinages
the most plentiful; a small proportion were Spanish, and
the remainder Eoman, We submit that the circum
stances under which such coins as these are continuaUy
c 2

26

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 139.

being produced from our harbour, between the HotweUs
and Bristol Bridge, proves our position that Bristol was
a Eoman town, for not in a desert or uninhabited spot
is lost money plentiful, but in the busy centres of com
merce and in the midst of a popiUation given to traffic.
TMs superabundance of Eoman money is to our
minds a more con-vincing proof of dense habitation by
the Latin race, or their coloni or prirati, than are the
temples of AquEe Solis or the tUe-bound waUs of Venta
Silurum, 19, Another discovery, made some years ago, con
nects more intimately stiU the present site of Bristol
¦with the trade of the Eomans, and gives, we think, con
clusive proof of their occu
pation of it as a place of
export, even before Sea
MUls was abandoned. In
the bed of the river Frome,
close to its bank, there were
found two pigs of lead,
weigMng respectively, one
76lbs., the other 89lbs.,
bearing the inscription
"IIIP. CAES. AN--NINI, AUG.
PH., PP," («.«., somewhere
between a.d, 139 — 161),
Whether these came from
the Mendip HiUs, or, as we
think, from Penpark Hole,'
is of little consequence.
The question is, how came
they in the bed of the
river? Too heavy to be
flung in from the bank,
they must have been acci-
dentaUy dropped in process
of shipment on board some
Eoman gaUey. Exhumed
after a burial of fifteen centuries, they prove that in
the second century Bristol was a place of export for
Eoman commodities,
Mr. Prebendary Scarth says: "It is not improbable
that Bristol in Eoman times may have afforded an outlet
to Eoman Somersetshire commerce, as Eoman coins and
two pigs of Eoman lead have been found there, and the
river Avon has j-ielded distinct signs of Eoman traffic." -
20. A single glance at an ancient map of the three
cities Glevum, Aquse SoUs, and Bristol wiU show a
most striking simUarity in size, form, and the method
' Penpark is named in a deed witnessed by Kino- Alfred, in
A,D. 883, as a place of diggings. — il/?-. Ker.thlce,
^ Som, Arch. Proc, XXIV,

Cmnlecl, at Stol;e Bisluqi.

of laying out the streets within the walls. This plan
had no connection with the cross of Christianity, as
Seyer supposed, ^ but is a necessary result of the Eoman
method of measuring, noting and dividing the land.
Each Eoman "civitas," or town, had its "territorium"
di^dded by "axes," in other words roads. Of these the
" car do maximus" ran from south to north, the " decu-
mamis maximus" from east to west. The rest of the
territory was divided by lines of roads that ran paraUel
to these "decumani" and "cardines,"^ The estates thus
parceUed out by system were registered in the govern
ment books, the roads on which they were situated
being each numbered. 21, There were several
trigonometrical surveys of
the island under the Eo
mans, for which they must
have selected for the trian-
giUation great base lines
marked by some distinctive
feature different from the
ordinary conformation of
the country ; natural ob
jects were made to suffice
when they were sufficiently
remarkable, but art was
frequently caUed to their
aid in order to make the
Une conspicuous.
22, Now, scattered over
the country we find a
number of artificial hills,
distinct in character and
outstripping in size the
tumuli or barrows. The
object of their erection has
been a puzzle for anti
quaries. Unsuited for
defensive warfare, and too vast for sepulture, combined
with the fact that they contain no human remains, the
cognoscenti have had to look to other causes for their
origin. In the west we have a number of these tumps,
as they are termed, Elberton, Maes KnoU, Silbury,
Marlborough, Maesbury, Cadbury, and we think we
may add also BeweU's tump, the site of the cross that
bore that name in the grounds of Cotham house, High-
bui-y, Bristol, which is hidden from general view by the
trees planted thereon in 1813.
It is very probable that BeweU's cross resembled in
some points that at BanweU, which is an earthwork,
^ Seyer, I., 210.
^ r'ciotf's Romans nf Britain, 42 — 121,

A.D. 161.

ANCIENT PRIVILEGES OF BRISTOL FREEMEN,

27

consisting of an oblong enclosure fifty yards long and
forty-five broad, having a sUght agger and fosse. In
the centre is a ridge of earth forming a Greek cross,
raised about two feet above the rest of the enclosure,
and four feet broad, in the middle of the cross is a
depression, apparently the mouth of a weU, like that
on Jordan hill an unquestioned Eoman quadrifinium,
BeweU's differed from tMs, and was we think raised in
reUef upon a mound. These crosses of the " agrimen-
sores " show the point of intersection of the Eoman
lines of centuriation.^
Upon opening them we find no signs of sepulture,
but merely such reUcs as a Eoman bridle-bit or spur,
broken shards of pottery, and a stratum of imperish
able charcoal : in fact just enough to teU us they were
raised by human hands, ^
The tump at Maes KnoU, so plainly visible from aU
parts of the city of Bristol, is 390 feet long, 84 feet
broad, and 60 feet Mgh from the outer ditch ; its mon
strous size proves that it could not be for defensive
purposes, indeed a short detour of a few hundred yards
would bring the assaUants to extended and compara
tively easy ramparts of only a few feet in height.
Besides tMs tump is manifestly an aftergrowth, and not
a part of the original British camp. It is a curious
coincidence, if not sometMng more than a mere coin
cidence, that the first five of the above named mounds
are very nearly upon a Une which runs north and
south, also that Broad street, Bristol, the northern arm
of the cross streets in the centre of the city, is made to
bend from a rectangle sUghtly to the west, and thus to
point directly to the timip at Highbury, Again on a
latitudinal Une running east from Highbury, we have
on a weU defined Eoman road, SUbury hill and Marl
borough tump, &c. The legitimate inference is that
these mounds are Eoman " botontini," and that the first
is the Une of a " car do maximus," the other that of a
" decumanus maximus," Here we have additional e'vi-
dence that Bristol streets are the result of Eoman tri-
angulation, and clearly belong to its " centurice." ^
23, The waUs of Bristol were assuredly designed
on the plan of a Eoman fortified to^wn. The inner
" pomcerium," or " murivant," can be foUowed on foot
for nearly the whole of the circumvaUation, the waU
itself was destroyed circa 1247 in order to aUow of the
gro-wth of the burgh. The area is traversed by four
^ Coote's Romans of Britain, 42—121.
^ The great Bishop of Hippo, St, Augustine, in De Civit, Dei,
lib. xxi,, u, 4, refers to the practice of burying charcoal under
these bolontini, by way of illustrating his argument. Quid in
carbonihus, &c,
° The reader who is curious in these matters should consult
Coote's Romans of Britain .

principal streets, which face very nearly the cardinal
points, these are intersected by paraUel lines of lesser
ways, "rici" and " angi2}ortus." The pubUc buUdings
have always occupied the central place at the inter
section of the roads, even as at Eome they were
grouped around the Forum, More land we know was
enclosed by a "second wall" on the north side, built in
the 10th or possibly the 11th century, necessitated by
the growth of the " municipium." Who then surrounded
it first with a waU, we are entitled to ask, if ^;he Eomans
did not ? Clearly not the Danes, They only came in
great strength during the 10th and 1 1th centuries.
Most certainly it could not be the Anglo-Saxons, they
were no to^wn - dweUers, they scorned to possess a
dweUing in a city or town.^ It seems to us that we
are forced to the conclusion that Bristol must have
been fortified as weU as previously planned by the
Eomans. 24. But not only in the form of our city do we
trace its Latin origin as a "municipium," its customs
and pri^vUeges which were confirmed by charter in the
12th century as having been enjoyed by the burgesses
" from time immemorial " are coincident many of them
with those enjoyed by the Eoman municipaUties, and
are such as could not possibly have been derived from a
barbarous and an uncivUized race such as the Saxons
and Angles. For instance, MeteUus by law decreed
that no Eoman citizen should pay portorium, a toU
le^vied on goods imported or exported. From earUest
historic times Bristol citizens claimed to be free of toU,
custom or passage, Kemble, the great Saxon authority,
admits that "the Teutonic kings and lords estabUshed
hostUe toUs to the injury of internal traffic." " This
freedom then could not be an increment of Saxon rule.
Even do^wn to the 9th century on the continent "Libertas
Romana " was defined to mean the privilege of minting
raoney and of holding markets and exacting toUs from
strangers.^ Bristol minted money certainly as early as
the 10th century, very probably before, but the fijst
known coin of the Bristol mint is one of Ethelred II.,*
and her burgesses not only imposed toUs on goods
brought by foreigners, but they prevented strangers
1 "House joined to house and surrounded by a dense quad
rangular wall, crowding into a defined and narrow space the
elements of civilization, are unintelligible to the Saxon," — Kemble,
Saxons in England, II., 263.
" They settled in the territoria of the cities, never in the in
side, but always outside of the boroughs." — Coote's Romans of
Britain, 231.
^ Kemble, Saxons in England, II., 316,
' Thierry, quoted by Coote, 382.
* " Ethelred enacted that there should be no money ers besides
the king's, and that their number should be diminished,"—
Kemble, Saxons in England, II., 323.

28

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 312.

selling anything within the waUs excepting through
the agency of a Bristol broker.
The Eoman laws of Papius and of Junius Pennius
denied to strangers a residence within the gates. We
know that the Bristol men limited the stranger to forty
days' residence.
25. What on the contrary was the custom of the
bond fide Saxon to^wns? They grew up around the castle
of the lord, " He encouraged as much as possible the
resort of strangers to his domain." ^ B'at Bristol castle
was outside the waUs of the town, and was an incre
ment and not the nucleus of the burgh.
The "Lex Atilia," A.u. 443, gave wardship of in
testate widows and orphans to the Prsetor and a
majority of the Tribunes. In Bristol such wardships
remained in the hands of the municipality for centuries.
We know that Teutonic rule was the reverse of this,
and the Saxon king had the wardship even of his
Thanes. The Eoman citizen could and did make his
wiU at pleasure, so did our Bristol burgesses ; a privi
lege and practice that was unknown to the German
race. The Eomans paid "tributum," a standing land-tax.
So did the Bristol men pay "landgafol," or a ground
rent for their holdings; not so "the Anglo-Saxon, who
at no period paid tributum for his land in the shire,
and it is weU known that he scorned to possess a
dweUing in any city or to^wn."^ The Eoman "muni
cipium" possessed territories outside its walls and sur
rounding them ; Bristol had its weU defined boun
dary lands, which in 1373, after, it is stated in the
charters, untold ages of possession were converted into
the county of Bristol. Further points of identity are
found in these municipalities : the to'smsmen of Bristol,
as did the citizens of Eome, kept the keys of their
gates, elected their own officers, administered civil
justice, maintained a police, had their own court-house,
and their coUegia or guilds. " Wherever," said Seneca,
"the Eoman has conquered there he inhabits." "He
makes the people slaves," says Tacitus, "but he says
nothing of destroying them."^ The above are a few
of the instances of Eoman survival in Bristol; they
are entirely foreign as we have shown to the spirit
of the Teutonic Ufe of those centuries, and were privi
leges neither claimed nor enjoyed in the Anglo-Saxon
period by any place that had not been a Eoman
" municipium" We have purposely omitted much that is common
to the whole country, but which was an inheritance
from the Eomans, such as the ornamental work in
tapestry and jeweUery, take for instance the so-caUed
* Kemble, Saxons in England, II., 304.
' Coote's Romans of Britain, 253. ' Annals lib,, XIV,

Saxon fibulae, for which Britain was famed aU over the
continent in the eighth and ninth centuries, but which
with many ordinary customs are palpably of Eoman
origin. To this day we beat the city bounds after the
Eoman fashion, the "ancient terminalia." We dance
with Flora on May morning. The ring, the veU, the
wedding gifts, the wheat or rice tMown over the bridal
party, the bride-cake, groomsman and bridesmaids
descend to us from the mistress of the world. Our
mourning garb, flowers on graves ; cypress and yew
come from the same source ; our lucky and unlucky days,
and other superstitious fears; our "God bless you" to
anyone sneezing, and the thought that some one is talk
ing about us when our ears tingle are aU relics of Eome.
26, To us it seems incredible that, to use the elo
quent words of an author to whose admirable work we
are under great obligations, "that a few generations
after the Anglo-Saxon occupation the Anglo-Saxon
race, which we know to have been at the epoch of
that event merely barbarous, was enabled by contact
only of a soU once peopled by a ci^vUized, artistic and
" policee " race, and without communication with that or
any other race equaUy gifted, to become possessed
through spontaneous and unconditional development,
not merely of civUization, but of the identical civilization
of the erased race, — a civUization of so peculiar a nature
and so precise a degree that in the natural order of
statictics it could not be obtained except under the
same conditions." ^
The multiplied accumulation of circumstantial proofs
which we have thus adduced, is we think sufficient to
show that in its inception our "municipium" must be
identified with that of the Eomano-Briton of the lower
Empire. 27. There remains yet another argument, but as it
applies more particularly to Sea MiUs than to Bristol,
we use it only as a proof that Christianity was enjoyed
in this neighbourhood before Constantine estabUshed it
as the reUgion of the State in a.d, 312 ; although we
cannot receive the theory that the four crossways with
their hypothetical churches were the result of the
Christian piety of the Eoman Emperor, ^
There was found under the turf of Sea MiUs camp
in 1873 a large flat stone, having its incised face
downwards, which was inadvertently broken by the
labourers ; four of the pieces were preserved, the rest
are lost. The pieces discovered form the upper part
of a mural tablet, about six inches thick and two feet
in height, it is pentagonal in form, the acute angle
being the apex, as in many a modern monument.
1 Coote's Neglected Fact in English History, vii,
^ Seyer, I., 209.

A.D, 360.

THE ROMAN LEGIONS RECALLED.

29

On the face of the stone is inscribed a female head
and bust, surmounted by a semi-circle (the rainbow of
Hope), above this in the centre is either a St, Andrew's
cross, -with a stem between the two lower arms, — X
or, as some think, an unfinished CMistian monogram —
\B. The woman has earrings, and on one side is a dog
rampant, on the other a cock. The drawing is rude,
the execution rough, and underneath the figure is the
beginning of an inscription — o Tenth with a leaf stop
on each side of the top
Une, Now the cross, the
bow, the dog and the cock
are all early Christian
symbols, and " spes " is a
female name,-"^
Both Mr, Parker and
Mr, Prebendary Scarth (no
mean authorities) agree as
to this being a CMistian
tombstone of tMrd century
date, erected or intended to
be erected to the ¦wife or
daughter of Cains Sentius,
Mr, Coote thinks it is pos
sibly MitMaic and of the
1st century,
"In none of her provin
ces did Eome seek to ex
terminate the natives, she
took away their national
independence, but she ele
vated them by giving her
laws, her arts, and her admirable system of municipal
self-government ; the ablest and wealthiest of the
Britons shared in these rights, and in CaracaUa's time
aU subjects of the emperor who were not slaves were
made citizens of Eome. Yet Britain, although she
shared in these privileges, never Uke Gaul or Spain
became thorougMy Eomanized. The people retained
their o^wn language, but during the five centuries of
1 Aringhi II,, 614, Gruter, 608. No, 6 Asinia Spes, 118.
No, 11 Torania Spes, Scarth in Somerset Arch, Proceedings,
1873.

Romcin incised Stone found at Sea Mills.

Eoman occupation they like the inhabitants of the rest
of the empire had become a Christian people." '^
28. Before a.d. 360 Britain was divided into epis
copal dioceses, for in that year tMee bishops ex
Britannia "attended the Council of Arimintun." ^
29. About A.D. 426 the Eoman legions were finaUy
and entirely withdrawn from Britain, the colonists were
thus left to their own resources ; tribal repubUcs and
free municipal governments arose as a necessity of the
age, and these conflicting,
stamped the ensuing half
century as one of chronic
turbulence and strife. In
A.D, 446 "the groans of
the Britons" was the title
of an appeal for aid which
was addressed to iEtius,
who was thrice Consul of
Eome, None but a civil
ized people would have
addressed him in these
terms : — " The barbarians
drive us to the sea, the
sea throws us back upon
the barbarians ; so that we
have nothing left us but
the wretched choice of
being either dro^svned or
butchered," The Consul
pitied but could not relieve
them. Twice since Victor-
inns ¦withdrew the Eoman
regulars from the island, after gi'ving the people and
the veteran soldiers and colonists who had settled in
Britain due notice that they must henceforth defend
themselves, had the Emperor Honorius sent a legion
to their assistance against the Picts and Scots; but
now Eome herself was in danger from the Huns, and
Britain was left to her fate,
1 Creasy, 4, Introduction to Great Events of Great Britain,
by S, Neil,
2 Coote's Romans of Britain, 413, 421,

CHAPTER III.

^

Tp i WmOW -f 60I]QUESTg -f jniB ^ ^ULE. ^

I. TAe Interregnum. 2. The Teutonic Invaders, and the order in which they formed settlements.
3. King Arthur, and the seat of his Kingdom. 4. Number of the towns that existed in Britain at that
period. 5. Lundenwic (London) a connecting link between Roman and Saxon. 6. Bristol jealously
copies London. 7. The Invaders never more than a minority of the Population. 8. The Land-laws.
9. The King and his Estate. 10. The Mark and Shire. 11. The Freemen, Witenagemot, and their
power. 12. The Thane. 13. The Sixhynde man of Mercia and Wessex, a town dweller. 14. Bristol
on the south frontier of Mercia. 15. St. Werburgh and Bristolington. 16. Presumed site of St. Augustine's
Conference. 17. Curious sculptured Anglo-Saxon stone dug up in the Chapter House. 18. Story of the
Roman Catholic mission to Britain, and St. Augustine's interview with the British Bishops. 19, First descent
of the Danes. 20. Alfred assigns them the Denalague. 21. Edward throws up a Castle at the mouth
of the Avon. 22. Mlla, a fictitious creation of Chatterton. 23. Aylward Sneaw, Lord of the Honour
of Bristol. 24, Death of Edward at Pucklechurch. 25, Characteristics of the later Anglo-Saxon Kings
and of their rule. 26, Ethelred. His coins the first known money minted in Bristol. 27. The marvellous
recuperative power inherent in Britain. 28. Camden's view as to the foundation of Bristol considered.
29. Commerce of slow growth in troublous times. 30. Edmund Ironside. 31. Knut's victory at Assandun.
32. State of the country at the change of dynasties. 33. English Works of Art in great request. 34. Curious
Saxon School Book, 35. Athelstan and his fleet. 36. Bristol famous as a place of export for Slaves.
37. The reign of Knut. 38. Elevation of Godwin. 39. Knut's Letter to the English People. 40. Dis
covery of Knut's body. 41, His Bristol Coins. 42, The Sons of Godwin. 43. Bristol Coinage of Harold I.
44. Harthaknut succeeds Harold. 45. Earl Godwin's Golden Gift. 46. The Confessor and his Norman
Policy. 47. Differences arise between the King and Godwin's Family. 48. The Earls worsted, Harold
flies to Bristol. 49. Visit of William, Duke of Normandy, to England; his Character. 50. 'Troubled
condition of the Kingdom. 51. Godwin returns, and the Normans fly. 52. Godwin dies, and his
son Harold succeeds him, as Earl of the West Saxons. 53. Harold's victory over Gruffydd. 54. Portskewet.
Harold builds there. 55. Bristol Pennies of Edward the Confessor. 56. Place-names in Bristol derived
from the family of Godwin. 57. Bristol Pennies of Harold II. 58. Boundaries of the Town at the
close of the Anglo-Danish period. 59. Its outer Natural Defences, 60. Frankpledge, what it meant.
61. Bristol at the Close of the Teutonic Era, strong, wealthy and prosperous. 62. Clifton, 'a Manor belonging
to the King, but held under the Provost of Bristol.

A,D. 449,

THE TEUTONIC INVADERS.

31

"FTEE Honorius had withdra-wn the Eoman
legions from Britain and left the inhabi
tants to their own resources, the govern
ment reverted to the native chieftains, who
stiU " greedy of quarrels," ^ were continu
aUy fighting with each other, and to the
colonies left by the Eomans, which, as free
cities, were self-governed when sufficiently
Hence smaU bodies of disciplined and fierce
invaders of a kingdom torn by dissensions, found no
great difficulty in seizing upon and maintaining their
position in the most fertUe portion of the island.
2. It is tolerably certain that there were Teutonic
settlements on the eastern coast before the Eoman in
vasion, and also that soldiers of the same race served
in the imperial armies and became coloni. Theodosius
and StUicho also repeUed Saxon invaders in the 4th
and 5th centuries. Thus the name Saxon became
famUiar to the natives, and is a term of reproach in
Wales to the present day. But the first of the Teutonic
tribes who conquered and established a colony after the
Eomans were the Jutes, who, in a.d, 449, founded the
kingdom of Kent, The Saxons under JEUa, in a.d, 477,
settled themselves as "South Saxons" {i.e. Sussex), A
very much larger kingdom began to be founded in a.d.
495, which bore the name of West Saxon {i.e. Wessex),
The East Saxons gave their name to Essex. The Angles
seized upon Northumbria, the land between the Humber
and the Frith of Forth, which again was divided into two
kingdoms — Beomicia and Deira (Yorkshire). The East
Angles came in the sixth century, and became North-
folk and SoutMolk, The last, and ere long the greatest,
of these Anglian kingdoms was that of the Mercians —
"March or frontier men," who, says Dr, Freeman,
graduaUy joined together several smaUer states, in
cluding aU the land wMch the West Saxons had held
north of the Thames. Such as the Lindesfaras and
Gainas in Lincolnshire, the Mageseetas in Hereford
shire, the Hwiccas in Gloucester, Worcester, and part
of Warwick, and several others, Mercia thus became
very large and powerful, "it was chiefiy an Anglian
kingdom but among the Hwiccas, and in some of the
other shires in southern and western Mercia most of
the people must reaUy have been Saxons." ^
The Eomano-British inhabitants of Somerset and
the Cotswolds appear to have manfuUy resisted the
advancing tide of West Saxon invasion. It was a
reUgious war as weU as a war of races. The Saxons
• Amm, Marcell., 15, 12.
^ Freeman, Old Eng, Hist,, 3S, 39,

were pagans, the British, nominaUy at least. Christians,
but no doubt many of the Britons, descended from the
Belgse or Belgas and Kelt, remained pagan, and with
the earUer immigrants of Tuetonic descent helped
materiaUy in the Saxon conquest of England,
3, These were the days in which King Arthur is
reputed to have flourished. His kingdom of CornwaU
comprised not only the county stiU known by that name,
but also Devon, Somerset, part of West WUtshire, and
of South Gloucestershire.
"This is that Arthur who was a man worthy of
having his actions pubUshed, not by deceitful fables
but by true Mstories, as being one who sustained his
faUing country and sharpened the broken spirits of his
countrymen to war, and lastly who put to flight 900 of
the enemy at the siege of Mount Badon." ^ It used to
be always considered that one of the hUls above Bath
was the site of tMs conflict, but latterly the preference
has been given to Badbury, in Dorsetshire. In a
metrical romance, it is said that during this invasion
" a vast army of Saracens (Pagans) from Denmark
made an attack on Bristol ¦with 30,000 men, in which
they were so completely defeated that not five of them
escaped, but AureUus Ambrosius was slain," ^ (This
was a Eomano-Briton of great ability, who was elected
general-in-chief.) Arthur it is weU known is reputed
to have been buried at Glastonbury, where there was a
church in British days, " and it is quite certain that the
West Saxon kings did not conquer any part of Somerset
until after the time in which Arthur is said to have
lived." 3
Here again we must ask our readers to judge for
themselves ; the Arthur best known to this generation
is a creation of transcendent poetical genius, and in the
search after the real man the historian is somewhat
like an aeronaut, drifting, not aimlessly, but helplessly,
amidst glorified cloudlands, in search of a soUd Alp on
which to anchor. All we reaUy know, is that we have
English and Welsh place names in close juxtaposition
on a line from the Avon to the Axe that apparently mark
the boundaries at that period between the two races,
4. The Anglo-Saxon invaders found here a number
of territorial towns and cities ; in a.d, 250 they were
59 in number,''' Kemble admits that there were 34
in the fifth and sixth centuries,' and he names Bristol
1 Wm. Malmes, I,
' Ellis's Specimens of Early English Metrical Romance, I, , 236,
= Freeman, Old Eng. Hist., 36.
¦* Marcianus Lib. I., 57 (Hudson's Geog, Min).
¦¦' Kemble, Saxons in England, II., 269.

.32

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 577,

as being the chief pro-sdncial to-wn, he also imputes
the growth and continuance of that burgh to the in
dustry and commercial activity of its inhabitants. His
words are as f oUow : "If royal favours and court
gaieties could have made cities great, Warwick, Stafford
and Winchester should have flourished ; for they were
the residences of the rulers of Mercia and Wessex,
the scenes of witenagemots, of CMistmas festivals and
Easters, when the king solemnly wore his crown ; while
the ceorls and mangeras of Brygstowe and Lundenwic
were cheapening hides with the Easterlings, warehous
ing foreign wines, or bargaining -with the adventurer
from the East for incense, which was to accompany the
Mgh mass in the Cathedral." ^
5. This is satisfactory proof that the British were
not aU wiped out by the Saxons, as one of our most
eminent Mstorians has assumed,
Lundenwic (London) connects the Kelt, the Eoman,
and the Teuton, her commercial fame dates from the
Eoman dominion, - but she always preserved as far as
practicable her character of a free city. Sturdy in
defence of her rights, she knew how to bide her time
when compeUed to bow before brute force, and by the
potent power of wealth to recover a little more than
that which she had temporarily lost, TMoughout the
six centm-ies of Anglo-Saxon rule she fluctuated between
being a princely dependency of Mercia, or of Wessex,
and the state of an independent commonwealth.
True, during the time of internecine strife, when
might became right in the eyes of aU men, and pillage
and plunder were legitimatized, we hear but little of
her commerce. But in the end of the 9th century she
emerges from chaos ; Alfred, when he rescued her from
the Danes, laid in her eastern borders the germ of her
future citadel. The dooms of the city (local laws for
self-government) were fixed by the citizens in the reign
of Athelstan,^ and being speciaUy favoured under
Ethelred her commerce spread over Western Europe
and along the shores of the Mediterranean, On more
than one occasion when the rest of the countrj- had
submitted to the invader, she by her passionate love
of freedom and her unbounded stores of arms and
wealth was enabled successfully to maintain her inde
pendence against the armies of the victorious Danes.
6. It is a time-honoured proverb that "Bristol has
always slept with one eye open." That open eye was
ever kept fixed on London, which was the great ex
emplar for the men of the West. Our earthen citadel
was raised outside our eastern waU, within twenty
1 Kemble, Saxons in England, II., 308.
= Tacitus Ann., XIV., 33.
" Kemble, Saxons in England, II., 521.

years of the death of Alfred. Our earliest by-laws
are similar to those of London; the date of our com
mercial importance foUowed closely upon hers ; and in
our charters Bristol repeatedly asserts her right to equal
privileges. Our ships saUed to the same eastern seas
as those of London, whUst in the western ocean Bristol
ships always led the van. Less strong and defensible
than the metropolis, Bristol was obliged to succumb to
her Danish invaders, but we find her minting money
under Ethelred before her faU, as weU as afterwards
for her conqueror, and under the quiet rule of Knut's
later years rivaUing, not always unsuccessfuUy, her
elder sister the Queen of the Thames.
7, This fact also ought to be borne in mind in con
sidering this subject, viz., the Anglo-Saxon invaders
were comparatively few in number, never more than a
minority of the population; they "cut dovim the taU
poppies," and British chiefs and warriors of repute
among the coloni were pitUessly sacrificed ; but the
people in the mass were made slaves or ¦viUans, doomed
to toil for their new masters, whUst the women and
children would undoubtedly be spared.
The land was conquered in detaU after a long pro
tracted, but not apparently any concentrated, or power
ful defence.
We might expect that after a sanguinary conflict, a
stubborn determined resistance, there would be indis
criminate slaughter, but it is a libel on human nature
to suppose that a bloody and blind rule of unnecessary
extermination, characterised the invasion tMoughout the
whole of the two centuries which elapsed between the
departure of the legions of Honorius and the battle of
Deorham. The men were savage, the warfare was at
times ferocious, but the idea generaUy received that
they annihilated the " Romano-Belgm" and the colonii&
incredible, and contrary we consider to Mstoric evidence.
The fact is that these invaders became the aristocrats,
the captains, chief nobles, heads of the people, and
eventuaUy kings; but they knew the value of the native
population too weU to exterminate them. The goose
that laid the golden egg might be plucked of its
feathers and robbed of its produce, but it was too
valuable to be foolisUy slain. Besides, long after the
Anglo-Saxons had invaded the land we find these
Eomano-Britons not only existent, but joining the in
vaders. It was they who helped the Angles in their
attack upon KeUic Cumberland, and also in their raid
on Strathclyde, and in this very district we find them
joining forces with CeawUn, the West Saxon, in a.d,
577 in his great battle at Dyrham, by which victory he
got possession of the tMee Eomano-British cities, Bath,
Cirencester and Gloucester. Nevertheless it is very

A.D, 692.

THE LAND-LAWS.

doubtful whether Ceawlin conquered the Cotswolds or
penetrated to the Severn, for we find that the Mercian
cathedral of Worcester was endowed in the year a.d, 692
¦with certain lands situated in the parish of Henbury,
8, Let us now turn our attention to the land and
the conditions under which it was held; conditions it
seems to us partly adopted from the Eoman rule, but
largely supplemented by the customs derived from their
o^wn country by the conquerors.
We find that from earliest times there are recognised
duties of the citizen or inhabitant, to the Commonwealth,
The famous "Trinodas necessitas," the obUgation to serve
in the field, to repair bridges and fortresses, was a recog
nised law, MUitary service by holders of land was due
to and exacted by the lord. Land was divided into
"folldand" and "booUand." Folkland was the property
of the nation, it was inalien
able except ¦with the consent
of the State, i.e., the king,
and the Witan or Grand
CouncU of the Nation, When
thus gran
ted it be-
camebook-
land, i.e.,
was booked
to the new
o^wner and became his
freehold. 9, The king had
Ms o^wn private estate,
aUodial property, and
also bookland. The
monarchy being elective he could not pass ciowa. lands
to Ms descendants, who might possibly never be his
kingly successors. But the claims of "his men" upon
the monarch had to be satisfied ; this naturaUy would
be done not from Ms private estate, but out of the
nation's property. So that when after the Norman
conquest the cro-wn became hereditary, folkland had
practicaUy become royal property and WiUiam claimed
it as such and made it part of the royal domain, the
lawyers deciding that the Hng could possess no private
estate, and that the land was the property of the cro-wn,
and descended to its legal possessor.
In modern days the monarch has conceded the
ancient right, the cro-wn lands are once more the property
of the nation, are controUed by Act of Parliament, and
practicaUy have become folkland, whUst the monarch, as
in Saxon time, can now inherit, hold, buy, seU or be
queath private estate,
10, In the Saxon divisions of the land the mark was
[Vol, I]

Saxon A-rms and Amcnir.

analagous to the modern parish. In a hostUe country
the occupiers would become federative for defence,
hence the anomalous shapes of modern parishes ; and
the shUes being simply a coUection of parishes, their
diversified forms as contrasted with the rectangular
divisions of the Eomans is at once accounted for. Each
shire was ruled by an alderman, who was appointed
by the Mng and his witan, under whom was the
" sciregerefa " or sheriff, who -was the Mng's officer and
representative, 11, Every churl (freeman) had a voice in Ms mark
(of which the parish vestry is a survival) and also
originaUy we think in the Court of the County, i.e.
the Shire Meeting, and apparently in the Witena
gemot or Grand Council of the Nation, But these
latter rights soon lapsed. In the natural order of
things men of wealth, power,
abUity (lay and ecclesiastic)
would take front rank, and
practicaUy, although appa
rently without any legal
form,
they would stand
as the
repre
sentatives of their
neighbours in the wi
tan. On the death of
the king (the head
freeman) these, his
f eUow Thanes, claimed
and exercised the right of choice in electing his suc
cessor. They had also the right of deposing the
monarch; Sigbert in the 8th and Ethelred in the II th
centuries are instances of the exercise of this power.
Even under "duresse," as in the case of Sweyn and
other Danish kings, the form of election was preserved,
for he would only be half a king who had not been
elected by the people's witan (or wise men). It wUl be
seen that under the Norman rule this power decreased,
and under the Angevin kings it was apparently mori
bund, but it was resuscitated for the people in the 13th
century, and it may be said truly that England has
never been entirely deprived of her "People's ParUa-
ment." The king's influence in the witan depended
upon his character and abiUty, A weak, vaciUating,
irresolute monarch found his master therein, and be
came a puppet in the hands of a single energetic
individual or of a few leading men; whUst an able
king could sway the assembly at his wiU,

34

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 586,

If the king could not legaUy act without the consent
of Ms witan neither could the witan do anything with
out the king (unless indeed he violated national law, or
endangered the nation's safety, when they removed Mm
if they could). The witan decreed, the king acted, and
if of superior mind or of more powerful wiU he so
moved the witan that they decreed according to his
wish. The fountain of honour, and of wealth, he could
not only make Thanes, but by grants of folkland could
stUl further enrich them. Hence his power.
12, The Thane was the nobleman, the feUow free
man of the king, whom he recognised merely as his
leader or chieftain for Ufe, or on good behaviour.
The Thanes lived in their own manors, surrounded
by their churls, and their serfs or vUlans, and they
never paid gafol or land tax to the king. The Thane's
house was an irregular pile of buUdings, chiefly of one
story, built of stone below and timber above, with a
room or house for each separate need of the family ;
these suiTounded an open courtyard. At the end oppo
site to the entrance on a raised platform was the hall,
on one side the chapel, on the other the ladies' bower ;
the strong place or tower joined these. Guardrooms,
kitchens, barns, stables and lean-to hovels formed the
other sides of the quadrangle, which was sui-rounded by
an earthen waU with palisades on the top. A wergyld
or Ufe price was put upon the different classes of men.
That of the thane was fixed at 1,200 sMUings, that of
the churl at 200 shiUings.
13. But in Wessex and Mercia there is found a man
of intermediate value, whose life price was 600 shiUings,
This sixhynde man was the townsman, or burgher, who
paid gafol or land tax to the king, and who could hold
land to any extent, even more than a thane held, but
its possession did not make him a noble. He could also
serve in the king's army as a horseman, and take his
part by voice and vote in the shire mote, privileges
which the churl by non-observance had lost.
This was, we contend, the status of the men who
amidst this unhistoric, chaotic disturbance, held their
ground, and were steadUy building up, not only London,
but also Bristol. Other Eoman to-wns, especially in
agricultural districts, feU into desuetude and decay,
being for the most part entirely dependent upon supplies
from the country that was overrun by the enemy, and
also without a sea-borne commerce to fall back upon.
Bristol, too far south to be often, if ever, disturbed by
Pict or Scot, although occasionaUy sacked by Saxon,
Angle, and Dane, possessed a strong recuperative power
in its maritime position, defensible river and commerce,
and was probably then, as we weU know it became in
after years, a fertile source of supply to needy kings.

14, In A.D. 586 the kingdom of Mercia was founded
by Cridda. Bristol became its south-western frontier
town, Mr, Kerslake, arguing for the supremacy of
Mercia, from the dedication of a church to St. Werburgh,
a daughter of the second cMistian king of Mercia, says,
"What was the condition of the spot now occupied by
Bristol, in the centre of which for eleven hundred and
fifty years the church of St, Werburgh stood ? A cen
tury and a half earlier (a.d, 577) Bath had been occu
pied by the West Saxons, and had no doubt so con
tinued until the advance southward of Ethelbald's
frontier also absorbed that city, or certainly its northern
suburb, into Mercia, A great highway, ^ of much earUer
date than the times here being considered, skirted the
southern edge of the weald that we only know as
Kingswood ; and at least approached the neck of the
peninsula — projecting into a land-locked lagoon (not a
swamp), flooded by the confluence at the crest of the
tide of Frome and Avon — upon which stands Bristol,
and which has been hitherto crovraed -with Ethelbald's
usual symbol of Mercian dominion. "As long
ago as ships
frequented the
estuary of the
Severn — ages
before the times
we are consid
ering — it is
inconceivable
that the uncom
mon advantages
of this haven
could have been
unknown, A
British city had
uo doubt existed for unknown ages on the neighbouring
heights west of the lagoon ; and there is a reason, too
long to set forth here, to beUeve that the sheltered
Bristol peninsula itself was used by the West Saxons of
Ceawlin's settlement at Bath, as an advanced frontier
towards the Welsh of West Gloucestershire, long before
it was appropriated by Mercia. It was, perhaps, already
a town before Ethelbald planted upon it one of his Umi-
tary sanctuaries, having 'more Saxonico,' a fortress on
the isthmus, upon which the great square Norman tower
of Eobert the Consul was afterwards raised,"^
15. Again he says, " a national name (St. Wer
burgh) which has outlived nearly a thousand years in
1 Antonine's iter between Bath and Caerwent,— Ed,
" Mr, Kerslake, Supremacy of Mercia, B. and G. Arch. Proc,
1878, 118,

AuglO'Sa.xoii Ship.

A.D. 603.

PRESUMED SITE OF ST. AUGUSTINE'S CONFERENCE.

35

exUe must have had a very long precedent gro-wth in its
own soU. TMs name therefore proves to us that Bristol
where we now find it, not only had a continued exis
tence from probably the end of the sixth century to
certainly the beginning of the tenth, but also that
during that early existence it held a very important
standing as a centre of intercourse between different
races and different nations. If Bristol had been, in
stead of an independent secular commercial port, an
appendage to an Anglo-Saxon monastery, its name
might have come down to us in some cartulary, even
as 'Penpole' and 'Combe Dingle' have.^ But no
matter. If the name 'Bristol' does not stand in any
of these -written waifs, a very archaic sample of it,
perhaps older than any of these, comes daily out of
our mouths whenever we mention one of them ' Bris
Ungton ' or ' BristoUngton.' * * * This name belongs
to one of the very earUest showers of Teutonic place
names that feU upon this island, * * * "When first
used, Bristol not only already existed, but had an off
shoot to wMch it then stood Godfather, Eome was not
buUt in a day, neither was Bristol a sudden growth of
yesterday." ^
TMs is assuredly an argument more conclusive than
the mere negation; "Bristol is not mentioned as one
of the places Ceawlin took, therefore Bristol was not
probably in existence in CeawUn's time,"
These British and Mercian dedications of churches
of the H-wiccii, and upon the line which afterwards
became the border between the West Saxons and the
Mercians, witMn the diocese of Worcester, and embrac
ing the very site on wMch in aU probabUity St, Augustine
had Ms celebrated meeting -with the British Bishops, are
strong corroborative evidence in favour of the early ex
istence of Bristol,
16, Bede says tMs conference was held a.d. 603 in a
place wMch, in his day, retained the name of Augus
tine's Oak, situate on the confines of the Hwiccii and the
West Saxons, and in the diocese of Worcester. There
are two places which fairly meet these requirements,
viz,, Aust, and St. Augustine's place, CoUege green,
Bristol, With regard to the first of these, the argument
is fairly shown in this work in the introductory sketch of
the Ecclesiastical History. The conditions, easy access
for the British Bishops west of the Severn, and the site,
on the confines, are fairly balanced. Tradition, we think,
slightly turns the scale in favour of Bristol, It is said to
have been the spot where St. Augustine preached, and
after him his chosen disciple, Jordan, who had a chapel
1 Cod. Dipl,, 313, A,D, 883,
' Mr, Kerslake, British Arch, Proceedings, St, Ewen, Bristol,
June, 1875, 174-5-6,

on the green, and who was buried on the site of his
ministry,^ As late as 1491-2 "the sacrist of the abbey
accounted for oblations amounting to twenty-two pence
from the box of St. Clement, adjacent to the Chapel of
St. Jordan in the green place," "
17, In October, 1831, a curious stone in low reUef
was dug up from under the floor of the chapter house.
It represents Om- Saviour ascending from the tomb,
treading under foot the gaping heads of Death and
HeU, whUst a number of naked human beings are
clinging to him for salvation. The dress, accessories
and execution are, we judge, not later than the 7th
century, and we think it possibly once covered the re
mains of St. Augustine's favourite disciple,
18, The tale of the introduction of the Eoman
Catholic form of CMistianity has been often told, and,
inasmuch as we believe it to have had a special relation
to the locaUty of Bristol, it wiU not be considered out of
place if in a condensed form we include it in our pages.
In Eome at the end of the 6th century there dwelt
a pious monk named Gregory. The city no longer
mistress of the world, but bereft of her pro-vinces, shorn
of empire, wealth and temporal power, her noble buUd
ings tottering in decay, her monuments in ruin, her Cam-
pagna a malarious wilderness, and dependent for her
food on supplies from Egypt and Sicily, was yet the
seat of a spu-itual power that assumed universal do
minion. In her market place one day the good monk saw some
yeUow-haired fair-skinned cMldren offered for sale as
slaves. Enquiring whence they came, he was told,
"they are Angles." "Not Angles, but Angels," said
he, gazing on the weU-proportioned forms. " They are
from Deira," added the dealers, naming the British
pro-vince of which they were natives. "It is weU,
' de ira eruti ' snatched from -wrath, tMough the mercy
of Christ," replied Gregory. "Have they a king?"
" Yes, iBUa." " Alle'lujah, God's praise must be sung
in those regions," and thenceforth he sought earnestly
the mission to Britain. Forbidden to go by his supe
riors, the desire was not evanescent, for when he became
Pope, he sent St. Augustine with about forty companions
to convert the people of the land to the faith of Eome.
MeanwhUe Gregory had learned that the island was not
whoUy given over to idolatry, that the Christian religion,
with its orders of monk, priest and bishop was aUeady
estabUshed in some parts, hence his wise and politic
ad-vice to St, Augustine was, to ignore the differences
between the GaUican and Eoman chm-ches, and to con
fine Ms efforts to teaching the great principles of the
1 Lei. Itin., 5-64, and Camden's Somersetshire,
' Mr. Taylor from Rot. penes Decanum et Capel, Bristol.

36

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 612,

CMistian faith, " Choose," said he, " from the several
churches whatever is pious, religious, and right, and
these gathered as it were into one whole, instU as obser
vances into the minds of the Angles,"^
St. Augustine however was a man of a different spirit
from Ms master ; at his first conference with the British
bishops, he assumed a higher ecclesiastical authority,
and demanded that they shoiUd conform to the Eoman
time of celebrating Easter, and the Eoman method of
baptism, and acknowledge him as their archbishop.
The native bishops desired to consult their people
before they pledged themselves to give up their ancient
customs, and sought the advice of a venerable and holy
hermit. His advice was, "If the man is of God foUow
him," "How are we to know that?" "Our Lord
said, ' Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I
am meek and lowly of heart.' If Augustine is meek
and lowly of heart he has taken upon him Christ's
yoke ; but if he
is haughty, and
proud, it is mani
fest he is not of
God, and ye need
not regard his
words." " How
shall we discern
this?" "Ai-range
it so that he and
his company ar
rive first at your
next conference ;
and if at your approach he shaU rise up to meet you,
be assured he is the servant of Christ, and hear him
obediently : but if he shaU despise you, and not rise up
to you who are the greater number, let him also be
contemned of you." They applied the test.
Angry at being kept waiting, St. Augustine received
them haughtUy, did not rise to welcome them; and then
finding that they rejected his mission, and declined to
yield to his authority, he threatened, that as "they
would not accept peace -with their brothers, they shoiUd
have war with their enemies." The vengeance they
were threatened with overtook them in a.d. 612 when
EtheUrid of Bernicia defeated the British army headed
by Powis, and massacred 1200 unarmed monks because
they had prayed for his defeat.
Discarding aU idea of "prophecy," the words were,
we think, a mere " brutum fulmen," uttered in a moment
of anger; an anti-CMistian anathema, which however
very possibly helped to bring about the fearful catas
trophe, ^ Bede, Book I,, cap. xxvii.

CC
Anglo-Saxon Writing

It could scarcely be supposed probable that the
ministers of a church that had struggled on for up
wards of three centuries, amidst a heathen people,
would yield up their opinions, and abandon their cher
ished customs at the mere dictum of one who offered
them no better reason apparently than the arrogance of
an ecclesiarch, 19, During the early half of the 9th century we
first hear of the piratical descents of the Northmen or
Danes ; their practice was to land from their shipping,
harry the country, and then retreat -with their plunder
to their vessels. For about 170 years history repeated
itself, and the woes suffered by the Britons at the
hands of the Anglo-Saxons were heavUy avenged upon
the descendants of the latter people by the Vikings
of Denmark, Success emboldened, and the easy ac
cession of wealth and plunder stimulated, their greed,
so that in ever increasing numbers the Scandina-vian
pirates swarmed
upon the Eng
lish shores. No
part of the coast
was spared,
Eounding John
O'Groat's at one
extremity and
the Land's End
4 at the other, they
u CCS SJ T^UTTl ^^^p* ^^' °°^^*
with impunity,
settled in large
numbers in Ireland, and ravaged the Bristol Channel
and Severn shores. About a.d, 850 they began to
make permanent settlements in England, the successive
Anglian kings finding thenceforth an Ixion-Uke task
in their endeavoui-s to enforce the obedience of the
resident Danes, and to repel the ever accumulating
hordes of their freebooting countrjinen,
20, Barrett, quoting HoUingshead, says that Alfred
in the third year of his reign di'ove the Danes from
Exeter to Dartmouth where they took shipping, and
dispersed others, some of whom fied to Chippenham
and some to Bristol,^ On another occasion, when they
landed at Brent, Alfred defeated them, the survivors
fled to Worle Hill -«vhere they fortified themselves,-
So numerous and powerfiU had the Vikings become
by the third quarter of the century, that Alfred, after
his great \dctory, by the peace of Wedmore, assigned to
them for settlement the Denalague, or country north, of
Watling street (the Eoman road that runs from Canter
bury tMough London, Lichfield, SMewsbury, and Os-
1 Barrett, 34, ' Langtoflf's Chron, Hearn, II., 465.

CCS SJR^ura
of tlie 6th Century.

A,D, 918,

CHATTERTON 'S SONG TO MLLA.

37

westry). Their Danish laws and customs were retained
by them, but their king was a vassal of Alfred, and
both he and his people were compeUed to be baptized
and to profess Christianity,
But the wheel stiU kept rolUng down the hiU on the
least relaxation of restraint, and the last five years of
our truly great countryman's Ufe were spent in a strug
gle, with fresh troops of invaders, that was equal to any
of his earlier years, Alfred now laid the foundation of
our naval greatness, by buUding a fieet of ships longer,
s-wifter and more powerful than those of the Vikings,
with which he scoured both seas, and freed Wessex
from aU but a few occasional forays for plunder. It
was about tMs period if ever, we think, that the sack of
Bristol occurred which is mentioned by Polydore Vergil,
Upon the death of Alfred, his son Edward brought
the whole of the land into subjection to Wessex, which,
from a smaU settlement in Hampshire, had graduaUy
gro-wn untU it covered aU the land south of the Thames,
and now either by absolute possession, or as suzerain,
Edward became, -with insignificant exceptions, the first
" King of England and Lord of the island of Britain,"^
Our pages wUl show the future growth into ' ' The
Umted Kingdom," and thence into the British Empu-e.
The foUowing remark of Dr, Freeman may startle
some of our readers who learn for the first time from
our great historian that " Every prince who has ruled
England before and since the eleventh century has had
the blood of Kerdic the West Saxon in Ms veins," ^
Edward's wars were cMefiy -with the rebeUious
Danes resident in the Denalague, whom he subdued;
his son Athelstane, and after Mm Edgar the Peaceful,
consolidated the kingdom, which he guarded by a fleet
in wMch he frequently made the cUcuit of Britain.
V Eight tributary kings rowed his barge on the waters
of the Dee.
21, Stow teUs us that Edward for the defence of
Bristol buUt a castle at the mouth of the Avon, In
those early days the word simply meant what we now
term a camp, i.e., an enclosure with an earthen or stone
vaUum and fosse, having wooden houses in the area,
Seyer thinks that this was at Portishead ; there is, it is
true, a smaU camp at Portbury, but it is of no strength,
Cadbury is too distant, and Blaize, Stoke Leigh, and
CUfton, were already in existence. We strongly incline
to the opinion that the site was Bristol, and that this
was the foundation of our celebrated castle ; the words
" at the mouth of the Avon," although inexact, are
sufficiently descriptive to warrant the supposition in the
absence of any other site.
In A,D, 918 two di-yisions of the Danes were ravaging
» Freeman, Nor. Conq,, I,, 62, ' Ibid, I,, 23,

the shores of the Severn ; defeated in HerefordsMre, they
fled in two divisions, the one landing at Watchet the
other at Porlock, both bays on the coast of Somerset,
They were attacked and destroyed, the miserable rem
nant escaping to the Flat Holm, where they remained
untU famine drove them to Wales, and thence to Ireland.
22. This is the period which "Bristol's marveUous
boy " Chatterton has chosen for his grand conception of
the castle warden, iEUa, and the battles with the Danes.
We need scarcely mention that .^Ua himself as weU as
the stately castle with its chapel of St, Mary Magdalene,
are mere mythical creations of the young poet. The
modern antiquary would have detected the imposture]

^oii©

mKJtxtru e^^1^mcU^7a?
Fragment of a Copy of tlie Evangelists in Latin, from an Anglo-Saxon MS.
of the iOth Century, with Illuminated Initixd Letter.
(Educed to half its original size.j
by its numerous anacMonisms, but no class of men
would more readily acknowledge the wonderful power
that cotUd select the hard incongruous words of the
earlier centimes, and weave those and others equaUy
unmanageable of his own invention, into the easy
swinging rhythm of the 18th century, -with a fire of
genius and a power of song that wUl make his lyrics,
uncouth as they appear to the eye, last as long as the
English tongue is spoken.
We cannot refrain, forgery though it be, from gi-vdng
here the " Song to JllUa " :—
SONG TO ^LLA,
LORDE OF THE CaSTEL OF BeYSTOWE YNNE DAIE3 OF YOEE,

Oh thou, orr what remaynes of thee,
.(Ella, the darlynge of futurity,
Lett thys mie songe bolde as thie courage be.
As everlastynge to posterity e.

38

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 980,

Whanne Daoy's sonnes, whose hayres of bloude-redde hue
Lyche kynge-cuppes brastynge wythe the morning due,
Arraung'd ynne dreare arraie,
Upponne the lethale dale,
Spredde farre and wyde onne -Watchet's shore ;
Than dyddst thou furiouse stande.
And bie thie valyante hande
Beesprenged all the mees wythe gore.
Drawne bie thyne anlace felle,
Downe to the depthe of helle
Thousandes of Daoyanns went ;
Brystowannes, menne of myghte,
Ydar'd the bloudie fyghte.
And actedd deeds full quent.
Oh thou, where'er (thie bones att reste)
Thye spryte to haunte delyghteth beste,
Whetherr upponne the bloud-embrewedd pleyne,
Orr whare thou kennst fromm farre
The dysmall crye of warre,
Orr seest some mountayne made of corse of sleyne ;
Orr seest the hatchedd stede,
Ypraunceynge o'er the mede.
And neighe to be amenged the poynotedd speeres ;
Orr ynne blacke armoure staulke arounde
Embattel'd Brystowe, once thie grounde.
And glowe ardurous onn the castel steeres ;
Orr fierye round the mynsterr glare ;
Lute Brystowe stylle be made thie care ;
Guarde ytt fromme foemenne and consumynge fyre ;
Lyche Avone's streme ensyrke ytte rounde,
Ne lette a flame enharme the grounde,
Tyll ynne one flame all the whole worlde expyre.
23. In A.D. 930 Aylward (surnamed Sneaw from his
fair complexion) was Lord of the Honour of Bristol.
Dugdale^ and Leland,^ both of them quoting from
Histories of the Church at Tewkesbury, state that in his
aged years he founded the Monastery at Cranbourne,
maMng the Priory of Tewkesbury subject thereto. His
grandson, the Ealdorman Algar (Algarus fiUus Meawes)
the son of Mean or Meaw, fought on the side of Knut
at Sherstone against Edmund Ironside,
One of the cMoniclers makes Aylward to have sprung
from the Ulustrious family of King Edward the Elder,
the son of Alfred, which perhaps accounts for his
honom-s and position, Leland,^ quoting the book of
the Kalendaries of Bristow, says that Aylward and
Brictric were Lords of Brightstowe before the Conquest.
WUUam Wyrcestre,* says the Pithay was Aylewarde
street. Barrett,^ states that of old the Pithay gate
used to be caUed Aylward' s gate. One could have
wished earUer authorities than the above, but there
seems to be Uttle doubt that Aylward did possess pro
perty in Bristol, and that the suburb of the Pithay was
buUt upon his land. We have, it is true, in the earliest
1 Dugd. Monast,, I., 153. = Lei. Itin., 6-78,
¦; Lei. Itin,, 7-94, * Wycestre's Itin,, 184. = Barrett, 56.

registers of our magistrates, men bearing the same name,
possibly his coUateral descendants, Eichard Aylward
was Mayor of Bristol 1233, 1240, and 1247, and Thomas
Aylward, Pr^positor 1237; but Seyer concludes, and we
think correctly, that the Pithay was buUt upon before
the 13th century. We are compeUed to reject the
generaUy received opinion that the second waU enclos
ing the above suburb was the work of tMs the fii-st
Aylward; the bastions and towers, one of which has
only recently been destroyed, were not of so early a
date, but were more like solid Norman work of the
12th century.
Upon the death of Aylward, a,d. 980, the estate
passed to Algive his wife, and then, his son Mean or
Meaw being dead, to Ms grandson Algar, from whom it
descended to Brictric. Aylward flourished in the days
of Athelstan, in whose reign, between 924 and 941,
there were monetaries established, one of wMch, Eoger
Hoveden says, was at Bristol, Of the coinage of tMs
period we believe there is no specimen extant,
24. In A.D. 946 King Edmund whUst feasting on St,
Augustine's day, the 26th of May, at Pucklechurch in
the King's Wood, was kUled by Liulph, an outlaw
whom he had banished early in his reign for robbery,
Liulph having audaciously intruded on the royal ban
quet, the king ordered Mm to be arrested, a disturbance
ensued, Edmund joined in the fray, and seizing the
robber by the hair he dashed him to the gi-ound, when
ere the intoxicated courtiers could interfere Liulph
stabbed the king to the heart ¦with his dagger. The
assassin was instantly cut to pieces. The site of the
palace in which this drunken brawl occurred is stUl
shown at Pucklechurch, but the mouldings of the
broken stones are those of the 13th century, so that
some apparently ecclesiastical buUding has been erected
on the site, which also has disappeared lea^ving no traces
in history save these few sculptured fragments. It was
probably a hunting lodge of the Bishop of Bath and
Wells, who held this manor in 1227,
Passing over the reigns of Edred, Edwy, Edgar and
Edward the Martyr, which have no special interest in
our history, we, in a.d. 978, find upon the throne Ethel
red II., the son of Elfrida, a lad of ten years of age,
in whose eventful reign of 38 years the Danish inva
sions assumed the character of a conquest, which ended
in placing a Danish dynasty upon the tMone of Britain,
25, The later Anglo-Saxon kings had proved inert,
luxurious and oppressive, they had aUenated from them
selves the affection of the people, who enslaved by their
aristocracy, and priest ridden to an extreme, quaUed
before the free Norsemen, amongst whom there did not
exist a single serf. Danish raids, that a smaU disciplined

a.d, 991,

ETHELRED.

39

force would have stamped out, proved successful every
where. One shire would not help another. When
caUed out by the witan, some districts took the field
months before the others were ready. These tired of
waiting and drawing no regular pay, disbanded and
went home dispirited. Many of the people were more
over, although resident in England, feUow-countrymen
of the invaders, and treason and cowardice were always
at work. When the king did manage to get together an army it
marched on the foe only in time to see them decamp to
the ships ¦with their plunder ; the English fleet, coUected
from aU parts of the kingdom, reached the piUaged
shores when the Danes were seUing the spoil in Nor
mandy, No wonder that a monarch who always
managed to be too late, who spent Ms strength in petty
wrangUngs ¦with his vassals instead of confronting the
common foe, and who went courting on the continent,
when foreign troops were ravaging Ms country, should
be nicknamed by Ms people " the Unready," The
hea^vy Danegelt, dra^wn from the country in about 20
years of Ethelred' s reign, amounted in value it is
estimated to more than one-tenth of the land of
England, In A.D, 991 the Danes were bought off with £10,000;
£16,000 was paid in a.d. 994, and in both cases the
invaders had to be maintained tMoughout the winter.
In 1001 £24,000 was demanded and paid; in 1007
£36,000 with provisions for the whole of the Danish
army throughout the winter, and in 1012 £48,000 more
was paid as ransom.
Be it remembered that in addition to these sums the
coast line had been everywhere despoUed, and that raids
had been made tMough the very heart of the country,
and it wUl be readUy understood, that the people began
to consider which of the two e^yUs would be the most
endurable, continued aUegiance to a king who demanded
that property and life should be risked for him, but
who was utterly unable to protect them ; or submission
to a foreign foe, whose exactions could scarcely be more
burdensome, whilst his strong arm could guard those
whom he took to grace,
26. Ethelred " the contemner of counsel " was a bad
man and a worse king, Ms misgovernment paved the
way for a change of dynasty, and he appears to have
had no redeeming feature beyond that of an attractive
handsome person, TMs king has put however his stamp
upon our city. The earliest coin minted in Bristol that
has as yet been discovered is a sUver penny of Ethelred' s,
A.D, 978-1016. A specimen is preserved in the Eoyal
cabinet at Stockholm, It bears on the obverse a profile
bust of the king to the left, diademed and within an

inner circle, the legend, jEldeed eex ang, with a cross
patee at the commencement of the legend. Reverse, a
smaU cross patee in the centre of the coin within the
inner circle. Circumscription -f jElfpeed on beic,
(,iEUwerd at Bricgstow), This penny is one of a very
large number of Anglo-Saxon coins now preserved at
Stockholm, which were originaUy sent to Sweden as
part of the celebrated tax or Danegelt.
The sUver penny, weighing from 20 to 27 grains
troy, was the cMef piece of coined money made by the
Anglo-Saxon kings, halfpence and farthings being gene
rally formed by cutting or breaking the pennies into
halves and quarters. AU the Bristol coins from
Ethelred II, to Harold II, inclusive, are pennies
weighing as just stated, and made of sUver of the
"old standard," ¦viz., 11 oz. 2 dwts. fine to 18 d^wts.
of aUoy. The pennies of this and aU monarchs down to and
including Henry III. have the type of the king's head,
with his name and title on one side, and some form of
the cross on the other, accompanied by the name of the
moneyer and the place of mintage, as in the instance
of the above described penny, the reverse inscrip
tion meaning that ,331fward was the workman of the
mint who struck this coin at Bristol. '^ Inasmuch as in
the early ages mints were estabUshed, not merely for
the purpose of coining currency, but also for testing
and assaying the value of foreign moneys brought for
payment of exports, the inference is clear that Bristol
in the 10th century was an important commercial to^wn.
27. Whence came the recuperative power of the
kingdom after enduring such heavy imposts, and such
vUlainous pUlagings as those previously described, but
from its trade ? The balance of exchange ¦with foreign
nations was clearly in times of peace largely in favour
of Britain as a manufacturing and an exporting country.
In both of these particulars Bristol now begins to
stand prominently forward,
28. Too much stress has been laid upon Camden's
remark, ' ' At what time and by whom it (Bristol) was
built it is hard to say, but it seems of a late date, since
in aU the Danish wars it is not so much as mentioned in
our histories. ^ For my o^wn part I am of opinion that
it rose in the declension of the Saxon government since
it is not anywhere taken notice of before 1063," ^
The veteran antiquary does not deny the existence
of the town prior to that date, he merely classes it as
inconsiderable. Yet in the same article he says, "In
^ Henfrey " The Bristol Mint and its productions," Brit. Arch,
Assoc, Deer,, 1875,
^ This is a mistake, Polydore Vergil does mention it, — Ed,
' Cam, Brit. Somerset,

40

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1015.

the catalogue of British cities it is called ' Caer Brito,'
by the Saxons Brightstow,"^ qd. " the famous place."
29. In those troublous times the gro^wth of commer
cial towns must have been very slow, and totaUy different
to the rapid development of some of modern days. The
life of Bristol was its commerce, which was favoured by
its situation, being on a river easily defended, with a
secure roadstead at its mouth, with a sheltered channel
opening graduaUy into the Atlantic.
There was at this time no Eoyal Na-^y, but when
the king needed and the Witan decreed that there
should be a fleet, ships were
gathered from aU the ports
which were hired and paid for
by the nation. These were
raised by assessment, the scale
of payment being determined
by the Witan, was by contri
butions in kind, i.e., ships, or
things needfiU for shipping.
Eich men occasionaUy found
a ship for their county. Thus
Archbishop ^Uric bequeathed
in his wiU one ship to Kent
and a second to WUtshire.
This was the way in which
the fleets of Alfred and Edgar
and now that of Ethelred were
raised. We have here the
germ of the famous ship money
of the 1 7th century. But
these early fleets were raised
legally by grant of the Witen
agemot. Charles levied cash,
not ships, and stretching his
prerogative, demanded it on
his own authority. What
precise share Bristol bore in
raising in 1009 the greatest
fleet that the country had
ever seen is not known, but the plan adopted continued
in force untU the da3-s of Henry VIII., and we shaU
frequently in this history have to refer to the practice.
Instead however of meeting the Danish foe with it,
ChUd WuUnoth, the South Saxon, deserted with twenty
ships, and turning pirate, began to plunder the south
coast. Brihtric, who foUowed him with eighty ships
to win great fame, promising to bring back the deserter
alive or dead, was overtaken by a storm which -wrecked
some vessels. WiUfnoth, who had sheltered and escaped
the gale, returned and bm-nt them. Panic seized the
' Cam. Brit. Somerset,

Bc'sii'in and Tower of the Second Wall.

remainder, which was the larger portion of the fleet,
and in which was the king -with his aldermen and -witan ;
these forsook the ships, and the crews took them to
London, and "let aU the nation's toil thus lightly
perish." Then came ThurkUl, the Dane, and after
him in 1013 King Sweyn, who speedily overran and
conquered the country, and was elected king by a
witan in London, whilst Ethelred deposed, fled to
Normandy, Knut succeeded his father Sweyn, but the -witan re
elected the absent Ethelred, "their lord by birth, if he
would only rule them more
righteously than he did be
fore," This he promised faith
fully to do, and returning, he
in his witan, confirmed the
best laws of his predecessors,
and passed others, some of
which were exceUent,
In 1015 Elnut landed -with
a large force at Poole, He
harried Dorset, Wilts and
Somerset, and aU Wessex
submitted to him and gave
hostages for their good faith,
30, The next year Ethel
red, who had brought such
e-vil upon the land, died, and
his son Edmund (Ironsides)
succeeded to the troubled
throne. He was a gaUant
warrior, who within seven
months fought six pitched
battles with Knut. The first
of these was at Pen Selwood,
at the junction of Dorset,
Somerset and WUts, wMch is,
it is thought, the site of the
ancient British city of Pen
Saul Coit, where Kenwalch,
in A.D. 658, fought the Britons, and conquering, drove
them back over the Parret. On the 16th of July
Edmund gained a second but hardly-won victory at
Sherstone. This he had nearly lost tMough the
treachery of his brother-in-law Eadric, who, fighting
on the Danish side, slew a man resembUng the Athe-
ling, and cutting off the head, cried out to the EngUsh
as he held it up, "Fly, English, fly! Edmund is dead,"
Edmund, seeing the panic and learning the cause, tore
off his heMiet, rushed into the melee, and hurled his
spear at the traitor. Unfortunately for England, he
missed his mark, but he kUled the soldier nearest to

A,D. I0I6.

KNUT'S VICTORY AT ASSANDUN.

41

Mm, The English renewed the fight and remained
masters of the field. At London, Brentford, Oxford,
and in Kent, Edmund achieved fresh victories, dri-ving
the Danes into the Isle of Sheppey, whence he would
have tMust them out of the kingdom but for the
miserable treachery that is such a marked character
istic of these wars.
31, Never was this more strongly sho-wn than in
Edmund's last battle, wMch was fought at Assandun.
The King had pardoned his traitorous brother-in-law
Eadric, and restored Mm to honour, favour and com
mand, the fatal trust of a generous soul. In the
moment of assured victory Eadric, by concerted arrange
ment -with Knut, deserted to the Danes -with his men
of HerefordsMre and Ms house-carles, and thus turned
the fortune of the day, ' ' AU England fought against
Kjiut, but KJnut had the -victory," Great was the
slaughter of noble Englishmen that day, Knut's ven
geance feU hea-vUy upon the clerics and the thanes.
The AtheUng escaped, and raising the men of Glouces-
tersMre, awaited Ms pursuing foe on the opposite shore
of the Severn. There was, however, no more fighting.
The two kings met in the Isle of Olney, and agreed to
di-vide the land, Edmund was to be the supreme king,
and to reign over the land south of the Thames, Essex,
East AngUa and London, Knut took the remainder —
the larger portion, but that in which the Danish popu
lation was most numerous. Ere the year was ended
Edmund was dead, slain in a fearful and dastardly
manner by an assassin, who was set on, it is thought,
by Eadric, and Knut reigned in Ms stead.
32, Here we pause. We have seen the Eomano-
Briton, Uke the picture in a dissol-ving view, fade into
and become the EngUshman ; the Ealderman grow
into the King of Wessex; the King of Wessex be
come the King of the Saxons, King of the English
and Lord of Britain, and now the scene changes, and a
Scandinavian King is master of England and occupies
the tMone.
Agriculture under the Anglo-Saxons appears not to
have flourished as in the Eoman period. We do not
read now of any export of corn ; wool, cloth, iron, lead,
tin, dogs, horses and slaves were the chief articles of
export. 33, English work in jewels of gold and silver was
in great demand ; the most eminent artists of Germany
resorted for suppUes to Britain, Gold and sUver must
have been plentiful, for we know that large sums were
taken out of the country. The Danegelt was paid
partly at least in kind, as from the laws of Ethelred we
learn that the common prices of certain articles in the
10th century were :—
[Vol, I,]

£ s. d.
A man slave... A pound  2 16 3 sterling.
Ahorse  Thirty shillings  1 15 2 "
Mare or colt... Twenty shillings  13 5 "
Ass or mule ... Twelve shillings  0 14 1 "
Ox  Sixshillings  0 7 OJ "
Cow  Five shillings  0 5 6 "
Swine  One shilling three pennies... 0 I lOi "
Sheep  One shilling  0 12 "
Goat  Twopennies  0 0 5i "
These were the legal values, besides which a toU was paid
on each sale to the gerefa (sheriff) ; of course (as is in
deed evident from the sale contracts) the prices differed
somewhat, according to the value of the article. The
coins were the sUver penny (fom- to the shUling), the
triens (one-third of the penny), the fartMng and the
half-farthing. The pound, mark, mancus and shUling
were not coins, but merely "money of account."
34. In the British Museum is preserved a Saxon
schoolbook, in which the merchant, gi-ving an account
of his occupation, in dialogue, says : — " I say I am
useful to the king and ealdermen and to the rich and
aU people, I ascend my ship with my merchandize,
and sail over the sea-like places, and seU my things,
and buy dear things which are not produced in this
land, and I bring them to you here with great danger
over the sea ; and sometimes I suffer ship-wreck, with
the loss of all my things, scarcely escaping myself,"
" What do you bring to us ? "
" Skins, silks, costly gems and gold, various gar
ments, pigments, wine, oU, ivory, orichalcus (brass),
copper, silver, glass, and such like,"
" WUl you seU your things here as you bought
them there ?"
" I wiU not, because what would my labour benefit
me ? I wUl seU them here dearer than I bought them
there that I may get some profit to feed me, my wife
and chUdren,"^
35. Athelstan, in the second quarter of the 10th
century, with the assent of the Witenagemot, enacted
that every merchant who made in Ms o-wn ship tMee
over-sea voyages should have the rank of a Thane or
Noble, which shows the estimation in which commerce
was beginning to be held,
Athelstan also sent a fieet to the help of his nephew,
Louis IV, of France, which is the first instance we have
of any political connection between the two countries.
Edgar's navy is said to have consisted of a fabulous
number of ships ; and Alfred, earUer than either of
these, when preparing for his final struggle with the
Danes, buUt, somewhere apparently in the Bristol
Channel, wMch was near Ms then refuge, a fieet of
1 Cotton MS., Tib. A. iii,
D 2

42

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1017.

ships longer, higher and swifter than the Danish eescas,
some of them having sixty or more oars.
36. From the biography of Wulfstan, who was
Bishop of Worcester at the time of the Conquest, we
learn that Bristol was a weU-known and wealthy com
mercial mart, although its cMef articles of merchandize
do not commend themselves to our modern feelings or
judgment. "There is a seaport town caUed Bristol,
opposite to Ireland, into which its inhabitants make
frequent voyages on account of trade, Wulfstan cured
the people of tMs to-wn of a most odious and inveterate
custom, which they derived from their ancestors, of buying
men and women in aU parts of England and exporting
-them to Ireland, for the sake of gain. The young
women they seduced, and carried them to market in
their pregnancy, that they might bring a better price.
You might have seen with sorrow long ranks of youn g
persons of great beauty, tied together -with ropes, and
daUy exposed to sale ; nor were these men ashamed, 0
horrid wickedness ! to give up their nearest relations,
nay, their o-wn chUdren, to slavery."^
From tMs we gather that Bristol had inherited the
trade from their ancestors, consequently that it had long
been a seaport doing a foreign trade, both Eoman and
Saxon having countenanced slavery. It was an ancient
custom for the poor to seU their own chUdren into slavery.
Men con^victed of certain crimes were made slaves
by the law, and their chUdren became servUe. Captives
taken in war (cMefly the Welsh) were held and sold as
slaves. Various ordinances had been passed to mitigate
the condition of the ¦victims and to restrain the spread of
the system; there is an e^vident repugnance to the barbar
ous practice that is creditable to the age, although
successive witans were unable to abolish it. The prin
cipal restraining enactment declared that "CMistian and
innocent men are not to be sold out of the land, least
of aU to heathen purchasers. ' ' By ' ' innocent men ' ' must
have been meant, we apprehend, men who had been
kidnapped, a practice that unhappily Ungered in Bristol
untU it was stamped out by Judge Jefferys in the reign
of James II.
37. Knut, upon the death of his father Sweyn, it
wUl be remembered, held the Denalague, and had been
proclaimed King by the Bersekers, as well as chosen by
a ¦witan held in London in April, 1016, Upon the death
of Edmund he assembled aU the notable men in ¦witan
at London in January, 1017, by whom he was elected
king of aU England, to the exclusion of Edmund's sons,
who were sent out of the kingdom. Knut divided the
realm into four pro-vinces, over each of wMch he placed
an earl. His brother-in-law Eric was Earl of Northum-
' -Wharton's Anglia Sacra, II., 258.

berland, ThurkiU Earl of East AngUa, whUst Eadric,
the traitor, was Earl of Mercia, The king retained
Wessex. StiU further to consolidate his power, he
married Emma, the -widow of the late king, who bore
him two chUdren, Harthaknut and GunhUd,
Eadric did not long enjoy his earldom, being put to
death at CMistmas, 1017, In 1018 a hea-vy Danegelt
was levied of £82,503, of wMch London paid more
than one-tenth. Knut then paid off his Bersekers and
retained only 40 sMps with their crews. On different
pretexts the sons-in-law of Ethelred were put to death,
after which Knut's cruelties and confiscations abated;
he then forsook Odin, avowed Mmself a Christian, and
in a witan at Oxford promised to govern on the basis of
the laws of Edgar.
38. Keen and sagacious as a reader of character, he
early in his reign, selected and speedUy advanced to the
highest station, a young EngUshman, who by Ms great
talents swayed tMough a long life, not only the counoUs
of the realm, but also exercised a powerful personal
and famUy influence over Bristol and its neighbour
hood. Few pubUc men have had more widely diver
gent stories told of their birth, their life and their
death than God^win. On the one hand his bitter foes
have ascribed to Mm an ignoble origin, a lewd sacri
legious life, and a sudden and violent death by special
judgment of God. On the other hand he is said to
have been of noble if not of royal descent, to have
been valiant in war, prudent in counsel, eloquent in
speech, and of admirable conduct.
By a masterly analysis of the various statements
respecting tMs great man, Dr. Freeman has arrived at
the conclusion that God^win was the son of Child Wulf-
noth, that Ms bravery and ser^vices under Edmund had
won for him the restitution of the property wMch had
been forfeited by the treason of his father; that his
valour and judgment commended him to the notice of
King Knut, who speedUy raised him to high rank, con
nected him by marriage ¦with himself, admitted Mm to
his most secret counsels, and finaUy at a ¦witan held at
Cirencester in AprU, 1020, exalted him to a position in
the kingdom that was second only to the tMone, God^win
became Earl of the West Saxons, the royal province
which Knut had Mtherto retained in Ms o-wn hands.
Henceforth the EngUsh earl was practicaUy the -viceroy
of the kingdom, a position wMch he retained for tMrty-
two years, with the exception of a few months of
banishment under Edward the Confessor, By the
king's favour and royal gifts God-win soon became
the wealtMest subject as weU as the first in position,
and as far as one can judge, Ms influence was freely
used for the good of the whole realm.

A,D, 1024,

KNUT'S LETTER TO THE ENGLISH PEOPLE.

43

Knut tMs year, as a thank-offering, built a stone
church on the field at Assandun, He made Stigand
its first priest, a man whose attainments quaUfied him
for high ecclesiastical rank. He was made Bishop of
Elmham in 1024, translated to Winchester in 1027, and
became Archbishop of Canterbury in 1052, Godwin
and Ms friend Stigand contributed largely to the change
in Knut's -views to which we have aUuded, The king
had by every account become an altered character, had
learned to control the violence of his temper, and now
he expressed his great sorrow for the cruelties he had
been guilty of in Ms earlier years. In 1029 Knut went
on a pUgrimage to Eome, from wMch place he ad
dressed a letter to his people in England, wMch, from
its character and the bearing it had on subsequent
events, is worthy of notice,
39. No man could have written in the style in which
Knut -writes to aU classes of his English subjects unless
he were fuUy convinced that he possessed and deserved
the love of Ms people. The tone of the letter is that
of an absent father -writing to Ms chUdren. In all sim-
pUcity and confidence he teUs them the events of his
journey, -with what honours he had been received, and
-with what presents he had been loaded by the two
cMefs of CMistendom, and what privUeges for his sub
jects, both English and Danish, he had obtained at
their hands. He confesses the errors of his youth, and
promises reformation of anything which may stUl be
anuss. AU grievances shaU be redressed, no extortions
shaU be aUowed, King Knut needs no money raised by
injustice. These are surely no mere formal or hypo
critical professions, every word plainly comes from the
heart. The same spirit reigns in his laws, wherein
the precept to fear God and honour the king here
takes a more personal and affectionate form,
" First above aU things are men one God to love
and worsMp, and one CMistendom with one consent to
hold, and Knut Ejing to love with right truthfulness."
The laws embrace the usual subjects, the reformation
of manners, the administration of justice, the dis
charge of aU ecclesiastical duties, and the strict pay
ment of aU ecclesiastical dues. The feasts of the two
new national saints, Edward the king, and Dunstan
the Primate, are again ordered to be observed on the
authority of the Witan, The observance of the Lord's
Day is also strongly insisted on, on that day there is to
be no marketing, no hunting, even the holding of folk-
motes is forbidden except in cases of absolute necessity.
AU heathen superstition is to be forsaken and the slave
trade is again denounced. The whole fabric of English
society is strictly preserved. The king legislates only
with the consent of his Witan. The old assemblies, the

old tribunals, the old magistrates, retain their rights
and powers. The bishop and the ealderman stiU fiU
their place as joint presidents of the scirgemot and
joint expounders of the laws ecclesiastical and secular.
The king, as well as the inferior lords, is to enjoy aU
that is due to Mm ; the royal rights, differing somewhat
in the West Saxon and the Danish portions of the
kingdom, are to be carefuUy preserved, and neither
extended nor diminished in either country. No dis
tinction is to be made between Danes and Englishmen,
The local rights and customs of the Danish and EngUsh
portions of the kingdom are to be strictly preserved.
Trespasses on the king's forests are stringently for
bidden, but the natural right of every man to hunt on
his o-wn land is emphatically asserted.
And as Knut's theory, so was his practice. No king
was more active in w^hat was then held to be the first
duty of kingship, that of constantly going through
every portion of his realm to see -with his own eyes
whether the laws which he enacted were duly put in
force. In short, after Knut's power was fuUy estab
Ushed we hear no complaint against Ms government
from any trustworthy Englishman. His hold upon the
popular affection is sho-wn by the number of personal
anecdotes of which he is the hero.
In the best known tale of aU he rebukes the impious
fiattery of his courtiers, and hangs his crown on the
image of the crucified Saviour, He bursts into song as
he hears the chant of the monks of Ely : —
' ' Merie sungen the muneches binnen Ely
Da Knut ching reu there by ;
Roweth cnihtes noer the land.
And here we these muneches saeng."
He joins in and rejoices to keep the church festival
with them. He bountifuUy rewards the peasant who
proves the thickness of the ice over which the royal
sledge has to pass. ^
After the contentions and invasions that had torn
the kingdom, there now ensued an unparaUeled peace of
many years duration, no civil discord, no revolting city,
no ambitious chieftain disturbed the realm. In the
second year of Knut's reign there had been a Scottish
inroad, which was for a while successful, but Malcolm,
then king, in 1031 became a man of the Dane and
paid him homage; and in 1022 Eglaf, a Danish earl,
invaded Wales and destroyed St. David's. These were
the only wars, and they were of brief duration, so that
during the latter years of Knut's reign it may be em-
phaticaUy said the land had rest, the king dwelt in the
hearts of his people, who had forgotten their terrible
wars and his cruel early deeds in the benignant riUe,
1 Freeman, Old Eng. Hist., 241.

44

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1035,

the spirit of equity and mercy, and the munificent
patronage of literature, the arts, and religion of their
monarch, 40, "A few days since the body of Canute was dis
covered in his monument in Winchester CoUege. It
was remarkably fresh, had a wreath around its head
and a silver penny in its hand, several ornaments of
gold, sUver bands, and a ring on one finger with a
remarkable large fine stone in it."^
41, KJnut coined extensively in Bristol, indeed so
various are the coins and so many are the moneyers,
as to afford strong presumptive proof that he made
the town for a wMle, at least, his head-quarters in the
west. There are six different specimens in the British
Museum, and eleven varieties are described by Hilde-
brand from the Stockholm cabinet. The name of the
town is speUed as on EtheUed's penny Bricgstow, vari
ously contracted ; and the names of the moneyers are
.^gelwine, ^Iftoine, Leofwine, TTtilficiiie, Wulsfmi, Wunsige
and Goaman.
" These pennies have on the obverse a profile bust to
the left, diademed, within a tressure of four arches,
legend + ci^t rex angl. Or a similar diademed bust
to the left, -with a sceptre in front of the face, legend
CNTT EECX, Or the head and sceptre as before, legend
(blundered) -f- ecpi eeccex. On the reverse they bear —
a tressure of four arches, with peUets on the points.
Over aU a long double cross -with crescents on the ends
of it, reaching to the edges of the coin, crosses patees at
the commencement of the
legends, which are ^gel-
pine ON BEX, or BEIC,
vELFPINE ON BEIC, ^LF-
pine on beg, ^le pine on
BEOS, jELPINE on BEIC, GO,
AJIAN ON BEIC, PVLFPINE
ON BEIC, P^VLPINE ON BEIV, PVNSIGE ON BEIC, PVNSIGE ON
BEics. Others bear a double cross within an inner
circle, an amulet over the centre ; legends  1- .^egepine
ON BEIC, .ALPINE ON BEI, LEOFPINE ON BEIC, Or PVLSTAN 0
BE, Another coin has a double cross within an inner
circle, over the centre is a small tressure of four curves,
with peUets at the corners and in the centre ; legend —
-|- jEGelpine onn beicc. "
42, God^win's eldest son Sweyn was created Earl of
Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Herefordshire, Somerset
shire and Berkshire. He thus became Lord of Bristol.
Harold, the second son, he who afterwards became
king, was made Earl of Essex, East Anglia, Cam
bridgeshire and Huntingdonshire.
1 The Bristol Journal, S. Faklby, Castle green, June 14, 1766.
^ Henfrey, December, 1875,

Bristol Silver Penny of Knut.

In the latter years of Ms reign Knut conferred the
highest places in the realm upon Englishmen, and in
everything he comported Mmself admirably as an English
king. He died in 1035, and the kingdom was once more
divided, Harold, Knut's reputed son by an EngUsh
woman, seized on the territory north of the Thames,
Harthaknut, the son of Queen Emma, who had been
designated as his successor by Knut, was loyaUy sup
ported in Wessex by Godwin and the EngUsh, Most
unwisely for his o-wn interests, Harthaknut preferred to
remain in his Danish kingdom whUst Ms mother (Queen
Emma), assisted by Godwin, ruled Wessex as Eegent,
In this interim her sons by Ethelred, the two AtheUngs,
Edward and Alfred (from whom she was estranged),
supported by a portion of the English people, crossed
the channel in forty ships and landed at Southampton,
Edward, after winning a battle, returned to the Con
tinent laden with plunder; Alfred was taken and crueUy
put to death it was asserted by the connivance, if not by
the direct agency, of God-win, MeanwhUe Harthaknut
keeping aloof from the realm, the West Saxon kingdom
lost its importance, and to prevent its sinking into a
mere province the witan of Wessex, in 1037, deposed
their absent and uncrowned Mng, God-wdn was thus
released from his fealty to Harthaknut, Harold was
chosen by the people and reigned, like his father, over
the whole of England. He banished Queen Emma, and
became reconcUed to Godwin, but his reign was short,
and he appears to have been a weak, irresolute and
wortUess character,
43. There are six specimens of the Bristol coinage
of this king in the British Museum and four other
varieties in the Stockholm Cabinet, "Among the
names of the moneyers Alfwerd again appears, who
may possibly be the same person as the Alfwerd who
minted the before-described penny of Ethelred H,
Other names of moneyers are Leofioyne, Seewine, Wulnoth
and Wulwine. Two of the Bristol pennies of Harold I,
bear on the obverse the King's head to the left fiUeted ;
legend, + haeolld eex or haeold eex. Reverse, a
cross, formed of four ovals issuing from a circle, with a
rose in the centre ; legend, + leofpine on beic, or
S7EPINE ON BEicsT, His othor peuuies have, obverse, bust
of the king in profUe to the left, a sceptre in front of
the face ; legend, -f haeold eex. Reverse, a large
double cross extending to the edge of the coin, with a
fleur-de-lys in each angle issuing from a compartment
in the centre ; legend, one of the foUowing : —
-|- AELP-WEED ONN BEI, ELFPEED ON BEIC, LEOFPINE ON
BEIC, SAEPINE ON BEIC, p-VLNOD ON BEIC, Or PyLPINE 0
BEIO,"^ 1 Henfrey, 344,

A.D, 1042,

HARTHAKNUT SUCCEEDS HAROLD.

45

44, Emma had no sooner reached the Continent
than she roused the latent ambition of her son Hartha
knut, and he was preparing an armament for the inva
sion of England when news reached him of Harold's
death, and also that the Witan of all England had
unanimously elected himself as king, Harthaknut' s
first act was to have the body of Harold exhumed,
treated -with indignity, and tMown into the river ; his
second was to le-vy on Ms new subjects a Danegelt of
£32,000, an impost wMch the people had supposed
obsolete, and wMch was paid so unwUlingly that
soldiers were sent as tax-gatherers into every shire to
coUect it for the King ; Ms third, to attack Bishop
Lyfing and Earl God-wdn, the two great national leaders,
whom he brought to trial for compUcity in the death of
Alfred. Lyfing
lost Ms
bishop ric of
Crediton;
but Godwin
cleared Mm
self by com
purgation,and was ac
quitted of
the crime by
the solemn judgment of the
Mghest court of the realm.
The EngUsh people soon found
King Log had been exchanged
for King Stork, and the na
tional "impatient ignorance of
taxation " culminated in our
diocesan city of Worcester, where the citizens rose
against their -military tax-gatherers and slew them.
For this the city was taken, sacked and burned, Har-
thaknut's reign was as brief as it was hatefiU and
infamous. At a wedding feast, whilst proposing the
health of the bride, he feU to the ground in a fit of
epUepsy, from wMch he never recovered, and before he
was buried, an English Witan at London chose Edward
to be their king in 1042,
45. During Harthaknut's short reign, God-win (pro
bably to induce the King to overlook the fact that in
compUance -with the decree of the Witan he had
assented to their choice of Harold) presented Hartha
knut with a ship, which had its beak of gold, and was
manned with eighty warriors, who were thorougMy
equipped -with every weapon both for offensive and
defensive warfare. Bach of these men was clad in a

coat of triple maU, and wore a gilded helmet, as weU as
a bracelet of gold weighing 16 ounces upon each arm.
Their shields had golden studs and bosses, their swords
gUded handles, and their Danish battleaxes were pro
fusely ornamented with sUver and gold. Godwin's in-
fiuence had placed Edward on the tMone, at once his
king, Ms son-in-law and his puppet, and weU would it
have been for England if God-win's power over the soft
priest-ridden king had been even more complete.
46. Edward the Confessor, son of Ethelred and
Emma, was Norman in everything but birth. Educated
on the Continent, he had acquired naturaUy the habits
and tastes of the people amongst whom he had lived
untU Ms election to the tMone. No sooner was he
seated thereon than he was surrounded by Normans, whose

Danish Arms.

duct
brought them
into repeated
coUision with
the English
people. Driv
en from the
land, they re
turned in in
creasing numbers and made the
kingdom groan beneath their
greed and their hauteur.
47, Some Frenchmen being
slain in a tumtUt at Dover,
which was occasioned by the
overbearing insolence of their leader. Count Eustace, of
Boulogne ; the King, -without inquiring into the case,
ordered God-win, in whose earldom Dover was situated,
to punish the townsmen. This the Earl, who had no love
for the foreigners, refused, and told the King "that no
man in his earldom should be put to death -without trial,
but they should be fairly judged, and, if found guUty,
should be punished." To defend the rights of English
men, God-win and Ms sons then gathered their followers
and encamped at Beverstone, on the Cotswold HUls.
Turning the tables on the King, they became the
accusers, and demanded that Count Eustace and his
men, who had slain an Englishman in his o-wn house at
Dover, should be delivered up to them. The King also
raised a large army, but Siward and Leofric, his com
manders, found their troops averse to begin a civil war.
Then the leaders on both sides met, and it was agreed

46

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1052,

to refer the matter to a Witan, which was to be held in
London, Godwin demanded hostages and a safe con
duct. WhUst awaiting these he imprudently dismissed
his army, Edward's generals, with more forethought,
had steadUy augmented their forces, and the King,
finding himself master of the situation, refused to give
the required guarantees.
48. A second demand being made by the English
earls, and the King proving inflexible, the Witan met
without them, Norman influence prevailed. Godwin
and his sons were deemed contumacious ; Sweyn, his
eldest, the Earl of Gloucester and Lord of Bristol,
was outlawed ; God^win and Harold were sentenced to
banishment, and ordered to leave England in five days,
Godwin, Sweyn, Tostig and Gurth took ship with their
treasure and fied to Bruges; Harold and Leof^wyne sped
westward to Bristol, where they went on board a ship
that Swejm had provided for himself and crossed over
into Ireland. The Saxon chronicle thus narrates the
incident : — " And Harold Earl and Lewin went to
Bristow on board the ship which Sweyn Earl had for
himself before designed and prepared, and the King
sent j3illdred. Bishop of London, ¦with a company, and
they should him outride before he to the ship come, but
they not could or not would ; and they went thence out
of Avon mouth, and met with so violent weather, that
he scarce away come, and him there much damaged.
He went thence on to Ireland, when to Mm good
weather came," There evidently was no great desire
on the English Bishop's part to catch the fugitives.
49, During the few months that intervened, and
whilst Godwin and Ms sons were in exile, WUUam,
Duke of Normandy, with a great foUowing came over
to visit his cousin. King Edward, He afterwards
asserted that the Confessor then promised to make him
his heir. Leaving behind him a number of his ad
herents charged to look weU after his interests, and
to ingratiate themselves with the weak-minded king,
WiUiam, well pleased and loaded with honours and
gifts, returned to Normandy.
His brief sojourn in the land had satisfied him as
to its industry and great wealth ; he noted that the
great lords held their possessions not as fiefs of the
crown, but independently, ruling as sub-kings, bitterly
jealous of each other, and he marked them for his prey,
WiUiam has been described by one who knew him
as " a stark man," i.e. one of infiexible wiU, that wUl,
was ultimately to possess England, peacefully if prac
ticable, if not, why it was a land worth winning by
arms, and the people might be denationalized by craft,
Godwin and Ms sons were in exUe, Norman courtiers
surrounded the tMone, Norman governors and men-at-

arms held the strongholds, Norman priests had the ear
of the monarch and possession of the richest benefices,
WhUst the English, both noble, franklin, burgher and
churl, were fuU feeders and heavy drinkers.
An easy conquest and a rich booty it seemed
awaited Arietta's son, but he knew how to keep his
own counsel and to "bide his time," Nor was he
without hopes of being able by craft to win to his
side, or else weaken the infiuence of, the great Saxon
earls, 50, MeanwhUe however, Godwin, the man of the
strong hand, was missed in the land, and the people
began to cry out for their English earl to deUver them
from the insolent misrule of the Normans,
Cognizant of this, Harold and Leofwyne gathered a
fleet and landed in Porlock Bay, Somerset, Odda, who
had been made Earl of Somersetshire and the western
part of Godwin's domain, met him with an army and
offered battle. Harold accepted it and defeated him,
more than thirty officers of distinction in the Mng's
party being slain, besides common men in large
numbers. After spoiling the neighbourhood, Harold
saUed round the Land's End and joined Ms father at
the Isle of Wight,
The detestation of the Normans was great, their
tyrannical abuse of the king's favour, the castles they
had built, and their usurpation of the lands of the
English, had roused the patriotism of the people. On
the other hand the English earls were their "ovm men,"
and were weU beloved, so that Godwin had no difficulty
in raising a large force. With tMs he plundered the
districts held by the foreigners and then saUed up the
Thames, landing beyond London, on the Strand, where
he drew up his forces and offered the king battle. This
Edward dared not accept, but ever weak, irresolute,
and vacillating, he was reconcUed to the earl,
5 1 . The Normans sought safety in flight. Godwin
and his sons were restored to their rank and honours,
and for the next fourteen years England was freed to a
great extent from Norman influence; the joy of the
people was unbounded, a great moral victory had been
won, and Godwin and Harold became the idols of the
English. Sweyn, the eldest son, had lost caste ; amongst
other crimes he had slain treacherously his cousin Beorn,
and now seized with remorse he had gone on a pUgrim
age to Jerusalem barefooted, from which he never re
turned, dying in Lycia of a disorder induced by exposure
to inclement weather.
52. In 1053 Earl God^windied. The monkish party,
ever bitterly opposed to him, said that he was choked
by a morsel of bread whUst taking a false oath, but all
such tales must be taken " ctim grano salis." There

A.D. 1055,

ATHELSTAN AND HIS FLEET.

47

always have been men who would not scruple to lie for
the glory of God and the good of their order. Godwin
was a man of eminent ability, a thorough Englishman,
and although ambitious, fond of power and of aggrand
izing his family, his death was a national calamity.
No reliance can be placed on the trumped up tales of
infamy brought against Ms memory by the monks whom
he had determinedly opposed. " The EngUsh people
wept for Mm as a friend and a father, only they re
joiced that he had left a son to walk in his ways," ^
Harold succeeded Ms father as Earl of the West
Saxons, and Algar, the son of Leofric, Earl of Mercia,
was made Earl of East AngUa,
Meanwhile Edward was
busy buUding an abbey at
Westminster for the monks;
Harold, who favoured the sec
ular clergy (the people's priests),
buUt a large church at Wal-
tham, and sought for the best
teachers for the people from
amongst the reformed churches
on the Continent. "Wise,
thoughtful, ever anxious to im
prove himself and others, he
was reaUy one of the greatest
and best rulers England ever
had." 2
Siward, Earl of Northum
bria, died in 1055, and Harold's
brother Tostig, a man of a
different caUbre, unfortunately
was made earl by the king
and his council, so that the
house of Godwin and the house
of Leofric between them ruled
the whole kingdom.
Algar, the East AngUan
earl, revolted, fled to Ireland,
and returning thence ¦with 18
sMps made a league with Gruffydd, the Eling of Wales,
and they together invaded Herefordshire, Opposed by
King Edward's army, led by Ms nephew Ealph, a
Norman, who caitiff-Uke fled at the commencement of
the battle, the forces under Gruffydd and Algar gained
an easy victory, they then entered Hereford and burned
the monastery, and the town also after they had plun
dered it, and slain many of the clergy and the in
habitants. England now only needed a general ; the aged
Leofric could scarcely be expected to march against
• Freeman, Old Eng, Hist,, 270, = Ibid, 273,

Plan of Early Norman Castle.

Ms own son. So Harold, the favourite of the nation,
was placed once more in command of the army,
Algar dared not risk a battle, but submitted incon
tinently and was again pardoned by the king, who to
pacify Mm restored him to his earldom, and upon the
death of his father Leofric made him Earl of Mercia.
East Anglia was then divided between Gurth and Leo
fric, two younger brothers of Harold, and now aU
England with the exception of Algar' s earldom was
governed by the sons of Godwin.
In 1058 Algar once more revolted, but assisted by
Gruffydd he was strong enough to dictate terms to
Edward, and he again obtained possession of his earl
dom. About this time Wulf
stan, prior of the abbey of
Worcester, a great friend of
Harold's, was made against his
¦wiU bishop of the diocese.
53. In 1063 Gruffydd, who
had repeatedly invaded England
and had given great trouble to
the people of the Marches, was
attacked by Harold, who ulti
mately fitted Ms men ¦with
leathern jerMns and light ar
mour, that they might be better
able to foUow the Welsh into
their fastnesses. Making a
rapid march from Gloucester
in the depth of ¦winter with a
smaU body of horse to Ehud-
Ian, he surprised Gruffydd, so
that he had much ado to es
cape in a ship ; Harold burned
his palace and his ships, and re
turned to Gloucester the same
day. "TMs year passing to an
end without other matters of
moment, save the frequent in
roads and robberies of Griffin, whom no bonds of faith
could restrain. King Edward sent against Mm, after
CMistmas, Harold, now Duke of the West Saxons,
with no great body of horse from Gloucester, where
he then kept his court; whose coming, heard of.
Griffin, not daring to abide, nor in any part of his
land holding himself secure, escaped hardly by sea,
ere Harold coming to ' Rudeland,' burnt his palace
and ships there, and retired to Gloucester the same
day." ^
Evans tMnks that Gruffydd had come up the Avon
1 Turner's Anglo-Saxons, I., 458,

48

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1066,

and buUt Mmself a palace at Eedland, from whence he
fled over the do-wns to Sea MiUs, barely escaping thence
by ship. There is some reason in this view of the
matter if we are to take the narrative UteraUy, for by
it we are led to suppose that the march from Gloucester
was made in a night, and the return to Gloucester was
as rapid. Euddyland, or Eedland, would doubtless be
the cognomen of many a place in those days, but we
know of none that fit the relation as it stands so weU
as the pleasant spot now witMn our city that bears to
tMs day the name. StiU we think that aU that the
narrator meant was this, that having sacked Ehudland,
in North Wales, Harold with his army left the same
day for Gloucester.
We next find the gaUant Harold fitting out a fleet
at Bristol, with which "on or about Eogation days," he
sailed for Wales, coasting along its shores, and co-oper
ating with his brother Tostig, who ravaged the country
with a body of cavalry.
The Welsh, driven to bay, surrendered, gave hos
tages, promised tribute, drove their unfortunate king
into banishment, and finaUy on the 5th of August,
1064, treacherously slew him, sending Ms gory head
and the beak of his ship to Harold, who presented the
ghastly trophies to the king.
54. Shortly afterwards Harold buUt a large strong
house at Portascith (Portskewet), which he stored weU
-with provisions, that his lord the king might take his
pleasure in hunting in those parts. We judge this to
have been on the site of Caldecott Castle, and possibly
the round mound and keep may be a portion of the buUd
ing. The Norman knights of Edward the Confessor
had, before this period, begun to buUd castles in the
districts conferred upon them by the king, and Harold
must have seen the great advantage of holding a weU
fortified place that could withstand the impetuous rush
of the hardy Welsh, nor would he fail to recognize the
advantage to be gained by such soUd built castles as
those he had met with in the war with Count Conan, in
Brittany, in which he had helped the Norman duke.
There are no signs of English occupation in Sudbrook
Camp, if we except the ruined churoh, which is of a
later date,
55. The Bristol pennies of Edward the Confessor,
1041 — 1066, are rather numerous. There are at least
twelve varieties, the name of the town is variously
spelled, viz., Br ice, Brec, Bryce, and Brygstow. The
moneyers' names are : -3ilfric, .^Ifward, ^Ifwine,
.athelstan, Ceorl, and Godwine. The name Jjllfwine
occurs on coins of Knut, but aU the others are new,
Elfwine and Jelfioine are apparently blundered forms
of „3Slfwine. Two of these pennies bear on the obverse

the king's bust in profile to the left cro-wned. No
sceptre and no inner circle. Legend, -|- edpeed ebcx.
Reverse, a smaU cross pattee witMn an inner circle.
Legend, -f- ^elpine on beioc, or godpine on bevce.
One rare penny in the British Museum has on the
obverse, fuU-face bust bearded and crowned, witMn an
inner circle. Legend, -\- badpaed eex a. Reverse
similar in type to the last described coins. Legend,
godpine on bevc. Two other pennies bear obverse,
king's bust to the left, fiUeted and with sceptre. No
inner circle. Legend, 4" edpeed eex. Reverse, a
double cross, with Umbs graduaUy expanding, issuing
from two central circles ; aU within an inner circle.
Legend, elfpaed on beicst, or edestan on bei.
Several more pennies have obverse, king's bust to the
right, crowned, and with sceptre. No inner circle.
Legend, eadpaeed eex. Reverse, a double cross, each
limb terminating in an incurved crescent. Legends,
.ffiLFEIC ON BEVGSTO, ^LFPINE ON BEE. .ffiLFPINE ON
BEVCSTO, or GODPINE ON BEEEC,
The next variety has : obverse, the king sitting on
his tMone, crowned, and holding the sceptre and orb.
Legend, edtveaedvs eex an. Reverse, a double cross
-with four martlets in the angles ; aU within an inner
circle. Legend, + ^lfpine onn bevce, TMs penny
is engraved by Sildebrand, tab. 10, from the original
coin in the Eoyal Cabinet, Stockholm. Two more
Bristol pennies have on the obverse, profile to the right,
cro-wned, with sceptre in front. Legend, -)- eadpaed
eex. Reverse, a double cross, -with a pyramid termin
ating in a peUet in each angle ; aU witMn an inner
circle. Legend, -f- ceoel on bevco, or ielfpine on
BEEC, ^
56, Eight centuries have been insufficient to erase
aU remembrance of the great EngUsh famUy of God-win
from Bristol, or to eliminate their names. The Earl's
Mead and Leof-wyne's or Lewin's Mead stUl remain to
remind us of the period when Sweyn was Earl of
Gloucestershire and Lord of Bristol, and Ms brother
Leofwyne was the governor of its earth-waUed castle,
Harold II,, the elect king of the English people and
the idol of the nation, feU on October 14th, 1066, at
Senlac, pierced to the brain by an arrow, dying glori
ously for his native land and the people whom he loved,
and thus the way was opened by one single blow for
the stark Duke of Normandy to ascend the tMone.
57. The Bristol pennies of Harold IL, 1066, are
rare, Ms reign was too short, so that very few are
known. The name of the town is speUed Bri-cstow,
Brycistow, and Brycstow. The moneyers' names are Ceorl,
.^thelwine, and Leofwine, the first of these names occur
> Henfrey, 345.

a,d. 1065.

BOUNDARIES OF THE TOWN.

49

on the money of Edward the Confessor, the others are
new. There is only one of these pennies in the British
Museum, it bears on the obverse the king's profile to
the left, cro-wned, -with a sceptre in front of the face.
Legend, -|- haeold eex ang. Reverse, the word pax,
between two dotted Unes across the centre of the coin ;
aU -witMn a beaded inner circle,' Legend, -|- leofpine
ON BEI. Another is said to be in the Hunterian coUec
tion at Glasgow University, and is engraved in Euding's
Annals of the Coinage, plate xxvi.. No, 2, Obverse, pro
file to the left, crowned; no sceptre. Legend, haeold
EEX ANEi. Reverse, the word pax, between two straight
lines, -within a plain inner circle. Legend, ceoel on
BEVCI, In the sale of the Eev, J. Martin's cabinet.
May, 1859, were two Bristol pennies of Harold, The
first had on the obverse, bust to right, -with sceptre.
Legend, haeald eex. Reverse, the word pax across
the field. Legend, -j- .eldpine on bevc The other
was simUar in type to that engraved in Ending, but
the two legends were : obverse, -{- haeold eex angl.
Reverse, -\- leofpine on bei,-"-
58, The boundary of the fortified to-wn which the
invaders found here in the 5th century may be easUy
traced by its murivant, wMch we can foUow tMough
out its circuit to tMs day. Starting from St, Nicholas
church, wMch stands partly upon the site of the ancient
waU, we traverse Nicholas street, the houses between
tMs and Bald-win street stand on the waU and its fosse,
wMch together measured in width 28 or 30 feet. Cross
ing Corn street we enter St, Leonard's lane, keeping
always in our peregrination the site of the waU on our
left hand, its course being between us and St, Stephen's
street; we now cross SmaU street into BeU lane;
tMoughout the whole of tMs portion, a miU leat,
wMch was cut from the river Frome, formed the fosse,
tMough the MU at the junction of Corn street and Clare
street, along St, Stephen's and Baldwin streets to the
King's miU on the Avon, From BeU lane, stUl foUow
ing the murivant, we cross Broad street into Tower lane,
passing Blind gate or Dove's tower, where the waU was
ten feet in thickness. Between the Blind gate and the
top of the Pithay, ^ WUUam Wyrcestre says there was
a large square tower, and at the junction of the Pithay
with Wine street there was another gate ; aU of these
have disappeared. On the outside of this portion of
the waU upon the slope of the MU reacMng down to
the river Frome was a strip of land of considerable
breadth. Here the suburb known as Aylward street or
the Pithay grew up under the fortifications, to be here
after enclosed by a second waU, The waU from the
1 Henfrey, 345-6,
' Pithay, in Norman " La haia du puit," in English " Well close,''
[Vol. I.]

Pithay was carried along the edge of the hUl on the
north side of Wine street. In 1820 some portions of
tMs waU were uncovered, and it was found to be six
feet in thickness; it was 19 feet from the street front.
It then crossed the top of Union street (a modern road
way) and ran along Narrow Wine street, turning appa
rently at a right-angle to Aid gate (St, Peter's church),
near the Avon it again angled, foUowing at a distance
of 70 feet the com-se of that river to St. Werburgh's
gate (St, Nicholas' church), which completes the circuit.
In the 13th century tMs waU was destroyed, and the
secular clergy (imitating the poUcy of the friars, who
had domicUed themselves outside the waUs so as to com
mand aU the roads into the town) buUt their churches
on the sites of the ancient gateways. Thus, St, Wer
burgh's gate became St. Nicholas; Bald-win's gate, St,
Leonard's ; North gate, St, John's ; Aid gate, St. Peter's,
this last was destroyed when the castle MU was waUed
around its base and Newgate was erected at its foot on
the castle ditch. Aylward' s gate in Wine street, also
being no longer necessary, made way for the Pithay
gate at the bottom of the MU, These were the cMef
entrances to the town ; over Blind gate, in John's lane,
there was a house, and at the bottom of SmaU street
stood St, Giles's church, -with its gateway. These two
were, we tMnk, merely postern gateways. The open
space upon the Avon bank was the Quay, and here the
butchers' shambles were placed according to our earUest
records. The natural course of the river Frome was
not by St, Stephen's and Baldwin streets, but do-wn
SkadpuUe (Scatterpool) street, now Marsh street, from
whence it wound its way to the Avon by Crow lane. Be
it remembered that the part of the floating harbour,
kno-wn as the Broad quay and Narrow quay, was not
excavated untU after 1247, The above waU was em
battled, and was strengthened by towers between the
several gates. One of these, Eicart says, stood midway
between St. Leonard's and St. Nicholas ; another Wyr
cestre mentions (the Nightingale tower) between BUnd
gate and Aylward's gate. The area -within tMs waU
was 19 acres.
59. The outer natural defences of tMs mural Une
were by no means insignificant in an age destitute of
artUlery. The rivers Avon and Frome engirdled the
waUs for more than three-fourths of their circumference.
For one half at least of this distance the banks were
high, and the MU steep, wMlst the rivers were tidal
with a deep bottom of mud. The lower or western front
was equaUy weU defended by a marsh Uable to over
flow, wMch extended outside the Frome, from Crow lane
to Brandon hUl, The hUl on the east was the site, we
believe, of the castle of wMch the Confessor made

50

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1065,

Leofwyne governor in 1049, which itself was a survival
most probably of the Eoman prsetorium, this MU was
waUed around its base by Geoffrey, and strengthened by
the Great Earl of Gloucester,
The tMee other mural additions to the town we
shaU have to mention subsequently, but the above is,
we beUeve, a correct plan of its fortifications at the
commencement of the Saxon era, Eedcliff, Thomas,
Temple and Bedminster, aU on the south side of the
river Avon, were not then within the jurisdiction of
Bristol, But we have some reason to conclude that
there was communication with the Somerset side of the
river by a bridge of wood. If the Thames could be
spanned by such an erection, and we know that it was,
the narrower Avon would offer no insuperable difficulty.
Besides, the very fact of one of the main streets of the
town leading down to a gateway abutting on the river
at that spot is a prima facie proof of the existence
of a roadway carried over a tidal stream that coiUd
otherwise have been crossed only by ferry at Mgh
water. The burgh was governed by the system of Frank
pledge under the burhgerefa (borough reeve) chosen by
the burghers, but subject apparently in certain matters
to the governor of the castle, who again would be re
sponsible to the ealdorman (duke or earl) of the shire
(Gloucestershire), 60, Frankpledge (Freoborh, free pledge, originaUy
Frithborh, the pledge to keep the king's peace) would
be better understood by its Yorkshire name "Ten man
tale;" by it aU the men of a town were di-wded into
tens, who were mutual guarantors, so that if one man
offended, the other nine were his security, if he fled
they were allowed thirty-one days in which to find and
produce him, then he was to repair the damage he had
done, out of his own property if he could, if that were
beyond Ms power justice was to be done on Ms body.
If they could not catch the deUnquent the head man of
the ten, had -with two of his best men to caU together
from Ms tMee neahborhs, tMee men from each, making
in aU twelve men, to clear himself and his frankpledge
both of the offence and the flight of the malefactor.
If he could not do this then compensation was to be
made as far as possible out of the property of the
wrong-doer, if this were not sufficient it had to be
supplemented by his feUows in the frankpledge. The
other nine men (neahborhs) had to make oath that they
had no part in the offence, and aU were bound if pos
sible at any subsequent time to bring the offender to
book, or to teU the justice where he was to be found.
These frankpledges were again united in larger numbers •
in the country as tytMngs, ten tythings forming the

hundred; in towns into gUds, and these into the com
monalty under the gerefa, or sheriff.
By this system each man had an interest in the
administration of justice, and to it we owe in a great
measure that submission to the authority of the law
that characterises us English people, EeUcs of the
system sur-vive in our midst. My neahborh is my neigh
bour, the venue where an action is laid is where the
witnesses are at hand ; the witness to character is a
descendant in law of the Saxon neahborhs ; the muni
cipal feasts grew out of the gild montMy meetings, and
the fine levied on the hundred in which riotous damage
has been done to a man's property is another sur-vival
of this age.
Of the buUdings of the pre-Norman period there are
no remains, they were without doubt aU " treen," i.e.
wooden. Stone dwelling houses and stone castles came
into vogue only on the eve of the Norman conquest,
and then made way slowly. The stately edifices of
Eome had never been planted in Caer Brito, wMch was
waUed around by Constantine at too late a date for their
erection, but the Mistress of the World left us as a
precious legacy her laws, her arts and her admirable
municipal local self-government.
To these the Anglo-Saxons added a love of personal
freedom, a regard for indi-vidual rights, a chivalrous
respect for the female sex, the chastity, and domestic
virtue of the Teuton home. Woman repaid by affec
tion the attention paid her by man, and shared Ms perUs
as weU as Ms pleasures, so that the names of -virgin,
wife and mother were held most sacred ; wMlst the
Keltic admixture gave to us that keen practical readiness
and versatiUty in wMch the modern Germans are defi
cient, and the Vikings and Bersekers infused into our
Bristol blood an adventurous love of the sea, which in
boldness of maritime enterprise, whether as discoverers,
merchants, colonists or fighting saUors, has never been
surpassed, although it has been doubtless equaUed by
many of our countrymen,
61, Whatever may be the opinion held -with regard
to our pre-vLOus history, tMs seems certain, the Normans
found Bristol a wealthy, prosperous, fortified burgh,
subject to law, claiming a prescriptive right to choose
from amongst themselves their o-wn magistrates to ad
minister justice, and their own Governor or Prsepositus
to regulate commerce, subject only to the dues and
customs claimed by the Lord of the Honour, to whom
the land and the houses belonged. On the east the
Earls possessed the manor of Barton (Barton Eegis),
which comprised the site of the Castle, the parishes of
St, Peter and St, PMUp. Towards the north Broad-
mead, the Horsefair, the site of St, James' church and

A,D. 1065,

CLIFTON, A MANOR BELONGING TO THE KING.

51

Lewin's Mead. Westward they o-wned the manor of
BiUes-wic, which comprised CoUege green. Canons'
Marsh and the Marsh of Bristol at the confiuence of the
two rivers (Queen Square), wMch by deed of 1240 we
learn was claimed by the to-wnsmen, i.e., the lord's
tenants, as common land, whereon from time im
memorial they had a right to take their pastime. Bed
minster and the sites of Temple, Thomas and Eedcliff
parishes belonged also to them, so that Harold or his
dependents apparently owned at the time of the Con
quest most of the land in and around Bristol.^
62. "CUfton be
longed to King Ed
ward the Confessor,
and was held of him
by Se-win, the reeve
(provostprsepositus,
the Norman scribe
wrote) of Bristou,
with the special
pri-vUeges of being
non-resident if he
chose, of not mak
ing any return in
the way of rent,
pro-viding a night's
entertainment, or
rendering any share
of the produce as
feorm." Mr. EUis
concludes the man
or to have been
Sweyn's, not of
right as portreeve
of Bristol, but as a
royal reward for
some special ser-
-vice, or an estate
of inheritance, held of the king, rather than of the
crown,, and -with pri-vUeges not common even to free
men. He quotes from Domesday, 1085-6, vol. I., folio
170, column 2 :— " LXXV, Land of Eoger Fitz Ealph,
In sines hoved hundred. Eoger Fitz Ealph holds one
manor, by name CUfton (of the King in Capite), which
Sewin, the provost of Bristou, held of King E., and had
been able to go with this land where he wished (i.e.,
to be non-resident), nor did he owe thence any feorm.
1 Seyer, I., 275,

There are 3 hides. In demesne are 3 plough teams,
and 6 -vUlanes, also 6 bordars, with 2 plough teams.
There are 3 serfs, and 8 acres of meadow. It was
worth (in King Edward's time) 100s., now 60s. (VUlans
were farm servants or servants of the villa, i.e., the
agriciUtural inhabitants of the viU — the -vUlagers — but
who were unable to leave without the Lord's consent ;
bordars were cottagers, ' bords ' cottages, in Eoman
times)." 1
Eoger Fitz Ealph was, Mr. EUis considers, a son of
Eoger de Berchelai, who farmed the King's Barton of
Bristol, and also the
great royal estate of
Berkeley, where he
resided. The re
duction in the value
shows the very un
settled state of the
country 20 years
after the Conquest.
There is no men
tion in Domesday
of church, priest,
or wood; but WU-
liam de Clifton
gave this advowson
in the foUowing cen
tury to the Abbey of
St, Augustine, In
the time of King
Henry I. the man
or was held of the
Honour of Glou
cester.
'^'"S.S.EUzs

THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF
time of the Normcuv Conqa&st,

BRISTOU about the

Here we pause,
we have endea
voured to elucidate
the History of Bristol out of the obscurity that veUs the
whole kingdom during the first ten centuries of the
CMistian era.
We have shown that at least five distinct peoples
have occupied its site, and as a result of tMs mingUng
of race we find the town early tenanted by men prone
to a maritime life, and possessing an aptitude for com
mercial affairs which enabled them to make Bristol the
second mart in the kingdom for foreign produce.
1 A. S, Ellis Bristol and Glouc, Arch, Proceedings, I,, 213.

CHAPTER IV.

•5^ Tr?E •!• 1]0^I]Q^1] + PERIOD. ^

I. William's conduct after his great victory at Senlac. 2. He richly rewards his medley array of
partisans. 3. He besieges Exeter. 4. His confiscations justifiable by the law. 5. The Lordship of
Bristol escheated to the King. 6. Statement of William's claim to the Throne of England. 7. Terrible
condition of the contumacious North. 8. Harold's sons land, and attack Bristol; Ednoth defeats them
in Somerset. g. They again invade the West. 10. Harding, the Prcspositus, or Chief Magistrate of
Bristol. II. Theories with regard to his origin and family. 12. His Pedigree. 13. Brictric, Lord
of Bristol. Romantic story told of him.. 14. Wulfstan in Bristol preaches down slavery. 15. William's
avarice. 16. State of the country. 17. Bristow and Barton Regis, King's land. 18. Jewry outside
Bristol. 19. William's death: 20. Bristol Money of the Conqueror. 21. The walls and gates of
Bristol in the Norman era. 22. Its Castle. 23. Bishop Geoffrey most probably its builder, sketch of
his life. 24. The Bishop holds Bristol for Robert, William's eldest son. 25. Fitzhamon made Lord of
the Honour by Rufus. 26. King Henry marries his illegitimate son Robert to Mabel, Fitzhamon's
daughter. 27. Position, property and character of Consul Robert. 28. Robert, ex-Duke of Normandy,
imprisoned in Bristol Castle. 29. Death of Harding. Site of his great stone-house at Bristol. 30. King
Henry at Berkeley. 31. Bristol Coinage, &c., of Henry I. 32. Bristol Castle enlarged and its Great
Tower built by Consul Robert. 2>Z- Ground plan thereof. 34. Architectural remains. 35. The Castle
Bridges, Gates, &c. 36. Stephen claims the throne, and seizes on Bristol Castle. 2,7- Robert re-conquers
it. 38. Bristol, description of from a MS. of that date. 39. Character given of the Bristowans by con
temporary writers. 40. Plan for damming up the Avon and drowning Bristol. 41. Robert's bold ride to
Bristol. 42, Robert takes Worcester, and Fitzherbert seizes on Malmesbury. 43. Bristol and all the
West favourable to the Empress. Stephen a prisoner in Bristol Castle. 44. Maud fails to make friends.
45. She besieges Winchester, and is herself besieged. Consul Robert is taken prisoner. 46. Stephen
exchanged for Robert, who fetches Prince Henry from Anjou. 47. Maud's escape from Oxford. 48. Prince
Henry educated at Bristol. 49. Battle of Wilton, Stephen defeated; great spoil brought to Bristol. 50. The
vale of Gloucestershire and the town of Bristow described by a writer of that age. 51. Robert and the
Bristowans relieve Tetbury Castle. 52. The Consul builds Farringdon Castle. 53. Cruel treatment of
Roger de Berkeley. 54. Death of Consul Robert. His character. 55. Prince Henry lands in England
and renews the struggle. 56. He and Stephen come to an agreement. 57. The war of Bristowa, dates of
the principal events. 58. Stephen's Bristol Coinage.

A,D, 1066.

WILLIAM'S CONDUCT AFTER SENLAC.

53

ILLIAM, the master spirit of the age,
after the death of Harold, had by
Ms great -victory at Senlac, on October
14th, 1066, prostrated the English
people, and won for Mmself the
cro-wn, but some years elapsed ere he
conquered the whole of the kingdom.
" He made diUgent enquiry after
those who had sided -with Harold, and confiscated the
property of such of them as had fought against him
self. Those who were doubtful, as weU as those who
from force of cir
cumstances had
been unable in time
to join the EngUsh
standard, were for
the most part de
spoiled of their
possessions, but a
hope was held out
to their chUdren
that if they con
tinued loyal to the
new dynasty some
portion of the fam
Uy heritage might
revert to them," ^
The booty thus
acquired was im- -
mense. The king
claimed for his
share aU the lands
of Edward the Con
fessor, which it is
said consisted of fourteen

away his ragged quUted coat to don a sUken cloak with
knightly baldric. "Flemish weavers and drovers from
Gascoigne, such as (EU de Boeuf , Front de Bceuf, Bonvi-
lain, Ivo de TaiUebois, Longue Epee, Hugues le TaiUeur,
&c., &o,, assumed the style of gentleman and the title of
nobleman by right of their victory and foreign birth."
Then " William de Coningsby
Came out of Brittany
With his wife Tiffany
And his maid Maufras
And his dogge Hardigras."^

hundred and twenty-two
manors, and the immense estates of Godwin, Harold,
Algar, Ed-win, Morcar and other great Saxon earls.
He took also the treasure of the kings, and the church
plate, nor did he spare the rich shops of the merchants.
He was thus enabled to redeem Ms promises to the
mercenaries who had joined his standard at Dive,
2, With a Uberal hand he showered his gifts. Ten
Normans alone received between them two thousand
eight hundred and twenty manors ; those who had
stipulated for gold had their coffers weU fiUed, whUst
many a weU dowered Saxon maiden whose father, or
widow whose husband, had faUen at Senlac, became the
prey of a successful soldier, Midas Uke, these men
turned aU they touched into gold ; the foot soldier cast
' Thierry's Nor. Conq,, I, iv,, 190.

WhUst Normans of
low degree, in flocks
both lay and cleri
cal, crossed the
Channel to share in
the rich plunder,
and to aid in the
reduction of the un
conquered portions
of the realm. Their
chiefs (for it must
not be thought that
the Normans were
aU canaille J became
the king's liege
men, and before
they took j)Osses-
sion of their fiefs
put each of them a
hand into that of
the king and swore
Ruins of the Castle of Bougemont, Exeter. ^^ lower their OWU
flags and to raise the tMee Uon banner of their lord
the king at his first command.
Eapidly building strong castles on their newly ac
quired domains, they then demanded from their depend
ents a similar oath of fealty and homage, and this system
was enacted through all gradations of rank down to the
archers and grooms.
3. WiUiam soon found work for their wUling hands.
On December 6th, 1067, he had hastily to return from
Normandy. Gytha, the mother of the late king Harold,
had taken refuge in the important waUed city of Exeter,
the burgesses of which had thrown up fresh intrench-
ments and buUt additional towers for defence. In
January, 1068, WiUiam by a rapid march appeared
before their waUs and summoned them to surrender,
1 Thierry's Nor. Conq., I. iv., 198, 233.

54

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1070,

From their answer we gather the semi-independent
position occupied by the great trading to-wns in the
Anglo-Saxon period. They said " we -wiU neither
swear aUegiance to the king nor admit him -within
our waUs, but -wiU pay him tax such as we have been
wont to pay," For eighteen days they bravely de
fended their city, until it was treacherously yielded by
their Thanes, The king acted -with moderation, and
saved the city from pUlage, but he puUed do-wn forty-
eight houses and buUt the castle of Eougemont to over
awe the citizens.
4, It is indisputable that in the confiscation and
distribution of property WiUiam at first kept fairly
within the ancient law which he in fuU Witan had
sworn to observe. He had been chosen as king by the
nation. The term "Conquestor" involved no idea of
the forcible subjection of a people, but merely signified
that he had obtained that which was his own by right.
His chaplain says he was electus in regem, " elected king,"
and Tb-chbishop Aldred "haUowed him to king" at
Westminster, putting the crown on his head only after
he had sworn "that he would so govern this nation as
any king before him best did if they would be faithful
to him." Hence these spoliations were justified as
being the necessary punishment of rebels. The nation
it is true did not at once become faithfiU to him, but
that WiUiam meant to deal fairly by them is instanced
by his moderation at Exeter, and his charter given to
London, wherein he says, "William the King friendly
salutes WiUiam the Bishop, and Godfrey the Portreeve,
and aU the burgesses within London, both French and
English. And I declare I gTant you to be all law-
worthy, as you were in the days of King Edward; and
I grant that every chUd shaU be his father's heir, after
his father's days, and I wUl not suffer any person to do
you a -wrong. God keep you."
5, We imagine that Bristol was dealt with in a
like manner. The king had received the Lordship by
escheatage, but he does not appear to have altered
the civU government of the town, or to have exer
cised any other power than that pertaining by right
to him as its lord. The Honour of Bristol had passed
from a subject of the highest rank into the hands
of the monarch, -svho held it for his wife, and every
burgess paid fealty to him as his lord. The mon
strous fiction that the king was the o-wner of aU the
land in the country had as yet no place in the mind
of either king or people.
6. The state of affairs was simjDly this. WiUiam
had claimed as his inheritance from Edward the English
crown, and by force of arms had obtained possession ;
foUowing the ancient custom he then caused Mmself to

be duly elected, and had sworn to govern the nation
by English law ; there was no annihUation of the con
stitution, changes many and great there were, most of
the men of rank and wealth were swept out of his path;
there was a new dynasty and a new nobUity, some of
whom were no doubt of a Mgher grade than their pre
decessors. The rank and file, i.e., the great bulk of the
English people, remained, and that, too, in such num
bers that they retained their o-wn language, borrowing,
it is true, a considerable and refined vocabulary from
their new lords ; and a greatly needed grace and polite
ness in their daily Ufe, their laws and their Uterature.
7, Eeturning, however, to the early struggles of the
Conqueror, we soon find a great alteration in the
King's conduct. In 1069 WUUam began to devastate
the north of England, laying it waste, making the fruit
ful place a desert, and with fiendish fury destroying the
life of the land. This was a more e-vU year for England
than that even of Senlac, for as the great general marched
tMough the country, stamping out the isolated attempts
at insurrection, by throwing the greatest number of
men avaUable into one spot, and so striking swiftly and
heavily, he left behind him a desolation. Upwards of
100,000 innocent people perished by famine, and the
survivors resorted to cannibalism or sold themselves
into slavery for a morsel of bread.
Nor was this aU, Where the piUaged to-wns were
spared the inhabitants were compeUed to aid in the
erection of the terrible Norman castle on the most com
manding site, whose stately donjon, taU, solid and
square, with its baUey and warlike appliances, kept
watch and ward over their every movement, and formed
at once a safe shelter for the Conqueror's garrisons, a
storehouse for his armies, and a menace to the English
people. How strange a phase this page of Mstory presents
as contrasted with the present order of things. Where
for one hundred miles by WUliam's orders not a man
was left alive, there is now the densest population
perhaps in the world ; where his soldiers marched
through a desert, distressed with fioods and torrents of
rain, there are beautiful vaUeys, with countless steam
engines, and miU wheels on every stream, and from the
hoUows of the hiUs on either hand, there rise the dense
clouds of smoke that teU of the tireless industry that is
busily producing an amount of national wealth, com
pared with which aU the plunder of the Normans would
be but as the small dust of the balance,
8. WhUe WiUiam was indulging in his outbreak of
savagery in the north two, some say three, of the sons
of the late King Harold landed with a large army at
the mouth of the Avon and marched upon Bristol,

A.D, 1069,

HARDING, THE PROPOSITUS OF BRISTOL.

55

They had reason to expect a welcome ; the town had
been for many years connected with Godwin's family,
who had been its lords, and it had evidently been weU
affected to Harold in the time of the Confessor ; but
either the ravages of the Irish Danes of the invading
army, who piUaged the country right up to the waUs
of Bristol, disgusted and alarmed the burgesses, or the
Norman power -within the burgh overawed them ; the
resiUt was that the townsmen closed the gates, manned
their waUs, and so stoutly defended their town that the
assaUants were glad to retreat with their plunder to
their sMps at SMrehampton, whence they saUed down
the Channel, landed in Somerset and marched into the
country, hoping to excite a general rising in favour of
themselves, as being EngUsh princes. The men of
Somerset joined them in large numbers, and, stimulated
by their hatred of the Normans, the Britons of Devon
and CornwaU raUied around the standard of the dragon.
The Norman forces were commanded by Dreux de
Montaign, to whose aid WUUam sent a large body of
EngUshmen under the command of Ednoth, who had
been Master of the Horse to King Edward the Con
fessor, and after him to King Harold. These men
were put in the fore-front of the battle, "WUUam
foreseeing a great reUef to himself wMchsoever should
conquer. Nor was he deceived in this supposition ; for
both parties of EngUsh ha-ving fought with each other
for some time left the king a -victory -without any exer
tion of Ms o-wn. The strangers were driven to Ireland ;
the king's army purchased the empty name of victory
by a very great slaughter of their men and by the loss
of their general, whose name was Ednoth, a person
famous in the time of the English at war and at home,
the father of Harding, who stUl lives," ^ Ednoth was
sheriff of Hants, and probably also of Somerset,
HolUngshed mentions him as " Adnothus, that had
been master of their father Harold's horses, whom they
slew -with a great number of others," Another historian
names him "Eadnoth, who had been King Harold's
stallar, &c,," so also Hoveden, WUliam of Malmesbury,
Stowe and others. In Domesday, Ednoth is said to
have been " Stallar ius" to Edward the Confessor, and
by Florence- of Worcester, to have been so to King
Harold. In the Saxon CMonicle he is termed " Stallere,"
which is translated " Mayor of the Palace," and also
"Master of the Horse."
9, Not accepting their defeat as final, two of the
brothers, Edmund and God-win, again saUed from Ire
land about Midsummer in the same year (1069), and
landed in the Taw, between Barnstaple and Bideford; a
nearly contemporary -writer says, "Two sons of Harold,
* Will. Malmes, "Gesta regum Anglorum," par, 254.

King of England, had fied to Dermot, a king of Ireland.
By him and the chiefs of his kingdom they were assisted ;
and having coUected a fleet of sixty-six ships and put
an army on board they landed at Exeter, and going
forward up the country they began boldly to waste the
country, and raging with fire and sword they endea
voured to commit the utmost mischief. Brian, son of
Eudo, Earl of Brittany, came upon them unexpectedly,
fought two battles in one day, slew over 2000 men and
the bravest of their officers ; and the sons of the late
king regained their ships with difficulty (only two it is

Norman Ship (shortenedj.
said remained to them) and fled to fiU L'eland with
mourning."^ Both of these accounts are we think
correct. Their first landing was made between Bide
ford and Barnstaple ; f oUed there, the army saUed round
the Land's End, and in the estuary of the Exe met
with their crusMng and final defeat,
10, There was a wealthy and celebrated man whose
name has been incidentaUy mentioned above, one
Harding, who it is said was at tMs time the ' ' Prse
positus " or chief magistrate of Bristol, When he was
first appointed is doubtful, one MS. says in the reign
of Edward the Confessor, but no authority is given.
Smyth, the historian of Berkeley, writes that "he
settled in Baldwin street (i.e. just outside the waUs of
Bristol) and that the Conqueror conferred upon Mm the
government of the to-wn, which he held by the name
of Patricius, Maior, Alderman, Prsepositus, Consul,
and the Uke attributes, as several writers have diversely
styled him and his place of office in several ages," He
adds that by Patricius he understands a nobleman of
England, and by Consul he means Earl, Here again
we have a lack of proof, the earUest references to the
> Ordericus Vitalis Lib., IV,, 513, Seyer, I., 55,

56

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

a,d. 1080.

titles being of the 15th century, which give us no
warrant for the statement that Harding was ever Earl
of Gloucester, 1 1 , With regard to the family from wMch Harding
descended there are several widely different theories :
That he was a younger son of the king, or of a
king of Denmark, or at least to have been of royal
descent. That he was the son of a Danish ¦viking or sea
rover — half pirate and half merchant.
That he was the son of Ednoth, the StaUere above
mentioned. There are other theories, but as we think the true
one may be found witMn the above limits we omit
them. Harding's aUeged royal descent is not, as some
think, a "mere invention of modern date by some
hanger-on of the family," The earliest testimony is a
MS. of the date of 1351, which describes him as of
the blood royal of Denmark. Leland, Camden and
Eobert Eicart accept this statement, but that which
gives greatest colour to tMs view is the inscription on
the fine Norman gateway between the Upper CoUege
green and the Lower, this, if it could be reUed on,
would be very strong e^ndence. It reads, "Eex Hen-
ricus Secundus et Dominus Eobertus filius Hardingi
fUii Eegis Dacise, hujus Monasterii primi fundatores
extiterunt" (King Henry the Second and Eobert, son
of Harding, who was a son of the King of Denmark,
were the first founders of this monastery). This by
many would be deemed conclusive, but inasmuch as the
whole of the superstructui'e of this noble gateway is
most probably a restoration of the late 15th century,
it cannot be accepted as satisfactory evidence. The
great, and, to our minds, insuperable objection to the
theory of royal descent is tMs — that Harding never is
shown to have claimed such a connection, his descen
dants never asserted it, but they sign their charters in
variably as his sons (Fitzharding). The sinister bar in
their escutcheon would have been deemed an honour in
the consecutive reigns of kings whose great ancestor,
WiUiam, the patron of their famUy, was himself Ule-
gitimate. Seyer concludes that Harding was the descendant
of a Danish viking, or sea-rover, "a class who to
piracy added the practice of merchandise, carrying their
plunder to various countries, where they exchanged or
sold what was not suitable to their purpose, Hardiuff
or Ms father," Seyer thinks, "frequented the port of
Bristow for disposal of his plunder, and growing rich
settled there perhaps under the protection of his coun
tryman Knut the Great, and quitting Ms piratical

habits, retained his merchandise," '^ He adds, in con
firmation of this theory, this free translation of a pas
sage in the "Annals of Margam": — "A fleet of pira
tical merchantmen from the Baltic came to Bristol in
the autumn of 1124, as they had often done in former
years, and staid here during the winter, long enough to
dispose of their merchandise and reload their ships,"
Harding inherited the fortune of his father, and by the
same occupation acquired great wealth, so tradition
asserts ; this and his local influence procured Mm the
appointment by Knut or by Edward the Confessor of
preepositus of Bristol, and WiUiam, flnding him an able
man, and not of Saxon famUy, continued Mm in the
office. We shaU consider tMs argument stUl further in con
nection with the two other theories, viz,, that of Ednoth,
the StaUere, and AMoth, the sheriff of Dorset, The e-vi-
dence is strong that these represent one and the same
person. In Domesday the name is spelt variously as
AMod, iBMod, EMod and Ednod, and it is certain that
in five counties Hugh, Earl of Chester, succeeded to
this Thane's estates, viz,, Somerset, WUtshire, Dorset,
Devon and Berkshire, Elsewhere we find the same
man's name spelt AMoth, EMoth, Eadnoth, Ealdnoth,
^Idnoth and ^Ifnoth, Orthography was but Uttle
studied in those days, and proper names were entirely
at the mercy of the transcriber ; aUowance also must be
made for the difference in dialect in various parts of
the kingdom. That this is not an isolated instance of
orthograpMc difference we see in the case of Eadric,
the traitor, whose proper name, Entris, has undergone a
stiU greater transformation into Edris, Edrich, Edric and
Eadric, ^ So in Seyer Eadnoth becomes Alnod or AMoth,
This great Thane was StaUere (Master of Horse)
under tMee kings— Edward the Confessor, Harold and
WiUiam the Conqueror,
12, Mr, A, S, EUis, in a pedigree carefuUy studied
(which is set forth in fuU on the opposite page), de
duces the descent of Harding from Alnod, and shows
that Eobert Fitzharding did not inherit his father's
estates, simply because he was not the eldest, but a
younger son. The grandsire AMod's estates were given
to Hugh de Abrincis (Earl of Chester) when AMod feU
opposing the sons of Harold in Somerset in 1068 (not
at aU, WiUiam of Malmesbui-y thinks, to the sorrow of
the Conqueror). One strong argument in favour of the
Hardings' descent from the StaUere, Mr, EUis shows, is
this, that Eobert Fitzharding and his Suzerain, Eannulf
(Earl of Chester), gave FifeMde Magdalen, an estate in
Dorset, which had belonged to AMod, to the abbey of
St, Augustine, at Bristol (circa 1142),
> Seyer, I., 313-15, » Freeman, Nor, Conq., I.

o

PEDIGEEE OF THE FAMILY OF ROBERT FITZ HARDING.

COMPILED BY A. S. ELLIS,

ALNOD [Ealdnoth, staller, or horse thane, under King:
Edward the Confessor, and afterwards under King Harold
and the Conqueror. Slain in the autumn of 1086 at the head
of the men of Somerset, in an engagement with the sons of
Harold, when devastating the sea board of that shire, after
their repulse at Bristol.]

= .. Note.

SEAL OP ROBERT FITZ HARDING.

HARDING, SON OF ALNOD, held in 1085-6 a manor=
in Meriet, co. Somerset (Godwin's in the time of King
Edward), and the manors (Tovi's in King Edward's time) in
Lopen, Bradon, Capland, Bucklaud and Dishcove. The
father of Nicholas fitz Harding enfeotfed in the time of
Henry I. WiUiam fitz Osbert in two parts of a knight's
fee and Wimund in the third part, and gave lands to
Baldwin and Hildebraud. Harding, the father of Robert,
died 6th Nov. (See Note.)

-William of Malmesbury (§ 254) in recording the death of Ealdnoth,
the staller, adds that " he was the son of Harding, wJio yet survives,
a man more accustomed to kindle strife by his malignant tongue
than to wield arms in the field of battle." This was probatly written
about 1140. Smyth gives the date of Harding's death about 1115,
but this is too early. Harding, son of Eadnoth, held land of the
abbey of Glastonbury, which he refused to surrender, until Abbot
Herlewine (1101 — 1120) obtained judgment against him. Robert fitz
Harding gave to the abbey he founded, Fifehide (Magdalen) in Doi set,
which it seems he held of the Earl of Chester, and which had belonged
to Alnod ill the days of Edward the Confessor.

NICHOLAS FITZ HARDING,
son and heir of Harding, having inherited
his fief which he certified in 1166 to be two
knights' fees and a half in Somersetshire.
He also held one knighb's fee of the old
feoffment of William, Earl of Gloucester.
Must have been 76 at least iu 1166 ; dead
im.

t
ROBERT FITZ HARDING of Bristol, Provost of the town, apparently^
a merchant there of great wealth and influence in the reign of King Stephen,
but partisan of Robert, Earl of Gloucester, on the side of the Empress Matilda,
obtains grant of Berkeley harness in fee from her son Henry ; from the Eaii the
manors of Billeswick juxta Bristol and Bedminster ; held lands of Humphrey
de Bohun and William, Earl of Warwick, 1166. Founder of the Abbey of St.
AuKustin in 1142, became a canon therein, and died on the feast of St. Agatha,
5 Feb., 1170 ; bur. between the stalls of the abbot and the prior.

,EVA, dau. of 
had a brother named Du-
rand, founded a priory of
nuns on S. Michael's Hill,
Bristol, wherein she took
the veil, and died prioress
12 March, 1170, but was
bur. with her husband.

ELIAS FITZ HAR
DING, ? of Beving-
ton in Berkeley, had
lands from his bro
ther Robt. in Combe :
witnessed the foun
dation charter of the

1 I IJ
MAURICEAGNESwife of Hugh
de Haseley.
MAUD.
CECILY.

JORDAN (? of the,
Weir in Bristol, and
father of Jordan "de
Were," David " Were,"
of Bristol, and Arthur,
nephews of Robert fitz
Harding. Ancestor of
the Lords de la Warr.)

HENRY DE MERIET,
gave a virgate of land
at Meriet to the Kt.
Templars before 1185.
Paid scutage 1171 : in
the roll as "Henry fitz
Nicholas."

HENRY, a
priest, dean of
Moreton, dio.
Exeter, after
arch-deacon of
Exeter, named
after Rlenryfitz
Empress. (?)

I
MAURICE.
FltZ ROBERT"
FITZ - HARD
ING, or"deBerk-
elev, " died 26
.lune, 1190, bur.
Brentford ch.,
Middx.

ALICE dau. of
Roger de
Berkeley

I .

I

I

ley.

MATILDA ALDENA HELENA NICHOLAS^ALA, dau.
and coh. of
Guido fil,
Tecii, of Tick
enham, who
was living
1158,hadlds.
in Elmore.

wifeofOthofitz wife of Nigel wifeof
William who fitz Arthur, of de Berkeley
had lands in Clapton, Som., of Dursley,

of Berke- Dursley with who had lands brother

her ? god dau. in Kingscote
oftheEmpress. with her.

Alice,Jan.

d. 12

FITZ ROBT."
of Ticken
ham, CO Som.
of gave the ad
vowson to
the
died 1189.

1 2
HAWISE,dau.^ROBERT ' de Were,*^ AVICIA

andh. of Robt.
de Gonrnay of
Barrow, widow
of Roger de
Clare and (?) of
Roger de Baal-
un : dead 1168.

Som., had his
father's manors of
Billeswyek, juxta
Bristol, Kinsswes-
ton, Redwick, Bever-
ston, CO. Glou. ; dead
1195.

d. of Robert
de Gaunt
'and heiress
of her mo
ther, Alice
Paynel.ob.
v.p. 1192.

THOMAS, a priest
archdea
con of
Worces
ter.

NICHOLAS DE.
MERIET, of
Meriet, 1205,
died 1229, "held
Meriet in capite
ly descent from
the conqiiest "
(Testa. deNevill,
p. 163), also the
lands in Lopen,
and a knt.'s fe*^
of the Earl of
Gloucester.

. JULIANA:
dau. of Wil
liam de Pont
de I'arch,
niece of Wil
liam Mar-
sb,il],Earlof Pembroke.

1 1.2
ROBE RT= LUCIA

de Berkeley,
of Berkeley,
born about
1165. consta
ble of Bristol
Castle, found
er of St.
Katherine's
Hosp., Bed-
minsrer,died
s.p. 13 Miy,
12^1, ?efflgy
in Redcliff
Church,

dau. of
re- mar.
Bughde Gonr- n.Ly.

THO MAS,
de Berkeley,
of Berkeley,
brother and
heir of Robt.
1221. died 29
Nov. 1243,
bu. S. aisle
of the Abbey
Church.

JOAN
dau. of
Ralph de
Someri, marr.
about 1216.

I I I I
MAURICE de Berkeley.
WILLIAM
de Berkeley.
HENRY and
RICHARD
said to have
gone to Suot-
laud.  wife
of Osbert
Giffard.

I I
HENRY ROGER
died s.p. FITZ
NICHOLAS, of Ticken
ham, died
1230, held
a knight's
fee of the
honor of
Berkeley 1205.

I I I
JORDAN ALA EVA'deGour-
wifeof nay,' sole heir
Ralph of her mother,

Bloet.

had Barrow
and English-
combe. CO.
Som., died in
her half bro
ther Maurice's
lifetime. Marr.
1 Thomas de
Tilly, of Rich-
mont Castle, in
Somerset ; 2
Roger dePeau-
ton.

MATILDA= only child of
Henry Doyly
of Hooknor-
ton, co.Oxf.,
but died
1219, with
out issue in
her father's
lifetime.

:MAURICE 'de=
Gaunt,' once occurs
as 'Paynel,' came of
age in 1207, an im
mense inheritance
fell to him through
his mother, the great
Barony of Paynel,
chiefly in Yorkshire
and Line, died s.p.
at Portsmouth, 30
April, 1230. Foun
der of St Mark's
Hospital and of the
Domician Priory.

MARGT. dau. of
widow of
Ralph de
So m eri.
She sur
vived
Maurice,
and was
living in
1247.

I
HENRY
de Gaunt,
a priest
the first
" master
almoner "
of St.
Mark's
Hospital resigned through
infinnity
1268 ; bu.
in the
chapel.

The Meriets of
Meriet.

The Berkeleys of
Berkeley.

The Fitznichols of
Tickenham.

58

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1085.

" The first definite notice that we have of Harding,
the son of Alnod, is in the Somerset Q-ueld inquest of
1084, where in one place he is called Hardin de Meriot,
in other places Harding Fitzalnod, Two years later —
1086 — Domesday, whether describing him as Lord of
Meriott, or as an Anglo-Saxon Thane, endowed by the
Conqueror with other Somerset estates, calls him uni
formly Harding filius Elnod," ^
That Harding, the son of Alnod, was recognised and
patronised by King WUliam sixteen years after his
father's death is clear, but we have our doubts as to his
being the father of Nicholas and Eobert Fitzharding,
It seems to us that one link is lost, and that those
notable men who in 1166 made the ordinary return of
their tenures in capite Nicholas in Somerset and Eobert
in Gloucestershire were probably the great grandsons
of Alnod the Stallere, and not his grandsons. We are
inclined to the opinion that the Hardin de Meriot, or
Harding Fitzalnod, is the man who was prsepositus of
Bristol in 1066, who is said to have died November 6,
1115, who was the powerful man and lawyer from whom
Herlewin, the abbot of Glastonbury (1100-30), recovered
certain lands, ^ and that he had a son who succeeded
him as prsepositus who was the father of the before-
named Nicholas and Eobert Fitzharding, and who, from
the return made to the Feodary of 1166, is spoken of
twice as though only recently deceased. The question
as to whether the term "fitz" was not loosely applied
thus early to the grandson as well as to the son of an
eminent man until it grew into a permanent prefix is
worthy of consideration. If this were so, William of
Malmesbury's statement ^circa 1140) that Harding Fitz-
eadnoth was a successful forensic contemporary with
himself would create no difiiculty,
Eobert Fitzharding was born in 1085 ; he was, as
we have seen, a second son, and one of a family of eight
children. If Alnod, Stallere to Edward the Confessor,
was the father of the Harding prsepositus of Bristol in
1066, and Eobert Fitzharding was the son of the latter,
it seems almost impossible for him to have been a suc
cessful contemporary of William of Malmesbury, But
if the lawyer of 1101 and the burgess, Harding of
Bristol, to whom Brictric mortgaged lands in Wheaten-
hurst (Domesday, 1085), are identically one and the
same person, whose son Harding (called by Leland
Eobert Fitzharding, and spoken of as living in the
reign of WUliam the Conqueror s) was the father of the
Eobert Fitzharding founder of the monastery, 1148, the
difficulty disappears.
Before Harding became the recipient of King WU-
1 Rev, R, W, Eytou in Notes and Queries, 6th Series, 20,
° Seyer, L, 308. = Leland Collect,, II., 912.

liam's favour, there is little doubt that he was a
wealthy man ; he had inherited a large property, was
engaged in profitable mercantile affairs, which the reve
nues of his office as prsepositus enabled him consider
ably to augment, Seyer contends, on the authority of a
MS, chronicle, that Harding was made the chief magis
trate of Bristol in the reign of Edward the Confessor
after Sewin, and that he was contiaued in office by
Harold, and after him by WUliam. He identifies the
office with that of high baUifl, and as such Harding
would be the elect of the burgesses ; but under William
he became the " custos," or provost, who, when a town
belonged to the King, levied the feorm, issues, and
other debts due to the King, superintended the estates,
and raised the revenues for his lord the King, To
this day the mayor of Bristol (Harding's successor) is
the King's escheator within the county of Bristol,
Harding married a lady named Livida (according to
Smyth), by whom he had issue five sons — Nicholas,
Eobert, Elias, Jordan and Maurice — and three daughters
— Agnes, Maud and Cicely, He acquired great wealth
and reputation in a lengthened career as the chief
magistrate of the second commercial town in the king
dom. From him sprang the noble house of Berkeley,
now represented by Lord Fitzhardinge, It is stated
that he lived in a great stone house, the foundations of
which were discovered in 1823; it stood on the south
side of Baldwin street, and its gardens were evidently
very extensive,
13. Brictric, the descendant of Aylward, was at the
time of the Conquest, we think. Lord of Bristol, and
Harding was probably his subordinate officer. Like
most of the other English nobles, Brictric' s power and
wealth made him obnoxious to the Conqueror. A
romantic story is told of his .having refused the offered
love of MatUda, the daughter of Baldwin, Earl of
Flanders, when he was ambassador to that court from
Edward the Confessor, and that MatUda, who had now
become the wife of the Conqueror, in revenge for his
rejection of her suit, with aU an angry woman's ven
geance, excited her husband against him, got him
arrested at Hanley,^ and thrown into prison at Win
chester, where he lingered until his death.
Even if this story be true, which we greatly doubt,
WUliam could scarcely have given it as the cause of
Brictric' s disgrace, and the confiscation of the whole of
his property. But there was little difficulty in finding
a sufficient reason, Brictric was possessed of vast
domains; he was an Englishman, and the piUage of
England had been the bait which had drawn so many
^ Leland says near Salisbury, but it was most probably on his
Manor of Hanley, iu Worcestershire,

A,D. 1080,

WULFSTAN IN BRISTOL PREACHES DOWN SLAVERY.

59

warriors to the standard of the invader, MatUda's
name was one of the first inscribed on the partition
roU, and William dowered her with all the lands of
Brictric. Seyer, enumerates them from Domesday as foHows :
In Dorset : The Manors of Devrel, Litelfrome, Cran-
boum, Wimburne and Aishmere, aU of great extent and
value. In Someeset : Winescombe, and the Church of
St. Andrew in GivUchestre, also lands at Curry. In
Devon : Levia, HalgeweUe, Clovelie, Bedeford, with a
fishery, Liteham, Langtrev, Edeslege, Sandforde, Win-
cheHe, Aisse, Slapeford, Bichentone, Morchet, Holcumbe,
Mochelsberie, Halsbreton and Aisbertonne, these were
most of them manors. In ConNWAii, : Conarditone,
Gudeford, Bennartone, Melled hame and Carewrge, In
WoBCESTEESHiBE : Bisologe and Burgelege, But the
chief of his possessions lay in Gloucestershire, and
were so numerous that Seyer says it would require a
separate treatise only to name them ; the chief were the
extensive Lordship of Tewkesbury, with its very great
dependencies, Hanley, Turnberie, Sopebury, Aveninge,
Fareforde. ¦¦• The Queen thus became the feudal pos
sessor of what was afterwards styled the Honour of
Gloucester and the Town of Bristow, and received aU
the rents and profits of Brictric's estates, farming them
out according to the custom of the time,, which, for
many centuries, formed a precedent for settling the
Lordship of Bristol as the dower of the Queen of
England. 14. In the year 1080 WUliam was at Berkeley, where
he confirmed a grant of lands to the church of St. Peter,
at Gloucester, by Walter de Lacy. ^ There is little doubt
but that the king visited Bristol, as it was somewhere
about this date that he abolished the abominable traffic
in slaves to which we have elsewhere aUuded. In the
nfe of WiUfstan it is said " to have been a very ancient
custom, which had fixed itself so firmly in their minds
that neither the love of God nor of King WiUiam had
hitherto been able to abolish it. . . . This custom,
so inveterate, transmitted down from their forefathers,
Wulfstan by degrees abolished. For, knowing that
their obstinacy could not easUy be bent, he abode in
their neighbourhood often two or three months, going
there every Lord's day and sowing the seeds of divine
preaching, which so far gaiaed strength, among them
during the intervals that they not only renounced this
crime themselves but were an example to others through
out England to do the same. FinaUy one of their
number, who opposed the Bishop's exhortations more
obstinately than the rest, they drove out of the town,
and afterwaxds deprived him of his: eyes; in which
1 Sjeyer, L, 269. ' Dugdale's MoDas., I,, 116.

instance I commend their devotion but disapprove of
the transaction, nevertheless no force of reason can
subdue the minds of clownish persons when once tainted
with vice." A notable instance of lynch law this,
probably the first recorded in England, Wulfstan has
been described by some as a weak, irresolute prelate,
but this self-sacrificing act of his, which would win him
little fame amongst the powerful, and which was opposed
to the interests of the king, who dearly loved money
and derived a revenue from such sales, stamps the
bishop as a worthy foUower of Him whose evangel
was one of liberty to the captive, and love to men
of every degree,
WUliam of Malmesbury elsewhere divides the honour
of abolishing the traffic between Wulfstan and Arch
bishop Lanfranc, " To which of them the glory of the
deed belongs I cannot certainly determine whether I
shaU impute to Lanfranc or to Wulfstan, Bishop of
Worcester, Both had great difficulty in persuadiag the
king to this measure, who complied at last reluctantly
on account of the profit arising from the duty which was
paid to him on the sale,"
But although the traffic in English slaves was
abolished in Bristol at this period, it was carried on
in other parts for a century or more, for Giraldus
Cambrensis informs us that in 1172 the Irish had
great numbers of English slaves among them which
had been sold to them not only by pirates and robbers
but by traders, "For the people of England by the
common wickedness of the nation used to expose their
chUdren in the public market, and to seU their own sons
and relations into Ireland, even before they suffered any
want or any pressure of hunger," ^ From Bromton's
Chronicle, 1069, we learn that there was scarcely a house
in Scotland that was without a man or a maid-servant
of English race. These were captives of war, and so pro
bably were many of those held in slavery in Ireland,
for one of the pretexts used by Henry II, for his in
vasion of Ireland was that the Irish had landed in
England and had carried away some English as slaves,
Bristol has, and not undeservedly, been stigmatised as
clinging to the last to the African slave trade to supply
the West Indian plantations, of which her citizens were
large holders ; let credit be given to her for having
had amongst her townsfolk men who were not, as is
generaUy thought, the last,- but amongst the first in the
kingdom to abolish a system which, by the precedent
custom of many centuries, had been deemed to be
neither nefarious nor iUegal,
In 1083 MatUda, the Queen, died on the 3rd of
November, and the King took fuU possession of the
^ Giraldus Cambrensis, I-I8.

60

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1085,

Lordship of Bristol, intending to hold it for his son
Henry, then a lad of thirteen years of age,
15, WiUiam, says the Saxon chronicle, "had faUen
into avarice, and greed he loved withal, " having screwed
the English to the utmost, he now undertook the more
difficiUt task of raising a revenue from the men who
had been his stepping-stones to the throne. His first
act was to exact sixpence in sUver from every hide of
land, without respect of persons. He thus raised from
the barons money enough to equip a new army. In
order to have a fixed basis for this demand, the King,

Norman Soldiers.— Archer and Crossbownmn,
in fuU Witan at Gloucester in 1085, determined to have
a register made of aU the land, the people and their
possessions. At Lammas, he was at SaUsbury, "where
to him came aU the great landowners of the kingdom,
who became his men, bowed to him and swore to him
an oath of fealty against aU other," The wUy King had
got completely the upper hand of his barons ; he claimed
aU property of which he had not divested himself by a
formal deed "par leffre et saisine," Few nobles, if any,
had thought of thus securing their grant, they conse
quently were at the King's mercy. He further claimed
that aU lands which had paid rent or service to the Con
fessor should now continue the same to himself. Many
of the Normans struggled, but in vain, against this
decree ; the idea of their becoming taxpayers was pecu-
Uarly abhorrent, and to render personal service for their
lands was intolerable, "Stark he was to them that
withstood him, none dare resist his wUl," When no
officer could be found bold enough to arrest Odo, bishop
of Bayeux, his half-brother, who was aspiring to the
Papacy, and had coUected arms, money and men, the
King did it himself, and laughingly said, " I arrest, not

the bishop, but the Earl of Kent." Nevertheless, he
kept him in prison to the day of his death.
The case of the English was far worse, of course,
than that of the Normans, AU titles to property pre
vious to the invasion, were declared nuU and void, and
every transfer of land by an Englishman after that
period was voided, unless the King had ratified the
same ; if he had not, it was escheated to the Crown,
The people were reckoned by the head, were sold,
given, lent, exchanged or divided amongst the Normans,
Those who by the most abject servility obtained a smaU
portion of their inheritance were obUged to pay for the
same by the most degrading service, or to receive the
land as an almsgift.
16, Let us briefly gather from Domesday the classes
of men by whom the land was occupied. First we have
the Norman Barons, and the Saxon Thanes, These
were free men, but many of the latter, if not tenants of
the King, were forced to place themselves under the
protection of some Norman Baron, There were also
some few free women ; then came the socmen, an infe
rior class of landowners, who owed suit in the Lords'
court, but had a permanent tenure, with defined service.
Next to these we have the viUans who could hold no
territorial property or goods, but who were aUowed to
occupy land at the wiU of the lord on condition of
undefined services often of the most degrading nature ;
there was stUl a deeper depth, which was fiUed by the
slaves. The townsfolk were divided, amongst other oc
cupations, into lawmen, mediciners, carpenters, smiths,
goldsmiths, farriers, potters, armourers, bowyers, fisher
men, mUlers, bakers, salters, taUors, barbers, moneyers,
mariners, minstrels, watchmen, &c,, &e. Amongst the
rural occupations were those of falconers, foresters, hun
ters, ditchers, ploughmen, beekeepers, shepherds, neat
herds, goatherds, swineherds, &c., &c.
The corn-growing land was measured and valued ;
so also was the meadow and pasture land; the fens
paid their rent in eels. The woods were estimated
by their amount of pannage, i.e,, the number of hogs
which the faUen acorns and beechmast would fatten;
but the great woods were claimed by the King as part
of the royal demesne, for the Conqueror "loved the
high deer as if he had been their father," Hence the
stringent and cruel laws he made to protect the game :
whoever kUled a stag was to have his eyes picked out ;
wild boars and hares were also protected. The Kings-
wood and Horewood (Horfield) had both been claimed
by William as Crown land, and no man, whatever his
degi-ee, was aUowed to hunt in either without the King's
permission. One hundred and fifty years after this date
aU the lands of Hugh Gurney were ordered to be seized

A,D. 1086,

BRISTOW AND BARTON REGIS, KING'S LAND.

61

because he had hunted in Horewood without the King's
leave. We shaU see in the course of our history a
special connection between the early charters of Bristol
and these fearful laws,
17, In 1086, when Domesday Book was compUed,
we find that the King stiU held the Lordship of Bristol
(it is inserted as Kings-land, 162-3), and to him belonged
aU the revenues. Such revenues were then in most of
the towns farmed out at a certain rent, i,e,, some wealthy
man bargained to give the lord a certain yearly sum of
money for aU his privileges and the revenues which he
derived from the town, such as reserved rents, fines for
renewals, licenses to trade, customs on merchandise, the
third penny, toUs on mUls, &c,, &c.
The sum returned as paid for the manor of Barton
Eegis and the town of Bristow amounted to £101 6s, 8d.,
from which we may deduct £16 for the Barton manor,
leaving £85 6s, 8d. as the rental of Bristol, a larger
sum than any other town in England was valued at
except London, York (£100), Lincoln (£100), Norwich
(£96), The name Kingsland is stUl retained by the
district adjoining Barton hUl,
It seems to us almost incredible that any historian
with this fact before him, and patent to the whole
world, shoiUd yet have ventured to assert that Bristol
was unknown untU 1063, that is, twenty-three years
before the date at which it was rated as the fifth town
in the kingdom, or including the Barton as the Second,
The passage in Domesday that relates to Bristol has
been translated thus by Seyer : — " In Barton at Bristow
were (heretofore) six hides ; in demean, three caracutes
and twenty-two countrymen, &c. But when Eoger (de
Berkeley) received this manor from the King he found
there (only) two hides and two caracutes in demean and
seventeen countrymen, &c. On this land a (or the)
church of Bristol holds three hides, , , . This
manor and Bristow pay to the King 110 marks of silver
(£73 6s, 8d,), The burgesses say that Bishop G, (Geof
frey) has thirty-three marks of sUver and one mark of
gold besides the Kiag's rent," A Norman sUver mark
was 13s, 4d,, and a mark of gold 120s, ; the sum, there
fore, paid to Bishop Geoffrey was £28, which was his
salary as Constable of the Castle.^
18, During the last decade of WUUam' s reign, there
landed in England a strange race of men some of whom
speedUy found their way to Bristol. They were men of
swarthy complexion, strongly marked features, with eyes
that sparkled under dark penthouse brows, black glossy
hair, and speaking a most ancient language. Boasting of
a genealogical tree which they could trace to its root in
Adam of a long liue of ancestry the elite of mankind,
1 Seyer, I., 322-3,

they were, indeed, the world's true aristocracy, the oldest
and purest in race and descent of aU the nations of the
earth, and from them sprang (although they owned him
not) Jesus of Nazareth "the unspeakable gift of God,"
Two thousand five hundred years before their arrival in
England a prophet of their race had said that, under
certain conditions, they "should be scattered among aU
people from one end of the earth even to the other,"
and in unwitting fulfilment of the prediction, after
spreading themselves over the continent some of them
had recently reached England, of whom a portion
settled down outside Bristol on the vacant spot known
now as Quay street and the Stone bridge, between the
town and the river Frome, just below the waU, The
laws of the burgh prevented their residence within its
boundary; that, under the system of frankpledge was a
thing impossible to a stranger, seeing that the man who
could dweU within the waUs for a year and a day be
came a freeman or burgess. Their first home was long
known as Jewry lane, and the office in which this work
is printed stands as nearly as possible upon the site of
their fitrst synagogue. When the second waU of the
town was buUt the Jews stUl kept on the outside of it,
and built themselves houses on the Broad weir, and
later on in the centuries they congregated at Jacob's
weUs, having their burying grotmd on the spur of Bran
don hiU which is now occupied by Queen Elizabeth's
hospital (City School).
Many gravestones with Hebrew inscriptions were
discovered when that buUding was about to be erected,
which led our Wits to assert that whatever else the boys
lacked, they would always have a good Hebrew foun
dation, WiUiam derived large revenues from these Jewish
traders, they were under his immediate protection, the
Jewry was (like the king's forest) exempt from the
common law. The Hebrew was a royal chattel, and
both Ufe and goods were at the king's mercy, he was
too valuable to be left to the wUl of hungry trader or
greedy baron, A royal justiciary secured law to the
Jew who had as an alien no locus standi in court. His
bonds or " starrs" were kept in a royal chamber at West
minster (hence the term star chamber), he was protected
from popiUar hatred, and aUowed the use of a syna
gogue and the choice of a chief rabbi. Castles and
Cathedrals were chiefly buUt by loans from Hebrew
capitalists, DweUing for safety in houses of stone, the Jewish
example graduaUy displaced the wooden hovels of the
EngUsh ; they introduced the practice of medicine from
the East, and mathematics from the schools of Cordova,
The chief traffic in oriental luxuries was in their hands,

62

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1087,

and the wealth accumulated by their industry made
them, as they remain to this day, the chief financiers of
the kings.
19, WiUiam's stern rule was now rapidly drawing
to its close, and men soon learned to regret the loss of
the iron-handed man -who had " made the good peace in
the land, so that a man might fare over his realm with
a bosom fuU of gold."
His was a strange and anomalous character ; one can
scarcely realise that the same man who had desolated
the northern portion of the kingdom, was utterly averse
to the shedding of blood by process of law. He for-
maUy abolished the punishment of death, and only one
single execution stains the annals of his reign,
WiUiam died at Eouen on the 9th September, 1087,
and with his death began a new phase in the Lordship
of Bristol, The use of seals and seaUng of deeds was, during
his reign, introduced into England as a practice, sur
names became general, and every lord of a manor was
a baron. The armour of the Norman knights was com
posed of rings of steel, it was caUed maU armour ; the
helmet was a conical iron cap with a straight bar down
in front of the nose, to protect the face ; the weapons
were long swords, battleaxes, spears and iron maces ;
for the foot soldiers bows and arrows and pikes ; the
shields were kite-shaped, but sometimes circular.
The custom of covering up aU fires in the town, in
the summer at sunset, and in the winter at eight or nine
o'clock, at the ringing of the curfew beU, " couvre-feu,"
was introduced by WiUiam, and from the tower of St.
Nicholas church it has continued to boom out its warn
ing every night down to the present time. It is a
curious but most useful survival of the Norman age,
20, "The Bristol money of WUliam the First con
sisted of sUver pennies simUar in weight, fabric, and
fineness to those of Edward the Confessor, the weight
is about 20 to 21 grains to each penny, and the standard
is that caUed ' the old standard, ' which indeed was
continued until the reign of Henry VIII, The Bristol
pennies of WiUiam I, and II, are numerous, but it is
uncertain to which of these two monarchs many of them
belong. The first coin on the foUowing list is the only
one that can be assigned beyond dispute to WiUiam the
Conqueror : —
"The name of the place is speUed on these pieces
Bricstol, Brec, Brice, Brici, Brie, or Bricustol. The
bkmdered forms Brieso and Briesopi also occur. The
moneyers' names are Brilitworth, Brunstan, Cmdwulf,
Colbac, Leofwyne, Lifivine, Oter, and Swegn or Swein.
No, 1, obverse, profile bust of the king, crowned to the
left, with a sceptre in front of the face. Legend,

Bristol Penny oJ H

-|- PiLLELMV EEX, Reverse, a cross having each limb
terminating in a large
trefoU within an inner
circle. Legend, -\- cedpl
ON BEicsTOL, Another
penny, no doubt minted
by the same moneyer, is
exactly simUar, except
in the legend of the reverse, which reads eedpl on
BEiESTOL. Another type has, obverse, fuU face bust
crowned, with a sceptre on each side, all within an
inner circle. Legend, pillem eex anolo. Reverse, a
cross Uke that on No. 1, but surmounted by another
cross saltire, aU within an inner circle. Legend, -f
LEOEPiNB ON BEici, Another has, obverse, fuU-faced bust
crowned, with a star on each side, aU within an inner
circle. Legend, -f pillem eex an. Reverse, an orna
mented cross within a tressure of four arches ; aU
surrounded by an inner circle. Legend, -\- leopote on
BEiEs, The commonest type of aU is the foUowing : —
Obverse, fuU-face bust crowned, with sceptre in right
hand, inner circle on both sides. Legend, pillelm eex.
Reverse, a large cross, with the letters paxs, each in a
circle in the angles. Legends, beiht pod on beic,
BEIHTPOED O NBEI, BIHTPOED O NBEIO, BEVNSTAN O NBE,
BEVNSTAN on be, BEVNSTAN ON BEI, BEPODE ON BEIBSO,
oolblac on beg (a fine specimen in the possession of
W, Brice, Esq., Town Clerk of Bristol), colblac on bei,
COLBLAC ON BEIC, COLBLAO ON BEICC, COLBLAC ON BEICT,
LIFPINE ON BEICSI, LIFPINE ON BEICST, SPEGN ON BEICSTO,
SPEIN ON BEicsopi. The pennies of the last type have
obverse, fuU bust of
the king, crowned, v^sS^J"-"
holding a sword in '"^ -'¦-'^ *
his right hand, inner
circle. Legend, -f-
ILLELM EEX,

Silver Fenny of William, from tlie
British Museum.

a cross over an orna
mented tressure of
four arches, within an inner circle. Legend, + liepine
ON BEIC. Another coin of this type reads correctly
PiLLELM EEX on the obverse, and lifpinb on beicsi on
the reverse. Another penny is exactly simUar to this
latter one, but has otee on d beecst on the reverse."''-
2 1 , We now turn our attention to the second line of
defence that became necessary to protect the enlarged
and rapidly growing burgh, Seyer, Barrett and Evans,
aU held different opinions with regard to the two waUs
that defended the town upon the northern side, Barrett
thought the outer, or Frome, waU was the earUer of the
two, and that the portion (which we have already
' Henfrey, 346-7,

A,D, 1100,

THE WALLS AND GATES OF BRISTOL.

63

described) which ran from SmaU street vid Tower lane
and Wine street was a later wall added, repaired or
enlarged by Geoffrey, Bishop of Coutances, who, at the
death of WiUiam, was left governor of the castle, and
held it for Eobert, the elder son of the Conqueror,
against WUliam Eufus, Evans contends that the waU
on the Frome was built in the reign of Athelstan, a,d,
930, probably by Aylward, and was the second or outer
wall, Seyer, however, we think more correctly, ascribes
this outer defence to a period posterior to the Norman
Conquest; he points out "that it is the work of a people
improved in the miUtary art beyond those who con
structed the plain waU, without bulwark or bastion,
roimd the original town." ^ This secondary, or Frome,
waU and its bastions may therefore be attributed to the
time of the Conqueror, and the enlargement of the
castle to the close of his reign. Aylward, or the Pithay
gate, bridge and street only show that Aylward was the
owner of the land ; indeed bridge, gate and street
mightjiave existed a hundred years before the outer
waU, which enclosed the suburbs, was built. But if the
Norman character of the work stamps it as being erected
after the Conquest, the fact that the castle defences of
Eobert the Eed Earl overlapped the end of this waU at
its junction with the castle, proves also we think incon-
testably that the waU itself was erected half a century
before his day. We should assign its date as probably
between 1069 and 1100, The necessity for such a de
fence was shown when Harold's sons in the former year
ravaged Gloucestershire, and were only repeUed from
Bristol by the strength of its waU and the courage of
its burgesses. Doubtless much of the plunder with
which the invaders retreated to their ships, was the
spoU of the inhabitants of the suburbs in the vaUey
of the Frome outside the fortified town on the hUl,
The area enclosed by the first, or, as we think, the
Eoman wall, was about 19 acres, that comprised with
in the second, or Norman waU, was, if we include the
castle and its precincts, 42 acres, that within the whole
of the walls Eedcliff and King streets, circa 1247, 136
acres, and we may as weU add in this place that the
area of the present municipal city boundary comprises
4,683 acres.
The second, i.e. the Frome or Norman waU of defence,
commenced at the new gate, at the foot of Newgate hUl,
adjoining the castle waU (the open space over its fosse
may be seen between the houses, the ditch by a dia
gonal line leaves the hiU and rejoins the river Frome,
which runs under Fairfax street), it then skirted the
southern side of Fairfax street to the Pithay. Here at
the foot of the modern steps leading down from the
1 Seyer I,, 272.

west side of Union street was a square tower, having a
semi-circular bastion projecting over the river, this tower
was twelve feet in diameter, and there was a roadway
through it under its first floor. From hence the wall
ran to Aldrych gate or the Nether Pithay gate, by
some named Aylward's gate. Portions of this gate
way and of the Pithay bridge were disclosed when the
foundations of the factory of Messrs. Fry were laid.
This bridge, Uke the great bridge of Bristol, had houses
built upon it, so that it could not be distinguished from
a street. Two semi-circular towers strengthened the
waU between the bridge and the BrideweU, one of these
was destroyed when Nelson street was made, the other
stood opposite to St, James's back (between these two
in 1656 another bridge was built over the Frome, which
was appropriately designated by the citizens "Needless
bridge "). The tower last-mentioned was destroyed in
1879 to make room for the new office for the magistrates.
Its waUs on the ground floor were between nine and ten
feet in thickness, it had a stone ceiUng groined without
ribs, and a stone staircase led to an upper story. Ad
joining this there was originaUy another smaUer square
tower with waUs three feet thick ; then another semi-
circiUar building which contained an oven nine feet in
diameter, and then the BrideweU (Central Police Station)
" a square building, being a tower with many chambers,
a strong place for keeping prisoners," The road to
Gloucester passed over the bridge between this and
another simUar buUding, and the whole of these erec
tions formed evidently a formidable outwork capable,
when garrisoned, of maintaining a lengthened defence.
The town waU east and west of this fortress was from
eight to ten feet in thickness, its distance from the
river averaged from ten tO twelve feet, and it stiU
skirted the southern bank of the Frome, Between
the Monken bridge (so caUed because it was the prin
cipal way into the town for the monks of St. James'
Priory) and Frome bridge there was first a smaU
round tower which stood opposite to the Choir of the
Franciscans, in Lewin's Mead, then a public "latrine "
(traces of which stiU exist at the back of the St, Helens
Glass Warehouse), then another and larger square
tower opposite to the church of the Franciscans, and
lastly another square tower at the end of Christmas
street, adjoining the Frome gate and bridge. Under
this tower there was an archway with thirty steps lead
ing down to the river, Seyer is in doubt as to whether
the waU was extended to St, Giles' gate. Small street, to
join the ancient waU vid the Stone bridge, or whether it
turned at a right angle vid Christmas street and joined
it at St, John's gate. We think there is little doubt but
that the latter was its course, inasmuch as we find that

64

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 915,

the Jewry was in this outer corner, and also at a later
date the churchyard of St, Lawrence, Moreover, the
inhabitants of Christmas street paid a quit rent to the
city, for back doors and windows through the city waU,
This must have been on the west side of Christmas
street ; for in the time of the Commonwealth, those
who escaped from Boucher's house (which was on the
west side of the street) dropped from one of the above
mentioned windows into the mud of the Frome and
so got away,
WiUiam Wyrcestre gives the length of this waU
from the lower Pithay to Frome gate as 1,000 steps,
Frome gate was an important item of the defences,
and had to play a
prominent part in
the future history
of the city. It con
sisted of two se
parate gatehouses
buUt at the ends
of the bridge ; the
gates were eight
yards asunder, but
buUdings as usual
covered the whole
length of the
bridge. The in
ner or town gate
house was eight
yards long; it was
arched and ceiled
with stone, and
had a chamber
over' it; beneath
this house
two gates.

were
which were secured with chains. The outer
gatehouse was close to Lewin's mead ; it was six yards
long, and had a chamber over it. The folding gates
leading from it to Lewin's mead survived the destruction
of the gatehouses, which were removed in 1694 by order
of the Mayor and Corporation, in order to make the
roadway more commodious. They were shut to keep out
the mob of coUiers in 1762, and were standing in 1765,
they now may be seen in Lewin's mead; the great
gates are hung at the entrance to the yard of Messrs'.
Slater, and the two smaU gates are hung, one at No. 19
the other a few doors to the west of the Messrs. Slater's
premises. There was a ceUar and a porter's lodge to
each gatehouse, as wiU be seen from the foUowing
account : —
" A cellar under Frome gate, rental  6j_ gd
A great tenement over Frome gate, rental  20s, Od

Quit rent of a tenement within Frome gate going into
Lewin's mead, for the beams standing in the arch
of Frome bridge  45. Q(j_
A tenement and porter's lodge, formerly paid by the
Sheriffs of Bristol  20«, Od,
The great tenement and cellars between the two gates
on the south side  4s, Od,"
In 1520 the yearly wage of the porter of Frome
gate was 1 3s, id. The Pithay gate was taken down to
widen the roadway in 1763,
22, The time of the foundation of the Castle of
Bristol is fairly open to conjecture. We have elsewhere
given our opinion that it was the site of the Eoman prse
torium, such a position agreeing perfectly with their
system of castra-
metation. That it
was not of Saxon
origin is we con
sider manifest for
reasons already
given, still we
think it possible
that it was utUised
and strengthened
by that people.
But that the MU
was occupied by
a fortress when
the town itself
was waUed, seems
to us absolutely
necessary for the
defence thereof.
The east was the
weakest side of
the burgh, Na-

Monlien, or Bridewell Bridge.
ture, by the confluence of the rivers Avon and Frome,

had protected the town elsewhere ; just here however
the hiU was higher than the site of the town, and a
transverse waU running across from river to river, could
only have had a dry fosse, and would have formed
but a sUght defence. Hence the necessity of an out
work or fortress on this spur- of the hiU to guard the
burgh from an attack on its weak eastern side.
We cannot imagine that such powerful and warlike
lords as Sweyn, Lewin, Harold and Brictric should
have had no fortress in which to reside, or at least in
which to take shelter if needful. It is possible, as we
have hinted, that this was the site of the castle which
Edward buUt in a.d, 915, which would be little if
anything more than a camp with an earthen vaUum,
for at that time castles with waUs of stone were un
known in England.

a,d, 1067,

SKETCH OF BISHOP GEOFFREY'S LIFE.

65

That the castle had grown in importance during the
reign of the Conqueror is certain, for WUliam held it in
his own possession, and at his death Geoffrey, the fight
ing Bishop of Coutances and of Exeter, and sheriff of
Gloucestershire, was, as we have shown, constable
thereof at a yearly salary of £28, paid to him by the
burgesses of Bristol. This sum being one-third of the
rental of Bristol with the Barton, it may be that the
Bishop held it
by the usual
constable's fee
of the third
penny for him
self, the other
two being for
the king his
master. The
probability is
that Geoffrey
strengthened
and walled the
castle at the
same time as he,
we think, con
structed the
second, or Frome,
waU, WiUiam
knew the value
of such fort
resses. One of
the conditions
which he had
Supposed Effigy of Bishop Geoffrey. exacted from
Harold when he detained him on the Continent was
that he should waU or fortify Dover Castle and deliver
it up to him.
We learn from a contemporary writer that Bristol
was a " very strong castle, which now became the head
quarters in a rebelUon against King WiUiam Eufus, and
a safe depository for the spoUs of a ravaged country." ^
Stress has been laid upon the omission of the castle
by name in Domesday Book ; but although that survey
records the names of 49 castles known to have been
built by WiUiam or his feudatories for the purpose of
overawing and so securing the obedience of the great
towns, there are some most notable omissions, London,
with its White Tower, and Winchester are not even
mentioned in the record ; Bristol Castle is most pro
bably omitted because, like those, it was royal property.
The repeated insurrections in the west of England
in 1067-8-9 must have made the King desirous of
1 Florence Wore,, 489.
[Vol,, L]

securing the safety of a town of such importance as
Bristol, and we therefore conclude, with Seyer, that this
was the period when the outer stone walls of the castle
were buUt by Geoffrey at the command of the Con
queror, Tradition favours this view. The old gateway which
adjoined the castle wall, although it was of far later
date than the period we are considering, had in its
outer face two niches, and in one of these was a statue
which held in its left hand a buUding supposed to be a
model of a castle, but which, with deference, we think
is much more like a church without a tower : in his
right hand was a purse, and a cross-handled dagger or
sword hung on the same side. The other niche con
tained a statue of an ancient man in ecclesiastical garb
in the act of
taking off the
cover of a chal
ice. These have
always been con
sidered to repre
sent the great
Earl or Consul
Eobert Fitzroy,
the builder of
the great tower
or keep, and
Geoffrey the
Bishop of Cou
tances. From the con
nection of this
gate with the
castle, from
which it was the
chief outlet into
Glouce stershire,
we grant there
may be some
probabUity for
the above tra-

Supposed Effigy of Robert Fitzroy.
dition ; but without being hypercritical, we think it
much more Ukely that the effigies represent the fact,
that Eobert built the Priory and the churoh of St,
James, and that the abbot of Tewkesbury watched over
the erection thereof and consecrated the same.
The historian teUs us that "Eobert had with him
every Sunday the abbot and twelve monks as long as
he lived;" also that he was so religiously incUned that
he gave every tenth stone which had been brought from
Caen wherewith to build the great tower in the castle, to
the buUding of the church of St, James. These figures

66

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1074,

were both of them on the outside of the gate, facing
the site of the church,
23, Geoffrey was a great favourite with the Con
queror, Descended from a noble Norman famUy, he
had fought by WiUiam's side at Senlac, and, in con
junction with Archbishop Aldi-ed, of York, he assisted
at the coronation of WiUiam in Westminster Abbey —
the one representing the Normans, the other the
English. Far
more ready
to wield the
sword than to
handle the cro-
zier, the war
like bishop,
on the inva
sion of the
sons of Ha
rold, gathered
together the
garrisons of
London, Win-
chester and
S ali sb ury,
and swept
down upon
the insur
gents in So
mersetshire and Dorset-
shu'e,towhom
he showed no
mercy. He is
indiscrimin ately called
Go sf r idus,
G o s f ry th ,
Geoffrey, GaKrid, and Godfrey. In 1074 he and Bishop
Odo crushed the rebeUion of Eoger, Earl of Hereford,
and Eandulph, Earl of East Anglia. WiUiam rewarded
his mUitary service with 280 manors : more than 100 of
these were situated in Devonshire, above 80 were in
Somerset, and nine were in Gloucestershire. Those in
our immediate neighbourhood were Hutton, Harptree,
Clutton, Timsbury, Norton, Farmborough, Weston,
Sandford, Easton St. George's, Portbury, WraxaU,
Twerton, Littleton, Cameley, Acton, Hambrook, Wapley
and Alveston, During WiUiam's reign Geoffrey held
high rank. When the great dispute about the Primacy
between Canterbury and York was determined at
Windsor in the presence of the King and his nobles
he signs the instrument thus: — " Liffo Gosfridus Con-

Siipimed Effigy of King Edward III.

Episcopus unus ex primatibus Anglice consensi."
He presides in the King's place in the court of justice,
and determines the plea between Bishop Lanfranc, and
Odo the King's brother, bishop of Bayeux ; he assists
at a council in St, Paul's ; he is one of a commission in
1080 with Odo and Haymo to adjudicate in the matter
of lands belonging to the church at Ely ; he is speciaUy
commissioned by the King to try the great cause between
Wulfstan, bishop of Worcester, and j5]gelwine, abbot of
Evesham; he was also a baron of the Exchequer, In
the last year of the Conqueror's reign he not only held
Bristol, but he was also earl or consul of the Northum
brians; and in 1087 we find him present and assisting
at the King's i^l iii A

obsequies in
Eouen, Faithful to
his great chief
and to the trust
committed to
his charge,
Geoffrey with
stood Eufus
in favour of
Prince Henry,
untUthat King,
who had the
hearty support
of his English
subjects, was
victorious, when
the bishop re
tired to his
diocese of Cou
tances. This con
fessedly great
man played so
important a
part in the
early history of
Bristol that we
must devote a few sentences to deUneate his position
and character,
Geoffrey was Bishop of Coutances, a town in Nor
mandy which may be seen on a clear day from the cliffs
of Jersey, One of our talented Bristol men has said of
him, in contrast with the character of St. Bernard, that
"he left but a battered effigy to decorate the stable of
a gentleman in Brislington." ^ But, with deference, we
think he left much more, viz., the waUs surrounding
' Lucas's Illustrations of Bristol, 7,

'l|l );''¦''*

'wuJU)...fenp •:-\^...'.^^'\. -¦ •

.Supposed Effigy of King Edward I.

A.D. 1069,

SKETCH OF BISHOP GEOFFREY'S LIFE.

67

the castle, and also a history that at least wUl serve " to
point a moral" if it wiU not "adorn a tale." When
the Newgate was demoUshed it was erected at Bris
Ungton, in the grounds of the strange looking edifice
which Horace Walpole designated " the Devil's Cathe
dral" (from the black slag that was used to a great
extent in buUding its waUs), In this gateway the two
statues supposed to represent Eobert, Consul of Glou
cester, and Geoffrey, Bishop of Coutances, occupy
niches in the inner face. Two simUar niches on the
outer face are fiUed with statues supposed to represent
the Kings Edward I. and III, ; they were brought from
Lawford's gate,
A part of the castle waU remains ; it must not be con
founded with the low outer waU which in Castle ditch
rises from the pavement, i.e., the inner edge of the
ditch ; this, it is evident, has been buUt in detached por
tions and at different periods, by those who enclosed
their portion of frontage to the property which they
had acquired within the castle, Geoffrey's waU is, we
think, the high waU buUt upon the edge of the sand
stone rock, a portion of which remains overlooking the
site of the castle miU and pond at the junction of Lower
Castle street and Castle ditch. This waU is admirably
buUt, so firmly are its stones cemented that when in
1878 a doorway was opened through it, they broke in
pieces before the mortar would yield. We should as
cribe the castle ditch and fosse that runs under Lower
Castle street also to Geoffrey, The foUowing sketch of
this great man is from the able pen of Mr, A, S. EUis:
pedigree.

Geoffrey, Bishop of
Coutances, 1048, ob.
2 Feb., 1093, Earl
of Northumber
land, 1087, buUder
of Bristol Castle.

Roger de=:
Montbrai? Uv, 1066.

Amy=Roger de
Aubigni, of
Aubigni-St..
Martin, near
Coutances,

I 1 1 2 I 2 I
Eobert de Moubrai.—Matilda, d.— Nigel de Au-=GnndndL!i,i, William-

Earl of Northumber- of Eichard bigni died a
land, taken 1095, strip- de 1' Aigle, monk, c.
ped of his honours and divorced by 1135.
estates, prisoner atUl Higel.
In Windsor Castle 1128.

of Gerard de de Aubig-
Gouxnai, m, ni Pin-
June, 1119. cerna.

Roger took the name of
Mowbray, ancestor of the
Dukes of Norfolk.
I
A

I

William de Albini, ;
cestor of the Earls
Arundel. I
A

of

"Geoffrey, 'Bishop of Coutances,' in Normandy,
member of a noble and powerful famUy, and brother
of Montbrai, Lord of Montbrai, in the Canton of Perci,
is also once styled in the survey 'Bishop of St. Lo,'
and so designated witnessed the king's charter to the
monastery of St, Augustine at Canterbury, 1070-6. St.
Lo, it appears, had been the episcopal seat of his pre
decessor, Eobert, in whose time the re-building of the

cathedral of Coutances was begun with the assistance of
the Duchess Gunnora and the canons at St, Lo. Geof
frey, when a very young man, was nominated to the
see, consecrated at Eouen, 10th April, 1048, and imme
diately set about coUecting money and other things
to help to complete the cathedral, going to ApuUa
even, to get the assistance of his cousin. Count Eobert
Guiscard, a native of HautvUle, close by St, Lo, and
aid from the other Norman barons settled there. How
ever in 1049, at the CouncU of Eheims, his election to
the see was asserted to have been obtained by sioaony,
but he declared he knew not that it had been bought
for him by his brother, and had been himself unwUling
to assume the dignity. Bishop Geoffrey having no
residence in Coutances, bought half of the town for
300 livres, buUt himself a haU and offices, pushed on
with the cathedral works, buUding the two western
towers from the foundation and the tower above the
choir, so that on the 8th December, 1056, the church
was consecrated with great ceremony, in the presence
of Duke WiUiam, by MaurUius, Archbishop of Eouen,
himself and others. The bishop then removed the
canons back from St, Lo to the mother church, and
took up his residence himself at Coutances, Cou
tances is a town said to have been founded by the
Emperor Constantius Chlorus, or in his time ; hence
its name, and Saint Laud, or Lo, himself was bishop
there in the seventh century. It is evident from this,
Bishop Geoffrey was a man of great energy and re
source, and we shaU be the less surprised at the active
part he was to take in the great events which the near
future developed. When, therefore, the expedition to
England was decided on, he and Odo, Bishop of Ba
yeux, accompanied it, attended by many priests and
monks, acting as chaplains and confessors. He appears
to have been present in the battle of Senlac, but took
no active part in it, though no doubt belted with a sword
and prepared to do so. When the Conqueror was
crowned in Westminster abbey on Christmas Day by
Aldred, Archbishop of York, it was Bishop Geoffrey
who demanded of the Normans present whether they
consented to have WiUiam for their king. The bishop
was back in Normandy next year, for he assisted at the
consecration of the abbey of Jumieges on 1st July, in
the presence of the Conqueror, We next find him at
Winchester, Easter, 1069, witnessing the king's charter
granting Deerhurst, in Gloucestershire, to the abbey of
St. Denis, near Paris.
"It would appear that the bishop had ah'eady re
ceived grants of many manors in Somerset and other
western counties, for this same year when the men of
Dorset and Somerset and their neighbours made a

68

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1076,

combined attack on the Count of Mortain's castle of
Montacute, near Yeovil, the bishop, commanding troops
from Winchester, London and Salisbury, came upon
them by surprise, slew some, mutUated the prisoners
taken, and put the rest to flight. He probably thus
prevented his own wide domains being harried and laid
waste. The bishop had developed a new side of his
character, and ' Ordericus ' says he was more distin
guished for miUtary than clerical abUity, better able to
array armed soldiers for battle, than to teach clerks the
offices of the church, and moreover prided himself upon
his noble birth. But there is evidence that the Con
queror had great faith in him and his judgment, by
appointing him to decide the dispute between Arch
bishop Lanfranc and Bishop Odo, these powerful parties
having no doubt agreed to abide by the decision of one
they mutuaUy respected. The archbishop charged Odo
with invading the rights and having possession of lands
of the see. The trial took place in the locaUty, at
Penenden heath, in Kent ; it lasted three days, and
Geoffrey gave judgment in favour of Lanfranc. In 1076
Bishops Geoffrey and Odo, the king being in Normandy,
led a force to attack the rebeUious Earl of Norfolk at
Cambridge, foUowed him when retreating to Norwich,
taking the castle there after a brave defence by the
countess, which kept them three months before the
waUs. He was one of the king's commissioners in
1080, sitting at Kentford, inquiring into the lands of
the see of Ely, and was sent into Worcestershire to try,
with Urso, the sheriff, the cause between the bishop of
the diocese and the Abbot of Evesham, about lands in
Hampton and Beningworth, 'judicante et testificante omni
vicecomitatii,' In 1086 we find, by the Survey, the
bishop in possession of lands in no less than twelve
of the southern counties. His infiuence was evidently
great on account of his holding Bristol castle, and
having the royal burgh thus in his power, Bristol was,
there can be no doubt, his chief residence, but no par
ticulars about the borough are given in the Survey, pro
bably because it was already privileged by royal charter.
Of the manors of Barton and Bristou the bishop had
the third penny of the customary crown rents, and this
is aU the Survey informs us about Bristol, except that
ten houses in the town appertained to the bishop's
manor at Bishport, in Bedminster parish. The bishop
can hardly be caUed lord of Bristol, and he was cer
tainly something more than the king's provost or port
reeve of the town and casteUan. Though the castle is
not mentioned in the Survey, it was evidently this great
buUder who erected it, choosing for the site with gi-eat
judgment that neck of land, the isthmus of the peninsula
between the rivers Avon and Frome, on which the town

stood, cutting off the only road into the town, and
making a new route under the waUs completely com
manded by them, and so depressed that it and the castle
meadows could be fiooded, aU having been carefuUy
planned at one time. The keep was afterwards-built by
Earl Eobert in the time of Henry I,, but the bishop woiUd
have erected a haU within the fortified enclosure, and
probably an oval sheU keep on the site of which the
later quadrangular one was afterwards raised. Barton,
near Bristol seems to have been the farm of the royal
haU there in King Edward's time, afterwards attached
to the castle, its successor, 'Old Market street,' being
the vUl and market place of the Barton,
" The bishop had lands in the neighbourhood of
Bristol on aU sides, but kept none of his Gloucester
shire manors in demesne. His vassal Hger held Acton,
caUed Acton-Hger from him to this day,
" Bishop Geoffrey being in Normandy at the time of
the Conqueror's death, was one of those who attended
his funeral in the Abbey of St, Stephen, at Caen. With
Bishop Odo, the Count of Mortain and the majority of
the great jaeers, we find him next year espousing the
cause of Duke Eobert against Eufus, and immediately
after Easter, having garrisoned and provisioned his
castles, he took up arms. The bishop, though he must
have been advanced in years, with his nephew Eobert
went to Bristol, ' where he had a very strong castle,'
laying waste aU the country as far as Bath, which they
burned, then marched across Somerset, plundering as
they went, to Hchester, to which they laid siege but
were repulsed, WUUam de Ow simultaneously ravaging
the southern part of Gloucestershire, piUaged the royal
vill of Berkeley. The bishop and his nephew brought
theu- booty into Bristol castle. But there was no unity
of action among the rebels or junction of their forces,
and by the autumn Eufus was again master of the
kingdom. The bishop and his nephew were among those
who effected a reconciUation with the king, and we meet
with the bishop attending the king's court at Old Sarum
in the ensuing November. He was one of those present
when the contumacious Bishop of Durham was exUed,
and what he said on the occasion is recorded. It would
appear at this time that Geoffrey had the government
of the tui-bulent earldom of Northumberland, no doubt
by the late king's appointment as successor to Aubrey
de Couoy, He is so described as present with other
magnates at the foundation of St. Mary's abbey, at
York, by Eufus, at the end of the year. This post,
which required a younger and more active man, he seems
to have resigned, with the king's sanction no doubt, to
his nephew and heir, Eobert de Moubray, We last
meet with the venerable prelate at Dover, 27th January,

A,D. 1093.

BISHOP GEOFFREY HOLDS BRISTOL.

69

1090, witnessing, with many others who were attending
the king, Eufus' charter ' giving ' Bath abbey to the
Somerset bishop John, Bishop Geoffrey was probably
on the eve of crossing the channel for the last time.
For three more years he lived, and at length, in the
presence among others of Bishop Odo his old friend, he
died evidently at Coutances, on 2nd February, 1093,
having governed his see forty-five years less sixty-six
days, and was buried according to his own desire not in
the church but in the ground adjoining. Eobert, Earl
of Northumberland, his nephew and secular heir, suc
ceeded it is said to all the bishop's lands, if so he enjoyed
them but two years, for in 1095 he forfeited by rebeUion
aU his honours and estates, was himself taken and sent
to Windsor castle, where 'nearly thirty-foiu- years after'
he was stUl lingering in captivity. Eufus it is evident
then seized the late bishop's lands and conferred aU
those in these parts, with the great lordship of Tewkes
bury, on one who had given him his active support,
Eobert Fitz Hamon, This formed the nucleus of the
Honour of Gloucester, constituted by Henry I, for his
son Eobert, when, having married one of the daughters
of Eobert Fitz Hamon, he was made Earl of Glouces
tershire." -"^
Geoffrey, a man of undoubted talent and great
bravery, attempted in accordance with the fashion of
his time to combine in himself two antagonistic systems,
the church and the world. He was a shepherd of souls,
and a slayer of men ; a priest of calvary, and a com
mander of cavalry ; a professed adherent of the kingdom
which is not of this world, yet the owner of lands won
by the sword, equal to a German principality ; marching
under the orders "take nothing for your journey save
a staff only, no bread, scrip, brass (money), &c.," yet
holding as his own the abbacies of Ely and Malmesbury,
the sees of Coutances and Exeter, the government of
Northumberland, and of Bristol with its embattled
fortress. Offices more incongruous and incompatible
can scarcely be imagined, WeU might Eichard I, say
of a brother prelate of Geoffrey a few years later,
when Pope Oelestius sent to him to demand the release
of his son, the Bishop of Beauvais, whom Eichard had
taken in arms against himself, his legal lord, " Lo,"
sending him with happy conceit the bishop's hauberk,
' From a paper " On the Landholders of Gloucestershire
named in Domesday Book," in the 4th vol, of The Trans, Bristol
and Glou, Archeeol, Soc, the family of de St, Lo or S. Laudo
was evidently descended from one of the vassals of the bishop,
brought over by him from that place. The widow of Geoffrey
de St. Laudo held lands in Winchester of the bishop of the see,
1 148, (Winton Domesday). Newton-St, -Lo was the seat of this
family. Sir John Sayntlowe, Constable of Bristol Castle (ob,
1448), was of a branch seated in the parish of Chew Magna.

"this have we found, see whether it be thy son's coat
or no." Nevertheless, for us to judge Geoffrey and
his peers by our 1 9th century notions would be mani
festly unjust. It was not untU many years subse
quent to his day that the church was divorced from
the sword, Ecolesiasticism had succumbed to the
feudal system ; its leading priests by the tenure of their
lands were transformed into barons, i,e,, men-at-arms,
with a spiritual title ; in many cases their lands have
descended through their heirs, and but for the institu
tion of celibacy the church would have lapsed into a fief,
would have become entaUed in its possessions, and lords
spiritual would have been succeeded by their heirs male
even as the hereditary titles and possessions of the lords
temporal descend to this day. We need scarcely add
that spUitual life would have become extinct, its high
functions would have ceased, " a star would have
vanished from the firmament, and a great light would
have gone out among men." From this terrible degra
dation she was saved by the pious forethought of the
men who, realising, however imperfectly, the motto of
theU Master "My kingdom is not of this world," set
themselves to win a dominion over mind rather than
matter, and to gain souls rather than to acquire lands or
wealth. The laches of their foUowers should not lessen
in our esteem, men who, Uke St, Bernard, St, Dominic
and St, Francis, undertook the ungracious task of sever
ing the golden chains that had bound together a living
church and a dead world,
24. Bishop Geoffrey, as we have seen, held the
Castle of Bristol in 1088 for Prince Henry by order of
the late King, and, in conjunction with the greater
portion of the Norman barons, he was in favour of the
succession to the throne of England of the Conqueror's
eldest son Eobert, Duke of Normandy, The Commons
of England, with a minority of the Barons, and Lan
franc, the Archbishop of Canterbury, sided with Eufus,
Geoffrey and his nephew Eobert de Mowbray hastened
to Bristol, wasted the country as far as Bath, which they
burned; plundered Somerset, WUtshire and Berkeley,
but were repulsed in their attack upon Hchester, They
stored the strong castle of Bristol with provisions and
every necessary for enduring a long siege, intending it
to be the headquarters for their army in -the west,^
Others of the party ravaged Leicestershire and Here
fordshire, and amid fire and slaughter marched to the
gates of Worcester, where they were repulsed with
great loss of men by good Bishop Wulfstan, to their
great discomfiture.
This was the turning-point of the strife. The
EngUsh people had no love for their Norman oppres-
' Anglo-Saxon Chron,

70

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1093,

sors, Eobert inherited Normandy, which he loved;
Lanfranc brought the whole power of the church to
bear in favour of the bold, arrogant and brutal Eufus,
who was crowned King of England, to the exclusion of
the elder brother. The old Saxon nationality, though
subdued, was not extinct ; and WiUiam was professedly
more EngUsh than Eobert, hence his popularity. An
immense army raUied around Eufus ; and the malcon
tents, headed by Odo of Bayeux and Eustace of Boulogne,
being besieged ill Eochester Castle, capitulated and
retired to the Continent, Geoffrey appears also to have
found his way thither ; Eobert de Mowbray was taken
prisoner, and WUliam II. reigned over aU England.
25. The King granted, it has been said, the Honour
of Gloucester, of which the town and castle of Bristol
formed a part, with aU the liberty with which Brictric
held it, to his cousin, Eobert Fitzhamon, who had right
loyaUy upheld his claim to the English Crown. Hamon,
the father of Eobert, and of Hamon "dapifer," or
steward, to the great WiUiam, was lord of CrenUly and
Torigny, in Normandy. Eobert, his eldest son, married
SybiUa, sister of Eobert Belesme, Earl of Salop, who bore
him four daughters — Mabel, Haweis, Cicely and Amice. ^
At the head of his own forces, and attended by
twelve of his own knights, Fitzhamon invaded South
Wales and conquered Glamorgan, which he held inde
pendently of the English Crown, and transmitted safely
to his successors. He was a great benefactor, if in
deed he was not the founder, of the abbey of Tewkes
bury, giving to it the church of St. Peter and the tithe
of the rents of Bristol, as proven by a charter of
Henry I., 1106, and by subsequent deeds and charters.^
As lord of the honour of Gloucester, it might be
expected that Fitzhamon would have fixed his residence
in that city ; but Gloucester was a royal burgh. Wil
liam Fitzosbern, Earl of Hereford, had, when he was
King's Lieutenant in the West, built the castle therein,
probably about 1067-8, in obedience to WiUiam's com
mand. After the death of the Earl and the rebeUion of
his son, the King kept Gloucester in his own hands.
The sheriffwick and constableship of Gloucester were
held by Eoger, the Viscount ; after him by Durand, his
brother. To him succeeded Walter Fitzroger, who
transmitted these offices to his son, MUo Fitzwalter,
who was constable in the time of Earl Eobert, whom
he actively supported, and was rewarded by the
Emjjress Maud with the Earldom of Hereford. ^
Fitzhamon was with Eufus at Winchester the night
before his death ; when a monk from beyond the seas
came aud related to him a horrible dream which he had
dreamt concerning the King. Fitzhamon, who, being
^ Lloyd's Cambria, 89-90. "- Seyer, I., 342. " Florence Wore.

the King's secretary, thought this ought not to be ne
glected, told it to Eufus, who laughed heartUy, saying
"he dreams for money, as monks do; give him a
hundred shiUings." Nevertheless, the King hesitated
whether he should hunt in the wood as he had intended.
That he decided to go and perished by the arrow from
Walter TyrreU's bow is weU known. Prodigal and
rapacious, perfidious, violent and tyrannical, WiUiam II,
was yet able and courageous ; he died unmarried. In
this reign began the rise of the third estate ; we first
read of bookseUers in 1100,
Gloucester was the place in which the King usuaUy
kept his Christmas, Eufus would go and return by
way of Bristol, spending a few days there on his route.
He was there in 1093, just before "he was taken sick
at Alveston," a royal town, which had been a part of
King Harold's property.
Eobert Fitzhamon at WiUiam's death gave his aUe
giance to Henry, the younger brother of the late King,
and continued steadfast when almost aU the other
nobles deserted him for Eobert. He was at his Nor
man estate when King Henry visited the Continent in
1104, and in the foUowing year, when war appeared
probable between the royal brothers, the partisans of
Duke Eobert seized Fitzhamon and imprisoned him, with
many others, in the castle of Bayeux, On the appear
ance of King Henry with an army, in 1106, he was set
at liberty; but, alas, liberty had become but a smaU
boon to him. He had received in battle a crushing
blow on the temple from a pole, which had deprived
him of his reason, and he died insane.
Fitzhamon was buried in the chapter house of Tewkes
bury, but was in after years re-interred between the
two piUars on the right of the presbytery, Eobert
Eicart says: — "At the instance and excitation of his
wife. Dame SibUl, bi grace of the Holy Goost, he
founded of the newe and newe bUled, to the worship
of God, and of His blessed Modre, Seynt Mary, the
churche of Tewxbury, with aU the houses of offices of
the same," Leaving only daughters, his great fief,
according to the law of the age, came into the hands
of the King, as their guardian, until marriage.
26, The shrewd King Henry made Cicely Abbess of
Shaftesbury, Haweis Abbess of Winchester, and married
Amice to the Earl of Bretagne, but reserved Mabel, the
eldest, as a wife for his own iUegitimate son Eobert,
This son was born at Caen, in Normandy, his mother
being Nesta, a daughter of Eees ap Tudor, Prince of
South Wales. Sometimes he was caUed Eobert Eufus,
because of his red hair, at others Eobert de Caen,
from the place of his birth. Henry proposed him
to Mabel as her husband by virtue of his right as

A.D, 1109,

CHARACTER OF CONSUL ROBERT.

71

feudal lord over the chUdren and property of a deceased
tenant. Be it remembered, moreover, that this very
property had been reserved for Henry himself by his
father, the Conqueror, but had been unjustly bestowed
by Eufus upon Mabel's father.
The uncouth rhymes of Eobert, the rhyming monk
of Gloucester, have been admirably metaphrased by
Seyer, who narrates the circumstance of the marriage so
graphicaUy, that we give the passage entire : — " Mabel,
the daughter of Eobert Fitzhamon, was heir of aU his
land; and the King bethought him of her heritage,
wishing to advance the fortune of his iUegitimate son
Eobert by marrying him to her. When he made the
proposal that she should marry his son she was against
it, and long withstood it ; and when the King often
soUcited her, she at last answered like a good and cour
teous maiden, ' Sir,' said she, ' I see plainly that your
heart is set on me, more for the sake of mine inheri
tance than of myself. Having such an inheritance as I
have, it would be dishonourable to me to have a lord
who had not two names. My father's name was Sir
Eobert le Fitzhaym, and that inheritance ought not to
be any man's who was not of his rank. Therefore, sir,
for God's love let me have no man for a husband who
has not two names whereby he may be known.'
"'Damsel,' quoth the King, 'thou say est weU in
this case. Thy father's name was Eobert le Fitzhaym,
and I will take care that my son shall have one as fair,
for his name shaU be Sir Eobert le Fitzroy,'
" ' Sir,' said the maiden, ' that is a fair name and of
great repute, as long as he shaU live ; but what shaU
his son be caUed or any other of his descendants ?
Unless care be taken of that, also, they may soon come
to have no name,'
"The King perceived that the maiden said nothing
unreasonable, and knowing that Gloucester was the
chief place of her heritage, ' Damsel,' said he, ' thy
lord shaU have a fair, unobjectionable name for himself
and for his heirs ; his name shaU be Eobert, Earl of
Gloucester, and he and his heirs shaU be Earls of
Gloucester.' " ' Sir,' quoth the maiden, ' then I like this weU ; on
these terms I consent that I and aU my lands shaU be
his,' " Thus was made the first Earl of Gloucester since
the Conquest, It was in the eleven hundredth and ninth
year since our Lord came down upon earth, and in the
ninth year of the King's crownment, that Eobert, King
Henry's son, was made first Earl of Gloucester by
marrying the right heir — a man who for his good deeds
deserves to be ever held in remembrance,
" And Bristow, tlirough his wife, was also his, and

he brought the town to great honour, as it stiU is ; and
there he built a castle with a noble tower, that of all
the towers in England is esteemed the flower. He
reared, also, St. James' Priory of Black monks, a little
on the northern side of the town, where his body yet
lyeth, for he was buried before the high altar there ;
that convent belongs to the house of Tewkesbury, And
his son, the Earl WiUiam, who succeeded him, began'
and reared the abbey of Keynsham," '^
27, Eobert the Consul was about twenty years of
age when he thus acquired a wife, immense possessions,
and a title that made him the feUow of Eoyalty, As
Earl of Gloucester, he received most probably the third
penny out of aU the royal revenue from the county.
With his wife he received the Honour of Gloucester,
which must not be confounded with the earldom which
had been created for him by his father. This honour
gave him the lordship over many manors, which accord
ing to custom he granted by " subinfeudation " to inferior
lords, who held of him, even as he held his from his
sovereign lord the King, This great barony was caUed
the Honour of Gloucester, because it had been anciently
royal property and held in person by the king. Hence
the lord its possessor affected almost royal state ; he had
his chanceUor, marshal, stewards, seneschal, provosts,
constables of his castles, as weU as subordinate knights.
He levied taxes often without the royal assent, held
courts of aU kinds, had the power of life and death,
granted charters of privileges in regal style, and coined
money. Besides this great barony or honour, Eobert had also
acquired through his marriage the Lordship of Glamor
gan, which at that time it would appear was of far
greater extent than the present county of the same
name. Fitzhamon had conquered it, made Cardiff his
capital, and many barons held of him in South Wales,
and from this source Eobert throughout his career drew
large numbers of men and not a little money. The
Conqueror had given the earldom of Kent as weU as
the Honour of Bristol to his Queen MatUda, designing
it to pass with her other property to their son Henry.
But Eufus had unjustly bestowed the whole of the late
Queen's possessions upon Fitzhamon. These comprised
the towns of Canterbury, Dover, and Leeds (in Kent),
together with lands in Hampshire, Marlborough (in
WUtshire), with several castles which had descended in
right of Mabel to Consul Eobert, the son of the prince
from whom they had been withheld. There were also
vast landed estates in Normandy held by Fitzroy' s
wife's ancestor before the Conquest, to which King
Henry added the land of Hamon, the uncle of Mabel.
1 Seyer, I., 353^,

72

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, III5.

"At Torigny, near St. Lo, the Consul buUt him a strong
castle on a rocky mountain that was deemed impreg
nable, and therein watched over his town, which it is
said was populous, prosperous, abounding in riches, and
adorned with public and private buUdings. Moreover,
on his death bed King Henry ordered his son Eobert
the Consul, who was the keeper of his treasure, to take
£60,000 (equivalent to upwards of a miUion pounds
sterling) and bestow rewards and donatives on his
servants and his mercenaries,"^
Eobert was therefore the richest subject and the
most powerflU baron of the age ; his relationship to the
King gave him politicaUy the highest rank in the king
dom next to the throne, his bravery and chivalrous
devotion to his sister and her son, his patronage of
literature in an age when kings signed with a cross, and
lordly barons made thumb marks on the wax serve for
their seal and signature, stamp him as a man far in
advance of his time. Geoffrey of Monmouth in dedicating
his history to this earl, speaks of him as being criticaUy
acquainted with the Latin language. " To you, there
fore, Eobert, Earl of Gloucester, this work humbly sues
for the favour of being so corrected by your advice that
it may not be thought the poor offspring of Geoffery of
Monmouth, but when polished by your refined wit and
judgment, the jiroduetion of him who had Henry, the
Glorious King of England, for his father, and whom we
see an accomplished scholar and philosopher as weU as
a brave soldier and expert commander, so that Britain
with joy acknowledges that in you she enjoys another
Henry." WiUiam of Malmesbury also dedicated his his
tory to the Earl of Gloucester. " To you have descended
the magnanimity of your grandfather, the munificence of
your uncle, the prudence of j'our father, * * * You
make it a peculiar part of your glory to pay attention to
literature. This also I must mention that you esteem
those learned persons worthy of your notice whom either
the envy of fame or the slenderness of their fortune
renders obscure, * * * Literary men therefore ex
perience in you manners suitable to them, for you look
upon them kindly, so as to put them beyond the appre
hension of Ul humour, you admit them pleasantly, you
dismiss them munificently."
That he was eminently a religious man for his age
has been shown in our Ecclesiastical Histoey,
28. When the Conqueror's son Eobert, Duke of Nor
mandy, was defeated and taken prisoner at Tenchebray,
1106, he was, after being twenty years in the custody of
Eoger, Bishop of Salisbury, transferred to the Castle of
Bristol, from which he was removed to the Castle of Car
diff, where he died in the year 1134. The story that he
1 Ordericus Vital.

was blinded by his brother is related thus by Matthew of
Westminster : " The King caused him to be kept safely,
but mindful of his relationship to him, he was kept in
free custody without any want of food, with the benefit
of light and with expensive clothes. He was also per
mitted to play at chess and at dice, and to wear the
same robes as the King himself received ; and he was
permitted to walk about the neighbouring orchards and
woods and pleasant places. One day whUe he was so
wandering about he suddenly leaped on a horse which
he had caught while his guards were unaware, and fied.
The guards, raising a loud clamour, instantly foUowed
him, and in a dirty field, where his horse sank to his
beUy, they caught him, and kept him close untU the
King was acquainted with what had happened. Upon
which the King ordered him to be privately deprived
of his eyes, stiU preserving the baUs. After which the
duke pined away with grief, and cursing the day of
his birth he did not much prolong his unhappy Ufe,"
"In the year of his death two moons appeared in the
sky, and one day a comet was seen abotit three o'clock,
distant about one cubit from the sun,"
This cruel story is apparently a monkish invention.
It is not mentioned by contemporary writers ; indeed,
a Welsh sonnet, said on good authority to have been
written by the prisoner, mentions the pleasantness
of the prospect from the windows of the Castle of
Cardiff. 29. Eobert the Consul had been in the possession of
his earldom about six years when Harding the Provost
died, 1115, and was succeeded by his son, Eobert Fitz
harding, in the position of chief magistrate of Bristol,
Eobert Fitzharding was born 1085 to 1095, and he
would be now from 20 to 30 years of age. His fii-st
separate residence was in Broad street (Cider house
passage, now the back of the Grand Hotel) ; he then,
on his father's death, occupied for a while his residence
in Baldwin street ; " afterwards he removed to the great
stone house which he buUt on the Frome, part of which
house to this day remaineth undemolished."^
The site of this house is undetermined ; one of our
chroniclers thought that it was on the outer bank of the
Frome, or mill leat, in what is now Baldwin street,
about the site of the Back haU, This may have been so,
but the remains of the building thought to have been por
tions of his house were probably the foundations of the
mansion of Eichard Spicer, built after 1247, when this
leat was filled up. Seyer thought Fitzharding's house
was about the middle of Baldwin street, and he seems
to infer that it was perhaps the house called King John's
1 Old deed quoted from the Chartulary of St, Augustine, fol,
33 ; by Smyth,

A,D. II15,

HARDING'S GREAT STONE HOUSE.

73

(in Back street), or the house where Henry II. was
educated (at the corner of the steps). This latter it could
hardly be ; there would be no room for a large house
between Baldwin street and Nicholas street, for the
waU and ditch occupied 30 feet of the width, which
was less than 50 feet altogether. We rather incline
to the opinion that it was on
the Frome proper, somewhere
about Nelson street,
Leland teUs us that "there
is a place almost against
Hungroad, caUed Portchester,
where Harding and Eobert,
his son, had a fair house, and
another in Brightstow town,"
Seyer concludes that this was
Sneyd park. Sea MiUs, It is
possible that the semi-circular
bastions, if indeed they are
not of Eoman workmanship,
may form a part of the de
fences of Eobert Fitzharding's
country seat. Near the time
of his father's death, 1115,
Eobert Fitzharding married
the Lady Eva, Smyth, on the
authority of Glover, Somerset
Herald, shows this lady to
have been niece to the Con
queror. By Eva, Eobert had
five sons, Henry, Maurice,
Eobert, Thomas and Nicholas,
and two daughters, Helena
and Aldena; these married,
one the heir of Eoger de
Berkeley, Lord of Dursley,
and the other married Nigel,
the son of Arthur, and Eobert,
her father, settled on them
the manor of Kingscot, from
which their descendants took
their name,
30, King Henry, who was an accomplished prince,
highly educated for so unlearned an age, earned his title
of Beauclerk from his translation of iEsop's fables.
Shrewd and ambitious, he had by force seized upon the
crown, his brother Eobert's rightful inheritance, and as
a matter of policy had married Maud, the niece of
Edgar AtheUng, which secured his popularity with the
EngUsh people. By her he had two children, WiUiam,
who was drowned, together with the flower of the
Norman youth, off Barfleur, when returning to Eng-
[VOL, I,]

Old House in Baldwin Str

land, and Maud, who first married in 1118 Henry IV,,
Emperor of Germany, and on his death, in August,
1127, Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou, by whom
she had three sons, the eldest of whom afterwards be
came King of England, reigning as Henry II. Henry I,
married for his second wife in February, 1121, Adelais, a
daughter of Godfrey, Duke of
Lorraine and Brabant, whom
in the Easter he brought to
Beorola (Berkeley).
On Sunday, Sept. 29th,
1118, about thi-ee o'clock,
whilst the people were at
mass, a violent earthquake
was felt in Bristol, Somerset,
Worcestershire and Glouces
tershire, which greatly terri
fied the inhabitants. Another
occui-red on July 25th, 1122,
which was very great in
Somerset and Gloucestershire.
On one of these occasions it is
stated that the Thames was
dry for three days,
31, The coinage of this
reign (1100-35) consisted of
silver pennies. Of these there
are only two varieties known
as being certainly coined in
Bristol, On them we find for
the first time the modern name
of the town, showing that at
the end of the 1 1th century it
was known as Bristol. ' ' One
penny in the British Museum
has obverse, full face bust of
the king, crowned, holding a
sceptre in his right hand ; aU
within a beaded inner circle.
Legend, -|- hbneigvs eex a.
Reverse, a cross having each
Umb terminating in a huge
trefoU, within a beaded inner circle. Legend, h, ethig
ON BEIST, This coin is in bad preservation, and it is
probable that the name of the moneyer was Harding
the preepositus, A second piece has, obverse, full faced
bust, crowned, with sceptre ; a rose at the side of the
head, and a beaded inner circle. Legend, heneicvs
EEX, Reverse, a quartrefoU enclosing a cross of peUets
with a star in the centre; four fleurs-de-lys in the
angles, AU within a beaded inner circle. Legend,
-\- GEEAED ON BEIST, The weight and fineness of
P 2

74

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,!., 1 130,

Henry I, pennies are about the same as those of
WiUiam I, and II, coins," ^ His coins are ruder than
those of his predecessors, and the portrait has gener
aUy a moustache.
Amongst the remarkable events of this reign we may
name the foUowing: — "Arabic figures were first used,
brought from Spain, but were not common untU two
centuries later. Colonies of Flemings driven by fioods
from the Lowlands were settled by the king in CarUsle,
and also in South Wales, The greater part of London
was destroyed by fire. Priests were forbidden to marry.
Long hair on men was deemed unlawful. Stealing
was punishable with death. Wrecking was prohibited.
The free use of fire and candle by night was aUowed.
Scale armour was introduced, supplementing the coat of
ringed maU, We are indebted to Athelard, a mathe
matician of Bath, for our first Latin edition of EucUd's
elements, 1127, The value of a sheep was four pence,
of wheat sufficient -for 100 men for one day one
shilling,"" Henry's laws for preserving game were more strin
gent and cruel than even those of his father and brother,
AU dogs kept on the verge of the woods had to be
mutUated by having one of their claws chopped off, and
only a few people, amongst whom were some of the
greater nobles and bishops and the burgesses of London,
were aUowed to hunt even on their own grounds,
32, This was preeminently a castle-building age,
Eobert the Consul buUt a castle in Normandy, he also
buUt one at Cardiff, ^ and he so strengthened and im
proved that of Bristol, as to win for himself the renown
of being its founder.
The rhyming monk says, " That' Bishop Geoffrey
with other chiefs had kept the castle of Bristol, ' such a
castle as it then was,' but Eobert deserved the title of its
founder because of the great additions to its strength
which he made thereto, building especiaUy the great
dungeon tower, and making the castle his principal
residence when in England. The stone for the buUd
ing was brought from Caen in Normandy, Eobert tithed
these, giving every tenth stone towards the erection of
the Chapel of St. Mary, near the Monastery of St,
James, Bristol,"*
The castle thus enlarged and strengthened gave to
Bristol great importance in national affairs in the reign
of Stephen, Seyer^ thought that the position of the
castle in the neck of the isthmus between the two
rivers, proves that the design of its erection was hostUe
to the town, interfering, as it needs must have done,
with the direct communication between the burgh and
1 Henfrey, 347, ^ Creasy's Great Events.
= Seyer, I., 372, * Leland, 6, 92, " Seyer, I,, 373,

Gloucestershire, and forcing aU traffic from that part
of the county to pass under the wall by the castle ditch,
and to enter Bristol by the gate which adjoined the
castle waU, and which was in the power of the governor
or constable of the fortress. The learned historian also
thought it probable that the site of the castle was
originaUy a part of the township of Bristow, but
that it was withdrawn from the limits and jurisdic
tion thereof when the castle was erected, and was
annexed to the hundred of Barton Eegis, from which
it is now locaUy separated, as is shown by the perambu
lation of Edward III,, 1373, and the Charter of Sale of
Charles I., as weU as by the ground plan, aU of which
show that the town lands (not the waUs) encompassed
the castle on every side,
WhUst admitting the geographical isolation, we de
mur to the supposed originaUy hostUe intention. The
castle was, as we have shown, a necessity for the
defence of the burgh, and stood in the fore front of the
side on which it could most easily be assaUed, A
glance at our map of Worle camp (page 10) wUl show
that in the earliest times a situation precisely simUar
was the part most strongly fortified. Just so do we
believe this to have been an elongation in an easternly
direction of the original fortification, which in or before
the 11th century assumed the character of an indepen
dent fortress outside the waUs of the burgh, and became
attached to the King's or Eoyal Barton, Its circum
vaUation was as foUows : — Commencing at the river
Avon, it crossed the west end of Castle street ; its bar
bican stood on the site of the house at the junction of
Peter and Castle streets, extending towards St, Peter's
church ; between this barbican and the waU there was
a deep dry artificial fosse crossed by a drawbridge.
The bottom of this fosse was about the width of the
second house in Castle street, it then ran down on the
western front of the Bear and Eagged Staff and
Catherine Wheel pubUc houses ; at the corner of Castle
green, where the school house now stands, it bent round
to the N,E., both fosse and waU being continued
through the Newgate on the hUl, at the bottom of which
there was a di'awbridge. This bridge was over a
leat of the river Frome, which had been brought to the
foot of the hiU to form a ditch. About ten feet from
the water's edge rose the lowest of the north waUs to a
height of from twenty to thirty feet, and from the inner
edge of the platform within this waU rose another
embattled waU of about the same height, so that here
the castle presented a double terraced front, we believe
of from fifty to sixty feet in height, reaching to and
guarding the hiU top. At the east angle of this waU
where the hUl had lowered considerably, the leat had

A.D, 1135,

BRISTOL CASTLE.

75

been widened to form a miU pond, in which stood the
cucking-stool for fraudulent brewers and scolding wives ;
the castle miU was on the north-eastern or outer edge
of the ditch and pond. From thence another deep
artificial cutting led a portion of the waters under what
is now the street known as Lower Castle street as far as
the end of Old Market street. Here there was a smaU
foot drawbridge, opening into a green (now Old Market
street). From this bridge the moat and waU bent

Great Dungeon Tower of Bristol Castle.
obUquely round to the west ; the covered moat stiU ex
ists, and runs under the first four houses at the south
east end of Castle street, after which it emerges, and is
continued as an open watercourse, passing under a
bridge in Queen street untU it joins the Avon in the
angle where the river makes a great bend to the south.
At this junction stood the water gate, guarded by five
towers. The space thus enclosed by creneUated waUs
with towers contains about three and three-quarter
acres. There was, however, outside this on the south
west the king's orchard, which contained two acres
more; this was surrounded by a "bastyle," i,e,, an em
battled waU without towers. This waU enclosed the
land whereon St, Philip's National School now stands.

Strong and spacious as the great castle was for 600
years but few relics of its buUdings remain, and its
written records are almost as scanty. The surviving
appeUations of Castle green. Castle ditch. Castle pre
cincts and Castle street designate certain portions of its
locaUty, and a few underground cellars, arched door
ways and dark dungeons wUl help us, with the aid of
WiUiam Wyrcestre, to trace its principal buildings,
33, The ichnography was as foUows : The ground
plan was divided into three portions, Ist, the outer
ward ; 2nd, the inner ward ; and 3rd, the king's
orchard. The two first plots of ground, between the
two rivers, covered the whole breadth of the hiU which
graduaUy widened and decreased in height from Peter
street to the Old Market, The outer ward was separ
ated from the inner by a creneUated wall which, com
mencing at the outer north waU, crossed the hUl by the
line of Cock and Bottle lane to the water tower upon
the Avon. Nearly in the centre of this ward Eobert
the Consul built his famous Donjon tower, apparently
upon the plan of the Great White tower of London; the
present Castle street runs nearly through the centre of
the site of this famous tower. Its waUs were, in the
foundation 25 feet in thickness, and at the top, under
the lead covered roof 9 feet 6 inches. In shape it was
a parallelogram, the greater length on the inside being
from west to east 60 feet, the breadth froiu north to
south 45 feet. Its outer dimensions were 110 feet x
95 feet. It was strengthened by four square towers,
one at each corner. The south-west or " mightiest
tower" was 30 feet higher than the others, and the
thickness of its waUs was there 6 feet. This edifice
was aU buUt (faced) of Caen stone brought speciaUy
from Normandy.
The keep, with the exception of that of London,
was the largest in the kingdom. Its size and impor
tance wUl be seen by comparing its dimensions with
those buUt within 50 years of its date.

Feet. Feet

Tower of London 

... 116 X 96

" Bristol 

... no X 95

" Norwich 

... 110 X 92

" Rochester

... 75 X 72

' ' Hedingham . . .

... 62 X 55

Guildford

... 47 X 42

The same general plan and distribution of the apart
ments was foUowed in each ease, there being three
floors besides the ground floor, and the top was sur
rounded by a high creneUated parapet."'-
^ Seyer, I., 381, These dimensions are at least doubtful. The
towers at Bristol and Norwich were abnormal. The greatest
modern authorities give as the earliest type, an oval shell keep
on a mound, as at Berkeley. — Ed,

76

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, II35.

¦¦¦i^^

1

Gi'onnd Plan of the Ancient
Beneath the keep was the great dungeon, to which
air and light were admitted by an aperture in the roof,
probably in the batter of the waU, where it diminished
in thickness. The descent to this horrible pit was by
a trap door and a steep flight of steps in the thickness
of the waU. At the north-east corner but in the bailey
outside the tower the great weU has recently been dis
covered and emptied ; it was a smooth cyUndrical bore,
40 feet deep and 1 0 feet in diameter,

Castle of BHstow. From Seyer.
The entrance to this ward and its keep was by a
drawbridge guarded by a barbican. At the north-west
corner of the keep was a separate building — St,
Martin's church. This church stood most probably on
the north side of Castle green, in the western angle of
the fortress.
To the south of the tower was the Constable's
lodgings, but between it and the western waUs in MU-
lerd's view there are a great number of smaU houses.

A,D, 1135.

ARCHITECTURAL REMAINS.

77

which of course would be of later date, probably of
the 16th and 16th centuries.
34. The inner or western ward was the larger of
the two. In it was a noble banqueting hall, 36 yards
long by 18 yards wide ; this contained in 1480 a marble
slab — ^the king's dining table— separate from the others,
15 feet long. The waUs were 24 feet high, and the
roof was of high pitch with wooden piUars 45 feet
in height. The windows were 14 feet high. In
Wyrcestre' 8 time there was a porch 30 feet long,
which served as an entrance to this haU, This is stUl
in existence, but it is, we think, an addition of the 1 3th
century, the original entrance being through the Nor
man arch with the dripstone label, which stiU stands at
the inner end of the said porch. This beautiful Early
EngUsh approach to the haU is in Tower street, [A
smaU room was nearly a century since buUt within it
Uke a box, which remains as a standing disgrace to the
proprietors and an outrage upon aesthetics.] It has a
groined roof, which springs from deUcate clustered waU
piUars, with tasteful foUated capitals. The groin ribs
are deeply hoUowed, with bosses at the intersection of
the cross springers, a Ught string course connects the
capitals ; the bases of the columns are below the pre
sent flooring, which is two feet above the street level.
The whole is so encrusted with limewash that minor
detaUs are hidden, and only the graceful contour of
capital and arch remains to gratify the eye.
The dimensions are 24 feet x 14 feet x 13 feet in
height. The inner Norman arch is 8 feet high by
8 feet in width ; in the jamb one huge gate hook
remains to give additional proof that this was originally
the outer gateway to the haU which stood, no doubt,
within this spot, the whole of the area within or to the
east of the archway being honeycombed with ceUars,
some of which have recesses for lamps, whilst others
have Norman freestone mouldings for the window-
frames, &c.
Adjoining the portico we have described, and upon
its northern side, there is another somewhat simUar
buUding both in size and shape, but of much ruder con
struction. The height is the same. The dimensions
are 23 feet x 16 feet 3 inches. The groin ribs are
larger and plainer ; they spring from short clustered
corbel shafts, with simple mouldings and an almost
entire absence of ornament. The stone work is rough,
and there is a want of finish that implies haste and an
adaptation to circumstances about the whole of the
room. Here, too, the inner waU (a continuation of the east
waU of the other portico, that with the large Norman
arch) reveals two freestone door jambs, with short

piUar shafts and capitals 15 feet asunder, and above
them the springing of a semi-circular arch that con
nected them. This once grand entrance at some subse
quent date has been divided into two smaUer doorways,
4 feet 4 inches and 7 feet 8 inches in width ; these have
been roughly filled in.
In the northern waU of this room, close to the present
entrance (which is a modern breach in the ancient waU),
is a recess in the form of a smaU doorway ; the top stone
is beveUed to a feather edge, to admit apparently the
ascent of a steep stau'way in the thickness of the waU ;
10 feet further in there is another doorway and two
recesses, one being apparently an aumbry, the other
a smaU piscina. This was, we imagine, the original
way into the royal chapel, which was afterwards, by
order of Henry III,, converted into a hermitage. In a
code of instructions signed at Berkeley, August 28th,
1249, the King enjoins the mayor and baUiff of Bristol
" to lengthen three windows of his chapel, and to white
wash it throughout ; also glass windows are ordered to
be put in our haU at Bristol, a royal seat in the same*
hall, and dormant tables around the same, and block
up the doors of the chapel beside our great haU there,
and make a door in the chancel towards the hermitage ;
in that hermitage make an altar to St, Edward, and in
the turret over that hermitage make a chamber for the
clerk with appurtenances ; also build a kitchen and a
sewer beside the said haU, and find the wages of a
certain chaplain whom we have ordered to celebrate
divine service in the chapel of our tower there aU the
days of our life, for Eleanor of Brittany, our cousin,
to wit, 50s. per annum.'" These buildings were pro
bably grouped together as at Berkeley, the chapel being,
we think, between the hermitage and the north waU
of the castle. In fact, some few yards to the east of
this little chapel there still stands part of a newel stair
case of Caen stone ; so worn are the steps by use that
they have lately been cased with wood. This was a
portion of the royal chapel, and led apparently to its
roof ; it is about 30 ft. in height, and abutted upon the
banquet haU. At the foot of these stairs there is a
cellar, which tradition affirms was a prison.
Near the chapel, which Wyrcestre caUs " magnifi
cent," but which Leland styles more truly " a pretty
little church," were " beautiful chambers and lodgings,"
a smaU square embattled tower stood upon the site of
the house in which Champion, the Bristol potter, dwelt ;
the ceUars in the present building are evidently a part
of the original edifice.
No doubt this portion is that which Wyrcestre and
others term the palace. Here, also, was the inner or
1 Parker Dom. Arch., I., 226,

78

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1135,

castle green, which in 1480 was the great garden. The
Prince's chamber stood on the site of Castle street, to
the south of the great haU; it measured 54 ft. by 27 ft,,
the roof was supported by two wooden piUars described
as being very old in 1480, Of this building not a
vestige remains above ground.
At No. 56 Castle street, a rough stone stau* in the
waU leads down to a large wagon-roofed room over
looking the south ditch, but about 20 feet above its
level. It is evidently a portion of the early fortress,
and has apparently from its resounding floor some kind
of apartment beneath. From the description given of
the room in which the Independent church in Castle
green was formed, and
held its first meetings
1660-70, we judge this
to have been the spot.
In the early part of the
last century it was turned
into a salt manufactory.
On this side of the castle
the lodgings for the sol
diers, &c., were chiefly
situated. In the north
wall, overlooking the miU
pond and about 14 feet
above the water, are two
large stone-vaulted rooms
of great waU thickness,
the floors reverberate to
the tread with a hoUow
sound, and doubtless con
ceal some subterranean
dungeons. These rooms,
which are accessible from
the road which now covers
the Frome ditch, are about
7 feet above its level, a recent doorway driven through
the waU proves the masonry to be of very early date
indeed. There are some curious remains of a narrow
stone stair in the waU between two of the rooms,
which seems afterwards to have been converted into a
" gardrobe." A large stone-ceiled room in Castle green,
now used as an iron store, is another remainder of
the earliest buUding.
35. A drawbridge crossed the moat into the market
just where the present Castle street now joins it. Here
in front of three gardens which belonged to WiUiam
Wyrcestre, on the south side of the green, stood the
Stallenge or Market cross. At this bridge began the
bastyle or embattled wall of the third portion of the
castle, known as the king's orchard. Its fosse forms

now a part of the roadway leading to St. PhUip's
church ; opposite the south corner of the churchyard
the fosse and waU turned to the south untU it joined
the Avon, enclosing one hundred square yards, or a
Uttle over two acres of ground.
This was an addition to the original fortress ; it
lies outside the artificial ditch of the Frome, which was
brought round to strengthen the defence on the weakest
point, the south-east. Access was given to this plot by
a bridge stUl standing in Queen street. On the moat
between the bridge and the Avon stood the water gate,
which was defended by 4 towers, and on the south
side there was also a fifth, evidently designed to keep
watch and ward over the
Countess-slip ferry. No
dependence can be placed
upon the often repeated
assertion that the seals of
the city represent this, the
water gate of the castle,
the style is simply a con
ventional one, common
to the age in which the
seal was granted, and is
simUar to that granted
to many other cities and
towns. From the water
gate an embattled waU
skirted the Avon as far
as the south-west corner
of the fortress, where by
a strong semi - circular
bastion it joined the waU
and ditch, with which we
began our description of
the circumvaUation,
From the fact of there
being a western and also an eastern drawbridge, it is
probable that there was a way right through the castle,
but one that certainly was not open as a highway for
the public. The Aid gate, WiUiam Wyrcestre says, was
in Narrow Wine street at the end of Checquer lane.
This was destroyed when the new gate was built with
a tower of defence on either side ; that on the west was
on the hill opposite to Little Peter street, which after
wards became the city gaol, or Newgate; its defence
on the southern or castle side was a portion of the
castle, on its site now stands the National school. New
gate (William Wyrcestre speaks of them in the plural
as gates) was 4 yards wide and 9 yards long ; under
neath the roadway was a deep vault or cellar, and
over it was a room, which at one time was used as a

Water Gate to Bristol Castle.

A,D, II38,

KING STEPHEN SEIZES BRISTOL CASTLE.

79

chapel, at another a grammar school was kept there by
Master Eobert Lane, principal grammarian. The gate
was taken down in 1766, and was re-erected at Bris
Ungton, There was no doubt a drawbridge over the moat at
the foot of the hiU and outside the gates. The fosse or
mill leat foUowed the conformation of the hUl, The
houses which stand on the site of the old mUl, at the
junction of Castle ditch, PhUadelphia street, the Weir,
EUbroad and Lower Castle streets, are very ancient, but
it is very doubtful if any of the remains of the first
mUl exist in them. Earl John, by his charter of 1189,
permitted the townsmen to grind their corn where they
pleased other than at the lord's mUl, which was there
fore standing at that time. In the Chartulary of St,
Augustine, fo. 178-9, the castle miU is caUed the mUl of
Bristol. With the help of the ground plan, on page 76,
the above description wiU, we think, enable our readers
better to understand the historical events that charac
terised the fierce internecine strife between Stephen,
who had usurped the throne, and the Empress Maud,
on behalf of her son. Prince Henry, who was heartily
assisted and counseUed by Eobert the Consul, her half-
brother. 36, Stephen, son of the Count of Blois, by Adela,
third daughter and eighth chUd of the Conqueror,
finding that the party of the Empress was unprepared,
seized on the throne of England, in 1135, on the 3rd
of December, The bishops gave him their aUegiance,
and Eobert the Consul, on his return from Normandy
to England, did homage " on ¦ condition that the King
should fully maintain his dignity," The truce between
usurping king and powerful earl ' was a hoUow one ;
more than once Stephen endeavoured to ensnare the
Consul, who was forewarned by the men employed for
that purpose.
The heart of the great earl was with his sister, and
he was fully determined, on sufficient cause, to break
with Stephen, renounce his homage, and take up arms
on behalf of Maud and her son, his nephew. Prince
Henry, At Midsummer, in 1138, Geoffry Talbot, who
had been driven out of Herefordshire by Stephen, took
refuge in Bristol, and both he and his men claimed
protection from Eobert against the usurper,
Eobert, in June of the same year, whilst in Nor
mandy, renounced by letter his homage to Stephen,
whom he accused of violating his promise to himself
and his oath to his sister, to whom Stephen had hereto
fore sworn fealty. Whereupon the King deprived him
of aU his possessions in England. The chief cause of
offence appears to have been that Stephen had already

seized upon Bristol, over which he had placed Sir Bar
tholomew de CourciU as governor, ^
37, This breach of faith roused the latent anger in
the breast of the Eed Earl; he raised his banner in
Normandy, flew to arms, and became thenceforth the
leader of the Empress' party. The alterations in the
Castle of Bristol were scarcely flnished, but he recovered
it, and, secure in the possession of the strongest fortress
in the west, backed by the wealth and power of Fitz
harding and the goodwiU of the burgesses, he sent
and summoned his men and forthwith defied the King,
Before the leaves had faUen Stephen, who lacked neither
bravery nor activity, had encamped before Bristol,
CaUing a councU of war, his barons advised him as the
most certain way to reduce the refractory burgh to sub
mission to fiU in the channel of the Avon at St, Vin
cent's rocks, and to submerge the town, Stephen's
wUl was good, but the engineering power was wanting.
Others advised the buUding of smaU castles before each
gate in the waUs, so cutting off aU communication with
the country, and starving the town into a surrender.
Neither was this expedient practicable, so the King
broke up the siege and marched against Eobert's castles
in Somerset, Harptree and Castle Cary, which he carried
by fire and sword,
38, The best account of the occurrences of these
times is that given in a MS. entitled " Gesta Stephani,"
written by a Norman ecclesiastic named Eobert de
Bee, or Eobertus de Monte, He was a firm partisan of
Stephen, apparently a personal friend, and from the
minuteness of his narrative was probably an eye witness
of great part of what he relates, but he was not attentive
to chronological order, ^ and was, moreover, bitterly pre
judiced against Maud's party, whose exploits are
branded as acts of ferocity against a lawful king.
We have seen that the church was on the side of
the usurper, and as aU the historians of the day were
ecclesiastics, bitter denunciations, unscrupulous stories,
and fiendish cruelties are without scruple ascribed to
those who made war upon their anointed king.
After a defect in the MS., which appears to have
been of considerable length, the author proceeds : —
"In this manner, the conference between the King and
the messengers of the Earl being ended, they departed.
The King went to London, and the messengers going to
Bristow, the Earl's especial seat, carried orders to his
subjects there very calamitous to the kingdom of Eng
land ; namely, that they should plentif uUy store the
castle there with an abundance of provisions ; that they
should admit the company of aU (mUitary men) who
1 Little Eed Book in the Council House, Bristol,
' Seyer, I., 406,

80

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1139,

should resort to them ; and should immediately commit
every act the most severe and hostile which they could
against the King and his subjects, as against the Earl's
enemies, Bristow is a city nearly the richest of aU the
cities of the country, receiving merchandise by sailing
vessels from the neighbouring and from foreign coun
tries ; placed in the most fruitful part of England, and
by the very situation of the place the best defended
of aU the cities of England.
"For as we read of Brundusium, here a certain part
of the province of Gloucester, being narrowed into the
form of a ton
gue and ex
tended a long
way forms the
city, two rivers
washing two of
its sides, and
meeting to
gether in a
great abund
ance of waters
on the lower
side where the
land itself is
defective {i.e.
about the
mouth of the
Frome, Queen
square. Marsh
street, &c,).
Moreover, a
quick and
strong tide
ebbing and flowing abundantly night and day, causes
the rivers on both sides of the city to run back upon
themselves in a wide and deep sea ; and forming a port
very fit and very safe for a thousand vessels, it binds
the circuit of the city so nearly and so closely that the
whole seems to swim on the water, and to sit on its
banks. But on one side, where it is esteemed more
exposed to a siege and more assailable, a castle, raised
on a considerable mound, fortified with a waU and
bulwarks, towers and various machines, prevents the
approach of assaUants. Into which they brought to
gether such an inundation of horsemen and footmen,
the Earl's dependents, or, I might say more truly, so
great and wonderful a number of robbers and plun
derers, that it seemed not only great and fearful, but
even horrible and incredible to aU who viewed them,
because coining out of different provinces and districts
they flocked thither so much the more readily and in

^rome Wall.

greater numbers, inasmuch as being under a rich lord
and in a weU fortified castle they were permitted to
do whatever came most readUy into their minds in the
richest part of England. Among the rest that Geoffry
Talbot was there, who, as is mentioned above, having
been banished out of England, determined to breathe
out his poison in every place, and to do whatever cruelty
his wicked mind was accustomed to conceive.
"But his wickedness by God's judgment was turned
upon himself, for while he was deUberating how to
murder some and condemn others, he himself, being
caught first and firmly held in bonds, nearly suffered
the sentence of condemnation. . . . There is a city
xii, mUes from Bristow where, through hidden pipes,
fountains throw up water warmed without human skill
and art out of the bowels of the earth into a receptacle
ornamentaUy arranged with chambered arches, and form
baths in the middle of the city warm and wholesome
and delightful to be seen,
"The city is caUed The Bath, because sick persons
from aU England are used to meet there for the sake of
bathing themselves in those wholesome waters ; and
those who are in good health also, for the sake of seeing
those wonderful eruptions of warm water and of bathing
in them. This city, therefore, because it was easy to
fortify, the Bristowans endeavoured to gain over to their
side ; for which purpose, having got together a body of
men, they unexpectedly approached it at the dawn of
day, bringing ladders with them and other machines for
mounting the wall; and being coUected together in a
neighbouring vaUey, they waited a Uttle whUe untU
the situation of the city and the mode of taking it
being examined by their spies they might altogether
rush upon it," To shorten and simpUfy this part of
the story, it seems that Geoffry Talbot and his relative,
GUbert de Lacy, were appointed to spy out the city, but
were pounced upon by the soldiers of the bishop. Lacy
managed to escape, but Talbot was seized, bound and
thrust into prison.
The Bishop of Bath was induced, says the narrator,
on the promise of a safe conduct to leave the city to
confer with the besiegers, but was treacherously seized
and exchanged for Talbot, who thus undoubtedly saved
his head at the expense of the consciences of his friends,
Eobert was in Normandy with his sister ; he only
arrived in England on Michaelmas day, 1139, so that
the charge of bad faith and of the atrocities of which
his partisans were guilty ought not to be laid to his
charge ; but making every aUowance for the author's
prejudice against Eobert's faction, enough remains to
prove that the state of society here in the West must
have been something fearful, ~~

A,D. 1137.

CHARACTER OF THE BRISTOWANS.

81

39, StUl red-handed war is much the same in every
age, and it is to us very doubtful whether the con
querors of Badajoz, Oawnpore, Ulundi and Cabul are
entitled to throw the first stone at the uneducated
inercenaries of the 12th century. Let us borrow, then,
the description of the manners of these men, so graphi
caUy given by our author : " The Bristowans, therefore,
being let loose to every crime, wherever they heard of
any lands or possessions of the King, or of those who
favoured him, like a hungry pack of dogs, thither ran
eagerly and early and seized and carried off, sold and
wasted yokes of oxen, flocks of cattle, everything de
sirable which either the eye saw or the ambitious heart
wished for. And when they saw that aU things which
were in their own neighbourhood, and as it were at
hand, were brought into that den of perdition (the
castle) and annihUated ; wherever they heard of any
monied or wealthy men in all parts of England they
quickly went there, and seizing some by force and
seducing others by fraud they carried them off, binding
up their eyes with a fiUet, and stopping up their
mouths either with a lump of something forcibly pressed
upon them or with a certain smaU machine in the form
of a bridle with a rough bit and toothed, and at last
they brought them into the middle of Bristow, as we
read of the robbers of Elisha (2 Kings vi, 20), and
either wasted them by fasting, or by inflicting punish
ments on them they squeezed from them whatever they
possessed, even to the last farthing,
" Others contriving a more crafty method, went
where England was more quiet, peace more abundant,
and the people more inclined to ease and security, and
there journeying in the daytime sometimes in one place
and sometimes in another along some beaten and fre
quented road, they concealed their name, their persons
and their employment, they showed no arms nor any
remarkable dress, they used no impious and extravagant
expressions as robbers usuaUy do, but they pretended a
humble look, a moderate gait, a smooth and gentle con
versation, and so far acted the hypocrite until they had
obtained their purpose, either by meeting some rich man
accidentaUy or privately carrying one off from any
place, whom they conveyed to Bristow, that stepmother
of aU England. And this mode of deceit, this fiction of
hypocrisy, was so common through almost aU parts of
England that there was scarcely a city or a viUage
where they did not practise these fraudulent contri
vances, where they did not leave traces of this infamous
robbery. Hence it came to pass that men could not
pass along the roads of the King's peace securely as
they used to do, nor could man trust himself to man
confidently as they used, but whenever one person on a
[Vol. L]

journey spied another he trembled aU over, and in fear
fled out of his sight either into a wood or to some bye-
path, until at last by recovering his spirit he might
proceed on his journey more safely and more boldly."
Miserable enough all this, it is true ; but admitting the
principle "that all is fair in war," there is Uttle, if
anything, that was not probably done also by the
King's party,
40. Stephen, as we have seen, hastened to relieve
Bath, raised the waUs higher, strengthened the defences
and increased the garrison, and then brought his argiy
to Bristol. Eobertus de Monte does not conceal here his chagrin
that the King did not throw into the river ' ' a vast
heap of large stones, wood and turf at that place
where the mouth of the port of the city is contracted by
a narrow pass, so that the entrance being blocked, the
aid which the citizens received from the river by the
labour of the rowers on which they principaUy de
pended might be intercepted, and the rivers which
flowed around the city by having their reflux inter
cepted might rise upon themselves, and being coUected
into a wide and deep lake like a sea might threaten
the city with immediate submersion." He says those
who frustrated this plan, and that other to which
we have aUuded of building castles before each
gate, were men who were fighting treacherously and
favouring the earl, that the advice was sound and
good, nor does he believe their statement "that it
was a useless labour to attempt to obstruct an abyss
of the sea with materials of wood and stone, since
it was most evident that whatever should be rolled
in there would either be swallowed up in the depth,
or would all be consumed by the tide rushing vehe
mently against it,""-
Stephen's faith, however, was not one that "laughs
at impossibUities, and cries ' it shaU be done.' " It
would be a tough job even now with the aid of dyna
mite and gunpowder to blast the rocks and form a break
water that should stop a head of water 40 feet high,
but to do this with axe, spade and crowbar, and to sup
port a large army while it was done, and that, too, in the
face of continued saUies from a weU-fed and powerful
foe, were elements that do not seem to have entered
into the contemplation of our warlike-minded ecclesi
astic. We may mention here that the height from the
bed of the river to high water mark is about 40 feet,
that a backwater 12 feet above high water level would
drown out the inhabitants of the lower parts of the
town, but that a barrier reaching almost half way in
height to the Suspension bridge woiUd be necessary
1 Seyer, L, 410-11-12, Q

82

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1139,

before the waters could be forced to run through the
Ashton valley to Clevedon.
Meanwhile Stephen's Queen, Matilda, by the aid of
her father's fleet from Boulogne, besieged Eobert's
castle of Dover by sea and land until it was surrendered,
and later in the year the King himself besieged and
took Eobert's castle of Eslede or Leeds, in Kent.
41. These great successes, together with the battle
of the Standard, which Stephen's troops won from the
Scotch king, who had espoused the cause of the Empress
in Northumberland whilst Eobert was in Normandy,
were to Stephen more disastrous than a defeat ; he
changed his placable demeanour and became so over
bearing and tyrannical that many bishops and barons
deserted his cause, and invited the Empress to cross the
sea and put herseK at the head of her party. She came
with a strong body of soldiers. The earl accompanied
her ; he, making a desperate push with ten archers on
horseback and a few soldiers, rode through the country
that favoured Stephen, from Portsmouth to WaUingford,
and thence to Bristol, leaving Ms wife and his baggage
at the castle of Arundel, in charge of the countess who
was the widow of the late King Henry, Thither also
came the Empress Maud, which when Stephen knew he
left the siege of the castle of Marlborough and with
great speed invested that of Arundel. With a degree
of chivalry not inconsistent with the character of the
age, or with his own disposition, Stephen di-ew off
his army and suffered his brother, the Bishop of Win
chester, to conduct the Empress safely to her brother
at Bristol, From Bristol, after a stay of two months,
Maud went to Gloucester, where MUo held the castle
for the earl, whilst Stephen with a great army of
Flemish mercenaries, "who flocked in crowds to Eng
land, and Uke hungry wolves did annihUate the fruitful
ness of the English soU," foUowed the Earl Eobert,
He caUed in the Welsh to her aid, who to the number
of upwards of 10,000 spread over England, destroying
the churches and ravaging the land,
" There were at that time," says Bromton, " as many
kings in England as there were lords of castles, each
having his own coinage of money and judging his
subjects in a regal manner."
Maud's presence had great influence on her party ;
the people flocked to the standard of one whom they
were pleased to term an EngUsh princess, and the
barons in large numbers finaUy declared in her favour,
42. On the 7th of November, 1139, Eobert placed
himself at the head of his men and took the city of
Worcester, from which he carried off much plunder
and many prisoners ; and shortly after Talbot succeeded
in taking Hereford and its castle, the King, who sought

to relieve the place, " departing without honour," but
he nominaUy deprived MUo of the constableship of
Gloucester, which he bestowed on WiUiam de Beau-
champ. An attempt was made at Whitsuntide in 1140 to
heal these lamentable contentions. Eobert, as delegate
from the Empress, met the Legate at a spot near Bath,
and also the Archbishop, who represented King Stephen,
but they could arrive at no agreement.
Meanwhile a dashing Fleming in the Earl's pay,
Eobert Fitzhubert (said to have been the ancestor of
the family of the Morgans, long and weU known in
Bristol), seized upon the castle at Malmesbury, and
there withstood an eight days' siege by King Stephen
and his army, making eventuaUy his own terms on
deUvering it up to the royal authority. The same bold
soldier then made a raid by night from Bristol on
Devizes, The royal castle, which is said to have been
one of the finest in Europe, surrounded by an Impreg
nable waU, he carried by surprise by means of ladders
of leather, which he attached by hooks to the battle
ments. A few of the King's party, aroused by the
noise, escaped into the tower, but being without provi
sions had speedUy to surrender ; the rest were taken
prisoners in their sleep.
Earl Eobert, hearing of this success, sent his son
with a numerous body of soldiers ; but Fitzhubert
turned traitor, drove him from the gates with igno
miny, declaring that he had taken the castle from the
King not to deliver it up to one more powerful, but to
keep it for himself. He then sought to entrap John,
the governor of Marlborough Castle, who Ustened to his
proposals for a league of amity between them for their
mutual benefit ; and craftUy enticing the traitor within
his fortress, shut the gates upon him, thrust him into
prison, and then saUying out upon the forces, with
which Fitzhubert had hoped to obtain possession of the
place, he defeated them, taking many prisoners and
pursuing the fugitives to the very waUs of Devizes,
John surrendered his prisoner to the Consul, who
carried him to Devizes, where he hanged him and his
two nephews in sight of his men, who stiU held the
castle, Hervey, the son-in-law of the King, induced
them to yield it to him for Stephen, and he bravely
held it untU being surrounded and besieged by aU the
people of the neighbouring country he was forced to
abandon it and to fiy the kingdom. The fearful inter
necine strife was carried on for months with varying
success in different parts of the kingdom, but the brunt
of the war was in our own neighbourhood, and in it
the garrison of Bristol generaUy bore a part.
43. By the end of the year the Empress' cause was

A.D. 1141.

MAUD BESIEGES WINCHESTER.

83

in the ascendant in the West of England ; Bristol and
Gloucester became the head-quarters of her army, and,
together with many other parts of the kingdom, acknow
ledged her as Queen, but London remained firm in its
aUegiance to Stephen.
On February 2nd, 1141, a great battle was fought
at Lincoln, in which Stephen was unfortunate, " He
fought Uke a Uon as long as he had three fighting men
about him ; but at last being left alone, and the handle
of his battleaxe being broken, he caUed upon the Earl
of Gloucester and surrendered to him,"
Several reasons are given why he was not put to
death, notably this one — that prisoners being the
property of their captors, Eobert was too generous to
put him to death or to surrender him to the vengeance
of Maud, Scandal, however, averred that the Empress
had been the paramour of Stephen, who was in reaUty
the father of Prince Henry. It is but just to say that
there is no warrant for the insinuation, nor need we
look further we think, than the close bond of consan-
guinity between the chief factors to account for the
King's Ufe being spared. He was brought before the
Empress at Gloucester, and from thence conveyed to the
tower of Bristol Castle, where he was confined, ' ' He
was at first treated UberaUy ; but afterwards, on account
of the insolence of some persons, who said openly and
reproachfuUy that it was not right for the Earl to keep
the King otherwise than as they chose, and Ukewise
because it was said that he had been found more than
once beyond his appointed custody, especiaUy by night,
his guards being either deceived or gained over, he was
secured by iron chains,"^
44. The true reason for this indignity appears to have
arisenfromMaud'sowiJiaughty and overbearing conduct;
it seems to have been an innate propensity in the blood
of the EoUos to be incapable of bearing success pru
dently. The whole kingdom, except Kent, had after the
battle of Lincoln acknowledged her as Queen, London
threw open its gates to her, and invited her thither to
be crowned ; but her insufferable hauteur and arrogance
and her extortionate demands for money alienated the
citizens, AU the beUs of the city rang out. " Clubs !
'prentices ! Clubs ! " was the cry, and the insurrection
became sudden and general. Maud was just sitting
down to dinner when the clamour and din alarmed her ;
she and her barons flew to horse, and had scarce passed
the waUs when the infuriated people broke into their
hotels, which they plundered and destroyed on finding
that their prey had vanished. The Empress, attended
by her brother, escaped with difficulty to Oxford, and
thence to Gloucester to her friend MUo, whence she
1 Will, Malmes., IL, 187,

immediately sent orders to load Stephen with chains.
Gathering an army, she went towards Winchester, and
on her way, at Oxford, in acknowledgment of the
many services she had received at the hand of MUo,
created him Earl of Hereford, The patent, which is
supposed to be the first specimen of that kind of crea
tion, is printed in Eymer's Foedera, and it gives as a
reason that it is granted " as a reward for his services,
particularly because by his assistance she holds King
Stephen prisoner in Bristoll," The witnesses to the
patent are David (King of Scotland), Eobert (Earl of
Gloucester), &c,, &c, Stephen's queen, with WUliam
d'Ypres, his general, had on Maud's flight from London
marchedthither and
assumed the
command. 45. Mean
whUe impe
rious Maud
would, a-
gainst her
b r other's
judgment,march on
Winchester
to be re
venged on
the bishop
who had, as
might be
exp e ct ed,
deserted her
cause for
that of King
Stephen, his
own brother.
The bishop escaped on a racehorse at the further
gate as the Empress entered the royal city ; she then
besieged his strongly fortified house and castle built in
the centre of the town. The earl came to her assistance,
and being master of the royal castle and the town, they
surrounded the bishop's fortress and vigorously as
saulted it.
Ere they could take it Stephen's queen, with her
army supplemented by a thousand Londoners armed
with helmets and coats of mail, engirdled the city.
Here was a strange spectacle, an army within a town
besieging a fortress, but itself besieged from without
by a superior force. The bishop's men in defending
their position unhappily set fire to the town, and two
abbeys were involved in the destruction.

Remains of s^ipposed Latrine on the Frome Wall.

84

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1142,

So strictly was Maud blockaded that no provisions
could be brought in, and after enduring a siege for
seven weeks, being unable to take the bishop's
castle, she determined to force, if possible, a passage.
Her retreat was interrupted, her forces dispersed, and
Eobert was taken prisoner and placed in the castle of
Eochester, Maud fled to LudgershaU Castle, and thence,
dressed as a man, on horseback she reached the castle
of Devizes, but even there, not considering herself safe,
and being almost dead with fatigue, she was laid out
on a bier and tied down like a corpse ; and so escaping
the notice of her enemies she reached Gloucester,
"MUo, the constable, after having been surrounded,
made a wonderfid escape, and arrived at Gloucester
almost naked, glad to
have saved his life . " j---
alone." His silver seal,
thrown away in his
flight, was found in
1795 in a field near
Andover, in a direct line
between Winchester and
LudgershaU, ^
46. Maud in her
extremity, was glad to
exchange the captive
king for Earl Eobert.
Stephen left in Bristol
as hostages for the safe
return of the consul his
queen, son, and two of
his leading men. On his
arrival at Winchester he
released the earl, who
left his son with the
king as security for the
safe conduct of his
queen and her party from Bristol. At Midsummer of
1142, Eobert crossed to the continent to solicit from
Geoffry of Anjou, Maud's second husband, succour for
her failing cause in England, Anjou was, however, iu
an unsettled state, and the earl, who had no great
affection for his wife, was indisposed to commit himself
to a foreign war. He aUowed his eldest son by Maud —
Prince Henry — to leave for England with his uncle, in
order to form a fresh raUying point for the adversaries
of Stephen, 47. The young prince, who was about nine years of
age, landed at Wareham in November, 1142, and the
consul immediately commenced operations by besieging
its castle, hoping thereby to create a diversion and
1 Seyer, I., 439.

reUeve the Empress Maud, who was closely besieged in
the castle at Oxford by Stephen himself, Stephen was,
however, too wary to be thus drawn from the prey which
was all but in his power. He knew that the garrison
was straitened for provisions and fuel, and that there
was every probability of an early forced surrender, so
he declined the chaUenge.
In her extremity Maud had recourse to another
daring exploit. It was Christmas time, the ground was
covered with snow, so dressing herself and three soldiers
in white Unen garments they ventured through the
enemy's guard, crossed the Thames on the ice, and on
foot, clambering over hedges and ditches, she reached
the castle of WaUingford, twelve miles distant, the
same night. One cannot
but sympathise with a
woman so fertUe in ex
pedients, so resolute in
adversity, and so coura
geous in the midst of
defeat and disaster,
48. The Consul Eo
bert was soon by his
sister's side, cheering
her with a brief visit
from her son, whom he
conveyed for safety to
Bristol, as the strongest
place in his power.
Although literature was
generaUy despised by
the barons, who deemed
reading and writing
mere frivolities only fit
for ecclesiastics, Earl
Eobert, who was a man
far in advance of his
age, and a friend to men of letters, placed his nephew.
Prince Henry, in the house, and under the care of,
Matthews, a schoolmaster, "to be instructed and
trained up in civil behaviour." The house which
tradition pointed out as the residence of the prince
was on the south side of Baldwin street, and near to,
if indeed it was not, the residence of Eobert Fitz
harding, There is every reason to believe that the
great intimacy which afterwards existed between Henry
as king and Eobert Fitzharding commenced when the
prince was at school in the house just outside the south
fosse of the town. Hoveden says that the prince was
educated in the court of David, King of Scotland, and
Seyer thinks it probable that the royal lad may have
visited that country and spent a short time with the

Entrance to Old Berliclcy Casth:.

A.D. 1U,3.

BATTLE OF WILTON.

85

king, who was his mother's uncle. But it wiU be
remembered that Mile's patent as Earl of Hereford
was witnessed at Gloucester by King David, and this
could scarcely have been done by proxy. It is pro
bable that the Scottish king remained here long
enough at least to welcome his grand nephew, and that
hence arose the report.
According to general estimation, Eobert Fitzharding,
was at this period busily engaged in buUding the
monastery of St, Augustine ; at its consecration Prince
Henry was not present, being in Anjou,
Smyth's supposition that the founder of the Berkeley
famUy and his future king were school-fellows must
be discarded ; the discrepancy in their ages is too great.
Eobert Fitzharding's eldest son, Maurice, was, we
beUeve, 25 years of age when Prince Henry came to
Bristol. It is quite possible, however, that some of
the younger branches of the famUy may have been his
school-feUows, certain that they would be his daily
companions, and not at aU improbable that their house
was the home of the prince during his four years'
sojourn in Bristol.
Eobert Fitzharding was rich ; he held the first posi
tion in the town, was in high favour with the Empress
and her brother the Consul, and his material support of
their cause both in money and men deserved the recog
nition and honours which were afterwards bestowed
upon him by a grateful sovereign.
49, And now the bitter strife between the contend
ing parties acquired fresh force, untU in July, 1143,
Stephen was thoroughly defeated in a pitched battle at
WUton, and the Earl of Gloucester returned victorious
with great spoU and innumerable prisoners to Bristol.
Chief amongst his captives was William de Martel,
whom he committed to close confinement until he forced
hiTn to surrender the castle of Sherborne, of which he
was the lord.
Victory having once more sided with the Empress,
Eobert, assisted by his active and courageous sons, re
duced the southern and western half of the kingdom,
and Bristol flourished as the metropoUs of the West.
50, From a work written by a Norman ecclesiastic
in 1140, we learn that, ruinous as the war was to many
parts of the country, the prosperity and trade of Bristol
and its neighbourhood were very great. The author
was bitterly opposed to the party of the Empress, and
his statement is therefore not Ukely to be overcoloured.
Speaking of the vale of Gloucestershire, he says : —
" The whole land is rich in corn and abundant in fruits,
in some places by the favour of nature only, in other
places by the skiU of cultivation, so that it holds out an
inducement to labour, even to the idle, where the pro

duce is likely to be hundredfold. You may see the
public ways covered with fruit trees, not planted, but
growing by the nature of the soU alone,
"The ground naturaUy throws itseU up into fruits,
and those far surpassing others in appearance and
flavour, most of which do not decay before the year,
but do their duty until the time of their successors.
This county is thicker in the number of its vineyards
fvinearumj, richer in their produce and pleasanter in
taste than the other provinces of England, for the
wines do not distort the mouths of those who drink
them with bitter sharpness, for they yield little to the
French wines in sweetness. There are innumerable
towns, exceUent abbeys and frequent viUages, to aU
which is added as its glory the river Severn, than which
none in this country is broader in its channel, more
violent in its flood, more abounding in fish by art. In
it the daily fury of the waters, which I know not
whether to caU an indraught or a whirlpool of waves,
comes in with great force, sweeping up the sands from
the bottom and piling them in a heap ; but it does not
extend further than the bridge (of Gloucester), and
sometimes it even overflows the banks and retires victo
rious, after having violently surrounded part of the
land. Unlucky is the ship which it strikes on the side.
SkUful sailors, when they see this hggra coming, for so
they caU it in English, turn their ship towards it, and
cutting it in the middle, avoid its violence. In the same
valley is a very celebrated town by name Bristow, in
which is a port, the resort of ships coming from Ireland,
Norway, and other countries beyond sea ; lest a region
so fortunate in nature's riches should be destitute of
the commerce of foreign wealth," '^
This is evidently the testimony of an eye-witness.
The graphic description of the tidal inflaences is true to
the letter ; but either climatic influences have changed,
or the vine whose fruit would sufficiently ripen in the
open air of this part of England, has died out, for at
the present day we question if a single bottle of drink
able wine could be made from aU the grapes that ripen
out of doors throughout the whole county.
51, The next item of importance pertaining to our
history is the relief of Tetbury castle, which was be
sieged and its outworks captured by King Stephen,
when Earl Eobert, at the head of a large body of
cavaby and a "cruel and unconquerable army of in
fantry, composed of Welshmen and Bristowans, re
lieved it. The barons who were with the King, hearing
that such a numerous swarm of enemies was come
together against them, and fearing the uncontroUable
1 Gul'. Malmes', de gest', Pontif. Angl',, lib'. 4, f, 161,
sect. 59. Seyer, I., 446.

86

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1146.

barbarity of the Welshmen and the disorderly multi
tude of the Bristowans, a wonderful number of whom
the Earl of Gloucester was leading in close array to faU
on them, dropped prudent counsel into the King's ear,
and advised him to break up the siege for a time and
remove his army to some other place where it might
be wanted, because it was inadvisable to expose his
squadron of cavalry to such a host of prize-fighters on
foot, for whom it was not a match, &c., &o." We can
understand the prudence of the suggestion. "Discre
tion was evidently the better part of valour," but we
cannot quite comprehend why a squadron of knights in
mailed armour should retire before a disorderly multi
tude, or how this mob of disorderly Bristowans could be
correctly described as being led in "close array" and
presenting so formidable a front that the royal army
dared not to stand their approach.
The Earl had made Philip, one of his sons, gover
nor of the castle of Cricklade, in which he had placed
a strong garrison. This young man is described as
being " outrageously violent against the King's party,
rash in things that ought not to be attempted, and con
summate in aU kinds of wickedness."^
52. He persuaded his father to build a castle that
should overawe Oxford, which was then held bj'
Stephen's forces. The Earl, coUecting a large body of
cavalry and a sufficient force, went to Farringdon, and
buUt there a strong castle with waUs and bulwarks, in
which he placed the flower of his army. The Eoyalists
at Oxford flnding their supplies cut off, and themselves
straitened for provisions, sent to the King for aid,
Stephen coUected an army, besieged and by treachery
took the new fortress, and once more his fortune was in
the ascendant. Philip deserted his father's cause, re
nounced his aUegiance to his aunt, received bribes from
Stephen and did him homage, entering into his service,
in which he became distinguished for his cruelty towards
his former associates and the rancour he displayed to
wards his father's people and lands, wasting the latter
by pillage until the fertile vales became a very desert.
The Earl of Chester, the Consul's son-in-law, also
forsook the standard of Maud, and being in command
of the North of England, made his peace with Stephen,
and actively assisted him in the war ; but the King
having no confidence in the traitor, forced from him by
imprisonment the surrender of the castles which he
held, whereupon on the recovery of his liberty Chester
returned to his aUegiance to Maud. No man's word
apparently could be taken ; every one's honour lay
open to suspicion; selfishness and greed, cruelty and
murder, the might of the strong hand to take and to
1 Gesta 'Steph,'

hold, formed the law of the castle-ridden districts in
England. The barons were unlettered, ignorant and
brutal, and neither king nor earl was able to restrain
the atrocities of his followers, or to punish acts of law
less violence committed against his express command
or in violation of his own plighted word.
PhUip, for instance, seized during a truce, Eeginald,
Earl of Cornwall, when he was on his way to accom
pany the Empress to an interview with King Stephen,
which had been agreed upon in the interests of the
kingdom ; and the King, greatly offended as he justly
was, had much difficulty in inducing him to set his
prisoner at liberty,
53. On the other hand, Walter, the brother of the
Earl of Hereford, lay in wait for Eoger de Berkeley, a
quiet, harmless man, connected with himseK by mar
riage, whom, seizing unawares, he stripped naked, and
so brought him, bound with cords, before his own
castle of Dursley, where, fastening a cord around his
neck three times, he hung him up, to give him a fore
taste of the death he should die unless he consented to
surrender his castle. Unable to obtain his wish, Walter
carried off the half -dead body of his prisoner to endure
the further torment of a prison.
54. Eobert, the great Earl, Uke Saul among the
prophets, stands out nobly above his contemporaries ;
his one great crime in the minds of his ecclesiastical
accusers was his deliberate, consistent and heroic
defence of the interests of Maud and her son. Prince
Henry, against the usurper Stephen, whom the Church
for reasons of its own considered the Lord's anointed.
It is surprising, considering their hatred of the man,
and their consciousness that aU opposition to Stephen
would have been futUe but for Eobert's great talents,
his vast possessions and his unbounded sacrifices in
men and money to maintain his sister's cause, that
comparatively so Uttle obloquy has been thrown upon
his name, and that his memory is not blackened by
their prejudiced pens to a much greater degree.
Grown weary of the turmoU and ingratitude of
chUdren and so-caUed friends, and seeing that Stephen's
cause was once again successful, Eobert accompanied
his nephew. Prince Henry, in 1146, to the castle of
Wareham, where he deUvered him into the hands of
a body of soldiers whom Geoffry of Anjou, the Prince's
father, had sent to receive him. The Earl hastUy re
turned to Bristol, where he was seized with a fever
which proved fatal on the last day of October, 1147.
He was by his own direction buried in a stone tomb of
green jasper in the choir of the priory of St, James,
which he had founded at Bristol, He had many chU
dren, but most of them turned out ill. His eldest son

A.D. 1152,

PRINCE HENRY LANDS IN ENGLAND.

87

and heir, WiUiam, is, however, mentioned by aU writers
with approbation,
Maud having lost her right hand by the death of
her devoted brother, weary of war, ceased the struggle
for a barren and blood-stained crown, joined her hus
band in Normandy, and the land had rest. The strife
between the two great rivals for the throne was for the
time over ; but the barons on both sides held their
castles and towns independently of either Empress or
King, and lived upon the services, the contributions and
the plunder of the country round about them, so that
it is doubtful whether the country people fared any
better for the change,
55, Prince Henry, invited over by the barons of his
party, crossed from the Continent in May, 1149, and
England was once again fiUed with the noise of war;
but after receiving the accolade at the hands of his
great uncle, David, King of Scotland, at Carlisle, he
and his knights returned to Normandy, having been in
England about eight months, part of which he spent
in Bristol, He landed once again with a fieet of thirty-two
ships and a large army, in the Octave of Epiphany,
1152, and made Bristol his head-quarters, arranging
his plans and gathering his friends. His father,
Geoffry, was dead, but his mother, Maud, being still
living, he merely claimed as heir to the throne under
his correct titles as Henry, Duke of Normandy and
Earl of Anjou, The war now broke out, at first with
aU its old virulence and ferocity ; but, happily for
Bristol and the wasted kingdom, the chief barons had
grown weary of fighting, and they forced a reconcUia-
tion between the contending princes.
56, A general assembly of the nation was caUed at
WaUingford on the 7th November, in which the king
acknowledged Duke Henry's hereditary rights to the
throne, whUst the duke consented to Stephen's reigning
for his life ; this was confirmed by the oath of both
princes, and ratified by the bishops and chief barons.
By the conditions it was enacted that all possessions
seized by invaders should return to the old and lawful
possessors as in the days of good King Henry, and that
the castles, to the number of 126, erected during this
civU war should be destroyed. The king and duke then
made a pacification with pubUc entry into London, Win
chester, Oxford, Dunstable, Canterbury, and Dover,
from whence Henry crossed to his dukedom in Nor
mandy. Thus terminated the miserable strife which was as
detrimental to the prosperity of the kingdom as the
Danish raids, or the Norman invasion had proved in
earlier days. Nevertheless, the period is particularly

interesting to the citizens of Bristol, because the town
was for years the seat of government and the principal
residence of one of the contending princes. For it
may be said generaUy, although with some exceptions,
that from the first breaking out of the war to the end
of the conflict, the eastern part of the kingdom with
London for its metropolis adhered to Stephen ; while
the western part maintained the cause of Maud and
her son, having Bristol for its capital ; insomuch that
King Stephen himself in his convention^ with Duke
Henry acknowledges this division of the kingdom, " It
is agreed," he says, "that I shaU execute the office of
royalty in the whole kingdom of England, as weU in
the duke's part as in my own part."
57. One historian^ caUs the war "the war of Bris
towa; " and it seems probable that if this state of affairs
had continued much longer under so incoherent a go
vernment as that of Stephen's was, something like
another Heptarchy would have been established by the
earls and barons of that age. At least we may say,
that had there been a mountain barrier capable of con
version into a scientific frontier between the eastern and
western portions of the realm, England would have
been converted into two separate and independent king
doms. The following table of dates we take from
Seyer, L, 462 :—
1, Thefirst year King Stephen's reign begins December 26, 1135
2. The empress with her brother came to
Bristol ...  September, 1139
3, After two months and more she went to
Gloucester  1139
4, Stephen brought prisoner to Bristol ...Feb. 1140-1, i.e., 1141
5, Consul Robert taken prisoner  September, 1141
6, The king and earl exchanged  November 1, 1141
7, Prince Henry, 9 years old, came first to
England  November, 1142
8. He quitted England after four years' re
sidence in Bristol  114G
9. The Earl of Gloucester, Consul Robert,
died  November, 1147
10, The empress quitted England  1148
11, Prince Henry, 16 years old, came into
England after an absence of two years
and four months  May, 1149
12, He returned to Normandy  January, 1150
13. He married Queen Eleanor of Guienne
at Bordeaux  Whitsuntide, 1151
14. He returned to England as Duke of
Normandy  January, 1152
15, He was at Devizes  1152
16, Peace between Henry and Stephen ... November 7, 1153
17, Henry quitted England  Easter, 1154
18, Stephen died  October 25, 1154
The first six and the last six dates are certain, there
is but little doubt as to the correctness of the remainder,
58. The Bristol pennies of Stephen are rude, imper-
1 Eymer's Ftedera, 1153. ' Annals Waverley,

88

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1154.

feet in execution, and very scarce, as might be expected ;
his hold on Bristol was so brief, that the wonder is that
we have any monetary token of his existence in connec
tion with the town. " One penny in the British Museum
has obverse, full face bust of the king, crowned, holding
a sceptre in his right hand. Legend, -|- stiefne. Reverse,
double cross with peUets
on the ends, and a peUet
in the centre ; all inside
a tressure, with fleurs-
de-lys in the angles of
the cross ; a beaded in
ner circle around. Le
gend (imperfect), , , , .
LM. N BR, Two other pennies of Bristol were found
near Dartford, Kent, in 1826. The flrst bears, obverse,
profUe bust to the right crowned, a sceptre in front of
the face. Legend, sh , , , . ee . . , Reverse, a cross
within a tressure fleuree, enclosed by a beaded inner
circle. Legend, -f- fa beist. The other penny is
similar to the last, but reads on the reverse vedan , . . ,
B , , , s. There is also a coin of Eobert, Earl of Glou
cester, which is the earUest example of an English coin
with a flgure on horseback, in a conical bonnet, armed

Silver Penny of Stephen.

with a sword, which is rather expressively though
quaintly executed. It has the legend eobeetvs ....
ST , L, Reverse, a cross patee, upon a cross fleuree the
letter d and a number of ornaments in place of the
legend. This coin, which we believe to be of Bristol
manufacture, is ex
tremely rare, only
two or three speci
mens being known.
There is a very curi
ous coin of this reign
in existence, which
is generaUy supposed
to represent Stephen and Henry. Hawkins thinks
Stephen and MatUda shaking hands, with a sceptre
between them ; on the reverse, instead of letters there
are only ornaments, such as roses round the ordinary
cross. This coin is exceedingly rare, and there is
nothing to prove where it was struck.
There are also several varieties of the coins of Maud
the Empress, which have, obverse, profUe to the right
with sceptre. Legend, -f iia . ild. iM(peratrix). Re
verse, cross with fleurs-de-lys in the angles, within a

Khieri's Pen\

tressure of four.

Legend, tvec , . l de b .
1 Henfrey, 348.

CHAPTER V.

-^ T^E i PL:«I]T^{JE1]ET f E^^, ^

THE HOUSE OF ANJOU,— PART I,

I, Change of Dynasty; some of its results. 2. The first Bristol Charter extant. 3, The Bridge of
Bristow. 4. Intimate connection of Bristol and the West of England with Ireland. 5. Henry gives Dublin
to his men of Bristow. 6. John, Earl of Mortain, and the unique Charter which he gave to Bristol.
7. Other Baronies than John's within the Burgh. 8. The ancient privileges of the Burgesses unpalatable to
the Nobles and Clergy. 9. William, Earl of Gloucester, conveys land in Lewin's Mead and Broadmead.
ID. Jewry. Sturmis, the Jew, and the Burgesses. 11. Bristol Pennies of Henry II. 12. A brief History
of the Berkeley family. 13. Robert Fitzhardinge' s wealth and manors ; he becomes a feudatory Baron.
14. Berkeley Castle. 15. The alliance between the houses of Berkeley and Dursley. 16. Story of the
witch of Berkeley. 17. The descendants of Robert Fitzhardinge. 18. Thomas, Baron of Berkeley, hunts
in Kingswood Forest and on both banks of the Avon. 19. The third Thomas has the custody of King
Edward II. at Berkeley Castle. 20. Maurice, the fourth Baron of that name, has a thrifty wife. 21. Their
granddaughter Elizabeth claims the Castle and Manors. 22. Maurice, the fifth of that name, husband of a
daughter of Philip Mede, Mayor of Bristol, 1458-1461. 23. Accession of Richard. " The fair Maid of
Bristowe." 24. Marriage of Prince John to Hawise. 25. John holds Bristol Castle against the King.
26. Character given of the citizens of Bristol and other towns and cities by a writer of that age, 27. State of
the nation at the close of Richard's reign. 28. John succeeds to the throne. 29. He divorces Hawise; her
further history. 30. John goes to war with his nephew Arthur and with Philip of France. 31. The King's
visits to Bristol. 32. He loses his Continental possessions, and quarrels with the Pope. 33. The Interdict.
34. The King's repeated visits to Bristol. 35. The Scotch Princesses brought to Bristol Castle. 36. John
tortures Abraham, the Jew of Bristol, and is guilty of other great atrocities. 37. He imposes an illegal
tax on the Burgesses of the town. 38. The Pope excommunicates him. 39. John becomes " the Pope's
man," and surrenders his crown to the Legate. 40. The Barons refuse to follow him to France. 41. He
concludes an ignominious truce with Philip. 42. Archbishop Langton and William, Earl of Pembroke,
call a Council, which adopts the Charter of Henry I. The Barons arm. 43. John sends for twelve of
his liege men of Bristol to Trowbridge. 44. His concessions are too late. 45, He signs Magna Charta.
46. He is at Bristol fretting under the yoke. 47. The Barons offer the crown to Prince Louis of France.
48. John's death. 49. His house in Back street, Bristol. 50. His gifts of houses and land in Bristol
to the A bbey of Beaulieu.
[Vol. I.] G 2

90

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1218,

ITH the death of Stephen, we arrive at the
close of the direct line of the dynasty
founded by the Conqueror. Henceforth
the monarch would be as much English
as Norman. Henry II. , although the
son of Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of
Anjou, was the grandson of a niece
of Edgar AtheUng, The Norman
nationaUty, which had characterised the throne and
the nobUity, was graduaUy, by intermarriage, assum
ing a more composite character. The dark hues that
disfigured the victors in the 1 1th century, their un
bridled lust, remorseless cruelty, unscrupidous craft,
and brutal contempt of the English, had toned down.
Chivalry began to shine in its fantastic splendour, the
spirit of song awoke at the touch of the Troubadour,
daring thinkers sought in school and cloister to dive
into metaphysical and theological mysteries ; courtly
refinement, gorgeous pageantry, and architectural mag
nificence characterised the coming age. The Normans
had given " kings to our thrones, ancestors to our
aristocracy, clergy to our church, judges to our tribu
nals, rule and discipline to our monasteries, instruction
to our architects, and teachers to our schools." ^ " They
high-mettled the blood of our veins," ^ and by their
mUitary prowess they freed the land from the cruel
ravages of the piratical Northmen.
But amidst all the turmoU and tyranny of their
earUer riUe, the spirit of freedom was not whoUy ex
tinguished : the guUds, never suppressed, cherished it in
the towns, and the assessors upheld it in the country
districts. "We wUl only pay him (the king) such tax
as we have been wont to pay" was the tenor of the
speech of other burgesses than they of Exeter, The
men of Bristol made their own return to Domesday,
and then farmed the revenues for which the burgh was
Uable to the Crown, And those who read between the
lines of the celebrated Charter, which John, Earl of
Mortain, Lord of Bristol, gave to his burgesses (in which
there is not the slightest reference to the sovereign),
wherein the greater portion of the privileges are con
ceded as being rights antecedently enjoyed, and in
which the principle of local self-government is abund
antly recognised, wUl see that the Norman kings (except
when they levied by force of arms) did not, as a rule,
levy taxes in the towns at their own arbitrary wUl and
pleasure. They speak of the "aid whicli my Barons
gave me." They take a scutage of the knights, taUage
of the commerce, and hidage and cariicage from the
' Palgravc. ' Campbell.

land ; and although the voluntary principle may have
been little more than a shadow, yet it evidently existed.
Debates did arise as to the taxation. Churchmen and
Laics at times refused payment, and finaUy at Oxford,
in 1207, King John yielded the claim for which he had
striven and obtained from a national Council, a grant of
an aid of a thirteenth of aU chattels from the laity. So
also in 1218 the merchants of Bristol granted to Henry
III, six marks on the sack of wool, making no doubt a
virtue of necessity, but asserting the principle, no taxa
tion without consent. It was the same also in the country
districts. There the jurors who assessed the value of
the lands were chiefly old inhabitants (EngUsh), yeomen
and churl; their local evidence formed the basis for local
taxation. In effect the people of a district decided the
amount of the taxation the district had to pay. In their
corporate capacity these men would be more independent
than as individuals they could venture to be ; and as
time roUed on, and holdings and rateable values changed,
new jurors had to be sworn, untU it became a recognised
principle that the taxes of a town or district must be
fixed by the " good men " living therein. This became
the germ of the most Uberal provision in Magna Charta,
And herein we recognise the truth of the Laureate's
beautiful verse, when speaking of Britain, he terms it
" A land of settled government,
A land of just and old renown.
Where freedom broadens slowly down
From precedent to precedent." English Idylls, 96.
Henry II. married Eleanor, the divorced wife of
Louis VII. of France, and heii-ess of Guienne and
Poitou. They arrived in England on the 8th of
December, 1154. Henry was twenty-one years of age
when his reign commenced on the 26th of October, and
he was crowned at Westminster on the 17th of Decem
ber, 1155. He commenced his career by renewing the
charter granted to London by Henry I, It is a legiti
mate inference that he did the same for Bristol, the
home of his boyhood. In a charter, circa 1160,^ he
refers to such existing privileges. "Henry, King of
England, Duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, Earl of
Anjou, to aU barons, justices, sheriffs and other his
servants, English or Welsh, wisheth health. I grant
that my men that dweU in my fee in the Marsh, near
tlie bridge of Bristow, have their certain customs and
liberties, and quittances through aU England and Wales,
as my burgesses, and ' namehj, those in Bristotv, ' and through
wg land in the counttj of Gloucester, as my charter testifies;
'' Evans, 45.

A.D. 1162,

THE FIRST BRISTOL CHARTER EXTANT.

91

and I forbid that anyone do them any injury or re
proach upon this account,"'-
The originals of these charters, as weU as that of
Henry I., are lost, but from them it is clear that one of
the king's first acts in Bristol was akin to the favour he
had shown to the citizens of London,
2. The earliest charter extant in the Bristol archives
bears no date, but being signed, amongst others, by
" Thoma Kantuarensi," it must have been given between
Whitsuntide, 1162, and Becket's quarrel with the king,
which occurred very shortly after that date : —
' ' Henry, King of England, and Duke of Normandy and Aqui
taine, and Earl of Anjou, to archbishops, bishops, abbots, priors,
earls, barons, justices, sheriffs, and all the men of his land, [sends]
health. Know ye, that I have granted to my burgesses of Bristol,
that they shall be quit both of toll and passage and aU custom
throughout my whole land of England, Normandy and Wales,
wherever they shall come, they and their goods. Wherefore I
will and strictly command, that they shall have all their liberties
and acquittances and free customs fully and honourably, as my
free and faithful men, and that they shall be quit of toll and
passage and of every other custom : and I forbid any one to dis
turb them on this account contrary to this my charter, on forfei
ture of ten pounds. Witnesses, Thomas [Archbishop] of Canter
bury ; William, the king's brother ; Reginald, Earl of Cornwall ;
Roger, Earl of Hereford ; Patrick, Earl of Salisbury ; Richard de
Humet, constable ; Warin Fitzgerald, chamberlain ; Walter de
Hereford; John the Marshall. At Salisbury."
In this, as weU as in subsequent charters, reference
is repeatedly made to "the liberties, acquittances, and
free customs," antecedently enjoyed by the " burgesses."
One charter expressly mentions the fact, that these
"liberties, &c.," had been theirs from "time imme
morial." Goods in the 12th century were sold chiefly
in open market or fair, and the vendor was liable to an
arbitrary toU, imposed by the lord of the fee in which
the market or fair was held, and so on in every lordship
in which the goods were offered for sale. Passage,
(landing dues) and consuetudines, ^ fees claimed by the
king's servants, were heavy taxes upon commerce,
3. In 1164 Eobert Fitzhardinge granted and con
firmed "that my men, who dweU in my fee in the Marsh
near the 'Bridge of Bristow,' have theu* customs, liberties,
&c,, which the men of Bristow have, as our lord the
king granted unto them ; and I wUl that they remain
to them whole and full during my time, and that of my
heirs. Witness, Eichard, Abbot of St, Augustine ;
William, prior;" &c., &c. This charter was confirmed
by his son and successor, Maurice, who especiaUy names
these men in the Marsh as "his men of Eedcliff."^
1 Barrett, 663,
"* " Consuetudines,'' customary payments, or dues, regal or
ecclesiastical of various kinds, not quite analogous to our ' ' Cus
toms," " Little Red Book in the Council House, fo. 12, b.

The foregoing proves that Bristol had charter privi
leges antecedent to those granted to the tything or
township of Eedcliff, and also confiLrms the opinion that
a bridge of communication existed at the period in
which these letters patent were issued.
The wooden bridge of London was re-buUt of stone,
the work commencing in 1176 and was finished in 1205,
If the above documentary evidence be not sufficient to
prove that a similar structure of wood connected, in the

Bristol Bridge. From

12th century, the opposite shores of the Avon, it is
strongly corroborated in our opinion by a relic which
was discovered when the first stone bridge, built 1247,
was pulled down. The stone piers were solid and sound,
in fact they support the present structure, but in examin
ing them in 1747, the workmen, to theU great surprise,
found, embedded in the pier on the Eedcliff side of the
river, a siU of oak one foot square and forty feet long,
with two uprights near each end, nine inches square
and eight or nine feet high, morticed into the sUl,
These were, rightly we think, supposed by them to be
portions of the old wooden bridge, which had been buUt
in as binders to the stone work of 1247, It is neither a

92

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1172,

forced nor an unfair inference to suppose that just as
the Bristol burgesses of the 13th century copied within
forty years the bridge which had been built in London,
so their predecessors had copied the earUer structure of
wood, which for centuries had spanned the Thames until
it was burned in 1136,
The convenience of such a mode of connecting oppo
site sides of the river, the necessities of traffic, and of
daUy communication, and the ease with which such a
work could be accompUshed by a thriving, imitative,
busy, commercial people, across a river only 153 feet in
width, completely swamp the argument, if such it may
be caUed, " that because a wooden bridge is not men
tioned in those times of scant Uterature, therefore there
was none," We shaU refer again to this subject on a
future page.
4, In 1172 we find King Henry again conferring a
commercial favour in the form of a charter to the town
imder the foUowing circumstances : — Dermot Macmur
ragh, King of Leinster, who had taken refuge in Bristol
in 1167, with a retinue of sixty persons, having got into
serious trouble in Ireland, applied to Henry for assist
ance, promising that, if restored to his kingdom by his
aid, he would acknowledge him as his sovereign lord.
Dermot is said to have come to Bristol in 1167, and
to have been entertained by Fitzhardinge ; but WiUiam,
Earl of Gloucester and Lord of Bristol, was no knight
errant who would seek by force of arms to restore an
adulterous wrongdoer to his kingdom, and although the
Bristol burgesses appear not to have been unwUUng to
adventure capital in the expedition, they had no man
amongst them qualified and willing to take the com
mand. In the autumn of 1168 we find that Eichard de
Clare, surnamed Strongbow, Earl of Pembroke, took
command of certain forces that had been raised under
letters patent from King Henry, which authorised any
of his subjects to assist the banished king. Strongbow
was successful; he then married Eva, Dermot's daughter,
and at his death he assumed the royal authority in
Leinster, It is a notable circumstance that the dialect of the
West of England stUl lingers in certain parts of the
counties of Wexford and Waterford, The soft z instead
of the s may be recognised, as in zag (sea), zeven ; the
V, in voure, veeve, brekvast ; the cUi instead of t, in dhree
(three), dhen (ten), dhrashel (threshold), &c. There cannot
be much doubt but that this is a survival of the men
who joined Strongbow in conc[uering and colonising that
portion of Ireland.
Henry could not brook a rival; he commanded the
earl and his adherents to return to England, The

pseudo King of Leinster compUed, and did homage to
his liege lord, who, finding a fertUe kingdom torn
asunder by internal cUssensions, and awaiting a master,
determined to enter in and take possession.
In the year 1172 the king saUed for Ireland with a
numerous and disciplined force ; he took ship at Pem
broke, and landed at Waterford, From thence he
marched to DubUn, received the homage of the native
princes, restrained his army from excess, and won the
hearts of chieftains and people by his affabUity and
poUtic bonhomie.
5. Henry's poUcy was not immediate conquest, but a
display of power as their feudal superior, which should
pave the way for his ulterior design upon the kingdom.
Of the princes holding independent rule in Erin, those
of Ulster alone refused him homage. Both in money
and in men Bristol largely contributed to the success
of Strongbow's expedition, and now they did as much
for that of Henry, Hence the king, who seems to have
taken possession of Dublin, in which he continued from
November 11th untU the foUowing Lent, gave during
his residence there as a reward to his ' ' men of Bristow
my city of DubUn for them to inhabit. Wherefore I
wiU and strictly enjoin," he says, "that they may in
habit it, and hold it of my heirs well and peaceably,
freely and quietly, whoUy and fully, and honourably,
with aU the Uberties and free customs which the men of
Bristow have at Bristow and through my whole land."
(Signed at DubUn.) This most singular grant has
puzzled our historians, Littleton and Camden both
think that from some cause Dublin had been drained of
its population, and that Henry's policy was to people it
with friendly and staunch adherents. Nowhere would
he be more Ukely to find such than in the men who had
known him as a boy, and who gloried in him as their
king; the men who, with his attached and long-tried
liberal friend Fitzhardinge, had adventured their means
in his cause ; and, above aU, the men who for centuries
had monopolised the trade with Ireland, and conse
quently must have been famiUarised to the people of
the seaboard.
Such a point d'appui as Dublin — Waterford being
abeady secured by Strongbow — would, in the faithful
friendly hands of the Bristowans, be invaluable for the
success of the scheme Henry had in contemplation.
Hence arose a stUl closer connection between Dublin
and Bristol, Only twenty-eight years after the above
date we find a Mayor of DubUn, John de Taylbui-gh,
ratifying and witnessing the deed of sale of a house in
Mercate street (Merchant street), Bristol, to Peter le
Marte, of Bristol, "In Bristol, therefore," as Seyer
says, "began the political connection of England with

A,D, 1185,

HENRY GIVES DUBLIN TO HIS MEN OF BRISTOW.

93

Ireland,"^ which has with many vicissitudes endured for
seven centuries, Henry avowedly made no conquests,
but on his return to England he produced from Pope
Adrian IV, (Nicholas Breakspear, an Englishman, and
a personal friend of the king) a special BuU dated
December, 1156, under which he claimed to be sole
monarch of Ireland, So that we gather that Henry's
purpose had been long cherished, that he knew how
"to bide his time" and seize upon the favourable op
portunity as soon as it occurred, and that Dermot's
appeal and Strongbow's success were, if not portions
of a pre-conceived plan, at the least fortunate accidents
converted by him into stepping stones to the assumption
of the Irish Crown by the kings of England,
Henry made a formal treaty with the King of Con-
naught (Eoderic O'Connor), whom he recognised as
head of the Irish princes, and who consented to pay
tribute to him. When Strongbow, who had been the
buttress of the English strength in Ireland, died in
1177, Henry obtained from Adrian's successor another
BuU, which enabled him to enfeoff either of his sons
in Ireland as its lord. This honour he conferred upon
his son, Prince John, who was then twelve years of age.
We give an extract from this BuU of Pope Alexander : —
"FoUowing in the steps of the venerable Pope Adrian,
we ratify and confirm the grant he made you of the
dominion of the kingdom of Ireland, saving to blessed
Peter and the most holy Church the annual pension of
a penny from each house in Ireland also, as in Eng
land,"^ Henry, however, sagaciously selected Hugh
de Lacy as lord deputy, who laboured most successfully
to reconcUe the Irish people to the interloping EngUsh,
De Lacy was recaUed in 1185, and on the 31st of
March in that year, in a councU at Oxford, the king
knighted his son Prince John, and invested him with
the Lordship of Ireland, Pursuing a contrary course
to that of his politic father, who had invited the chieftains
to his table and treated them with marked courtesy, this
vain young prince encouraged his extravagantly clad
and shaven attendants to mock at the homespun dresses
of the men who came to tender their fealty, and even
to pluck at the long beards worn by the Irish, Such
insolence met with its due reward. After squandering
a vast sum of money and losing the best part of his
army, John was obliged to return to England on the 31st
of December, leaving John de Courcy as his deputy,
6, It was on this occasion most probably that Prince
John, as Earl of Mortain and lord of Bristol, granted
the unique and celebrated charter which defines so
clearly the privileges of the freemen of Bristol, and
1 Seyer, I,, 495,
^ Creasy's Great Events, date 1172,

which has served for the pattern of several of our
subsequent charters.
Let us try to understand how it was that Prince
John, who was not at that date Earl of Gloucester,
could grant such a charter, and also endeavour to arrive
at an approximate date for the document.
When Eobert, the great Earl of Gloucester, died,
he was succeeded by his son, William, who, as Lord
of Bristow, held that castle and aU the landed estates,
and was, Uke his father, a supporter of Maud and her
son Henry, WUliam lacked the vigour and warlike
enterprise of his father, as wiU be seen from the fact
that his Castle of Cardiff, with a garrison of 120 soldiers
and many archers, was attacked by one of his rebeUious
Welsh vassals, "Ivor," a man of prodigious strength,
who secretly scaled the waUs with a few chosen foUowers,
and carried off the earl, the countess and their little son
into the woods, where they were kept untU they made
terms with the brave Welshman, Of WiUiam's pious
foundations, particulars may be found in our Ecclesi
astical HiSTOET, pp, 33-4. His elder son, Eobert, died
before him, and having only three daughters, Mabel,
Amice and Avicia ^ (Hawise in English), the king would
legaUy, the earl knew, have the wardship of them and of
his vast estate. WiUiam therefore, in 1175, made an
agreement with Henry that the king's youngest son
John, then about nine years old, should marry Hawise,
the earl's youngest daughter, if the Court of Eome would
allow it, they being third cousins, and that John should
become his heir in the earldom; the king undertaking to
make an allowance of £100 in rents (equal to perhaps
£2,000 present money value), to each of the other
daughters, Mabel, wife of Aumary, Earl of Evicreux,
and Amice, wife of Eichard, Earl of Clare, with a pro
viso that if WiUiam should hereafter have a legitimate
son, then that son and Prince John were to divide the
earldom between them, Hoveden (a contemporary)
adds that the earl also ' ' surrendered his castle of Bris
tow, of which untU now the king was never able to get
possession,"^ This was, no doubt, the earnest, de
manded by the king.
Earl WiUiam died in 1 1 83. Now, in the " Pipe EoU
of Gloucestershire 31 Henry II, [1184-5] rot, 10 b.," we
find that "Hugh Bardulf renders an account of £119
7s. 5d. from the issues of Bristou, and of the mills, and
of the fairs ; , , , and for hiring a house at Bristou,
where the king's rents are received, lOs.; and expended
in the livery of the clerk who coUects the king's rents
at Bristou, 60s. lOf?. ; , , , and expended in the repair
of the castle of Bristou ; and for hiring carpenters, and
'¦ Not Isabella as Seyer states.
'' Hoveden, 544.

94

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1185.

ipiiaiiSiiaeii'diiiiii

¦¦¦¦MIMMMM^

ff!iMW«lliiliillliil»

o, Hi!;li street, ?). M,^lTPort Strert. r. Wine Str. Tt. d Broad Ktrei-t, with the Gnililli.ill. c. Small Street /. Com .-llreet a
I; I'rorae Bridge. /^; Site of .St Stephen's Chureh, not then hullt. I. Present Site of St Petei'a Chm-rh. iii. Castle built hy William tli.

The Pithily Eridge, h. Bridewell Bridge.

the hottorn of Corn Street (conjeetiiral, but certain), o. Baldwin Street. A Bastion, afterwards Newgate.
The Walls of the Burgh of Brlst'd in the time of .John, Earl of Mortai
for miUstones, and in repaUing houses throughout the
manors, £14 and 5 pence, by the king's ^\'i'it."^
The Tewkesbiu-y MS. says Henry detained the lands
in his hands six years,- another gives the period as
eight years.* This refers, we think, to the Bristol
castle and lands, which, if farmed to Bardulf for eight
years, would bring us to about the period 1184-5, when,
' Seyer, I., 503. " Monast., I., 155. " Lei, Itin., 6, 80-4.

m the Conqueror (conjectui'al). n. A Bridge at
From Seyer.
giving up possession to Prince John, he claims the
above expenses from the crown.
The charter we have referred to was not signed by
John, as Earl of Gloucester, but only by his title of
John, Earl of Mortain, and is granted to "his" burgesses
of Bristol, he must therefore have been Lord of Bristol,
although, as we shaU see, he was not Earl of Gloucester
until 1189, Moreover the document is witnessed by

A,D, 1185,

THE EARL OF MORTAIN'S CHARTER TO BRISTOL.

95

Maurice de Berkeley, who died on the 16th of June,
1189, so that it must have been granted between the
time when John ceased to be a minor, March 31st,
1185, and the above-named date.
This charter became an ensample for other towns,
for instance in 4 Eichard I. , Earl John grants ' ' to my
burgesses of Lancaster aU the liberties which I have
granted to the burgesses of Bristol." '^ The reason
why the charter was sought may be found in the fact
that "in 1184 the burgesses of Bristol paid a fine of
£50 to have respite that they might not plead without
the waUs of their town tUl the return of the king into
England, who was then gone into Normandy," " this
was evidently before the charter of John, which would
appear to have been given in consequence of this appeal
to the king, who returned to England on June 13th,
1184. Seyer places it aboid 1188, We are strongly
inclined to the opinion that John's futile expedition to
Ireland and lavish expenditure in 1185, enabled the
burgesses to obtain such ample concessions and ac
knowledgment of their long enjoyed privUeges. The
charter was granted to "my burgesses of Bristol," and
runs as foUows : —
" John, Earl of Moreton, to all his men and friends ot France
and England, Welsh and Irish, present and future, [sends] health.
Know ye, that I have granted, and by this present charter have
confirmed to my burgesses of Bristol, dwelling -within the walls
and without, as far as the boundary of the town, that is to say,
within Sandbrooke, and BeweU, and Brightnee bridge, and the
spring in the way near Aldebery of Knolle, all their liberties and
free customs, as well freely and completely (or more so) as they
ever had them in my time, or in the time of my predecessors.
But the liberties which they granted to them are these, viz. , ' that
no burgess of Bristol shall plead or be impleaded out of the walls
of the town in any plea, except pleas relating to foreign tenures,
which do not belong to the hundred of the town : and * that they
shall be quit of murder within the bounds of the town : And ° that
no burgess shall wage duel, unless he shall have been appealed for
the death of any stranger, who was killed in the town and did not
belong to the town : And " that no one shall take an inn within the
1 Seyer, I,, 514. ' Barrett, 664.
' The Tolzey Court exercises this privilege at the present time,
* If a man had been slain, and the murderer was unknown, the
Lord imposed a fine upon the town ; the innocent sufl'ered whilst
the guilty might possibly escape.
'^ A mode of trial introduced by the Normans to supersede the
ancient method of trial by jury. Heaven was supposed by it to
give the victory to the innocent ; practically it gave it to the man
most skilled in the use of arms. This law, from which Bristol was
in 1185 exempted, was only repealed in the kingdom generally in
1819, by Act of Parliament.
" The old view of frankpledge by which the community to
which a man belonged was answerable for his conduct was con
firmed, and the king's marshall was prohibited from granting
licenses by which men might open an hospitium, [boarding-house or
inn], in which men might live in the town in defiance of the ancient
custom. No other jurisdiction than that of the people was hence
forth to exist within the walls, " This was local option,"

walls by assignment or by livery of the Marshal against the mil
of the burgesses : And ^ that they shall be quit of toll and lastage
and pontage, and of all other customs throughout my whole land
aud power : And ^ that no one shall be condemned in a matter of
money, unless according to the law of the hundred, viz., by for
feiture of forty shillings : And that the said hundred-court shall
be held only once in the week : And " that no one in any plea shall
be able to argue his cause in miskenning : And that they may
lawfully have their lands and tenures and mortgages and debts
throughout my whole land, whoever owes them [any thing] : And
with respect to lands and tenures which are within the town, that
they shall be held by them duly according to the custom of the
town : And * that with regard to debts which have been lent in
Bristol, and mortgages there made, pleas shall be held in the town
according to the custom of the town : And that if any one in any
other place in my land shall take toll of the men of Bristol, if he
shall not restore it after he shall be required, the Prepositor of
Bristol shall take from him a distress at Bristol, and force him to
restore it : And " that no stranger-tradesman shall buy within the
town of a man who is a stranger, leather, corn, or wool, but only of
the burgesses : And that no stranger shall have a wine-shop unless
iu a ship, nor shall sell cloth for cutting except at the fair : And
that no stranger shall remain in the town with his goods for the
purpose of selling his goods, but for forty days : And ° that no
burgess shall be confined or distraiued any where else within my
land or power for any debt, unless he be debtor or surety : And '
that they shall be able to marry themselves, their sons, their
daaghters and their widows, without the licence of their lords :
And that no one of their lords shall have the wardship or the
diapos^il of their sons or daughters on account of their lands out
of the town, but only the wardship of their tenements which be
long to their own fee, until they shall be of age : And ^ that there
^ Lastage, payable on goods sold by the last, 4000 lb. ; pontage,
bridge toll.
' Forty shillings was the limit.
' Miskenning, misprision, a mistake or clerical error in the
pleadings. * Debts contracted in Bristol recoverable in Bristol. If toll
were taken wrongly from a Bristol man in another town, the
Provost of Bristol was authorised to distrain upon any property,
found in Bristol, belonging to any man of the town wherein the
wrong was done.
° A residence, within the walls, of a year and a day, would
make him a Freeman. Hoveden says, in London the wine mer
chants sold their wines in their ships, or in cellars near the river,
and that by the licence thus given the land was filled with drink
and drunkards.
" Previously any Bristol man was liable to arrest in any town
wherein any other Bristol man owed money.
' The Lord often exercised his right of forbidding his tenants,
and mesne lords, and their families from marrying. He exacted a
fine for his consent, and at times proposed some disagreeable
marriage, in order to extort a fine for not enforcing its com
pletion. When a tenant or mesne lord died, the Lord had the
guardianship of their widows, children and property until they
came of age.
" Recognitio ; by which some understand there shall be no re
opening of cases that had been settled in court ; hence the rich
man could not by repeated litigation oppress the poor. It would
seem, however, to mean that there should be no Assizes held in
the town, but that all pleas should be held, as had been customary,
in the principal courts, under the Provost, See Stubbs' Constitu
tional History, I., 615.

96

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1185,

shall be no recognition in the town : And '' that no one shall take
tyne in the town unless for the use of the lord earl, and that
according to the custom of the town : And - that they may grind
their corn wherever they shall choose : And '¦' that they may have
all their reasonable guilds, as well or better than they had them
in the time of Eobert and his son William, Earls of Gloucester :
And * that no burgess shall be compelled to bayl any man, unless
he himself chooses it, although he be dwelling on his land. " We
also have granted to them all their tenures, within the walls and
without as far as the aforesaid boundaries, in messuages, in copses,
in buildings on the water and elsewhere, wherever they shall be
in the town, to be held in free burgage, viz. , by landgable service,
which they shall pay within the walls. We have granted also
that any of them may make improvements as much as he can in
erecting buildings any where on the bank and elsewhere, so it be
without damage of the borough and town : And that they shall
have and possess all void grounds and places which are contained
within the aforesaid boundaries, to be built on at their pleasure.
Wherefore I will and firmly enjoin, that my burgesses aforesaid of
Bristol, and their heirs, shall have and hold all their aforesaid
liberties and free customs, as is written above, of me aud my heirs,
as well and as compleatly (or more so) as ever they had them in
good times, well and peaceably and honorably, without any hind
rance or molestation which any one may offer them on that account.
Witnesses, Stephen Ridel, my chancellor ; William de Wennen ;
Roger de Dlau ; Roger de Newport ; Maurice de Berkeley ; Piobert,
his brother ; Harao de Valognes ; Simon de Marsh ; Gilbert Raft ;
WiUiam de la Faleyse ; Master Benedict ; Master Peter ; and
many others. At Bristol,"
^ Tyne was a certain quantity of ale for the use of the gar
rison in the Castle ; in Henry III.'s reign it was 24 gallons, but
how often it was levied we know not, probably each time that the
Lord visited the Castle.
' It was a cherished right of the Lord to oblige his vassals to
grind all their corn at his mill. This must have been a constant
source of exaction, for not only would they fear to complain of the
breadth of thumb in my Lord's miller in striking the bushel, but
the exact amount of each man's harvest would be known to his
dapifer or steward.
' The system of frankpledge, or neighbour standing surety
in all things for his neighbour, had resulted in power falling
largely into the hands of the wealthy and influential, hence the
Mariners Guild and Merchants Guild, in Bristol, virtually ruled
the borough. Now each craft was allowed the right to have its
own Guild, and one result of this charter was this, that the con
trol of trade passed gradually into the hands of the trade guilds,
which in 1449 numbered in Bristol 26 (Evans, 104), each of which
had a- hall ot its own ; there were other smaller guilds without
halls, and sundry religious guilds. These guilds had the right of
choosing each its own master or warden, and through these the
Provost or Maj'or. This democratic element was the death-ldow
to feudal power iu the borough.
¦' Under the Norman rule, if the lord of a fee were taken
prisoner in battle, he might compel his men to bail him or pay
his ransom. Now it is enacted that no man shall be compelled to
become bail for another, although he dwell on his land,
" All land aud tenements in the borough were now to be held
in free burgage, viz., by land-gable service, which was to be paid
within the walla. The burgesses were also permitted to build on
the river bank, and on void and waste places, within or without
the walls, in the township, so that they did not injure the de
fences. (Practically this led to the destruction ot the most ancient
wall, circa 1247, and the building of an outer embattled wall.)

7. It must not be supposed that aU the burgh be
longed, however, to John. Eobert Fitzhardinge men
tions lands in Bristol that belonged to three different
baronies. So also we read, " Terram quse est de feodo
Canonicorum de Keynsham : habendam cum omnibus
consuetudinibus, quse ad terram Baronise in BristoUo
pertinerent,"^ Over aU the lands, however, the king,
as original grantor, had supreme dominion ; nor could,
as a riUe, the barons tax the holders without the king's
precept. Mention is also made of existing guUds in
this charter, dating, as it shows, from his grandfather's
day, therefore unquestionably of Saxon custom and
usage, but probably of Eoman origin.
It is evident also that the town had already out
grown its original Umits, as mention is made of the
township as weU as the burgh {"sine damno burgi et
villcej. Seyer thinks that the " township of Bristol
was a separate Hundred, and not a part of Barton-regis
Hundred , , , a sejaaration which seems to be at
least as old as the Saxon age,"^ It is most Ukely
that Bristol and Barton-regis were withdrawn from the
jurisdiction of the hundred when they became a royal
possession : then the royal burghs became distinct from
the ancient crown demesne, though, no doubt, ori
ginally part of it. Most probably Swineshead Hun
dred originally extended up the country from the
Avon, in breadth from Clifton to Bitton, "The chief
part, if not the whole, of the liberties and franchises
granted, or rather confirmed by this charter, was not
the grajit of Earl John, but the ancient privUeges
and customs of this borough, as of many others, ex
pressly so called in the charter itself. It is to be
lamented that we have no means of ascertaining which
of them were granted by the Earls of Gloucester, which
by the ancient Saxon lords of the honour, and which
were derived without interruption from the practice of
the Eoman-Britons, as probably the com-ts were, and the
gilds, and perhaps much more than can be proved."*
8. We have, we trust not altogether without suc
cess, striven to show that these privUeges were Eoman
survivals : that these banded communities were nur
series of freedom, and were distinguished, Dr, Eobert-
son says, "by the name of ' liberfates.' " They were
odious to the nobles from the first, who foresaw what a
check they must prove to their power and domination.
Nor did the Church at all times lools upon them with
favour. " Guibert, Abbot of Nogent, calls them exe
crable inventions, by which, contrary to law and justice,
slaves withdrew themselves from that obedience which
they owed to their masters."''
1 Seyer, L, 506. " Ibid, 511. '' Ibid, 515.
¦* Robertson's Charles V., I., note xvi.

A.D, 1168,

JEWRY.

97

EeUeved by these confirmations of their lord, as
well as by the charters of their king, from the irregular
and tyrannical oppression of the barons, Bristol became
somewhat like the Free Hanse towns of the Continent,
its burgesses exercising a modified kind of Eepublican
government within their township, and their principal
men taking nominal rank as noblemen. This was the
case at least at York, Chester, Warwick, Feversham
and London,^ In 1377, in the poU-tax of that year,
each of the aldermen of London was rated as a baron, ^
the mayor as an earl, and aU other mayors of great
towns in England each as a baron.
In a charter granted to Bristol by Henry III,, 1256,
it is expressly stated that Bristol is to enjoy the same
privUeges as London. John Carpenter, in the Liber
Albus, 1419, says: — "The king's representative in
the city has the honour due to an earl, as well in the
king's presence as elsewhere. Hence it is that the
sword is borne before him, as before an earl, and not
behind him." In Bristol the sword is, and always has
been, borne before the mayor, who is the king's
escheator. Barrett says : — " The mayor, being the
king's lieutenant, giveth place to no man, but unto his
majesty. The Duke of Norfolk, the Earls of Leicester,
Warwick and Pembroke, the Lords President of the
Marches, the Justices of Assize, aU have and do give
place unto the mayor ; so also the bishop's predecessors
have ever done the Uke."-'' Six hundred and sixty-
four years undisturbed use is at least equivalent to any
charter. And Bristol's mayor stiU maintains the dig
nity, although he never claims the title of " my lord."
9. WUliam, Earl of Gloucester, must have been enor
mously wealthy. In 1168 he held above 260 knights'
fees,* He died in Bristol castle in 1183, on the 23rd
of November. He wUled to be buried in the Church
of St. James with his father, but he was privately con
veyed by night unto Keynsham abbey, of which he
was the founder. His large seal is 2^ inches in dia
meter, having a tiger passant before a taU, upright
plant. It is a matter of debate whether he did not at
the close of his life become an ecclesiastic. One of his
deeds, which conveys land in Lewin's Mead and Broad-
mead, furnishes the conjecture : —
" ' . . Clericus Com' Gloecestr', Omnibus hominibus suis
de Brist' , , salutem [omnibus amicis et fidelibus hominibus
suis de Eruist' salutem], Notum sit vobis, me dedisse et conces-
sisse Roberto fil' Suein et Christianse uxori ejus et eorum heredibus,
terram et domum quas Blachemannus [Blakemannus] tenet de me
in feria [feira] de Brist', et terram et domum, quas Lefwinus
[Lewinus] Lari tenet de me iu feria [feira] de Bruist' [Brist'] ; et
1 Lyttleton's Henry IL, IIL, 351,
" Fitz Alwyn's seal bore hawk on fist, the emblem of a baron.
" Barrett, 83. " Madox's Baronia Anglica, xv., 2.
[Vol, L]

terram & domum quas Hugo Margam [Morgon] tenet de me in
feria [feira] de Bruist' [Brist'] ; et illam longam domum & terram,
qua3 est juxta domum Will' Traiue in feria de Brist' [in feirS, de
Bruist'] ; et servicium Willelmi de Hereford [Herefort] de terra
quam de me tenet in ssepe dicta feria [feira], scilicet unam libram
cumini per annum. Testibus Magistro Moise, nepote meo ;
Waltero Clerico ; Willelmo capellano ; Roberto fil' Osb' ; EHa de
Hintana [Hinetuna] ; Roberto de Paris ; Roberto de Penedoc ;
Waltero Hachet [Hacat] ; Petro Camerario,'
" The corner at the beginning of both copies is unfor
tunately decayed, and one or two words are lost ;
whereby the foUowing difficulty occurs : i£ the begin
ning of the deed was thus, ' WUlelmus Clericus, Comes
Glocestrite,' it must be supposed that WUliam Earl of
Gloucester in the latter part of his life entered into Holy
Orders, But if the beginning contained only the name
of the Clerk who wrote the deed, thus, ' Magister A, de
HeU, Clericus Comitis Gloecestrise,' " (as is most proba
ble), "how
is it that
he writes in
his own name
' de me ten
et,' and not
in the name
of his lord?
The seal also
of this Deed
is worthy of
notice ; it is
a Jupiter sit
ting, having
a helmet on
his head,
holding a
thunderbolt
iu his right hand, and an upright spear in the left :
it seems to have been a gem or a seal of Eoman work
manship, left by the Eomans and preserved ever since
their departure. Bound the gem is a rim added to it
by a late owner, having this inscription -|- sigillvm
ADAM DE HBLi, The size of the gem without the inscrip
tion is 8-lOths of an inch by 6-lOths,"^
This may account for Earl WiUiam's giving up the
Castle of Bristol to the king in 1175, making Prince
John heir to the earldom, yet continuing to reside therein
untU his death,
10. We have seen that under the Norman kings, the
Jews, when they first settled in England, became the
king's chattels, both life and goods being at his mercy.
In Bristol they lived in Jewry, outside the town, and
were exempt from common law. In some way the bur-
1 Seyer, I., 408-9. II

Seal of William, Earl of Gloucester.

98

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1080,

gesses of Bristol had infringed the Idng's rights in the
person of Sturmis, the Jew, either by plundering him
or by kiUing him, Seyer supposes ; at aU events, they
had to pay a compensation of 80 marks into the king's
treasury. The language used is ambiguous, but we do
not think it necessarily means that Sturmis was kUled.
Some infraction of the king's right there was, and some
wrong to the Jew ; but if he had been kiUed we do not
see how he, the "usurer, could have freed it in the
king's treasury, and was quit." ^ AU the bonds, deeds
and chief valuables of the Jews were compulsorily
placed for safety in the king's custody. It seems to us
that the burgesses were merely mulcted in a fine of 80
marks, which Henry very probably took care to borrow
of Sturmis, During the reign of Henry, Liverpool began to be
noticed as a seaport, and in 1173 its merchants had
their first charter granted to them. Henry made it the
rendezvous for his troops for the North of Ireland.
Coats of arms now became common, but were not
generaUy hereditary untU the time of Henry III. ;
windows of glass began to be used in private dwel-
Ungs ; and the trial by the ordeal of fire, water, or by
wager of battle, graduaUy gave way to trial by jury.
Henry greatly encouraged chivalry. The armour
of the knights differed but Uttle from that of the pre
ceding reign, and the clothing of the burgesses and
freemen was a quilted stuff known as gambeson.
In this reign Scotland was an acknowledged fief of
Barons errant," " Justiciarii iiinere," i.e.,
judges on circuit, were probably first regularly estab
Ushed ; there were three circuits, with three judges to
each, 11. "Several Bristol pennies exist of Henry II. 's
first coinage, minted about 1156. They are of rude
and irregular work
manship, and in
weight and fineness
resemble the coins of
William I, The
name of the town is
speUed beisto, and
the moneyers' names
are JSlaf, Ricnrd, and Tancard. These pieces have on the
obverse the full-faced bust of the king, crowned, with a
sceptre in his right hand ; legend, henei eex ang.
(sometimes more abbreviated), licrerse, a cross potent,
with a small cross within each angle, all within a
beaded inner circle ; legend, the name of the moneyer
and the mint, preceded by a cross,
" In the British Museum are specimens of these pen-
^ Evans, 48,

England

Bristol Penny of Henry TI.

nies, with the foUowing reverse inscriptions : — elaf :
ON : BE,.,, [e]lae : on : beisto, tancaed : on : bei, and
BEIST, "Among a large number of pennies of this coinage
found at Tealby, Lincolnshire, in 1807, there were some
Bristol pieces with these reverse inscriptions : — elaf on
BEISTO, EIOAED on BE..., [ei]cAED ON BEIS, t(aNCAe)d ON
BEI." 1
Mr, Henfrey is not aware of any Bristol coins of the
second coinage of Henry II. or of Eichard I, and John,
Henry was a friend to trade and commerce, an able
warrior, and a shrewd politician, but he was haughty
and vindictive. He died in 1189, and was succeeded
by his third surviving son, Eichard,
12. It is necessary that we should now return to the
history of the lordship of Berkeley, and of the pro
genitors of the present noble house of Fitzhardinge,
At the Conquest the above lordship was bestowed by
the Conqueror upon his devoted friend and steward
Fitzosbern, ^ who placed at Berchelai a provost to take
care of the property, receive the rents, and to levy the
accustomed services. Fitzosbern reserved five hides of
land, however, as his own demesne whereon to erect at
some future period a castle. This intention was frus
trated by his death. His son and successor being at
tainted in 1074 for rebellion, the lordship, together
with his other possessions, Bristol, Barton, &c,, must
have fallen into the king's hands, Berkeley was granted
at farm to one Eoger, thence styled Eoger de Berkeley,
at a farm rent equal in present value to £3,000, by
Eoger Fitz Ealph, who held it at the survey for Domes
day, and who speciaUy claimed as his own the five hides
also above mentioned, which, most probably, had been
given to him by WUliam Fitzosbern, Earl of Hereford,
who had at Cirencester done a precisely similar thing,
viz., withdrawn land out of feorm and given it to a
vassal. Eoger de Berkeley entertained the Conqueror at
Berkeley in 1080, when the king confirmed a grant of
land by Walter de Lacy to the church of St, Peter at
Gloucester, Eoger, however, was fonder of accumu
lating land than he was of justice. He at this time
held of the abbey of Gloucester the subordinate manor
of Nympsfield, but finding it more to his advantage to
hold it under the king, he caused it and also the manor
of Shotteshore to be entered as royal property.
This robbery of the church by misdescription, how
ever, preyed upon his conscience, so that in 1091 he
became a monk of the above abbey, and restored
' Henfrey's Bristol Mint in British Arohfeological Journal,
December, 1875.
° Seyer, cap. viii., 89,

A,D, 1121.

THE BERKELEY FAMILY.

99

Shotteshore; and afterwards, in 1093, his son and suc
cessor in the lordship, Eustace, restored also Nymps
field, Eoger took part with WUUam Eufus, and in
1089 Berkeley was plundered by the adherents of
Eobert, Duke of Normandy,
Eustace's successor, Eoger, at Easter, in 1121, en
tertained King Henry I, and his queen at Berkeley.
This Lord Eoger obtained leave of the king to erect
a reUgious house, which he proposed to endow with
certain lands, to be held by service of a knight's fee.
He died before his purpose was effected, but his nephew
and successor, WiUiam, carried out his intention, build
ing and founding the Cistercian abbey at Kingswood, ^
which foundation was confirmed by the empress Maud
in 1139, In the "Pipe EoU," 1131, it is on record that
this WiUiam "held the Lordship of Berkeley under the
crown, paying a feorm of £234 13«, Ad. by weight,"
His son Eoger complained that the abbey, founded
by his predecessors, had been removed to Hasilden and
Tetbury, and he demanded that it should be brought back
to Kingswood, or that he should have his lands again.
The matter seems to have been compromised, as in 1 148,
Eoger confirms the grant of lands to the monastery of
Kingswood, and releases it from the service of a knight's
fee which WiUiam, his son, owed to him, due from the
abbot, "The monks in their chapter have again ac
knowledged and received me as their founder," he says.
He also granted to the church of the blessed Mary of
Kingswood the manor of Acholt ; the witnesses to the
grant are Simon, Bishop of Worcester, the Abbot of
St, Augustine's in Bristol, Eobert Fitzhardinge, Henry
LoveU, and others,^ This was the same Eoger de Ber
keley who was, as we have elsewhere related, so barba
rously used by Walter of Hereford about 1144, The
names of the Abbot of St. Augustine's and Eobert
Fitzhardinge, as witnesses, go far to prove that this
grant was made at Bristol where Eoger was probably
brought a prisoner.
Bishop Simon died in 1150, and the abbey of St,
Augustine was dedicated in 1148, so the probable date
of the grant would therefore be 1148-9, PhUip, son of
the Eed Earl, or Consul, of Gloucester, had married a
niece of this Eoger, and because his father was reported
to have been accessory to the seizure and iU-treatment
of Eoger, and most certainly held him a close prisoner,
PhUip, as we have related, revolted from his own father,
and arming his men, threatened to lay waste his whole
province unless the uncle of his wife was released from
captivity, ^ Near Wotton-under-Edge, It is a portion of Wiltshire
isolated in Gloucestershire,
^ See Foabroke's Berkeley Manuscripts, under the head Kings-
wood.

In this PhUip faUed, and stricken with a blow
(paralysis apparently), he went on a pilgrimage. This
Eoger was attached to the cause of King Stephen, as
his father WUUam had been, hence his misfortunes.
Surrounded on aU hands by the puissance of the great
Consul, he was, as we have recorded, whether originaUy
seized or not by order of the empress and her brother,
at least held by them in captivity and stripped of the
greater portion of his vast property,^ He was left in
possession of Dursley, and thenceforth he is frequently
spoken of as Eoger de Dursley. He died in 1150-1, and
was succeeded by his son Eoger, by whom the feud
with the Fitzhardinge family (to whom the Lordship of
Berkeley had been given when taken from his father),
was carried on with great bitterness, untU in 1153 it
was healed by a double marriage between the two
famUies, Srnyth contends for the Saxon origin of the famUy,
The Dursley and Coberley Berkeleys certainly were
large landed proprietors ere Berkeley was granted to
them, and the family tradition of their consanguinity
to the Conqueror may account for their having been
permitted to hold their estates. But of this there exists
no positive evidence. On the other hand those who
contend for the famUy being of Norman origin point to
the fact that about this period one Eoger de Berchelaieo
and Eissa, his wife, gave to the abbey of St, Martin
d'Auchy, near the town of Aumale, in Picardy, sundry
vestments, a silver chalice, a golden cross, two beUs,
and other gifts. ^
The " Hernesse"^ (Lordship) of Berkeley included in
1086 the subordinate manors of Camme, Dursley, Cow
ley, Uley, Nympsfield, Wotton, Kingscot, Ouzleworth,
Almondsbury, Horfield, Weston (King's), Elberton,
ArUngham, &c. There was at Berkeley a market, and
seventeen vassals who paid their tax in the rent, Ealph
de Berkeley also held at farm, the manor of Barton, near
Bristol, Eoger Fitz Ealph, probably a son of Ealph de
Berkeley, Eoger's brother, we learn from Domesday,
held Clifton, in Sineshoved Hundred, in capite of the
king, which Sewin, the Provost of Bristou, held of King
Edward in 1065, and had been able to go with this land
where he wished,* nor did he owe thence any feorm.
There are three hides. In demesne are three plough
teams, and six viUans, also six bordars (cottagers), three
serfs, and eight acres of meadow. It was worth 100s.
1 Because he paid not his farm, but took part with King
Stephen, — Robert Ricart,
- Archseologia, XXVI,, 359,
=> Her, Herr, Saxon for lord,
* i.e., might be non-resident.

100

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1140,

{i.e., in Edward's reign), now (1086) 60«.i The Coberley
branch of the Berkeleys appears to have been Ealph's
descendants, 13, The wealth of Eobert Fitzhardinge must have
been immense. Although a friend and powerful sup
porter of the Eed Earl and of the Empress, he does not
appear to have been a man of war ; at aU events, we
do not read of him as being actively engaged in any
of the battles of the time. As far as we can gather,
he used his opportunities wisely and weU as a mer
chant of highest repute, and deserved all that he
acquired. In the year 1140 he began to buUd the Abbey of
St, Augustine, at which time he was in possession of
immense estates in land partly inherited from his father,
but the greater portion became his through grants from
Eobert, Earl of Gloucester, in consideration of the large
advances made by Fitzhardinge in support of the cause
of the empress Maud, In Gloucestershire he possessed
the manors of FUton, Almondsbury and Berkeley,
Siston, Thornbury (where he buUt the body of the
church and tower and dwelt at EoUs place), Beverstone,
Elberton, which he held of the manor of Berkeley
in the time of WiUiam the Conqueror, Kingsweston,
which, with Beverstone, he settled on Eobert, his second
son ; he also purchased the three Hundreds of Portbury,
Bedminster and Hareclyve from Eobert, Earl of Glou
cester, also the manor of Bedminster. He bought the
manor and advowson of Portbury from Eichard de
MorevUl; besides which he had in Bristow and its
immediate neighbourhood the manor of Byleswike, pur
chased from the Earl of Gloucester, whereon he built
his abbey; the manor of Lega (Abbot's Leigh), near
Bristol, being a part of the manor of Bedminster,
divers lands and tenements in Bristow and Eedclyve ;
the manor of Bitton and the lordship of Berkeley, of
which Eoger de Dursley had been deprived. This grant
of Berkeley, &c,, to Eobert Fitzhardinge is mentioned
in the rhymes of Eobert of Gloucester : —
" A burgeys at Bristowe, Robert Hardyng,
For great treasure, and riohesse, so well was with the king,
That he gave him and his heirs the noble barony,
That so rich is, of Berkele, with all the seignory.
And that Robert Harding reared afterward, I wis.
The abbey at Bristowe, that of St, Austin is,"
Smyth gives the foUowing account of this last trans
action : — "And so far forth, e'er that Crown claim was
settled did the Empress and her son Henry make use of
the pui-se of this Eobert in that wantful time of theirs
that from Eoger of Berkeley, lord of Dursley, were his
fee-farm lands of Berkeley taken by this Duke Henry
and Maud, his mother, for causes formerly remembered ;
1 Domesday, I., fol. 170, col, 2,

and for an handseU, as it were, of that lump which fol
lowed, one hundred pounds-land of that of Berkeley,
with the manor of Bitton, was given to this Eobert and
his heirs by deed yet remaining under seal,"^ (i.e., the
handseU was £100, the lump that foUowed was the
grant of Berkeley, which was by two subsequent grants
confirmed and enlarged by the duke, afterward king.)
By the above-named grants Fitzhardinge became a feu
datory baron of the king, and was bound to pay mUitary
service, having liberty to buUd a castle, enjoying baronial
rights, and entitled to coin money, A copy of his seal,
from Lysons, is given on page 57, The monster, a com
bination of deer and swan, was copied from a sketch
by Smyth, who states that Fitzhardinge also used an
equestrian seal of the ordinary type then in use. The
castle was the caput of the barony,
14, There was previously existent a fortress at
Berkeley, most probably of Saxon adaptation, Eoger
de Berkeley is said to have had a "Uttle castle at
Nesse," Sharpness is but a short distance from Berke
ley, Mr, G. T, Clark, in a recent examination of the
castle, pronounces the half-hoUow circular keep, which
is unusuaUy large, to be based on a Saxon fortification.
For 22 feet of its height this important tower encloses
a mound of earth, which he argues was not Ukely to
have been fUled into the sheU of masonry, holding
rather that the Norman buUder, finding a moated
mount of suitable dimensions, adopted it for the soUd
core of the keep by buUding around it a revetment
waU, as at Pontefract, and raising on the waU the pre
sent curtain. Placed at the extremity of a tract of
land that suddenly drops from the southern waUs of
the fortress into a flat meadow which extends to the
Severn, a mile to the west, the station was one of
obvious importance against irruptions from the Welsh
borders. Berkeley was, most probably, an entrenched
position against the Kelts, who had been driven to their
hiUs across the Severn and Wye. It was the seat of an
EngUsh Lord in the 9th century, and it is stated by
Smyth, the historian of the Berkeleys, that in his day
(1620) traces remained of an early mound and fosse.
The positions that had formed the most avaUable points
of defence to the Wiccii, and after them to the
Saxons, would naturaUy offer the same advantages to
the Normans,
"Entering the outer ward we are confronted by the
western half-round of the huge keep, which has the
gateway of the inner ward attached to its southern
face. Passing into the second court we find on the
right the domestic apartments, which, though struc-
turaUy Norman, are pierced with Tudor windows. In
^ Signed at Bristow, Seyer, I,, 463-4,

A.D. 1153,

THE BERKELEY AND DURSLEY ALLIANCE.

101

front are the great haU, buttery and kitchen, while on
the left are the misceUaneous offices. All these buUd
ings are attached to the Norman curtain, or buttressed
outer waUs of the castle, and are as skUfuUy designed
for convenience as for security, while to enhance domestic
privacy there are distributed within the haUs and towers
concealed apartments enough to form the architectural
type of some Mgsteries of Udolpho. Except on the
north angle, which is occupied by the sheU keep, a
feature that is iu marked distinction from the usual
massive rectangular tower, the external form of the
fortress is a rude square of an average extent of 67
yards on each face. The keep is about 50 yards in
diameter, with waUs 8 feet in thickness. The exterior
height is 62 feet, but one-third of the sheU being filled
with soUd earth, the access from the courtyard is by
winding steps which land the visitor on a grass-plot
22 feet above the level of the wards. Here we find
practicaUy a third court, the domestic apartments being
on the southern concavity of the keep against the inner
gateway. Projecting at irregular intervals from the
exterior circuit are three segmental bastion turrets
about 20 feet in diameter at the broadest parts. Two
of these towers are hoUow downwards from the keep
platform to 2 feet below the level of the wards, one
of them being the ancient prison-hold. Into this
black den, deeper than the TuUian dungeon and as
noisome and terrible, were thrust some of the captives
of King John when he, in 1216, seized the castle,
Edward II. was immured in the guard chamber imme
diately over this fearful hole. The famUy banner is
planted on what is known as the Thorpe Tower, which
is a rectangular building, also Uke the bastions attached
to the keep, but on the northern part of the circuit.
The estate of WansweU Court, a mediteval house in the
neighbourhood, was held by the famUy of Thorpe on
the tenure of defending this tower." ^
15, The contention between the new baron of Berke
ley and the dispossessed lord, then known as of Dursley,
became so rife, and Eoger troubled Fitzhardinge so griev
ously, that the latter petitioned the king to resume the
gift. But finaUy the famUies were united by a double
marriage, Eoger giving his daughter Alice to Maurice,
the eldest son of Eobert Fitzhardinge, with the town of
Slimebrigge for her portion, she having also £20 in
land of the fee of Berkeley for her dower, whilst
Helena, the daughter of Eobert Fitzhardinge, married
^ Mr. J. Taylor in Saturday Review, January, 1880. [For an
admirable account of the Castle itself see the ' ' Transactions of
the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society," by Mr.
G, T, Clark, 1876, 115-32, The three grants that are mentioned
by Mr, Clark, are still preserved in their originals in the Castle,
J, H, CooKE, F,S,A,]

the heir of Eoger, and had for her dower the manor of
Siston,^ The covenant for this family compact was
made ' ' in the house of Eobert Fitzhardinge at Bristowe,
in the presence of King Stephen and of Harry, then
Duke of Normandy and Count of Anjou, and by his
assent, and in the presence of many others, both clarkes
and laymen, &c., &c,, whereupon all right in the barony
of Berkeley was voluntarUy released by the Lord Durs-
ley,"^ This must have been in the year 1153, after
November 7th, or in the beginning of 1154, ere Henry
left for the Continent.
Berkeley was a royal manor in the reign of the
Confessor ; it seems to have originaUy been the private
property of some of the West Saxon kings, indeed by
some it is thought to have been the principality of one
of the British princes. There is some evidence of a
religious house before a,d, 778, of which TUhere, after
wards Bishop of Worcester, was the abbot ; it appears
to have been mentioned at the synod of Cloveshoe in
A,D, 824,^ There was a nunnery there in Edward's
time, which Earl Godwin destroyed, and Gytha, his
wife, being a pious woman, thenceforth refused to eat
anything that was the produce of Berkeley manor ;
therefore her husband bought for her the manor of
Woodchester, from whence her provision was brought
whenever she abode at Berkeley, It is probable that
the nuns did not hold the manor, but only certain lands,
which Godwin, who held Berkeley at farm from the
king, wished to possess.
There was also a monastery there. From the year
A,D, 915 the Abbot of Berkeley was chosen Bishop of the
Wiccii, and this is confirmed by the famous story of
the Berkeley witch, A similar case, we are told, occur
red to others, particularly to Charles Martel, so Matthew
of Westminster, whose version we give out of a number
of others, says, "it ought not to appear incredible,"
The tale, with slight variations, runs not only through
our early histories, but it also found its way into the
foreign chronicles, and that of Nuremberg, 1493, has a
wooden engraving of it, of which we append a copy,
16, " About A,D, 852 a certain wicked woman, Uving
in a town caUed Berkeley, a lover of gluttony and of im
pudence, setting no bounds to her wickedness and her
witcheries, even as far as old age, continued an immo
dest woman even tiU the time of her death. One day
while she was sitting at dinner a raven, which she kept
1 Roger, the elder son by this marriage, mortgaged his land
in Dursley, Stanley and Dodington to the Jews of Bristol and
Gloucester, He paid a fine of 50 marks to the king that he
might hold the lands and pay the annual value to the Jews, —
Seyer, L, 482,
'' Atkyns' Gloucestershire, Berkeley,
» G, T, Clark, Brist, and Glouc, Arch,, 1876, 128.

102

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 852.

as a favourite, began chattering something. On hearing
this the knife feU from the woman's hand, and her face
began to turn pale ; and, groaning, she said, ' this day
I shaU receive a great mischief, this day my plough is
eome to its last furrow.' Upon this a messenger of iU
news arrived, and the woman asking him what was the
cause of his coming, 'I bring you,' said he, 'news of
the death of your son, and the destruction of the whole
family by the faU of a house.' Being grievously moved
by this calamity, she immediately took to her bed and
was very sick ; and, perceiving the disorder creeping
on toward her vitals, she summoned by a letter her
surviving chUdren, a monk, and a nun. When they
arrived, she said to them in a sobbing voice, ' 0, my

The WilvU of Berkeley. From, tlie Nuremberg Chronicle, 1U93.
chUdren, I have alwaj^s brought on my own wretched
fate by devilish arts ; I have been a sink of aU vices,
a mistress of aU charms. Yet amid aU these evUs my
hope was in your reUgion, which fortified my despair
ing soul ; I hoped for you as my defenders against the
devUs, my guardians against those very cruel enemies.
Now, then, since I am come to the end of my life, I
beseech you, by your mother's breast, that you would
endeavour to aUeviate my torments. When I am dead,
sew me up in a deer skin, and then put me into a stone
cofiin, and fasten down the cover with lead and iron,
and, lastly, gird the stone with three very strong iron
chains ; and bring here fifty clerks, singers of psalms,
and as many priests, to celebrate masses for three days.

who may drive away the ferocious attacks of the ene
mies. Then, if I shaU Ue safe for three nights, on the
fourth day bury me in the ground,' It was done as
she had directed ; but, alas, nor prayers, nor tears, nor
chains, were of any avail, for on the two first nights,
when companies of singing men stood near the body,
the devils coming to the door of the church, broke it
open, although fastened with an immense bolt, and
broke asunder the two outward chains with very Uttle
difficulty, but the middle chain, which was stronger,
remained unbroken. But the third night about cock
crowing, the whole monastery seemed to be moving
from its foundations at the noise of the enemies' ap
proach. One of the devUs therefore, more terrible in
his aspect, and taUer of stature than the rest, shook
the gates of the church with dreadful violence, and
scattered them in pieces. AU were stiff with fright,
clerks as weU as laymen ; their hair stood on end, and
the singing of psalms was stopped. Whereupon the
devil, going to the grave with insolent step, loudly
caUed on the woman by name and ordered her to rise ;
and when she answered that she was unable to rise by
reason of the chains, ' You shaU be released from
them,' said he, ' to your cost,' and immediately the
chain, which had baffled the ferocity of the other devUs,
he broke like thread ; and then, kicking away the cover
of the grave, he dragged the woman out of the church
in the face of them aU to the gates, where stood a
black horse proudly neighing, having iron hooks and
nails fastened aU over him, on which the wretched
woman being thrown disappeared from the sight of
those who stood near, but her horrible clamours calling
for assistance were heard for as much as four miles,"
Our Bristol poet, Southey, has thrown this ghastly
story into the baUad form, with great power and
startling effect,
17, Leaving this interlude, we return to the sober
matter of our history. Eobert Fitzhardinge lived to a
green old age, and saw his " children's children grow to
ripeness of years." Wise, prudent and honourable in
his deaUngs, it is not impossible that the proverb that
"Bristol sleeps with one eye open" originated with him.
Under his care the town flourished, no prowling baron
plimdered its stores or carried off its burgesses; but
whilst administering its affairs with wisdom and discre
tion, he evidently was shrewd enough to turn an honest
penny, and knew how to make and to secure a good
bargain. To his honour, however, be it said that he
spent his wealth in a noble manner, in supporting the
cause of his legal sovereign, and in erecting a monastery
which in that age had few superior to it.
As the founder of an iUustrious house, whose names

A.D, 1216,

THE DESCENDANTS OF ROBERT FITZHARDINGE.

103

and fortunes have been in almost every subsequent age
connected with Bristol, and whose sympathies were for
the most part with the people, we give here a brief
account of the early members of his family.
By his wife Eva, Eobert had flve sons and two
daughters. After her husband's death Eva founded a
nunnery on St, Michael's hiU, caUed " The Magdalens,"
It stood on the site of the King David inn, hut, we
beUeve, the only relics of the buUding are a broken font
of no architectural beauty, which stands on the horse
steps in the yard, and a newel staircase, Eva liberally
endowed this house, became its flrst prioress, and died
there on the 11th March, 1173, having survived her
noble husband rather less than three years, Maurice,
Eobert's eldest son, succeeded him. He was the flrst
of the family to take the name of Berkeley. Of Nicho
las, the second son, some account wiU be found in the
history of the abbey. The third son, Eobert, had the
three hundreds on the south of the Avon in Somerset,
viz,, Portbury, Bedminster, and Hareclyve, also the
church of St. Nicholas in Bristol, and divers lands in
the town. He married Hawise de Gurney, Thomas, the
fourth son, became Archdeacon of Worcester. Henry,
the flfth son, was Archdeacon of Exeter and treasurer
to the Duke of Normandy (afterwards King Henry II.).
Helena, the eldest daughter, was, as we have described,
married to Eobert, son and heir of Eoger, Lord Dursley,
she died in the tenth year of King John. Maurice on
succeeding to the barony ultimately left Bristol, and
made the castle of Berkeley his residence, and was
thenceforth known by his title " Maurice de Berkeley."
He was born in Bristol, circa 1117, and was brought up
in the great stone house on the bank of the Frome,
where he Uved untU he quitted it for his lordly resi
dence. Although not actuaUy school feUow of Henry,
his future king (he being twenty-flve years of age and
the prince only nine when he came to Bristol), he was
doubtless his guide, companion, and friend. By his
wife, AUce de Dursley, Maurice had issue six sons and
one daughter. Alice lived to extreme old age, having
long survived her husband, and did so reverence his
memory that to the last in her conveyances, she styles
him Bominus meus Mauricius, "my lord Maurice."
Maurice died June 16, 1189, and was buried in the
church of Brentford, of which he had been a special
benefactor. He was succeeded by his eldest son, Eobert,
who was born about 1165, and who spent some years in
the court of Henry II, for his education. He was sub
sequently made constable of the castle of Bristol. " He
was one of the barons who rebeUed against John,
though he afterwards made peace with that king.
FaUing again from his aUegiance, he was excommuni

cated by Pope Innocent IIL, and his castle of Berkeley
and aU his lands were seized, and the proflts of the same
ordered for the maintenance of the castle of Bristol,
In 1216 he obtained letters of safe conduct to come to
the king at Berkeley castle, where, upon his submission,
he got a grant of his manor of Camin, Gloucestershire,
for the support of Juliana his wife,"^ King John was
at Berkeley October 29th, 1200 ; March 6th, 1211 ; July
20th and August 18th and 19th, 1216. At Henry III.'s
accession to the throne Eobert, for a flue of £966 13s. Ad.,
made his peace and was restored to aU his lands except
the castle and town of Berkeley, which, however, were
granted afterwards to his brother and successor Thomas
in 1223. Eobert was twice married, and died May 13th,
1219, without issue, at the age of 55 years. ^
Thomas, the next baron, lived to the age of 76, and
dying in November, 1 243, was succeeded by his eldest
son, Maurice, the second of the name. He had been in
France with his father ; and he subsequently attended
the king, Henry IIL, well accoutred with horse and
arms, against LleweUyn ap Griffyth, Prince of Wales,
then in the field. Lord Mamice entertained Henry III.
at Berkeley castle in the 40th year of that sovereign's
reign. In 1279 Eoger de Mortimer held jousts at Kenil-
worth, whither Maurice proceeded with 100 knights
weU armed, and as many ladies going before singing
joyful songs. '^ Their joy was soon turned into sorrow,
for Maurice, the baron's eldest son, was kUled whilst
jousting. This lord, to settle all cUsputes, purchased
of his kinsman Henry, lord of Dursley, a release of all
rights in the manor of Berkeley. He died in AprU,
1281, aged 63 years, and was buried in St. Augustine's
Abbey at Bristol, leaving his second son, Thomas, to
succeed him.'''
18. Thomas, the second of the name, was born and
spent his early boyhood at Berkeley. The m^nor of
Bedminster was then given to him by his father, and
there he was educated by the abbot and prior of St.
Augustine's and the master of St. Catherine's Hospital,
Brightbow. His maturer years were spent in active
warfare, for which his great love of falconry, hunting,
running at the ring, jousts and tournaments had been
most admirable training.
King Edward I,, in reward for service against the
Welsh, gave Thomas a grant under the great seal
"that at all times during his life he should have
liberty with his own dogs to hunt the fox, hare, badger
1 Collins' Peerage, III., 596. Juliana, Lady Berkeley, was
niece to William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke,
'^ Taylor's Book about Bristol, 85.
" Fosbroke's Berkeley Manuscripts, 100,
- For further particulars see our Ecclesiastical Histoey, 85.

104

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1314,

and wUd cat in the king's forest of Mendip and in his
chase of Kingswood on both sides of the water of the
Avon near Bristol, the same to take and carry away,"
Thomas raised the power and splendour of the
family to their zenith. One of his chaplains wrote : —
" While thulke lord lived.
All thinge by his powre
Was in gay plight ;
For gile was hidde.
Good peace was kidde.
And honesty had might, "
Great differences arose between him and his son Maurice,
on the one side, and the burgesses of Bristol on the
other respecting the feudal rights of the lord within the

He vowed, as did 60,000 others, to go on crusade to
the Holy Land, but never went personaUy, having done
duty by a paid proxy, Smyth afterwards adds that
on account of his not having, through death, been able
to fulfil his vow his children were disquieted in their
consciences, and both his son and grandson paid the
charges of others who performed the duty in his name
and stead, ^ Maurice, third of the name, his eldest son,
born 1281, succeeded to the title and estates. It is said
that he was only eight years of age when he was mar
ried to Eve, a daughter of Lord Zouch, and that a son
(Thomas) was born to him ere he and his wife were either
of them 14 years old, Smyth, anticipating doubts as
to this startling statement, avers that he has abundant

Berkeley Castle in
limits of the town. To these we shaU refer in their
proper place. In 1298 he was summoned to attend
King Edward I. on his invasion of Scotland.
In 1314, his Welshmen refusing to fight, Thomas and
his son were taken prisoners by the Scots at Bannock-
burn. He married Joan, daughter of the Earl of
Ferrars and Derby, and died at the Castle of Berkeley
on the 23rd of July, 1321. He was the first to assume
the ten crosses, having as supporters originaUy two
flying serpents, which were afterwards changed for
mermaids. He was religious according to the manner of
his age, giving liberally to the Church, and feasting
yearly about Lent the abbot and monks of St. Peter's,
at Gloucester, and their brethren of St. Augustine's,
Bristol, at that town.

the 17th Century.
evidence in proof of this precocity, Maurice Uved
during his minority at Bedminster and Nailsea, mak
ing the downs lively with "martial exercise, running
a tilt with lances, hastihides, spear plays, and the Uke
suitable to those times." On the year of his accession
to the barony, by the death of his father, he was per
fidiously seized and made prisoner at Cirencester, in
violation of a safe conduct granted to him by King
Edward II. , because he had taken part against the two
De Spencers, and was shut up in WaUingford Castle.
His lands, including the manor of Portbury, the
hundreds of Portbury, Hareclyve and Bedminster, were
given to hold at the king's pleasure to Eobert LoveU,
After making an ineffectual attempt at escape, fretting
' Fosbroke's Berkeley Manuscripts, 87- 8,

A,D, 1326,

KING EDWARD II. AT BERKELEY CASTLE.

105

like a chained eagle, he died in his prison on the 31st
of May, 1326, aged 46 years,
19, Thomas, said, as above, to be the eldest son of
Maurice, third of the name (but we think possibly his
brother), succeeded, being about 30 or 32 years of age.
He married Margaret, the daughter of Eoger de Mor
timer, Earl of Marche, Queen Isabella's adulterous para
mour. Having also offended the king by harrying the
lands of his favourites, he was consequently sent to
the Tower, whence escaping and being retaken he
was immured in Pevensey castle tiU his captivity was
ended by the capture of the king himself. While
taking refuge at Tintern abbey (October 14th and 15th,
1326) Edward had given the custody of Berkeley castle
to Thomas de Bradestone, but the growing power of
IsabeUa and Mortimer soon reversed the act. Within
the next twelvemonth the wretched monarch made his
own awful acquaintance with the towers of Berkeley,
He was committed to the custody of Thomas de Berkeley,
who had an allowance of £5 a day for his expenses, the
castle steward's accounts of the time showing that two
sums of £700 and £500 were received from the Ex
chequer for the maintenance of the king and his at
tendants during his whole imprisonment. But Lord
Thomas showed too little resentment for his own inju
ries, and being thought to treat the royal prisoner too
gently, he was commanded to deliver him, together
with the castle, to Lord Maltravers and Sir Thomas
Gonrnay, " Ser Thomas Berkeley," says Capgrave,
"had the keeping of him for a month, and treted him
ful worschipfuUy ; and Ser John Mauntravers had the
keping of him two othir month, and treted him ful
ongentyly. The queen sent him pleasant giftes, and
clothis ful precious ; but sche would not se him. Sche
pretended that the lords would not suffer her." Her
difficulty, if it ever existed, was soon solved, for
"Hark!
What sounds of death through Berkeley's roofs that ring
Shrieks of an agonizing king,"
The unfortunate Edward was murdered in the castle by
his keepers. The room in which the foul deed was
committed, which gives the castle its tragic celebrity,
was doubtless the chamber over the dungeon, and not
the guardroom to the entrance of the dungeon keep, as
generaUy received. The former view is supported by
Mr. Grantley Berkeley. The fretted marble tomb of
the murdered monarch in St, Peter's abbey — now the
cathedral — Gloucester, is a shrine fit for a saint ; and, in
deed, to the monks Edward proved the Thomas a Becket
of the West, the oblations of pilgrims in the course of
fifty years at his sepulchre being enough, it is stated,
to have re-built the church, had the work been needful,
[Vol, L]

Lord Berkeley was tried, but finally acquitted of com
plicity in the murder of the king, and lived to serve with
his son Maurice in the battles of Crecy and Poictiers.
In 1332 this Thomas de Berkeley purchased divers
lands and houses in Bristol, as is shown by deeds
extant. ^
In 1333, King Edward III. gave him leave to cut
down certain oaks to the value of £40, within his manor
of Bedminster, and to dispose of them at his pleasure.
This grant was necessaiy, as the timber was within the
king's chace at Filwood (the vaUey, this side of Maes
Knoll, in which are Whitchurch, Hengrove, and Bish
port), "He often held four leet courts, or views of
frankpledge, in the year in Berkeley,
and by levying an impost of Ad, and
Qd, upon each brewing of ale, and
farming out the wharfage and market
to the mayor, he drew more yearly
than the rent of the borough.
"In 1339 the toUcestres, which I
call brewings, were 284, which yielded
to him upon the catch polls account
£8 14s., which now yield nothing." -
(There is some discrepancy here, the
sum at the price stated would amount
to £63 18s.) This lord's power and
magnificence rivaUed that of the second
Thomas. He added to his arms the
chevron, and took a bishop's mitre for
his crest. He died on the 27th Octo
ber, 1361, aged 68 j^ears, and lies
buried in Berkeley Church.
20. Another Maurice, the fourth of
the name, succeeded ; he married, at
eight years of age, Elizabeth, daughter of Hugh De
Spencer, who became such a thrifty woman that she,
in the year of her lord's sickness, made herself a new
gown of cloth, furred throughout with rabbit skins
from the kitchen. During the lifetime of his father
Thomas, Maurice, in 1356, joined King Edward's forces
in Picardy, and at the battle of Poictiers he for the
first time displayed his banner, seeking to do doughty
deeds. Sixty thousand Frenchmen were arrayed against
8,000 EngUshmen, but the Black Prince had chosen his
position ; the French king was taken prisoner, with 2,000
men at arms and a crowd of nobles ; the rest sought
safety in fiight. Sir Eobert de Bradestone and young
Berkeley were first in the chase, the former was killed
as he foUowed the flying foe in at the gate of Poictiers.
Maurice was wounded and taken prisoner, as is related
by Froissart. (See our Ecclesiastical Histoey, 86.)
> Smyth. ^ Ihkl, 297,
H 2

'Dominus metis
Maicricius. "

106

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1469,

Effigies from the Allnr Tomb.

We append engravings from the altar tomb, which
are generaUy supposed to represent the 4th Maurice
and his lady, but
which, from the
style of the ar
mour and the fe
male costume, we
incline to think are
those of Maurice,
the third of the
name, who died
1326, and Eva his
wife. The father, more
fortunate than his
son, by the ransom
of his prisoners,
and those taken by
Maurice before his
capture, realised
not only sufficient
to i^ay a ransom
of six thousand
nobles for his son, but had over and above enough
wherewith to build the castle of Bever,stone.i
Maurice never recovered from his wound, but lin
gered on at his beautiful castle untU 1368, when he
died. He was succeeded by his eldest son Thomas (the
fourth of the name), who was born in 1352, and who
married Margaret, daughter and heiress of Gerard
Warren, Lord Lisle, dying without a male heir in July,
1417; he was buried at Wotton-under-Edge, and his
estates were divided. The chief portion, including some
houses in Bristol, were devised to his daughter Elizabeth,
who was married to Eichard Beauchamp, son of the Earl
of Warwick; the remainder went to his nephew and
heir male James, the eleventh lord, a son of James, a
younger son of the fourth Maurice.
21. Elizabeth held the castle, supported by her hus
band, and claimed all the connected manors ; she was
besieged therein, in 1420, by her cousin James, The
castle was taken and re-taken several times during this
generation, whilst the town of Berkeley was half de
stroyed. On James' death, November 3rd, 1463, his
son William succeeded to the estates. Born in 1426
this baron was created Viscount Berkeley, by Edward
IV,, on the 21st of AprU, 1481, and on the 5th March,
1483, he was made a member of the king's Privy Council,
with an allowance, to sustain the dignity, of 100 marks
per annum for life, the moneys to be paid out of the
subsidies raised on Bristol and London, On the 28th of
1 Lei, Collect, 2, ,307,

January, 1488, he was created Marquis of Berkeley, by
Henry VII,, with £35 fee out of the lesser customs of
London, It was in this Lord WiUiam's time (in 1469),
that the celebrated battle of Nibley Green was fought,
wherein the young Viscount Lisle lost his life, as wiU
be hereafter related,
22. WiUiam, once as wealthy as any of his prede
cessors, was a wastrel, who squandered, sold, and dis
posed of the greater part of his property. Being dis
satisfied with the mesalliance, as he conceived it to be, of
his brother and heir, Maurice of Thornbury, he married
three wives, but dying childless was buried in the Church
of Austin Friars, in London, and was succeeded by his
brother, the fifth Maurice (the third son of James and
Lady Isabella Mowbray), who was born at Berkeley in
1435, and who had married, in 1464, the daughter of
Philip Mede, of Bristol, and Uved with his wife on his
estate at Thornbury, Maurice was outlawed for the part
which he had taken at Nibley Green, and had to fly
from his home. Upon the reversal of the outlawry
he returned to Thornbury, where he continued to reside
until, by the death of his brother WUliam (the second
son having previously deceased), he, in his 56th year,
became possessed of the paternal title, but found him
self dispossessed of the land. Barrett says : — " That
in displeasure at this alliance, the lady not being of
honourable parentage, the Lord WiUiam disinherited
his brother by conveying his lands to the king, Henry
VII."^ In fact, he entaUed all of which he had not
otherwise dispossessed himself, including the manors
annexed to the ancient barony, on that monarch and
the heirs male of his body, with remainder to his
own heirs, so that the estates reverted to the great
grandson of the disinherited brother on the death
of Edward VL, although not without litigation with
some powerful alienees of the Crown, This seems to
us to be at variance with the fact " that Maurice, out of
brotherly love to him and to his honour, upon that
short warning of one night at most, stole from his
young wife and tender son the hope at that time of
both their posterities {i.e., WiUiam, the childless lord,
and his presumptive heir, Maurice), and met him with
a fair band of men, Mr. Hilpe and others, suddenly
raised from Thornbury, where he then dwelt, early the
next morning near Nibley Green," We should gather
from this that there was no disagreement between the
brothers at that period. This readiness to give aid on
the one hand, and willing acceptance of service on the
other, is inconsistent with Barrett's statement, and we
are inclined to look for another tangible cause of differ
ence between the brothers, occurring, too, at a some-
1 Barrett, 256,

A,D, 1157,

ACCESSION OF RICHARD.

107

what later period. Besides, the Medes were of good
family, having an estate at Failand, in Somerset, and
this accusation of mesalliance seems to have been only
a colourable excuse for Thomas to deal with the 120
manors, which in his own right, and that of his wife,
he possessed, after the counsel of his own will and for
the acquisition of a higher title of nobility, [For further
particulars see an excellent paper by Mr, J. H, Cooke,
F,S,A,, of Berkeley, in the Bristol and Gloucester Archceo
logical Transactions for 1879, 318-19.]"
Leland says: — "Thus parted Berkeley from his
lands. First he was rather winked at than forgiven
for the death of the Lord Lisle, And he being without
chUdren, his brother (Maurice) sold, and did bargain
for his own son, heir apparent to the lands, whereupon
Lord Berkeley, in a rage, made King Henry VII, his
heir for most of his lands, and after was made a
marquis,"^ Maurice appears to have been fortunate in his mar
riage, "for the longer they Uved the more they loved,"
says the historian. He died in 1506, leaving great
estates, some of which he recovered by suits -at -law
from those to whom his brother had UlegaUy granted
them, but the bulk of his property, including Tetbury
and many other manors, descended to him as one of the
heirs of the Lord Breause ; he had also a good estate at
Thornbury with his wife, and one also of his own by
purchase. He was buried in St, Austin's Friary, Lon
don, which church was greatly enriched by the Lady
IsabeUa, who survived her husband nine years, dying
at Coventry in 1516. Maurice left issue by her, three
sons — ^Maurice, Thomas and James — also one daughter,
Anne, Maurice, the sixth, succeeded to the barony. He
married Katherine, the daughter of Sir Wm. Berkeley,
of Stoke Gifford, He was High Sheriff of Gloucester
shire in 1516, and was appointed Governor of Calais
and created a baron by writ, 14th Henry VIII,, 1523,
From this it is clear that the barony had been consi
dered as one by tenure, foUowing the course of descent
of the castle and its attached lords, which indeed gave
James, the eleventh lord, his claim against his cousin
Elizabeth, Countess of Warwick, the daughter of
Thomas, the tenth lord, who claimed the title and
estates according to the usual descent of baronies in
fee. Maurice died at Calais in 1523, and was buried
in the Church of St. Nicholas of that town.
His brother Thomas, flfth of that name, succeeded
him. He held a command at the battle of Flodden-
field, where the King of Scotland was slain, Thomas
was only Constable of Berkeley castle, the property
1 Lei. Itin,, 6, 45,

being then vested in the Crown by virtue of the wiU of
WiUiam, Marquis of Berkeley, he who died in 1491,
Thomas died at Mangotsfield, in January, 1532 ; and
was fu'st buried there, but was afterwards removed to
a new tomb, set up according to his wiU, beside Eleanor,
his first wife, in the Abbey of St, Augustine,
23, Eichard I, succeeded Henry II, The glamour
thrown around him by the marveUous genius of Scott,
and the charming baUads of Eobin Hood, have given
this king an undeserved pre-eminence in EngUsh history.
Born in 1157, at Oxford, he succeeded to the throne in
July, 1189, was crowned in September in that year in
Westminster Abbey, and again in 1194 at Winchester,
on his return from his imprisonment, on which occasion
the King of Scotland carried the sword of state. He
was utterly indifferent to the welfare of the kingdom,
and visited it only twice during his reign of nine years
and nine months, leaving on both occasions bitter remem
brances owing to his extortions. At his first visit he
landed at Portsmouth on September 3rd, in order to be
crowned ; he left the kingdom on December 11th in the
same year. He came again on March 20th, 1194, when
he landed at Sandwich, and finally quitted the shores of
England on the 11th of May, so that the total of his
residence as a king amongst his people was under flve
months. It has been stated that he visited Bristol, but
the only evidence we can flnd is that which is furnished
by an old play entitled The Faire Maide of Bristoio, a
scarce black letter of the time of Elizabeth, The scene
is laid in Bristol, where the king is supposed to have
just landed ; —
"King, All haile, thou blessed bosome of my peace ;
Richard findes instance of his home returne,
Bristow, thou hapie rode, where first I lande.
Send word to London of our safe arrivall.
While we awhile in Bristow heere repose us,
" Godfrey, Fame with her brazen trump hath borne this tidings
hether,
"Eustace, And Bristow with their cittizens expresse
Their gladnes by their triumphe at your safetie,"
The play concludes thus : —
" In Bristow here awhile ourselves will stay,
And spend some sportfuU houres, to crowne your joy.
After so many troubles, and tyerd annoy,"
We need scarcely say that the sentiments expressed
above were never those of Eichard Ooeur de Lion ; the
landing and the goodwiU are both alike mythical and
contrary to fact. He was emphaticaUy Eichard of
Normandy, Although he found in the English treasury
1,000 marks left by his father, he pubUcly sold the
Crown demesnes, earldoms, public offices and the suze
rainty of Scotland to raise funds for the Crusade ; "his
court was a market, and he a royal chapman, who

108

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1199,

boasted ' that he would seU London itself if he could
find a purchaser,' " ^
24. The first event in his reign which had any rela
tion to Bristol was the marriage of Prince John to
Hawise, Countess of Gloucester and Lady of Bristow.
The ceremony was performed at Marlborough, August
29th, 1189, seven weeks after the death of King Henry.
Johu was at that time 23 years of age. Hoveden, a
contemporary writer, states that Vi'hen King Henry
was dangerously iU in 1170 he divided all his foreign
possessions among his chUdren ; to John, the youngest,
he gave the earldom of Mortain.^ This grant was
confirmed by King Eichard, who before he came over
to England ' ' gave to his brother John all the lands
tohich his father had given to him, viz., £4,000 of lands in
England and the earldom of Moreton, with its appurte-
tianees, and he gave him also the daughter of the Earl of
Gloucester with that honour, and the Castle of Marl
borough with that honour, and the Castle of Ludger
shaU with that honour, and the Castle of Peek with
that honour, and the Castle of Bolesover with aU the
land that belonged to Wm. Peiterel, and the town of
Nottingham with that honour, and the Castle of Lan
caster with that honour, and Darbyshire, and the honour
of WaUingford and the honour of TikehiU."''* The
Tewkesbury MS. adds to this list the earldoms of Corn
wall, Dorset and Somerset. ^ Ai-chbishop Baldwin in
vain forbade the marriage, and laid all John's lands
under an interdict, because the parties were cousins in
the-second degree ; —
Henry I \ ^^P^ess Maud— King Henry II. — John.
( Eobert Consul — Earl WiUiam — Hawise.
It is difficult to ascertain the value of the estates
that John received with his wife, "In 14 Henry II,,
1168, WUliam, Earl of Gloucester, held above 260
knights' fees, and in 15 John, the Earl accounted for
above 337 fees,"
25, On Eichard's return from the Holy Land, in
1194, being convinced of the treachery of his brother,
the king, by a solemn judgment of his nobles, deprived
John of aU his honours and seized upon liis castles and
lands. It would seem, however, "that John's garrison
in the Castle of Bristol withstood the king and endured
a siege, for in 1196 one Eichard d'OrescuUz was fined
100 shUlings for having been present at the siege of
Bristow," ^ We presume this to mean that ho was an
officer of the garrison. In 1 193 the burgesses of Bristol
were guilty of some disrespect tu the king's justiciaries,
Eobert Marmiun and his fellows, in not going out to
^ Sir F, Palgrave, Rotuli Curiic Regis, Intro,
2 Seyer, I., 518. » Bromton, 1157.
* Dugd, Monast., I., 153. ' Seyer, I., 518.

meet them as they ought, for which neglect they were
fined £100 by those justices,^ The king, in 1195, at
the intercession of their mother, restored to John the
earldom of Mortain and the honour of Eye, together
with the earldom of Gloucester, and made him an
annual aUowance of £8,000 money of Anjou in lieu of
his other estates ; but Eichard kept the castle of Bristol
in his own hands, for we find that in 1196 the burgesses
paid him 200 marks for taUage, and 10 marks more for
the fairs of St. James', ^
Eichard died AprU 6th, 1199, During his reign
coarse wooUen cloth was first introduced as a manufac
ture into England, and trading companies were estab
lished. The price of an ox was 4s, ; a farmer's horse,
4s, ; a sow. Is, ; a sheep, with fine wool, \0d,, with
coarse wool, &d.
The art of heraldry also became general, in order to
distinguish the crusading knights, Eichard changed
the arms of England from two lions passant to three,
and added the motto Bieu et mon droit; and a national
standard of weights and measures was introduced.
Neither Eichard nor his predecessor, Henry H., are
known to have coined money in Bristol, The silver
Poitou penny is the only money known to have been
coined by Eichard,
26. There is a curious letter given by Eichard of
Devizes, written about this date, which, divested of
its monkish prejudice, contains a brief but exaggerated
description of some of the chief cities and towijs of
England; the narrator is a Jew : — " Go not to London,
Every race of every nation abides there, and they have
there brought their vices. It is fuU of gamblers and
panders, of braggadocios and flatterers, of buffoons
and fortune-teUers, of extortioners and magicians. At
Canterbury people cUe in open day in the streets for
want of bread and employment. Eochester and Chi
chester, mere viUages, are cities only in name, Oxford
barely sustains its clerks, Exeter supports men and
beasts with the same grain, Bath is buried in a low
vaUey, fuU of sulphury vapour, Worcester, Chester
and Hereford are infested by the desperate Welshmen.
York abounds in rascaUy Scots, Ely is putrifled by
the surrounding marshes. At Durham, Norwich and
Lincoln there are none who oan speak French. At
Bristol everybody is, or has been, a soapmaker, and
every Frenchman esteems soapmakers as he does night-
men. But Winchester is the best of aU cities, and the
people have only one fault — they tell lies like watch
men," As far as Bristol is concerned a vein of truth
is found in the letter, for ninety years after the above
words were written by the Jew, London merchants
» Evans, 51. = Madox Exch., XVIL, 3.

A,D, 1200,

JOHN SUCCEEDS TO THE THRONE.

109

bought aU their soap at Bristol, and we weU know that
the trade stUl retains its pre-eminence,
27. The exactions of the Norman nobles, the tyranny
of the forest laws, their hatred and contempt for the peo
ple, fostered by the songs of the jongleurs, whose pithy
proverbs; such as " He shames God who raises a villan "
(serf), or " Why should viUans eat beef or any dainty
food," fanned the spark of smouldering hatred in the
hearts of EngUshmen, Banded outlaws were honoured
and sheltered as redressers of wrong. Men rejoiced to
hear that a fat abbot had been fleeced by the foresters,
or that the Jews had a flrm grip on a plundering baron.
The love of gambUng was universal, so that restrictions
had to be made to keep it within limits. No man
below the rank of a
knight or clergyman
was aUowed to play
for money, and they
were limited to a
loss of 20s, a day;
soldiers playing
without leave were
to be whipped, and
saUors to be plunged
into the sea on three
successive mornings.
Quarrels were fre
quent. Prince John
lost his game and
his temper at chess,
and broke his oppo
nent's head with the
chess-board ; his ad
versary (Fulk Fitz
Warin) returned the
compUment by a blow that nearly kUled the prince.
The out-of-door games were bowls, wrestling, quar
ter-staff play, the sword dance and the archery meeting.
Jugglers, bearwards, dancing girls, baUad singers and
stroUing musicians made each market lively and each
fair a scene of roUicking festivity. The great fair of
Bristol was that of St, James, which was held on
a site now known as the Horsefair, The old free
English spirit, repressed by Norman misrule for months,
would on these occasions break out in such strength as
frequently to overawe their lords, and the lessons learned
at such gatherings prepared the way for the coming
struggle for their liberties.
Eichard's flrst fleet consisted of thirteen large busses,
fifty-three armed gaUeys, and a hundred carracks or
transports. These were moved all of them by oars as
weU as by saUs, The busses or dromons had three

ships of the

masts, one saU on each ; these and the gaUeys were
double-banked with oars. Each gaUey had a beak or
ram ; the smaUer galleys were termed galleons. The
crusade gave a great impulse to the naval progress of
the country, and raised the seamanship of the English
saUor. English wool was at this time of superior
quality, and more valuable than that of Spain, and all
wooUen cloths were obliged to be dyed in towns; of
this trade Bristol had a large share.
28, For fifty days after the death of Eichard,
England was without a king. Prince Arthur, the son of
Geoffrey, the third son of King Henry II,, was the
legitimate heir to the throne, under the system of here-
cUtary descent, which had been introduced by the Nor
mans, But he was
a lad of twelve, and
John was an astute,
ambitious man of
thirty-two years of
age. It was there
fore convenient to
ignore the recent
practice, and to re
vert to the old Eng
lish system of an
elective monarchy,
and an avowed res
pect for the will of
the late king who
had named John as
his successor.
In a great Coun
cU held at North
ampton, Hubert,
^^"' '^'""•'T- Archbishop of Can
terbury, addressing the assembled nobles, said "You
are come hither this day to choose you a king," They
chose John, who was crowned on the 27th of May,
1199, On the Continent, in Normandy, Aquitaine and
Poitou, his authority was also recognised; but Anjou,
Maine and Touraine, espoused the cause of Prince
Arthur, Philip, King of France, wary and subtle,
preferred to be suzerain over a youth like Arthur
rather than a king in whom he recognised a man of
consummate ability, unrestrained by principle. The
French monarch, therefore, invaded Normandy, and
placed garrisons in the three provinces faithful to
Arthur, 29, John, on the 23rd of May, 1200, by the influence
of the Cardinal of Capua, made peace with Philip, and
Arthur, as Duke of Brittany, had to do homage to his
uncle. Meanwhile the voluptuous king had seen and

110

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1204,

coveted the beautiful betrothed of Hugh, Count of La
Marche, and he hastened to divorce his wife Hawise,
the daughter of the late Earl of Gloucester, on the
grounds of consanguinity, and because she had borne
him no children, Hawise was, in 1214, upon promise
of payment of a flue of 20,000 marks, aUowed to marry
Geoffrey de MandeviUe, Earl of Essex, "The king
gave her permission to convey her possessions and
titles to her husband, with the exception of the honour
of Gloucester, the town and Castle of Bristol, and
the whole hundred of Barton Eegis : these were never
again permanently united to the earldom, being too
important a possession to be left in the hands of
a subject,"! Hawise married a third time in 1216,
her next husband being Hubert de Burgh, Earl of
Kent, Chief Justiciary of England, and a staunch friend
of King John ; but dying soon after without issue,
the earldom devolved on Aim eric her nephew, son of
her sister Mabel, Countess of Evreux; he dying without
issue the earldom came to Eichard de Clare, Earl of
Hereford, in right of his wife. Amice, the third daughter
of WiUiam, Earl of Gloucester ; he died in 121 1, and his
widow became in her own right Countess of Gloucester ;
on her death GUbert de Clare became Earl of Gloucester
and Hereford separately and jointly, in which family it
continued for many generations,*
IsabeUa, daughter of Aylmar, Count of Angouleme,
tempted by the splendour of a crown, forsook her be
trothed, and John married her ; but although he gained
a wife he lost his continental kingdom. The Count of
La Marche excited an insurrection in Poitou and Aqui
taine ; the crafty Philip supported him, and in two-and-
a-haU years John lost aU that he had inherited from
WiUiam of Normandy and Fulk of Anjou,
In 1199 a tax was laid on Gloucestershire by the
king. Bristol paid 500 marks, Eedcliff 100 marks, and
Temple 50 marks. ^
30. The year 1200 witnessed a renewal of the war
with PhiUp, avowedly on behalf of Arthur-, who was sent
at the early age of fifteen into Poitou to head an insur
rection against John, Arthur's grandmother opposed
him, but had to take refuge in the citadel of MUabel,
whUst Arthur and his faithful Bretons occupied the town.
By a rapid march John sm-prised the town on the 1st of
August, and captured Arthur, his sister Eleanor, the
Count of La Marche, and above two hundred knights.
The latter were loaded with irons and thrown into dif
ferent prisons. Two of them, Emery de Luens and
Hugh de Oire, were for a brief time confined in the
castle of Bristol, but a more disastrous fate awaited
them. Johu, with a vindictiveness that disgraced the
» Seyer, I,, 523. " Ibid, L, 524, = Madox, Exch, XVII,, 4.

age of chivalry and a revengeful spirit that was abso
lutely fiendish, dispatched on the 4th of February, 1202,
from Eouen, an order for their removal to Corfe castle,
where, with twenty other knights who had taken part
with Arthur, they were starved to death, ^ Eleanor, at
the same place, met with more gentle treatment; -but over
the fate of Arthur there hangs an inscrutable mystery.
Shakespeare has immortalised the tradition that Hubert
de Burgh was ordered to put out the eyes of the young
prince, but mercy withheld his hand. The lad suddenly
vanished, John was openly accused of his murder.
Whether the prince feU by his uncle's hand, or by that
of a hired assassin, is open to conjecture, but the people
of the two realms were convinced of John's guilt, so that
in both England and France he was held up to general
execration, and in 1203 he was summoned as a vassal
of France to appear before a court of his peers and clear
himself of felony, treason, and the murder of his nephew.
As he did not put in an appearance, in his absence he
was declared guUty, and sentenced to forfeit aU the lands
on the continent that he held by homage. With the
loss of Normandy, John lost aU chance of making Eng
land a feudal nation. He stood face to face now with
the English people unaided by the rapacious knights of
Normandy, 31, In July, 1204, John was at Bristol for thi-ee
days, and again in December of the same year. On the
5th of February, 1205, the king writes to John de la Warr
commanding that his beloved Justiciary Geoffrey Fitz-
Peter, Earl of Essex (a man who exercised some Uttle
influence over the lawless monarch), should be presented
with 20 casks of his good wine at Bristol ; ^ and on the
23rd of the same month payment is ordered to be made
of 41s. 6d, for the carriage of 30 tuns of wine from
Bristol to Tewkesbury, 2 tuns to St, Briavels, and 1 tun
to Winterbourne ; in March, 40 tuns are ordered to be in
readiness for the king's messengers ; and the constable
of the castle is ordered to pay out of the fee-farm of
Bristol 97|^ marks to the merchants of whom the wine
was purchased, John, on this occasion, conflrmed to
John de la Warr a grant of the manor of BrisUngton,^
Also in April, the Baron of the Exchequer is ordered to
pay to John de la Warr, Jordan Eufus and others, £586
for wine purchased by the king's orders at Bristol,
On the 7th of June following, 20 casks are ordered
to be placed in Bristol castle, 50 casks to be sent to
Portsmouth for the king's use, and large quantities
flere also forwarded to Kenilworth, Malmesbury and
' Annals of Margam, 26,
^ Taylor's Book about Bristol, quoting Rott, Litt, Claus, I„
36-140, " CoUinson, Hist, Somerset, II., 411.

A,D, 1206.

THE KING'S VISITS TO BRISTOL.

Ill

other places. John had his fits of remorse, and, al
though no man could be more utterly irreligious, it
woiUd seem that at intervals, probably when suffering
after a debauch, he sought to salve a sore conscience by
some deed of charity; for instance, he gave 18s, 9f?, in
alms to 200 poor people in Bristol, whom he fed because
he twice ate on the Friday after the feast of St. Michael,
and also on the Friday after the feast of St. Dionysius ;
at another time he made a vicarious condonation in
bread, meat and ale, to 30 poor persons, because Geoffrey
Fitz-Peter had eaten flesh on the Wednesday next after
the Octave of St, Peter and Paul, ^ On the 8th, 9th and
10th of September, in the same year (1205) the king
was again in Bristol; and in 1206 he granted the town
of Bristol to the burgesses in fee-farm, at a yearly rent
of £245, the castle of Bristol excepted, reserving the
prisage of beer, viz,, as much as the Constable of the
Castle and his people there have need of,"^
32, In 1206 John made his final attempt to regain his
continental kingdom. In this he was unsuccessful ; and
on October 27th in that year the English kings ceased
to have any dominion in France, except Poitou, although
they retained the empty title upon their coins until the
commencement of the present century. From that hour
England stood alone ; Norman and Saxon blended into
one self-contained English nation — "A precious stone
set in the sUver sea" — and a fresh page in her history
began, on which, ere another decade had passed, was
inscribed in imperishable characters, the Magna Charta
of her Uberties,
John had already incurred the displeasure of the
Pope, Innocent III,, one of the ablest men who had
worn the tiara, by his divorce and subsequent unhand
some marriage. He had early in his reign arrogantly
flung deflance to Eome when he wrote, ' ' Know ye that
we have given license to Peter BuiUo to enter into any
reUgion he pleases," ^ And now, when he had lost
France and had become unpopular in England, he
must needs set himself in antagonism to a pontiff who
claimed that " all regal dignity should be a reflection
of the papal authority and entirely subordinate to it."
Had John's opposition been founded on a sincere desire
to maintain the liberty of his kingdom and the religious
freedom of his people, instead of an assertion of his own
haughty wiU, he would have won for himself a glorious
name in Britain, In 1207, the see of Canterbury was
vacant. The monks of St, Augustine's abbey elected
secretly their sub-prior, and sent him to Eome to obtain
the sanction of the Pope, John and the suffragan
bishops gave the appointment to Gray, Bishop of Nor-
» Taylor, quoting Cole, 236, ^ Evans, 53,
» Hardy Pat, Rolls, 60,

wich. The Pope coolly put both candidates aside and
directed the monks to choose Cardinal Stephen Langton,
an Englishman of high character, great learning and
ability, then resident at Eome.
33, The above was a most fortunate choice for Eng
land, but an unfortunate one for the Pope, as weU as for
John, who would have done wisely if he had acquiesced.
Instead however of so doing, he seized on the monas
tery at Canterbury, appropriated its revenues and ban
ished the monks. Within the year the whole kingdom
was laid under an interdict, the churches were closed,
the death bell ceased to toll, the dead remained un-
buried, or were interred without the usual solemn rites,
weddings had to be deferred, for no priest could be
found to perform the ceremony, and the merry mar
riage peal no longer resounded its welcome to the bridal
procession. This anomalous state of things, however,
did not last, John rose to the occasion and acted
vigorously ; he found priests who were conformable to
his wiU, who preached in churchyards and at market
crosses, and married folk at the church door when they
could not obtain access to the interior of the building.
The very sound of strife seemed to invigorate him.
He banished the clergy who obeyed the Pope, confls-
cated their lands, and aUowed outrages on them to
remain unpunished. He granted a charter of incorpora
tion to London, and gave the citizens leave to elect their
own mayor, to hold their flrst court of common council,
and sent them an architect to build their noble bridge.
34, During the four years of struggle betwixt King
and Pope, John seems to have been a frequent visitor
to Bristol, Seyer says John was in Bristol in 1206,^
when a tax was laid on the town in the king's jDresence,
amounting to £469 6s, M, In 1207 he spent the I7th,
18th and 19th of September in the castle, and in 1208
he was here during part of the months of March and
June, and on December 24th, 25th and 26th, That
Christmas in Bristol was signalised by the issue of an
edict which has borne bitter and bloody fruit in aU parts
of the kingdom, and which is to this day a means of
peopling the gaols, increasing the taxes, and keeping
alive a feeling of angry animosity between the owners of
land and the men who toil thereon, John decreed that
feathered fowl should thenceforth be considered as game
and be strictly preserved. The times were bad, bread
was scarce, and the poor had to be fed by the hand of
charity, John himself had recently issued a writ com
manding the Abbot of St. Augustine's in Bristow to
feed 200 poor people, the "corn to be bought by our
fee-farm and thereof to make bread, so that four loaves
shall be worth a penny ; and that ye cause also certain
1 Seyer, I., 526,

112

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1210,

meal to be made to make porridge thereof; and from
the day of the receiving of these our letters to the day
of the Assumption of our Lady the poor to have each
of them daily one loaf and so much pottage made of
the said meal and herbs while herbs may be found, and
when they cannot be gotten ye make so much pottage
of beans or of peason, whereby they may be sustained,
so that they perish not," The Norman kings had by
their terribly restrictive forest laws deprived the peasant
of the means of eking out his scanty fare with an
occasional stray rabbit, or hare, or a slice of venison ;
and now the man's bow had to be thrown aside and his
skiU abandoned, for the birds that had hitherto been
common propertj', as free as the air in which they flew,
were converted, by the wiU of a king, from an article of
food for the poor into a royal luxury.
In 1208, John ordered " that in Bristol a tun of Poitou
wine should not be sold for more than 20s,, nor wine of
Anjou for more than 24s., wine of France for more than
25s., unless it were so good that any person would give at
the highest two marks for it ; that Poitou wine should
not be sold for more than 4d. a gallon, nor white wine
for more than 6d. ; and he appointed 12 officers, who
were to take care that these regulations were observed.
Wheat also was to be sold at 12s. and beans and oats at
4s. per quarter of eight bushels."
35. In the spring of 1209 the burgesses of Marl
borough, one of the places that John had obtained by
his marriage with his cousin, paid the king 10 marks,
in order that the burgesses of Bristol might not harass
them contrary to the liberty granted to them by the king's
charter. This was in March. During this spring John
marched against the King of Scotland, who had been
coquetting with the Pope, One of John's pretences for
the war was this — that WiUiam I. of Scotland had given
one of his daughters in marriage without the sanction of
himself, his sovereign lord, &c. The armies met at Nor-
ham castle, where the Scotch king, fearing to hazard a
battle, asked for a truce, paid a large sum of money as
indemnity, and gave his two daughters nominaUy to be
educated, but virtually as hostages. These ladies were
brought to Bristol castle, and Eobert de BarviU was
afterwards paid 40 marks for conducting them thence,
together with 48,000 marks taken out of the Bristol
treasury, to Nottingham. The ladies were soon after
removed to Corfe castle, where they became for a while
companions to the unfortunate Princess Eleanor of
Brittany, who had not then been removed to Bristol
castle. There are entries on the roUs of orders for
vestments to be provided according to definite patterns
for the three princesses in company. ^
1 Taylor's Book about Bristol, quoting Cole, 236.

John was in Bristol in May, July, September and
December of the above year,
36. In May, 1210, the king again visited Bristol,
being on his way to Ireland, To defray the expenses of
his armament, " he imprisoned aU the Jews in England,
and plundered them of their goods to the amount of
66,000 marks,"! "Persons of that nation, of both
sexes, were seized all over England and crueUy treated,
till they would ransom themselves according to the king's
pleasure." " From the same authority we learn that
John, on that occasion, brought immortal infamy
upon his name by his atrocious cruelty. Abraham,
a Jew of Bristol, residing without the waUs, refused to
ransom himself at the price the king demanded, 10,000
marks, John thereupon ordered "that the tormentors
should every day forcibly dash out (excuterent) one of
Abraham's cheek teeth tiU he consented to pay the
money." The executioner struck out seven in as many
days ; but on the eighth day Abraham yielded and paid
the money, having but one tooth left, fearful lest his
head should follow the last molar. From Bristol, John
obtained also 1,000 marks; from Eedcliff, 1,000 marks;
and from Temple, 500 marks. Of these moneys £237
6s. .Sid. were put into the treasury, and 225 marks were
paid to Engelard de Cygony to be put into the king's
treasury in Bristol. Engelard was sheriff of Gloucester
and king's justiciary, as well as king's treasurer in
Bristol. In the same year the " f erm of Bristow" was
granted to this personage for the sum of £145 per
annum ; Eichard the burgess accounted for him. Bristol,
it would appear, as we have seen, was usuaUy farmed
out in this manner, but generaUy to the chief magistrate
in the name of the community, Eichard, the burgess,
was no doubt the coUector for Engelard, who must have
laid a heavy hand upon Bristol, as he is speciaUy ex
cepted by name in Magna Charta as one to be removed
from all office in England, and to be sent out of the
kingdom, ^
In Ireland, John was hailed as a deliverer, and he
met there with the only notable success of his reign.
The English barons who had tyrannised over the natives
were defeated by him. Hugh de Lacy, Earl of Ulster,
was driven into banishment; WiUiam de Braiose escaped
to the continent, but his wife Matilda and children, with
1 Annal. Waverl., 172.
= Matth., Paris, 229.
= Magna Charta, Clause 58, runs thus : — " We will entirely
remove from our bailiwicks the relations of Gerard de Athyes, so
that for the future they shall have no bailiwick in England, We
will also remove Engelard de Cygony, Andrew, Peter and Gyon
de Cauceles, Cyon de Cygony, Geofiry de Martin, and his brothers,
Philip Mark, and his brothers, and their nephew Geoffrey, and
their whole retinue,"

A,D, 1210,

JOHN IMPOSES AN ILLEGAL TAX ON THE BURGESSES.

113

others, were made prisoners. Here John showed again
the fiendish side of his character —
" The man who bears an honourable mind.
Will scorn to treat a woman lawlessly, "
But this miscreant monarch brought the ladies to Eng
land and threw them into the castle prison of Bristol,
demanding from them a fine of 40,000 marks, MatUda
faUing to make good her fij-st instalment, he raised the
sum to 50,000 marks, and threatened to raise it by 10,000
marks at each future faUure, As she was never able to
make good the payment, the cruel tyrant starved her
and her son WiUiam to death at Windsor, to which
place they had been removed. Acting on discreet
advice, John commanded that the EngUsh laws shoiUd
be observed in Ireland,
37. Eeturning to England, he landed in Bristol in
triumph on the last day of August, 1210. StiU defiant
of the Papal power, his officers kept close watch at aU
the ports, so that the knowledge of the buU of excom
munication should not be disseminated amongst the
people. Yet, unwise and selfish as ever, he aUenated the
townsmen of Bristol by his iUegal exactions. Violating
their charter, he imposed a cocket, or toU, on every ship
of fish brought into the port, which tax was to be paid
to the constable of the castle. This unjust imposition
was, as we shaU see (although perforce submitted to in
the presence of a victorious army), bitterly resented,
and was the principal cause of the burgesses being
deprived of their charter by Edward I, (restored 1284^),
and also of the great insurrection, 1312 to 1316, under
Edward n,
38, But the Bristol burgesses were not the only
sufferers; the wealth of the ecclesiastics and of their
churches was seized ; the castles and estates of the
barons who sided with the Pope were taken possession
of by the king, who starved the owners to death in his
prisons, and violated common decency by his outrages
on their wives and daughters. The whole land was
filled with disaffection, and men everywhere began to
look about them for a remedy. Then the Pope launched
his last thunderbolt. Acting on his previous excom
munication he deposed the king, absolved his people
from their aUegiance, called upon all Christians, kings,
barons and people, to dethrone John, and excommuni
cated those who held any intercourse with him. Had
John been as wise as he was able, as studious of the
welfare and happiness of his people as he had been
unjust and tyrannical, he might have laughed to scorn
the fulminations from Eome, and thrown himself un
reservedly upon the affections of his people, who would
have sacrificed much rather than endure such an outrage
1 Evans, 68,
[Vol, L]

from a foreign pontiff. For by this buU aU the ordinary
operations of law were suspended, crime might be com
mitted with impunity, and there was no safety for
property or for life.
But John had forfeited all claim to the loyalty of
his subjects, and he found at this his hour of perU that
he coiUd place no reUance on baron or burgess. His
cruelties were intolerable. Amongst the records of his
atrocities we find that "one Geoffrey, of Norwich, sus
pected of being engaged in a plot against him, was
first imprisoned at Nottingham, and thence brought to
Bristol, where he was miserably put to death by a new
kind of punishment," ^ This was in 1212, in which
year John was in Bristol, on July 25th and 26th, and
on October 18th and 19th. In 1213 he learned, to his
consternation, that Philip of France had obtained the
promise of the English kingdom from the Pope, that
he was in league with the English nobility, and that a
large army was assembled on the French shore ready
for the invasion of England, To crown aU a fanatic,
"Peter of Pomfret, had prophesied that before Ascen
sion Day, May 16th, 1213, John would cease to reign."
39. The king was busy in Bristol on March 13th
and 14th of that year, feeUng the pulse of his hereto
fore faithful men. When his position was clearly seen
by him, his change of front was sudden and complete,
his arrogance dropped into servility, his haughty pride
sank into the deepest depth of mean abasement. He
resigned both crown and kingdom into the hands of the
Pope's legate, took an oath of fealty to the Holy Father,
as his vassal, and consented to pay to him an annual
tribute of 1,000 marks, and so received back a tarnished
crown. He, moreover, was obUged to reverse aU out
lawries, to make what restitution he could, to recaU the
exiled ecclesiastics, and to welcome Langton as Arch
bishop of Canterbury. AU England was astounded.
"He has become the Pope's man," the people cried;
but as a poUtical measure the success of John's submis
sion was complete. On the 15th he knelt before the
legate and degraded England to be a fief of the Holy
See ; and on Ascension Day (May 16th) he hanged the
fanatic Peter as a false prophet, although the prophecy
had been painfuUy true,
40, The character of John displays a strange com
pound of abject meanness and great courage and ability ;
from grovelling at the feet of the legate for the restora
tion of his crown, and hanging a crazy fanatic because
he had unwittingly told an inconvenient truth, we find
him successfuUy organising a league which, had he
been supported by his people, would probably have laid
France at his feet. He wrote at this time to his con-
1 Matth, Westm, I

114

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1215,

stable of Bristol castle commanding him to send without
delay 54 coats of mail and haubergeons, with iron caps
and helmets, so that they may be at Portsmouth by the
day of St, HUary (January 14th), He ordered that
every ship in the realm that could carry six horses
shoiUd rendezvous at Portsmouth, and every man-at-
arms in the kingdom was summoned to the coast of
Kent, By far the greater number of the barons, although
they obeyed the caU, refused to embark, aUeging that
their term of feudal service had expired. The king then
sought to lure them to foUow him, and saUed to Jersey
in that anticipation. Instead of doing so, however, they
met in council at St, Albans, and issued in the royal
name a proclamation commanding that the laws of King
Henry I, should be observed, John returned in a rage
and determined to punish the barons as traitors ; but he
was met by the sturdy Archbishop who told him that no
man could be punished without a trial, and threatened
him with excommunication if he dared to proceed to
extremities, 41, Notwithstanding this defection, the king boldly
crossed the Channel with his fleet, landed in Poitou,
and captured Angers, The Earl of Salisbury burned
Dieppe and destroyed the French fleet, Otho of Ger
many, with his knights and the Flemings of the Count
of Flanders, joined him, and John's force amounted to
150,000 men, the greater part being, however, foreign
mercenaries. The two armies met at Bouvines ; the
result was the total defeat of the aUied armies by the
French and the utter overthrow of the hopes of John.
He immediately concluded an ignominious truce with
PhUip and returned to England in October, stiU cherish
ing the belief that by the aid of his mercenaries he
should be, to use his own words, "for the first time.
King and Lord of England,"
42, Archbishop Langton and WiUiam, Earl of Pem
broke, were equal to the occasion, A council was held
at St, Paul's during the king's absence, in which the
patriotic prelate produced the charter of Henry I,, a
code of ancient Saxon laws, with Norman additions,
which the whole assembly adopted and swore to main
tain ; and within a few days of the king's landing the
barons met at St, Edmund's Burj', and swore on the
high altar to demand from him, if needful by force of
arms, the observance of Henry's charter and the Con
fessor's law.
At Christmas they presented themselves in arms
before the king and preferred their claim. He pro
mised to give them a definite answer at Easter, The
few months that foUowed showed John that he stood
alone — no man would help him against the charter,
43. His liege men of Bristol, who appear to have

been hitherto more faithful to him than he deserved,
had grown weary of his exactions. He endeavoured to
aUay their rising discontent, and sent an order for
twelve of the most discreet citizens to meet him that
very day, the Sunday next after the feast of St, Pancras
(AprU 3rd), at Trowbridge, in order that he might
expound to them his wUl. The writ further ordered
that at the same time, and apparently under their safe
conduct, forty hogsheads of wine should be sent to him
at Marlborough and twenty others to Devizes, Mor
bidly suspicious of the burgesses, he further directed
Peter de Cancel ( ? Chancellor), the keeper of his wines
in Bristol, to go to the king's treasure-house, taking
with him certain persons, and in their sight he was to
break the locks and to replace them by new ones, the
keys of which were to be kept under the seals of the
persons appointed, and nothing was to be abstracted
without their presence and concurrence,'- This was on
the eve of his appointment with the barons, whom he
had to meet at Easter,^ Whether the chosen discreet
twelve went to the king or not, we gather from the
foregoing, and from the banishment of Cygony and de
Cancel, that the voice of Bristol was heard in the
meadow of Eunnymede,
44, John, now too late, made concessions to cathedral,
monastery and convent ; he took the Cross for the Holy
Land ; he sent ambassadors to the Pope to solicit his
aid ; but as Easter drew near, he found to his cost that
the terrible Nemesis was rapidly overtaking him. The
barons met in arms at Stamford on AprU 27th; they
marched to Brackley, where the king was then living,
and presented to him the heads of their demands.
These were indignantly refused, "Why do they not
ask for my kingdom ?" said he in his fury. The whole
country rose as one man on his refusal to accept the
charter. London opened its gates to the barons' army,
the great towns furnished their contingents, and, with
seven horsemen in his train, John found himself face to
face with a nation in arms,
45, The Magna Charta of our English liberties was
signed by the unwUling king on June 15th, 1215, at
Eunnymede, an island on the Thames. For its provi
sions we refer our readers to the history of England,
it being far too lengthy for quotation ; we give, how
ever, a brief sample of the character in which it is
written. Bat the struggle was not yet over between
John and his people. The king appealed to Eome, and
the Pope, as over-lord, annulled the charter, excommuni
cated the barons and the citizens of London, and sus
pended from his office the Primate ; whUst John sat
1 Close Rolls, 1215,
^ Magna Charta, Clause 58. See note 3, page 112,

A.D, 1216,

JOHN'S DEATH.

115

brooding vengeance in the Isle of Wight, laying his
plans, and anon marching along the south coast waiting
for an expected army of mercenaries. From Poitou,
Brabant, Gascony and Flanders there came, scenting
their prey, large troops of discipUned freebooters, and
the king found himself at the head of an army of
foreigners, whom he led against his own people,
46, On July 19th and 20th, and again on August
19th, 20th and 21st, the king was in Bristol on the old
errand — raising money and gathering men. His mer
cenaries plundered and burned wherever they marched,
and the royal route might have been traced by the
smouldering embers of the king's last sleeping-place.
The undisciplined people everywhere fled from the
fierce marauders, and John's star seemed to be once
again in the ascendant,
47, Driven to despair, the barons and burgesses, stiU
despising the papal buU and saying ' ' the ordering of
secular matters appertaineth not to the Pope," offered
the crown to Louis, the eldest son of the King of France,
The French prince accepted gladly, came with a powerful
fleet, and <J«mitts ky-a^<}(l^iciot^S^c^ii^<t<>xi.iiiSvIL^^ ^rot^\. ^4triMn^«r«bif(
^^ „^^. Hufeifc'^c Jcni30^cttelc'wl;picU.mcJ]pu2;«\ttiSel^eml& <pwK1^"'§««-fe^l)«i«'? DiVUtf. (iH^im
umphant; J)aff«t.p^»ripp>ViIW.p«feV]^<.|i|r«^^^^ Km '^n^oiliis.jrJtoy.ti'^ermw nt^:
but what ^'^
Louis gaiaed by his sword he lost by an unwise tongue. A
death -bed confession of one of his nobles, that the
prince had said he would when triumphant, destroy
the men who raised him to the throne, and his lavish
bestowment of honours and possessions upon French
men, convinced the English people that they were only
exchanging a native oppressor for a foreign tyrant.
48, In this crisis John with his army, hurrying to
the reUef of Dover, in the castle of which Hubert de
Burgh was besieged by Louis, was surprised by the
tide whilst crossing the Wash, his baggage and his
treasures were swept away, and the kingdom was saved
the horrors of another sangxdnary civU war by the
king's death from exhaustion and mortiflcation, at
Newark, on the 1 9th of October, 1216,
49, When John retained the lordship of Bristol in his
hands he also kept the private property, of which he had
held possession. In 1817, an old house that stood in
Baldwin street, on the south side, was puUed down ; it
had an entrance from Back street, with a large garden

his career
was for
a brief
whUe tri

Facsimile of Magna Charta,

and orchard extending down towards Queen's square. It
was built apparently upon an older arched foundation,
the ground being low and subject to floods. This house
was traditionaUy known as King John's house, it ad
joined the gardens of the "great stone house," and the
entrance was from what is now known as Back street.
The spot itself would be tolerably secure against any
sudden attack, it being an island, formed by the mUl
stream fosse of the south waU of the town, and the rivers
Avon and Frome, This would appear to have been in
the 11th and 12th centuries a fashionable suburb; for
here also, according both to history and tradition, stood
the great stone house of Eobert Fitzhardinge, and the
house in which Matthews, the schoolmaster, educated
Prince Henry, About 80 yards from the steps, going
towards Clare street, there were also in Seyer's time the
ruins of a chapel, in which a groined ceiUng could be
traced ; this was reputed to be King John's chapel.
In Barton Eegis hundred, about a mUe from the
city, on the road to Upper Easton, there was also in
the last century a gateway in a waU, which, it was said,
led to a
house be-
longing also to
this king,
whichSeyer
thinks
was used by him as a hunting-lodge when he took his
pastime in the adjoining forest of Kingswood,^
50, In the penultimate year of his reign, John gave
certain services, lands and houses in Bristol to the abbey
of BeauUeu, in Hampshire, which had been founded by
himself, ^
John does not appear to have coined money in Bristol.
His character has thus been described by a con
temporary : —
" Foul as it is, hell itself is defiled by the fouler presence of King
John," — Boger of Andover,
During this reign Giraldus Cambrensis, whose home
was at the back of Barry island, Peter of Blois, Gervase
of Canterbury, Henry of Huntingdon, Ealph de Diceto,
and Bishop Grostete gave a stamp to the literature of
the kingdom. The dinner hour was nine a,m,, the
supper hour five p.m. Chimneys were first used chiefly
in kitchens ; the assize of bread was appointed, and sur
names began to be common,
1 Seyer, L, 532,
2 Full particulars of this gift may be seen in Seyer, L, 533^,

CHAPTER VI.

^

Tr^E -f Pli^aiJT^GEIlET ^ E^^. ^

THE HOUSE OF ANJOU.— PART II.

I. Henry III. crowned at Gloucester. 2. He holds a Council at Bristol. 3. Grants the right to
choose a Mayor. 4. State of the Country. 5. The " Chase of Bristol." 6. The Princess Eleanor a
prisoner in the Castle. 7. The burgesses farm the revenue of the Town. 8. The King renews the Charter.
g, Hubert de Burgh's escape from Devizes. 10. Henry's character and conduct. 11. De Marisco's piracies
in the Bristol Channel, and a description of the Island of Lundy. 12. The shipping accommodation in the
Port. 13. The course of the river Frome. 14. Improvements in the Port. 15. A stone Bridge built.
16, The Township of Redcliff. 17. The new Wall of Defence at Redcliff. 18. The new Wall in the Marsh
(King Street), ig. Ichnography of the Religious Houses. 20. Ichnography of the Churches. 21. How the
Walls were built and kept in repair. 22. Curious tenures and gifts in connection with All Saints Church.
23. Charter of 1252. 24. Bristol given to Prince Edward and his wife. 25. Charter granting a Coroner.
26. The " Mad Parliament." 27. Prince Edward besieged in the Castle. 28. Simon de Montfort's
Parliament. 29. The struggle on the Severn. 30. Prince Edward victorious. He takes Bristol. 31. State
of the country at the close of Henry's reign. 32, Henry's Coinages at Bristol.

*,ENEY III, was only ten years of age
when he succeeded his father. On the
28th of October, 1216, in the Conventual
church at Gloucester, he was solemnly
crowned with a plain fillet of gold, the
crown of England having been lost in the
Wash with John's treasures. The cere
mony was performed by the Papal Legate
Gualo, who had come from Eome to assist the late king
against the French Prince and the confederate barons.
This was a serious innovation on established usage.
Heretofore the Primate, or in his absence the Arch
bishop of York, had claimed the right on behalf of the
people to place the crown on the head of the monarch,

but Gualo's was an overt act on the Pope's behalf,
asserting his right as the over-lord to dispose of the
crown of England, for which the boy monarch was com
peUed to do homage to his Holiness,
So repugnant to the nobUity was this that they were
" conspicuous by their absence," only three bishops and
a few barons deigning to attend the ceremony.
The Earl of Pembroke was appointed governor of
the young monarch and regent of the kingdom. By
his wise and prudent conduct the breach between the
confederated barons and Louis was made irreparable,
and the nobles abandoned the foreigner and offered
aUegiance to Henry.
2, On the 11th of November the king held a councU

A,D. 1217,

HENRY III. GRANTS THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE A MAYOR.

117

in Bristol, ' ' eleven bishops presented themselves, Lang
ton and the Bishop of Lincoln, and probably the Arch
bishop of York also, were stiU abroad ; the Bishops of
SaUsbury and London were Ul; the sees of Durham,
Norwich and Hereford were vacant. The Earls of
Pembroke, Chester and Derby represented their own
branch of the councU; WiUiam of Aumale also had
returned to his aUegiance before John's death ; Hubert
de Burgh and the two WiUiams de Briwere, father and
son, represented the administrative body; Savario de
Mauleon and Fulkes de Breaute, the mUitary strength
which John had laboured so hard to maintain. Of the
other barons present the most famous names are those
of Beauchamp, Clifford, Mortimer, Lacy and OantUupe,
most of them from the western shires, and the March,
where the personal influence of John had been longest
and least oppressively felt. Of the twenty -five executors
of the charter, WiUiam of Aumale alone appeared,"^
Henry, at the above councU, confirmed the Magna
Charta in aU its essential details, London stUl adhering
to the French prince, who in the hour of need had come
avowedly to the succour of English Uberty, Henry took
up his residence in Bristol and spent his Christmas there,
Louis foreseeing a great defection of his English sup
porters, had hurried to France for reinforcements. Of
these a large force in AprU, 1217, consisting of 600
knights and 20,000 men, was ruinously defeated at
Lincoln by Pembroke with a comparatively smaU army.
This was foUowed by a more fatal disaster ; a fieet of
eighty ships fuU of men sailed from Calais to aid the
prince, Hubert de Burgh coUected forty ships from the
Cinque Ports, manoeuvred so as to get the weather
gauge, scattered powdered lime in the air, rammed his
ships on to the French fieet ere the enemy had recovered
their eyesight, and, boarding, carried the day with the
battleaxe. From that hour the cause of Louis was hopeless.
The legate who had excommunicated both him and the
barons, his partizans, now granted the prince absolution,
Pembroke consented to treat with him, advanced £5,000
to meet his most pressing necessities, conducted him
safely to the coast, and England was once again freed
from the presence of a foreign foe,
3, It was whUe Henry was in Bristol, in 1216, that
he granted a charter to the burgesses simUar to the one
which his father had given to the burgesses of London
in 1213, giving them liberty to choose a mayor from
among themselves. This charter is lost, but there can
be no reasonable doubt as to its substance,
London was at this time in open active rebeUion
against the king, Bristol was the royal residence.
1 Stubbs' Constit. Hist,, II,, 19,

London had chosen Eoger Fitz Alan, a citizen, as her
first mayor ; Bristol now chose Adam le Page to fUl the
civic chair, London appears to have used the title of
mayor some years before the charter was granted, the
appointment, we think, was not at fir-st an annual one,
as Henry Fitz Elwyne was chief magistrate of that
city from 1189 to 1212. ^ So also in Bristol the title
was in use at least as early as 1200, in which year
Eobert Fitz Nichol witnessed as "mayor" the transfer
of a bakehouse to the church of St. Nicholas,^
At the same place and time Henry and the Legate
Gualo approved of the old established GuUd of the
Calendars, "propter antiquitates et bonitates, in ea
Gilda repertas," and Gualo commended it to the care of
the Bishop of Worcester, for particulars of which see
our EcoLESiAsxicAi History, To the same volume also
we must refer our readers for an account of the rapid
growth of the monasteries and the friaries during this
century, 4. The University of Oxford was at this period the
centre of the democratic life of England, light was
breaking, knowledge was recognised as more powerful
than mere brute force, and both the feudal and ecclesi
astical regimes, found themselves at strife with the
schools, where "to know more than one's feUows was a
man's sole claim to be a ruler." That this knowledge,
however, combined physical force, and inteUectual ac
quirements, is evident from a pithy proverb of the
period, "When Oxford cb-aws knife, England's soon at
strife." Whilst England suUenly growled at the exactions
of the Papacy, the roystering students took the bull by
the horns, and besieged the legate himself in the stately
abbey of Osney, under the very shadow of the great
Norman towers of the castle of Oxford. For Eome was
sucking the very life blood of English freedom and
wealth, her legate resided at the court, and, as guardian
of the king during his minority, claimed a share in the
administration as the representative of the over-lord
the Pope.
5. Langton had returned to England, In 1222 he
held a synod at Oxford, where he made fifty canons, and
steadily upheld the principles of Magna Charta. A
friend to his order, he was a greater friend to English
freedom. It was he who caused to be re-introduced into
the Charter the clause which had been omitted in the
confirmation at Bristol in 1216 "during his enforced
absence," which restricted the royal power over taxation;
and he also caused to be passed a Forest Charter, by
1 Liber Albus, 645.
2 J. F, Nicholls, Bristol and Glouc, Arch. Proc, 1879, 8. [We
shall, in a subsequent chapter, give as complete a list as possible
of the civic dignitaries from the date 1216. — Ed.]

118

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1224.

which it was enacted that no man shotUd lose life or
limb for taking the royal venison. It was also owing
to his influence that the king's woods were lessened,
and some of them disafforested. This was passed
reluctantly by Henry at a ParUament in Oxford in
1223, " 1222, Huntingford Chase, alias Horewood Chase,
was now caUed the Chase of Bristol, All the lands of
Hugh Gurney were ordered to be seized for hunting in a
chase of that name without the king's leave," ^ Probably
this piece of gross injustice had some share in procuring
the Charter of the Forests ; more likely stUl is it that it
was the cause of the foUowing change in 1227 : — "At
the general petition of the inhabitants of those parts,
and especiaUy of the men in the Forest of Horwood,
and for £150 in money. King Henry III,, in the 12th
and 13th yeares of his reign, did disafforest aU the
townes, lands and woods between Huntingford (where
Berkeley Hundred and Hugh Gurney's lands parted)
and the wood of ffurzes now caUed Kingswood, within
fewer mUes of BristoU and so from Seaverneside, to the
browe of the hUls by Sodbury, excepting only Allestone
Parke, And for more assurance, the Bishop of Bath
and WeUs, and some other lords, took particular patents
of disafforestation of their proper manors,"
Mr. Fosbroke adds : — "A writ passed for disaffores
tation of king's forest near Bristol caUed Huntingford ;
claus. 12 Hen. Ill, A flue of 12,000 marks was paid
for the disafforestation of the King's forest of Hore
wood, on this side Severn; Fin. 12 Hen. III. At the
same era the Bishop of Bath and WeUs held a charter
for disafforestation of his manor of Pucklechurch,
within this chase ; Cart. 13 Henry III," ^
Henry resided in the castle during his stay in Bristol,
"He added a new barbican outside the western gate
(the site of the entrance to Castle street) at a cost of
£30. At the same date is a payment of £5 for forty
wooden crossbows, bought by the royal command for
the fortress ; also a payment for repairs to the Castle
Palace, which had been injured by violent winds," ^
In 1 224 the king was again in Bristol, On leaving for
Devizes he ordered a good carriage for three horses to
be provided to carry himself, his armour and other
accoutrements ; also a bag of almonds, two frails of
flgs, a frail of raisins and a sack of rice, WhUst here
he made a gift to the Bishop of Sarum of a certain
remainder of timber in Clarendon Wood, near SaUs-
^ Evans, 56.
'-' Evans, 57, from Smyth's History of Berkeley. Most probably
the ruins to which we have alluded on page 38 were the relics of a
hunting lodge or a manor house of this bishop.
' Taylor's Book about Bristol from Rot. Litt, Claus., Hardy's
Intro,, xiv.

bury, towards the erection of the present cathedral then
buUding," ^
6, When the Princess Eleanor was first brought
into permanent residence in Bristol is not quite clear.
That she was here in 1224 during the king's visit is
certain. Although she constantly insisted on her right
to the crown (to which she had in point of fact a better
title than her cousin the king regnant), she was not
treated with harshness or closely confined. By writ
dated October 9th, 1224, Henry commanded his baUiffs
at Bristol to attend at the castle once or twice every
seven days, with four elect and approved men of the
town, to see that the princess was in safe custody. She
was aUowed three waiting-maids, and rode abroad upon
a palfrey with gilded reins. There are orders for the
sheriffs of London to provide for her a fraU of almonds,
a fraU of figs, and five ounces of sUk for her tapestry
work. The Bristol bailiffs are to furnish her with a
tunic, super tunic, cloak and hood of dark brown or
green, with cape of cambric, furred, and forty yards of
fine Unen ; also her waiting-maids are to have a tunic,
and super tunic, and cloak, with a cape of rabbit's skin,
furred with lambskin. For the hermit in the castle
(her chaplain probably) was to be made a tunic and
cloak of the price of 12d. a yard, with a thick cape of
lambskin. For the cook and master jaUer of the same
castle each a tunic and super tunic at lid, a yard, furred
with lambskin. For the three other jaUers each a robe
tunic and super tunic at I4d. a yard, without fur. For
each of the two grooms and seven watchmen a tunic
and super tunic at I2d. per yard, without fur. Pre
viously to this, on March 13th, 1224, when Henry was
at Bristol, he ordered that on every Sabbath day Eobert
Lupus and Ealph WiUiton should receive 50s, for the
expenses of Eleanor and the royal servants at the castle,
Hubert de Burgh, chief justiciary, and the Bishop of
Bath and WeUs being witnesses to the written injunc
tion. By a later writ, 12th March, 1225, the king
commands that the princess receive five marks a quarter
for abns or pocket money. He also enjoins that two
casks of old wine be suppUed to her ; and on the 25th
of January foUowing, an order occurs for ten casks of
wine to be sent from the king's vintners at Bristol to
Ealph WiUiton, the constable of the castle, for her use,
so that if wine could gladden the heart of the captive
she was not denied its powerful efficacy. On the 9th of
September, 1226, the king sends her a present of two
stags from his chase at Corfe, On the 25th of May,
1236, there is an order " Pay from our treasury to eight
servicemen in Bristol Castle 12d, a day each; to three
' Taylor's Book about Bristol from Rot, Litt, Claus,, Hardy's
Intro,, xiv.

A.D, 1225,

THE KING RENEWS THE CHARTER.

119

others, l^d. a day ; £19 15s, for forty days. Pay also to
twenty serving footmen S^d, a day, fortwenty-four days," '^
In a Code of Instructions, signed at Berkeley,
August 28th, 1249, 34 Henry III,, the king "enjoins
the mayor and bailiff to lengthen three of the windows
of his chapel, and to whitewash it throughout ; also glass
windows are ordered to be put in our haU at Bristol,
a royal seat in the same haU, and dormant tables
around the same, to block up the doors of the chapel
beside our great hall there, and make a door in the
chancel towards the hermitage ; in that hermitage make
an altar to St. Edward, and in the turret, over that
hermitage, make a chamber for the clerk, with appur
tenances ; also bnUd a kitchen and a sewer beside the
said haU; and find the wages of a certain chaplain
whom we have ordered to celebrate divine service in
the chapel of our tower there, aU the days of our life
for Eleanor of Brittany, our cousin ; to wit, 50s. per
annum," In 1222 the king granted the burgesses by
charter the customs on imports for two years, for re
pairing the waUs,
7, In 1225 the revenues of the town were farmed
out to the burgesses at a rent of £245 per annum,
"They are to answer for two parts of that rent at
Michaelmas, and for the remainder at the feast of St,
HUary ; saving to the King for the use of the Constable
and his people in the castle of BristoU the prisage of
Beer, as much as they want ; so that the Burgesses may
have the remainder ; and saving to the King the BaiU-
wick of the barton of Bristol, and of the chace of BruU
(Bristol), of Keinesham, and of the wood of Furehes
(Kingswood), which baUiwick the King has retained in
his own hand,"^ The townsfolk were thus freed from
the exactions of the revenue farmer, knew exactly how
much they were required to pay, and at what periods
the money was due.
8, For the third time the great charter was con
firmed, in 1225, by Henry in councU, upon the occasion
of the grant of a fifteenth upon aU personal estates ;
but in 1227 the king declared himself of fuU age, and
set up his prerogative above aU letters patent, which he
claimed to "interpret, enlarge, or diminish by his own
free wiU," He ordered most of the corporate towns to
renew their charters, and that of Henry II,, 1164, was
confirmed by him to the Bristol burgesses for a given
sum, the amount of which is not known ; this charter
was witnessed by Hubert de Burgh, WiUiam, Earl of
Pembroke, and Ealph Fitz Nicholas,
9, The death of the great and patriotic churchman.
Archbishop Langton, had left Hubert de Burgh alone
in the administration of the affairs of the kingdom,
1 Taylor's Book about Bristol, 185-6, ^ Seyer, IL, 10,

but when the young king, with "his own free wiU for
his guide," and a posse of foreign favourites surround
ing his throne, had tasted the sweets of power; he
speedily quarreUed with the chief justiciary, whom he
threw, in 1233, into prison in the castle of Devizes, and
WiUiam, brother of Lord Talbot, was made constable
of Bristol castle. One night by the assistance of his
esquire, who was his faithful and only attendant, De
Burgh (now Earl of Kent) let himself down through
the lattice by the aid of towels and napkins and took
refuge in the parish church. He was dragged from
thence in the morning by his keepers, but the bishop
claiming the immunity of his sanctuary, he was taken
back to the church, where he was closely watched by
the soldiers and the posse comitatus.
WiUiam MareschaU, Earl of Pembroke, who had
himself received most scurvy usage at the king's hand,
hearing in his castle of Strugoyl (Chepstow) of the
treatment of his ancient friend, despatched two of his
knights, Gilbert Basset and Eichard Siward, with a
body of armed men, who forced the guard, armed De
Burgh in the church, mounted him on a mailed horse,
and crossing the river at Aust conveyed the earl in
safety to Chepstow.
De Burgh made his peace. He was constable of
the castle of Bristol in 1229, in which year the mon
astery of the Black Friars was founded by Maurice de
Berkeley, who, dying the ensuing year, " gave by deed
to the king Beverstone, Aylburton and Weston, whence
the bequest is caUed King's Weston," " William de
Putot, sheriff of Gloucestershire, declined to answer
for the profits of the county, because the King had
granted them for the custody of the Castles of Bristol
and Gloucester, and for the maintenance of Eleanor his
kinswoman, and the soldiers dweUing in both Castles —
including the rent of Berton Eegis, 60 marks, and the
prisage of beer," ^
In 1231, according to the Patent EoUs, murage was
imposed upon Bristol by charter. It was a toU paid for
every loaded beast or carriage entering within the town,
which was applied to the purpose of repairing the walls.
In an old deed of 1235, John de la Warr, mayor,
witnessed a gift of a rent charge upon two stone houses,
opposite St, Nicholas church, by Eobert Aurifaber
(goldsmith), for the chaplain celebrating mass in the
said church, the chaplain to be chosen by the mayor
and the steward of the Merchants' Company,
10, Henry was utterly lacking in the poUtical capa
city that had distinguished his race ; weak, capricious,
vain, profuse, superstitious and false, he became a mere
tool in the hands of the rapacious foreigners who crowded
1 Evans, 58,

120

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1237,

into England on his marriage with Eleanor of Provence
in 1236, The extravagant hauteur of the queen's re
latives, their monopoly of lands, wealth and honours,
the lawless violence of their crowds of hungry retainers,
who openly piUaged the markets and robbed the mer
chants, the exactions of the king by forced loans, or by
his living at free quarters wherever he chose to hold
his court, the extortionate use he made of the forest
laws, his pensions to foreign favourites, amounting to
one-sixth of the royal revenue, and the great indebted
ness of the royal household, alienated the people from
the crowm, so that when in his financial straits he had,
in 1237, to appeal to a Great Council for aid, it was
only granted
uponhis ^_ ^fc
confirming
the Charter
and solemn
ly promising
to abide by
its provi
sions. Neither
promises nor
oaths could
bind so friv
olous, false
and mean a
king as Hen
ry. When,
in 1239, his
son was born
he sent mes
sengers into
the cities and
chief towns to ask for gifts, " God gave us the child,
but the king sells him to us," said the Bristol men,
nevertheless they prudently contributed. At New
Year's day Henry made another appeal for money,
which was granted. In 1248 he had to seU his jewels
to the citizens of London ; this annoyed him. They
wouldn't lend money, but they would buy! "They
caU themselves barons indeed ! They possess a surfeit
of riches! That city is an inexhaustible weU ! " cried
he. And he took care to dip his bucket into it pretty
constantly on one pretence or another.
11. At this period the commerce of Bristol suffered
greatly from the piratical attacks of WiUiam de Marisco,
the lord of the island of Lundy, which marks the south
western boundary of the Bristol Channel,
" Where rock and ridge the bulwark keep,
The giant warders of the deep."

Lundy Castle in the nth Century.

The island Ues about llj mUes N.W. of Hartland
Point, and consists of a huge granite boss, which bias
apparently been thrust up through sUvery slate rocks
like those of Morthoe, There is but one practicable
landing-place, which is at the S,E,, where the peninsula
of Lametor and Eat island project, forming a bay with
good anchorage fringed by a pebbly beach.
This little bay is commanded by a castle which
stands on the verge of the beetling cliff and covers the
only road of access to the summit. It was buUt in the
11th century by John de Marisco, and its stones are
cemented together by a pecuUarly hardened clay with
out lime, which distinguishes the ancient fortification
from the
t .^^ more modern
structures erected in
the 1 7th cen
tury for the
defence of
the island.
At their
base the cas
tle waUs are
nine feet
thick, hav
ing on the
seaward face
a consider
able batter
to one -third
their height,
which in the
keep (the
only portion
standing) was 51 feet. Traces of embattlements and of
machicolations are visible where the modern masonry
has stiU further heightened this venerable structure.
In form the castle is Early Norman, square, with turrets
at the angles ; it was surrounded by a stone waU with
bastions at each corner and a deep fosse, except on the
seaward front, there was a drawbridge on the north
east side. Traces of extensive offices, guard-houses, &c.,
remain, which show that once it was a place of consider
able strength. There are besides this castle the remains
of a large number of ancient structures, which were
utilised for batteries in the civil wars, and in the reign
of Queen Anne, when French privateers infested the
Bristol Channel, and some foundations of round, iso
lated towers link its history to that of Ireland, Grose,
in his Antiquities teUs the foUowing curious story : —
"A ship of force pretending to be a Dutchman, and

A,D, 1242,

THE ISLAND OF LUNDY.

121

driven into the road by mistaking the Channel, sent
a boat on shore, desiring some milk for their captain,
who W8LS sick, which the unsuspicious inhabitants
granted for several days. At length the crew informed
them of their captain's death, and begged leave, if there
was any church or consecrated ground on the island, to
deposit his corpse in it, and also requested the favour of
aU the islanders to be present at the ceremony, which
was immediately complied with. Accordingly the coffin
was landed, and, by the assistance of the inhabitants,
carried to the grave. They thought it remarkably
heavy, yet were without the least suspicion of any
hostile intentions. As soon as they had rested it
the inhabitants were desired to quit the chapel, the
visitors intimating that the custom of their country
forbade foreigners to be spectators of that part of
the ceremony which they were then going to per
form, but that they should be admitted in a few
minutes to see the body interred. They had not
waited long without the waUs before the doors were
suddenly thrown open, and a body of armed men,
furnished from the feigned receptacle of the dead,
rushed out, and made them aU prisoners. The poor
distressed islanders then soon discovered these pre
tended Dutchmen were their national enemies the
French, and were not a little hurt to find stratagem
prevaU where force would have been ineffectual, and
the more particularly so as they had lent assistance to
forward their own ruin. The enemy immediately seized
50 horses, 300 goats, 500 sheep, and some buUocks,
Alter reserving what they thought proper for their own
use, they hamstringed the remainder of the horses and
buUocks, threw the sheep and goats into the sea, and
stripped the inhabitants of every valuable, even to their
clothes ; and so much were they bent on destruction,
that, a large quantity of meal happening to be in cer
tain lofts under which was some salt for curing of fish,
they scuttled the floor, and so, by mixing the mea and
salt together, spoUed both. Thus satiated with plunder
and mischief, they threw the guns over the cliffs, and
left the island in a most destitute and disconsolate
condition." ^
Our readers must take this cum grano salis. The
amount of stock said to have been captured is out of all
proportion to that which the island could have main
tained, and, moreover, the same story is told of the
capture of the island of Sark, but in that case the account
is indisputable. From their stronghold on the rock, the robber lords
of Lundy made their piratical attacks, not only on the
ships traversing the high seas, but also on the adjoining
1 Grose's Antiq,, IV,
[Vol, I,]

coasts of CornwaU, Devon, Wales and Ireland, In 1238
one Eichard, a clerk, feigning to be a fool, played the
jester for some days at the Court of Henry IIL, at
Woodstock, One night when the king was retiring to
rest, this man was found lying hid in the straw under
the king's bed, armed with a long knife, with which he
had intended to kiU the king. He impUcated WiUiam
de Marisco, by whom he professed to have been insti
gated to commit the murder. The wretched man was
drawn at the taUs of horses from Woodstock to Oxford,
where he was hanged,
Marisco fled to his island of Lundy, where he sub
sisted on piracy and rapine until 1242, when the island
was taken by surprise (very probably in a manner some
what simUar to that narrated above), and he and sixteen
of his companions were taken prisoners.
Condemned to death they were drawn from West
minster to the Tower and hanged on a gibbet, " When
Marisco had there breathed out his wretched soul he
was disemboweUed, his bowels were burned on the spot,
and his wretched body, divided into quarters, was sent
to the four principal cities of the kingdom to strike
terror into all beholders," This is said to have been
the first time that this barbarous punishment was in
flicted in England, The island then was declared forfeit
to the king, Edward II, sought in vain to reach it as a
refuge when flying from his queen and the barons. It
played a conspicuous part in the 17th century, in the
early portion of which it was again the rendezvous of
pirates ; then it was captured by Spaniards, afterwards
it was held loyaUy for Charles, until the garrison
were reduced to feed on horseflesh, and when they sur
rendered it is said that they had not eaten wheaten bread
for six months. In the middle of the 1 8th century a
notorious adventurer, Thomas Benson, of Bideford, made
it a receptacle for convicts, whom he had contracted with
the Government to convey to Virginia, and also for goods
which he smuggled, or of which he defrauded the in
surance offices by landing cargoes on the island and then
scuttling the vessels. During the present century the
granite has been quarried, but without pecuniary success,
12, In 1241 the Princess Eleanor died after a cap
tivity of 40 years, Henry, always apprehensive of an
emeute in her favour, as having a more legitimate claim
to the throne, felt greatly relieved at her death ; for now
was the crown settled on the legal heir of King Eichard,
Bristol, we have seen, was early famous for its soap
manufacture. In 1242 grey soap was sent from Bristol
to London to John Lamb, who sold it at one penny per
pound, and black soap at a half-penny.
The year 1239-40 was an eventful year for Bristol
commerce, and the proceedings of the burgesses show
I 2

122

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1247.

that, notwithstanding the exactions of the clergy and
the aids to their king, they had prospered abundantly.
The town quay, at which ships could load and unload,
occupied only the space between the end of Baldwin
street and St, Peter's hospital, be it remembered that
this was, moreover, merely the bank of a tidal river,
whose waters twice every day rose to height of 23 feet
on an average, and as often subsided into a shaUow
stream flowing mostly through wide borders of soft deep
mud. The chief quay was that on the bank at the back
of Bridge street, and from this the church of St, Mary
derived its name St, Mary-le-port, This bank was high
and the river bottom stony. Ships settling down at low
water upon uneven ground were frequently strained
(hogged) out of their fair lines, hence the term attached
to Bristol shipping for centuries (Bristol hogs). How
the vessels passed the wooden bridge, which we have
no doubt was in existence, is not stated, most probably
there was an opening with a drawbridge, Uke those
which existed at Frome bridge, St. Leonard's bridge
and the castle, besides most of the shipping in that age
could raise or lower their masts at pleasure.
13. The river Frome in its natural course flowed
down what is now Marsh street, and thence across the
middle of Back street by the Lawditch to the Avon,
which it joined near to the churchyard at the end of Crow
lane. But the chief portion of the water of this stream
had for centuries been diverted into the fosse of the
town, which ran under the waU from the Quay head
through what are now St. Stephen and Baldwin streets
untU reaching the Avon bank, it there drove Baldwin's
cross niiU. The overplus of this water in times of flood
would naturaUy find its old level, hence the earUest
name of Marsh street built upon its ancient bed was
SkadpuUe street (Scatter or Overflow-pool street). It is
very probable that for some considerable time the old
river was used as a pill or creek for smaU vessels which
could at high tide get as far as St. Stephen's Church —
this became PyUe street ;i hence, too, the name of
Back or Beck, a brook. The land on the eastern, or city
side, of the old water course belonged chiefly to the lord,
but some of it had passed into the possession of the
secular church of All Saints ; that on the western side
was a part of the manor of BiUeswick, which had by
Eobert Fitzhardinge been given to the abbey of St.
Augustine, This latter appears to have formed one
large fleld known as Chanter's Close, and the' townsfolk
had thereon an ancient right of way along the river
bank to the Avon, and most probably a towpath from
the junction of the Frome with the Avon, to Kingroad,
From this it wiU be seen that there was an irregularly
1 Will. Wyrces,, 44,

quadrangular insulated piece of ground known as Bristol
Marsh, whose angles would be at the Stone bridge.
Thunderbolt street. Crow lane, and the end of Baldwin
street, which island, as we have before shown in these
pages, being thus protected, had become a fashionable
inhabited suburb, containing the houses and chapels of
Eobert Fitzhardinge, King John, Matthews, the school
master, and Baldwin's cross mUl, &c,^
On the south and west sides of the ancient bed
of the Frome, the land included within the foUowing
points : — The Drawbridge, Thunderbolt street. Crow
lane, EedcUff ferry-slip and Canons' Marsh, belonged
to the Abbey of St, Augustine,
1 4, Some sagacious feUow who had heard the mer
chants' loud and frequent complaints of want of room
to load and unload their shipping, and who knew
that the town was "cabin'd, cribb'd, confin'd" within
its narrow boundaries to the great detriment of trade
and of health, conceived the design of first making
a new, safe and commodious port outside the then
waUs of the borough ; and secondly, of permanently
uniting to Bristol by a stone bridge like that of Lon
don, and incorporating with the borough, the thriv
ing parishes of Temple, Thomas and Eedcliff, There
is no record as to who the born engineer was who first
conceived the idea to which Bristol commerce owes its
extensive and exceUent quays and the vast development
at a bound of its commerce, neither is there any fear
that the city, which has not a single pubUc monument
to any one of its greatest known benefactors, wUl ever
raise one in gratitude to the great unknown. Indeed,
his glory is already numbered amongst the things that
have been, the bend of the tidal river has become a
spacious floating harbour, and soon, it is evident, the
tortuous channel of the Avon, which was suitable enough
for the short cogs, ketches and pinnaces of the bygone
centuries, must be made to afford suitable accommoda
tion for the steam leviathans that bid fair to monopoUse
the ocean traffic of the world.
The first part of the scheme was accomplished by
the purchase of the abbey land which we have described
as lying outside the Frome on the south and west
between the boundaries before-named, and the foUowing
covenant was sealed by both parties. It is the first title
deed in the Great Red Book in the CouncU House,
" Conveutio facta inter Abbatem et Conventum Sti Augustini
BristoUiffi & Majorem & communiam Bristolli«, de terra in
marisco Sti Augustini versus aquam de Frome,
" Ha3e est conventio facta inter dominum Willelmum de Brade
stone, tunc abbatem Sti Augustini de BristoU' et eiusdem loci
conventum ex una parte, & Ricardum Ailard tunc maiorem
^ This was, we believe, the river bank on which John, by
charter, allowed, the burgesses to build, — Ed,

a,d. 1247,

IMPROVEMENTS IN THE PORT.

123

BristoU' & totam communam BristoU' ex altera parte. Scilicet,
quod dictus Abbas & conventus concesserunt pro se & successori-
bus suis in perpetuum maiori & commune BristoU' &, eorum heere-
dibus totam terram illam iu marisco Sti Augustini BristoU', quse
jacet exra fossatum quod circuit terram arabilem dictorum canoni
corum direote versus orientem usque ad marginem portus Frome :
quod quidem fossatum extenditur a grangia dictorum canonicorum
versus Abonam Salvis abbati and conventui pr^dicto de terrS,
proximo prasdicto fossato versus grangiam prsedictam, ubi dicta
communa incepit fossare, septies viginti & quatuor pedibus
terrae in latitudine ; & in medio dicti marisci quater viginti &
duodecim pedibus terrae in latitudine ; & in exteriori parte dicti
marisci versus Abonam sexagiuta pedibus terrfe in latitudine t
super quam terram sic mensuratum communa BristoU' & eorum
hseredes habere debent liberum iter suum, introitum, exitum et
transitum ad naves suas & ad spatiandum pro voluntate eorum, de
die & nocte, longe & prope, pacifice & sine contradictione in
perpetuum, sicut semper habere consueverunt. Debent autem
prsedicta communa & eorum heredes & salvare abbati and con
ventui prsedicto & successoribus suis eandem terram mensuratam ;
ita soihcet, quod si cursus aquae ipsam terram deterioraverit,
dicta communa illam debet emendare. Residuam vero terram
dicti marisci Sti Auguistini BristoU' (ex orientali & australi parte
praedicti fossiat debent praadicta communa et eorum heredes
integre et habere et possidere, ad faciendum inde unam tran-
cheam & portum & quicquid dictae communae melius sederit
absque omni impediraento & contradictione in perpetuum. Pro
hac siquidem concessioue dederunt praedictus maior & communa
BristoU praedicto abbati & conventui novem marcas argenti : unde
ut haec concessio rata & stabiUs permaneat, tam sigillum praedicti
conventus quam commune sigiUum BristoU' mutuo appensa sunt
huio chirographo. Hiis testibus ; domino Joharme filio Galfridi :
Thoma de Berkeleia : Rob' de Goumey : W de Pycott : Ignatio
de Clyfton : Rogero de Warre de Knolle : Johanne le Warre de
Brixtulton ; & aliis. Facta autem conventio vigilia annunciationis
beatae Mariae, anno regni domini regis H, filii J vicessimo quarto,
"The tenor of the foregoing covenant was as follows. The
Abbot and Convent grant to the Mayor and Commonalty all the
eastern part of St Augustin's Marsh, [that is, aU that part which
now forms Queen's Square and the adjoining streets] ; from a cer
tain ditch which bounds the arable land belonging to the abbey,
eastward as far as the bank of the port of the river Frome ; and
this ditch extends from the Abbey grange [on the north] to the
Avon [on the south]. But out of this grant the abbey still re
serves to itself a strip of land adjoining to the ditch [on it's
eastern side], 144 feet wide near the grange, 92 feet wide toward
the middle, and 60 feet wide near the Avon. Nevertheless the
commonalty are to have fuU right of ingress on the said strip of
land by day or night to visit their ships or for any other purpose
at their wiU, as they always have had hitherto. And this breadth
of land the Mayor and Com'ty are to secure to the convent, and
if the current of water [in the new trench] shall damage it, the
Mayor and Com'ty shaU make it good. The remainder of the
marsh, viz. aU which lies to the east and the south of the aforesaid
ditch, the Convent grants to the Mayor and C'ty for the purpose
of making a trench and harbour, and any thing else, which they
please. The price was nine marks of silver,
" Several circumstances are observable in this transaction. It
cannot be supposed that nine marks could be the real price paid
for such a piece of land in such a situation. It is true, the
townsmen had a customary right to walk there, as they pleased,
for business or pleasure, which certainly lessened it's value : but
still £6 sterling on any calculation of the value of money is a
contemptible price. One of our MS. Calendars quoted above says,
that the town was to pay an annual rent ; but the Covenant makes

no mention of, nor have I found any other trace of it. Another
MS. quoted above says, that the Corporation gave Trin Mills to
the Abbat in exchange for the Marsh, This account has great
probability ; for the Abbats and their successors have possesed an
estate at Wapping close to Trin-mOls ever since, aud it is the
only property which they had on that side of the river Avon ; and
it does not appear by what other means they could have acquired
it. Perhaps also, the Abbey was forced to give way to a measure
of great public utility. Nothing is more probable than that
Thomas Lord Berkeley persuaded the Abbey to a compliance : he
was it's Patron, the Founder's Grandson, Lord of Bedminster and
Redcliffe, and greatly interested in the prosperity of Bristow ; he
was present as a witness to the sealing of the covenant, and was
undoubtedly consulted in every stage of the transaction. [One of
the MS, states that in the conveyance of Treen (wooden) mill to the
abbot reservation was made of the right of the magistracy of Bristol
to indulge in the pastime of duck hunting in its pool (now Bathurst
basin). — Ed.]
The exact year in which this great undertaking was accom
plished is subject to some doubt. All our Calendars say that the
work was begun in 1247-8, and that Aylward was then mayor ;
the covenant proves that Aylward was mayor, but it is dated
March 24, 24 Hen' III ; that is, March 24, 1239-40, at which time
it says that the work was already begun : and certainly there is no
error in the date of the covenant, because Thomas Lord Berkeley
one of the witnesses died in 1243, and abbat Bradstone resigned
in 1242.1 (Aylward was also mayor in 1233 and 1240. — Ed.)
' ' This great undertaking the digging through the marsh, and
forming the quay, executed by our ancestors without the modern
aids of gunpowder and machinery, show most decidedly the great
increase of wealth and power, which Bristow had acquired at the
beginning of the 13th century. Perhaps the whole breadth of the
quay, as it now is, was not excavated at once ; some might be left
for the labor of succeeding times and some for the constant opera
tion of the current : but notwithstanding this abatement, whoever
duly considers the magnitude of the work, the trench being about
2,400 feet long, that is somewhat less than half a mile, and about
40 yards wide, and 18 feet deep, taking both at a medium, and
compares it with the smallness of the town in that age, must per
ceive, that our ancestors were not only opulent, but of an active,
enterprizing spirit. From a note in the great white book in the
chamber of Bristol, it appears that the cutting this trench for the
course of the Froom through the marsh, cost the commonalty of
the city the sum of £5,000. If it be multiplied by 15 or 20, the
product wiU be a sum equivalent in modern times. [At the
present date it would be upwards of £120,000. — Ed.] It was the
first improvement of the port, the foundation of aU others in suc
ceeding ages ; it was the first attempt at changing the natural
form of the two rivers, and accommodating them to the purposes
of a commercial people. If we compare this undertaking even
with the enormous amount of labor and money, which has been
expended for the same purpose within our own memory, bearing
in mind the comparative resources of the two ages, we must
acknowledge the sagacity, and spirit, and expenditure of our
ancestors to have been equal to our own,
"The land being purchased iu Aylward's mayoralty A' D'
1239-40, they began the work, first opening the ground below St.
Augustine's parish-church near Tombs's dry dock. How long a
space of time was spent in excavating the trench, we are not
informed ; but it is probable that the date which our Calendars
give for the beginning of the work was in fact it's conclusion, and
that the trench was finished in 1247-8. Being finished and the
water of the Frome now ebbing and flowing in it's new channel
along the present quay, they began the second part of their
1 Seyer, IL, 19-21.

124

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1247,

undertaking, the building of a stone bridge across the Avon,
And that the workmen might lay the foundations with perfect
ease and security, they laid the whole bed of the river dry by
turning the current into a temporary channel dug for that pur
pose, which began at Tower Harratz at the end of Temple-backs,
and passed close to Temple and Redcliffe gates, where temporary
bridges were built, and from thence to the Avon again at Redcliff
backs. Great part of this channel may still be traced ; for the
town-wall, most of which remains, was afterwards built on it's
inward edge, and the new channel was preserved as a ditch to the
wall, in some places still visible, in others arched over and used
as a drain. At and near Tower-harritz it is still so open, that if
not excluded by a hatch, the tide would flow through it as high
as Temple gate : the lane which passed on it's edge is still called
Bach-avon walk ; from which we may suppose that this stream,
while it lasted, was called the Bach-avon : on the south side of
PortwaU lane it was within memory very evident, passing at the
back part of the houses in Pile-street, which is said to have
derived it's name from having been a pill or creek at that time ;
and there is 'an account of a boat and materials belonging to
shipping having been dug up here in the gardens behind Pile-
street,' From Redclifl' gate to the Avon it is covered and used as
a drain, "After this, the raising two dams across the river, strong and
high enough to resist the spring- tides rising 18 feet, must have
been a work of great labour and expence. The upper dam was at
Tower-harratz ; the situation of the lower is not precisely men
tioned, but it must have been higher up than the mouth of the
new channel, somewhere across from the Back to the Redcliff
side ; and this lower dam must have been furnished with hatches.
The bed of the river being laid dry, they were enabled to proceed
by a method different from modern practice ; they dug and laid
the foundation of the piers at leisure as of any ordinary edifice on
land, and built them up of firm and solid masonry ; which ap
peared in 1762 when they were partly taken down and partly
examined by boring. There were four arches and consequently
three piers ; which piers were made so unnecessarily thick, that
here, as in London, they much impeded the current, and caused a
waterfaU. But the architects of that age were not aware of the
strength of their own masonry, to what an extent arches might
be trusted. They were pointed in what is called the Gothic
form, aud the whole breadth of the bridge was 19 feet.''^
15. We cannot agree with Mr. Pryce's argument,
founded upon the statements of different MS. calendars,
viz., that there was no bridge over the Avon before this
date, 1247, The arrangement of the streets on both
sides of the river — EedcUff, Thomas, Temple and
Tucker streets on the south — aU trended to, and met at,
a point on the south side of the Avon opposite to a
similar point of junction of the Shambles, Bridge,
High, Nicholas and Baldwin streets on the north or
Bristol side. It is an impotent conclusion to say they
led to a ferry. The physical difficiUties connected with
the great rise and faU daUy of the tides — the spring
tides rose about 20 feet, but in times of land flood to
30 feet— and the obstacles arising from the frequent
heavy floods would cause so great an impediment to
the traffic carried on between the two places that the
idea that for centuries the Bristol men had submitted
1 Seyer, II. , 27-29,

to such a loss of time and of money as this necessi
tated, conveys so mean an opinion of the abUity and
spirit of the mercantUe community that we are com
pelled to reject the theory as untenable. There was
no difficulty in spanning a river of 200 feet in width
by a bridge of wood. Many generations of the mer
chants must have been acquainted with and have passed
across the wooden bridge of London, 925 feet long ; in
no other matter are they supposed to have been so
obtuse and bUnd to their owm interests as Mr, Pryce
supposed them to be in this. The kings so often resi
dent in Bristol, as weU as the over-lords, woiUd recognise
the necessity of such a structure. Why, we may further
ask, was there a gateway (St, Werburgh's, afterwards
caUed St, Nicholas gate) in the town waU abutting on
this spot but for the possible danger of an attack, which
would assuredly not have been made over a ferry in the
face of an armed town, when the river could have been
forced a few hundred yards above or below it ?
Our readers wUl remember the discovery of the sUl
of wood found embedded in the piers when the present
bridge was built, as referred to on page 91, and the
argument derived therefrom.
Indeed we are strongly of opinion that there are
valid reasons for the existence of more than one bridge
across the Avon before 1247, WUliam Wyrcestre gives
very different accounts of the length of the bridge of
Bristol, giving in the one case a length of 72 yards, or
216 feet, ^ and in the other 94 gressus (or steps of 20
inches), i.e. 150 feet. The difference here is surprising,
being not less than 66 feet. Elsewhere he gives 184,
140, and 120 steps.
In Nasmyth's edition of WiUiam Wyrcestre (366)
he says the bridge of Bristol was flrst founded by
John, king of England, which contains in length 140
steps. The date given is 1215, a year in which John
had something else to manage more difficult than bridg
ing the Avon, and therefore the authority from which
our great topographer derived his statement is doubtful.
But by whomsoever founded, Wyrcestre seems to us
to speak of a second and longer bridge over the river
than the precursor of the present structure, Seyer says
a wooden bridge "might have been frequently destroyed
by floods or by warlike operations, and frequently set
up again. There is moreover some reason for sus
pecting that there was another wooden bridge over the
Avon here before that of stone was erected. The place
of the ferry over the river which used to be caUed
Countess slip is called in an ancient title deed in my
possession Pons ComitisscB. I know not that the word
pions ever signifies in any dialect a slip, a stair, a descent,
' Dallaway's edition, 27,

A,D, 1247.

A STONE BRIDGE BUILT.

125

but simply a bridge ; and if so there was a bridge be
tween the castle and the end of East Tucker street,
which was erected bj' a Countess of Gloucester, probably
by Haweis, wife of WiUiam, about 1170, and caUed
Countess-bridge."'^ (Most likely this was their road to
Keynsham,) This bridge (if not purely hypothetical) would
measure about the longest length mentioned by
WiUiam Wyrcestre and would probably be for foot
passengers only. Whether or no such a structure ever
existed, there can be no question that a Ught iron
bridge spanning the stream at that spot is a necessity
of the present age.
Before leaving this part of our subject, let us hazard
yet another conjecture, viz, this, that during the period
of the construction of the stone bridge another was
thrown across from Counterslip, which remained standing
as late as the end of the 1 5th century, and is the long
bridge that Wyrcestre describes. But whatever may
be thought as to the idea of two separate wooden
bridges, we think that to an unprejudiced mind the
evidence afforded by the transcript contained in the
Little Red Book in the Council House of the charters
of Henry II, and Eobert Fitzhardinge, by Maurice,
the son of Eobert, the mandamus of 24 Henry III. and
the charter of 31 Henry III., 1247, afford conclusive
evidence of the existence of a bridge before 1170 and
of the close connection that existed between the men of
Bristol and their neighbours of the Marsh, afterwards
caUed EedcUff,
We have quoted, pages 90-1, from the charter of
Henry II, (1160), and that of Eobert Fitzhardinge
(1164) ; for the satisfaction of our readers we here give
it in the original, from the transcripts in the CouncU
House : —
' ' Henricus Rex Angliae, Dux Normanniae et Aquitaniae, Comes
Andegaviae, omnibus baronibus justiciariis vice-oomitibus et
omnibus ministris suis Angliae et Wallis, salutem. Concede quod
homines mei qui manent in feodo meo in Marisco juxta pontem
de BristoUia habeant suas rectas consuetudines et libertates et
quietancias per totam Angliam et Walliam, sicut mei burgenses,
et nominatim in BristoUia et per totam terram Comitis Glouc',
sicut carta mea testatur, et prohibito ne super hoc aliquis eis
faciat aliquam injuriam vel contumeliam. "
The second is as foUows : —
" (Robert), Filius Hardingus omnibus amicis suis et homni-
bus prajsentibus et futuris salutem, Notum set vobis, quod ego
conoessi et confirmavi quod homines mei qui manent in feodo meo
in marisco juxta pontem de BristoUia, habeant suas consuetudines
et libertates et quietancias quas homines de BristoUia habent,
sicut rex dominus noster eis concessit et carta sua confirmavit ; et
volo quod ita integras et plenarias eis maneant tempore meo
et heredum meorum omnium. Teste Ricardo Abbate Sanoti
Augustini, &c,"^
1 Seyer, II., 33, - Little Red Book, 12,

The Marsh herein mentioned must therefore mean
Eedcliff, and these men so dweUing in the Marsh near
"the bridge" in 1160-4 are, in 1239-40, commanded
by mandamus to join the men of Bristol in cutting in
the trench (broad and narrow quay), whereas the stone
bridge, of which we are now treating, was not begun
to be built untU 1247. The union of the men of Bristol
and Eedcliff in this great work brought about a stiU
closer connection. On July 28th, 1247, Henry, by
charter, granted "that the burgesses of Eedclive, in
the suburb of Bristol, shaU for ever answer (that is sue
and be sued) with our burgesses of Bristol before our
justices, as our said burgesses of Bristol answer, and
where they answer and not elsewhere," &c. The wit
nesses are, "Eichard, Earl of CornwaU our brother;
Eich, de Clare, Earl of Glouc, and Hereford ; Ealph
Fitz Nicholas, &c., given at Woodstock,"
The mandamus of Henry III., as translated by Bar
rett from
the trans
cript, is as
foUows : —
"Hen
ry, by the
grace of
God, King
of Eng
land, Lord
of Ireland,
Duke of
Normandy,Aquitaine and Earl of
Anjou, to aU my honest men dweUing in la Eedclive,
in the suburb of Bristol, wisheth health. Since our
beloved burgesses of Bristol, for the common profit of
the town of Bristol, as weU as of your suburb, have
begun a certain trench in the marsh of St. Augustin,
that ships coming to our port of Bristol may more freely
and without hindrance come in and go out, which trench
indeed they cannot perfect without great charges ; we
therefore command you, that since for the bettering the
said port no smaU advantage wiU accrue, not only to
those burgesses but also to you, who are partakers of
the same Uberties, which our burgesses have in the said
town and are joined with them both in scot and lot,
that you lend the same assistance as they do, as it wiU
be also very profitable and usefiU to you to have the
work of the trench happily completed, according to what
shaU fall to your share together with our burgesses;
and so effectually that the aforesaid work, which we
regard as our own, receive no delay through defect in

Old Bristol Bridge.

126

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1247.

you. Witness myself at Wyndleshore (Windsor), 29
AprU, 24 year of our reign," This was in 1240, about a
month after the covenant was signed, by which possession
of the land was obtained.
This stone bridge (as shown on the previous page),
copied, as Seyer states, from MUlerd's map and Barrett's
sketch,^ was buUt with three piers, two of 20 feet, the
centre 25 feet in thickness ; from these four arches were
thrown, which made the total length of the structure
about 165 feet. The starlings, or feet of the piers, were
of great length, 50 feet and upwards, in order to give
greater stabUity and carry a further superstructure ;
but Seyer's conclusion is that it at the first was simply
a long narrow bridge, of 15 feet in width, with angular
recesses for passengers to shelter in when meeting a
drove of cattle or a throng of traffic, and that the super
structure was added circa 1360,
In order to meet the objection that the starUngs
were of far too great a length, 60 feet, for a bridge
only 19 feet wide on the outside, Seyer thinks they
might have been so built as a matter of precaution, or
have been lengthened afterwards. Of this there is,
however, no evidence, and we are compeUed to differ
from our worthy historian, and to conclude that the
original idea of the bridge was one with houses on each
side. In fact it was a combination of three paraUel
structures forming one homogeneous whole, the central
being devoted to traffic, the two sides to purposes of
habitation and commerce. The roadway on the arches
was 19 feet in width. Then "they built a waU about
four feet thick on each side of the bridge, paraUel with
it, and about 16 feet, or perhaps 18 feet, distant from it,
resting on the same starUngs, and pierced with the same
arches as the bridge itself ; and it must be presumed,
although there is no certain authority, that strong cross
waUs were built from each pier of the bridge to each
pier of the waUs, tying the two structures together as
firmly as if they had been one. Large beams were then
thrown across from the bridge to the paraUel waUs
and on them the houses were buUt. . , , The bridge
in consequence became a dark and narrow street, from
which the flrst step into a shop was on the timbers where
the floor alone was between your feet and the water ;
through the crevices of which the wind blew up in a
manner which would be intolerable to our warm modern
shopkeepers ; the ink has sometimes frozen in the pen
of my informant in the counting-room behind the shop.
Neither were the owners contented with the space
thus gained ; for the beams projected beyond the
waUs, insomuch that they were supported by trusses
from below, and on these trusses some raised the back
1 Barrett, 80,

waU of their houses, others had closets, bow windows,
and other projections, each according to his fancy,
whereby some gained a depth of 20 or 24 feet from
the street; Wm, Wyrcestre even says that the depth
of the houses from the side of the bridge was ten yards,
which is surely too much. The ground floor contained a
shop and a smaU room behind, the staircase was behind
the door. The flrst floor contained the parlour and
usually the kitchen. The second floor two bedchambers,
the same on the third floor, and then two garrets. Some
had leaden jilatforms, and some a fourth floor, making
flve in all. Some also had cellars contained in the piers
of the bridge, the smaU windows of which are visible in
the engraven plate. The windows which overhung the
water were particularly useful ; for it was commonly re
ported that contraband trade was sometimes carried on
there. The houses were buUt wholly of wood and covered
with slate, no other material was aUowed."^
The discomfort, inconvenience and danger of such a
place for trade, would seem to us at the present day to
be so great as inevitably to lead its occupants into the
bankruptcy court. But it was not so, " As a place of
trade it was particularly valuable, being necessarily a
crowded thoroughfare ; even to the time of its flnal de
molition in 1763, the houses were let at the highest
rents in the city, many of the wealthiest tradesmen
lived there, ^ and no smaU portion of some ample for
tunes stUl existing was gained in them . . . the back
part of them healthy and pleasant : and as for the terror
of the situation I never heard it mentioned by those who
knew the houses best, or acknowledged when mentioned
by others. It has, indeed, occurred that the mast of a
vessel came through a kitchen window, and even rose
up through a shop floor, and that aU the utensUs of a
ceUar were afloat, and that an ox forced his way through
a shop and window behind and feU into the river un
hurt, and the like ; but such events were unusual : and
when it is recoUected that these houses continued in
habited and valuable for 400 years, it is manifest that
the situation was not objectionable," ^
Across the centre of the bridge was buUt a chapel
dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary ; to gain sufficient
length for which an oblong square pUlar, strengthened
by buttresses, was raised in the middle of the stream,
25 feet to the eastward, from which a very strong arch
was thrown to the central pier, this supported the
east end of the chapel,* Boats could pass up, under
one arch of the bridge, turn transversely under this
> Seyer, II. , 35-37.
^ The father of the Archbishop of York, Toby Mathew, for
instance. — Ed.
" Seyer, II., 38. ^ Ibid, 39.

A.D, 1247.

THE TOWNSHIP OF REDCLIFF.

127

chapel arch, and return by a third archway of the
bridge. Over the groined ceiling of the gatehouse that
spanned the road there rose a tower 108 feet high,^
Under this chapel, with a gateway to the street and on
a level with it, was a large handsome room, 40 by 21
feet and about 14 feet in height, in which tha mayor
and aldermen of the town used to meet. On the opposite
side of the way was a smaUer room, 21 by 18 feet.
These rooms were converted into priest's chambers,
which being burnt, the site was, in 1649, granted to
Walter Stevens and Son by Sir WUliam Birch, of West
minster, to be buUt on, and a chief rent of £4 per annum
for a house which went across the bridge at the top,
caUed afterwards the chapel-house. - This was a ware
house, and the two rooms we have mentioned were shops,
when in 1763 the bridge was taken down,
16. The calendars state that EedcUff was incorpo
rated with Bristol immediately upon the completion of
the bridge. It may be so, but the union had practically
been begun long before, although it was not a fuUy
accomplished fact untU the foUowing century. Eedcliff
was a subordinate manor, dependent on Bedminster.
Once the property of the Saxon lords, it had descended
to Eobert, Earl of Gloucester, who sold it to Eobert
Fitzhardinge, But it is evident that the lords of the
honour of Gloucester still retained some authority
therein ; inasmuch as John, Earl of Mortain, in his
charter to Bristol, includes the inhabitants of Eedcliff
therein under the style of "my burgesses of Bristol,
dweUing within the waUs, and without as far as the
boundary of the town, that is to say, within Sandbrooke
and BeweU, and Brightnee bridge and the spring in the
way near Aldberry of Knowle." Now both of the last
named are south, of the Avon, in Eedcliff manor, and
the boundary line includes Temple, Thomas, Eedcliff
and part of Bedminster, This was in 1188, and the then
Lord of Berkeley, Maurice, and his brother Eobert,
were assenting witnesses, so that it could have been
no infringement upon the rights which the Berkeleys
claimed as under -lords, and which we shaU hereinafter
see them maintaining by force of arms.
A part of this estate Eobert, the Eed Earl, had also
granted to the Knights Templars, which became a
separate manor caUed Temple-fee, co-extensive with
the present parish. Eobert Fitzhardinge in his charter
of 1164, as the under-lord, styles them "my men,"
having the same Uberties, customs and quittances as
the men of Bristol. Henry II, in his charter of con
firmation of the same date, terms them his ' ' burgesses,
having the same customs, liberties and quittances as
those of Bristol," and Maurice, the witness to Earl
1 WiU, Wyrces,, 109, ^ Seyer, II,, 43,

John's charter, confirms to them, between 1170 and
1189, as "his men of Eedclive the same customs and
liberties which they had in the time of his father"
(Eobert) ; and now we see in 1247 Henry III, styles
them "his burgesses," Eedcliff was iu fact a viU or
town, having the same privUeges as the adjoining
burgh, of which it was an outgrowth. It had three
churches, held a market on every Monday at the Stal
lage cross, at the top of Temple street ; had its own
preepositus, who was at first appointed by the lords of
the fee for the coUection of their dues ; but after the
charter grants he would be, we presume, a magistrate
chosen, as was his brother preepositus in Bristol, by the
burgesses themselves.
In ancient title deeds, Seyer says, "the ' Prcspositus
de la Redclive ' was commonly mentioned as a witness,
as is the ^Preepositus villa Bristol.' " Hugh Woltang,
1240; Eichard Draper, 1274; Hugh de Opulle, 1284
and 1298, are amongst the names which he had thus
seen. The privUeges of both towns were thus iden
tical, and, indeed, the estimate of their wealth was the
same if we may judge by their taxation. In one in
stance Eedcliff and Temple paid as much as Gloucester
and Bristol combined. In 1210 Gloucester paid as an
aid to John 500 marks, Bristol 1,000, Eedcliff 1,000,
and the men of the Templars of EedcUff 500. Bristol
had, however, been bled freely before, which may
account for the difference.
Doubtless many a Bristol man had crossed the river
to settle, or had built there his country house in which
to enjoy his otium ctim dignitate. Henry styles them
"his burgesses," but he reminds them that they are " a
suburb of Bristol," hence it is evident that Bristol had
the pre-eminence. There is confessedly some difficulty
in understanding the matter, for whilst Earl John's
charter in 1188 gave to aU his men within the bounds
the right to be tried within the waUs of and by king's
justiciaries in Bristol only, we find that fifty-eight years
after that date the burgesses of Eedcliff, which was
by John's charter within the bounds, at their own re
quest, are found seeking to be delivered from the
burdensome onus of their county courts, and obtaining
by charter the privilege of having their causes tried
also in Bristol, and by the justiciaries. That the Eed
cliff men were not for another century freed from the
jurisdiction of the Lords of Berkeley however our
future pages wiU show. In fact it was not until 1373,
when Bristol was made a county, that the union between
the two places became complete.
One of the MS, Calendars states :—" 1247-8— This
year the charter of the town was enlarged for the cor
poration and Uberties, and the shire stones were set

128

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1247,

both on Gloucester and Somersetshire sides, how far it
should go,"
17. The increased intercourse facUitated by the new
bridge caused Eedcliff to become rapidly more populous
and wealthy, so that ere long, but at what precise date
is not exactly known, it was deemed advisable to protect
it by a waU across the peninsula at its base, which
should rest on and connect the two portions of the river.
The area thus enclosed was an irregular pentagon, of
greater extent than the old burgh of Bristol with the
castle included. Here rose the great manufactories of
the middle ages, the weavers, the tuckers, soap boUers,
glass blowers, &c., trades which were almost exclusively
carried on in Bristol from the middle of the 13th to
the 16th century.
This waU began at the river Avon at the Tower
Harratz (top of Temple back) ; the tower was about
20 feet high. It then passed along the course of the
back Avon 100 paces, where there was another tower
12 paces square, between this and a third tower was
marshy ground 120 steps long; this third tower was
square, 9 yards wide; 110 steps further was a fourth
tower, square, 10 j-ards wide. Then came a space of
94 steps, and a round tower 8 yards in diameter; and
at the end of 100 steps was Temple gate with a square
tower built over it. (This last gate, of which we shaU
give an engraving in our chapter on the Siege of Bristol,
was re-built 1734-6 in rustic Grecian stjde, but becom
ing inconvenient on account of the increased traffic it
was taken down in 1810.) At Temple gate the waU
formed an obtuse angle ; between it and Thomas street
there was a tower 6 yards wide, opposite to Thomas
street was another of the same size, between that and
EedcUff gate was another tower. Wyrcestre's state
ment is more than usuaUy obscure with regard to Eed
cliff gate (or gates, for he says there were two). The
one in the line of the waU was undoubtedly at the end
of PortwaU lane, it was taken down to widen the street
in 1788 ; from this gate of Eedcliff the waU ran by the
narrow lane of St. John's (commonly caUed Jones') lane,
and the site of the Friends' burying ground to the Avon
at Eedcliff wharf. This is the only spot where any relic
of it remains. The other gate, WjTcestre says, was
about 54 feet distant from the first near the conduit
as one goes up Eedcliff hill, we ajipreliend it to have
been a barbican. This waU throughout was defended
hj a deep ditch, which, combined with its own height
and strength, rendered it well nigh impregnable. These
gates are mentioned in the perambulation of 1373, and
in a petition by the mayor and commonalty of Bristol
to Edward II. , in July, 1325, Temple street is said to be
" within the waUs."

18, The rapid extension of the town in the direction
of Queen square on the ground purchased from the
abbey, and available for buUding purposes, necessitated
another waU on the south and west. In fact Bristol
was growing so rapidly that she had to cast her sheU
and make herself a new one. This waU began on the
Welsh back, enclosing PyUe street and the creek that
was once the bed of the Frome ; it was 6 feet thick,
and proceeded from the river at a right angle, crossed
Back street which had a gate (33 feet distant from King
street), passed behind St, Nicholas' almshouses, and ran
as nearly as possible paraUel to King street, "It is,"
says Seyer, " the boundary between the pubUc property
of the city on the outer or King street side and private
property on the other side," St. Nicholas' almshouses
are buUt on land given by the city ; adjoining these is
the Old Theatre, which was buUt in 1766 on private
property, whUst the entrance is holden under the corpo
ration. The front waU of the Library in King street is
coincident with the line of this waU, and the wing of
that building now used as a news-room is built on the
site of a projecting tower; of these there were two in
this portion, the other being probably on the site on
which Coopers' hall now stands. In 1613 Eobert Eed-
wood gave his cottage on the town waU for a library for
the citizens. The grant is dated 1615, and conveys a
tenement and tower on the town waU near Avon marsh,
and in 1875, during certain alterations in the building,
the foundation of the waU and of a portion of the tower
was uncovered, and broken through with great diflB.culty.
The width of the ditch was shown clearly in the same
year when the foundation for a new warehouse was dug
out between the Library and the Theatre ; it was then
shown to be in a line with, and of the same width as,
the open space between the gate waU of King street
HaU and the pubUc house in King street.
At the end of Marsh street was a gateway having
no building over it, says Seyer, quoting from the cham
berlain's account, 1665-6. But WiUiam Wyrcestre de
scribes one of 1 6 y.ards in roundness, which is inserted
in MiUerd's map, and without doubt he is correct, for
when, a few years since, the great sewer was formed
through Prince street, the excavators came upon a
block of masonry so compact and firm as to be broken
up with the greatest difficulty. The foundation was
outside the line of castrametation about 30 feet, and
was, we have no doubt, a barbican intended to cover
the front of the waU by a fianking fire. Thunderbolt
street was a portion of the fosse, at the end of which
the waU bent at a right angle, and ran facing the
Quay to the end of Clare street. In building operations
in 1878-9 its foundation was several times uncovered,

A.D. 1247.

ICHNOGRAPHY OF THE RELIGIOUS HOUSES.

129

Map of Bristol in the 13th Century, showing the wjwle of the Walls and tlie sites of the ancient Churches and Bsligious Houses.

the site being immediately under the fronts of the
houses upon the Quay. At the corner of Thunderbolt
street was a round tower 16 feet in circumference,
close to which John Burton's great ship was buUt,^
possibly there was another tower on the Quay, mid
way between the last named and that built by John
VieUe, which was 30 yards in circumference, and which
stood at the junction of Clare street and the Broad
quay. From this point the waU was carried along
the line of the fronts of the houses untU it joined the
ancient waU at Frome gate. [This is evident from the
foundation which was imcovered in September, 1880,
wherein were discovered portions of a doorway leading
to the river, the mouldings of which were of the 13th
century.] WUUam Wyrcestre says " its height was by
estimation 40 feet and its thickness 8 feet;" but in
no place that we have seen do the foundations exceed
6 feet, and we therefore doubt the correctness of the
altitude which he assigns to it.
19. We have described the embattled waUs that
' WiU. Wyrces,, 146,
[Vol. I.]

surrounded Bristol in this age, let us now briefly show
the position occupied by the reUgious houses which by an
outer zone completely hemmed in the town, commanding
every road that led into it. Neither baron nor burgess,
franklyn nor peasant, gentle lady nor serving wench
could enter or leave the town without passing under
their espionage or rendering themselves subject to their
appeals, we might say demands, of aid for religious
uses. Their life, learning, habits, houses, &c,, are treated
of in our Ecclesiastical Histoey, chapter viii, ; we
simply notice here the sites which they occupied and
their pecuUar relation to the burgesses. There can be
no doubt whatever that in the early days of their settle
ment Bristol owed much to both monk and friar. They
were the learned of their day, the transcribers of the
sacred Scriptures, A large veUum bible (imperfect),
circa 1225, preserved in the City Library, and said,
traditionaUy, to have been written by the monks of
St, Augustine, and an illuminated missal, of later date,
are both of them beautiful specimens of caligraphy.

130

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1247,

History owes much to their pen, prejudiced though it
may naturaUy have been in favour of their order. Sorry
are we to have to add that with the above exceptions, a
smaU book of HomUies and Eules of the Order (written
at the house of St. Mark, 1402, and which can scarcely
be said to be historical), and a few phUological and theo
logical treatises, they have left us in this city no speci
men of their handiwork. They were also the almoners of
the rich and the benefactors of the poor. From their door
the needy were never sent hungering, nor was a night's
shelter refused to the weary vagabond. To their credit
be it said that when money ran short, and the larder
was empty, they pawned their plate with the Jews to
minister to the needs of the necessitous. They were the
market gardeners, dairymen, poulterers and fruiterers
that supplied the town. Cow lane. Orchard street. Cul
ver (Pigeon or Dove) street, Eosemary street, the Barton,
and the orchards and gardens, especiaUy those which
ran up the hiU from St, Michael's on the west to Prior's
hUl on the east, are name-relics of their daily avocations.
Had their latter days been as their beginning, calumny
must have been silenced, when men pointed out the
beneflts they had conferred upon the community.
That the monks, the flrst comers, should secure the
most fertUe spots avaUable outside the waUs, and that
the friars, sworn to voluntary poverty and Uving upon
alms, should choose sites which commanded the traffic
of the town, was both natural and commendable. If to
the "wisdom of the serpent" they had continued to
add " the harmlessness of the dove," their influence
would have been far more lasting and powerful. The
Black Friars of St, Augustine, whose monastery (the
Cathedral) was founded in 1142, owned the land from
the Avon (Canons' Marsh) to CoUege green, which was
their cemetery.
The good men of St, Mark (Bons-Mommes), who
came circa 1220, occupied the ground from CoUege
green to Pipe lane ; their boundary stone, the winged
lion of St, Mark, is stUl to be seen in the corner house
at the north end of the lane. This lane appears to have
been the only road to Brandon hUl and the HotweUs
{via Cow lane). From Pipe lane the triangular pro
perty of the Carmelites stretched from the new trench
up to the Eed Lodge, and from thence to Steep street,
on the other side of which the house of St, Bartholomew
had a narrow strip running up the hiU as far as the
King David inn. This inn occupies the site of the
nunnery of St. Magdalen, founded by the Lady Eva,
wife of Eobert Fitzhardinge, Johnny BaU lane divided
the Bartholomews from the Franciscans or Grey Friars,
whose house (founded circa 1228) and gardens, sheltered
Ij}' the hill behind, reached to Silver street. On the

opposite side of SUver street stood the church and
priory founded by Eobert, the great Earl of Gloucester,
in the flrst half of the 12th century. This priory also
held lands in Eedland and outside Lawford's gate, St,
James' barton abutted on Barrs lane, the roadway into
Gloucestershire ; and on the opposite side of that road
the property of the Dominicans or Black Friars {circa
1225) began: it extended to the road running in front
of the moat of the castle. Outside the south-east corner
of the castle, between it and the Avon, the girdle was
closed by a priory of Benedictines and the church of
St, Jacobus of the Market (St, PhUip and James).
On the other side of the river the Templars had
their fee; and just within the Temple gate in 1252 the
Augustinian Eremites, or Begging Friars, had their
home, and levied their contributions on the Somerset
shire traffic,^ Outside the gate was a hospital, caUed
Eoger Magdalens of Nonney from its founder,^ Then
came the church of St, Mary EedcUff, and, extending
from it to the river, was the hospital of St, John,
just outside the town waU, There seems also to have
been a hospital for lepers dedicated to St, Mary Mag
dalen on the west side of EedcUff hiU.^ Further out,
at Brightbow, stood the little hospital of St. Catherine,
estabUshed 1221 for the temporary lodging and reUef of
pUgrims and wearied traveUers. These reUgious founda
tions, whose limits can for the most part be pointed out
with tolerable certainty, complete the zone.
20, These religieuse were looked upon with great
jealousy by their more unlettered brethren, the secular
or parochial clergy. How many churches of these
latter were in existence within the ancient wall of the
borough during the first half of the 1 3th century must
always be matter of conjecture, Seyer and others place
four — one in each angle of the cross streets in the centre
of the town. Of three of these there is no question as
to their antiquity and position — St, Ewen, AU Saints
and Christchurch, the existence of the fourth, St,
Andrew's (on the site of the pargetted house at the
corner of Wine street and High street) is very doubtful.
Early deeds of the 1 4th century show St, Andrew's to
have been part of the dedication of St, Peter's (SS, Peter
and Andrew*), That St, Werburgh's and St, Mary-le-
port were also within the waU is absolutely certain. That
St, Peter's also was standing is equaUy sure, but it is not
so manifest that it was within the waU of the borough.
There is also a difficulty with regard to the first
church of St, Nicholas, which we are strongly inclined
to believe stood in its churchyard upon the Welsh back,
^ Seyer, XII., 54, but Evans places it in PortwaU lane, close
to the gate, " Lei. Itin,, VII., 96.
" Tanner's Notitia. '' All Saints' Deeds,

A.D. 1247.

HOW THE WALLS WERE BUILT.

131

St. Nicholas, it must be remembered, was the patron
saint of sailors. Now, whUst St, Mary-le-port was
provided for the spiritual need of the mariners who
saUed into the port, what more likely than that St,
Nicholas was built in the outer suburb (in Saxon days
as is stated) for the ministering to the sailors of the
smaUer craft or of the ships that lay awaiting their
turn of entrance. It is absolutely certain that within
a century of the date of which we are writing there
were at least two ecclesiastical buUdings of which
certain portions stiU remain between the churchyard
and Baldwin street. In aU the early maps of Bristol
an ecclesiastical edifice is shown in connection with this
God's-acre, but it is ever a church without a name,
neither has anyone to our knowledge attempted to solve
the mystery of its existence, St, Stephen's church was
outside the ancient borough waU, but it was enclosed
by the last that was buUt, That the churches of St,
Nicholas, St. Leonard, St, GUes, St, Laurence and St,
John were upon the ancient waU and formed a portion
of it is simply incredible. No mUitary engineer would
have so weakened his defences as to pierce it in five of
its most easUy assailable points. That there might
have been churches dedicated to several of the above-
named saints, and probably within the waU, we do not
dispute, but that they occupied the position assigned to
them upon the waU itself there is not, as far as we know,
a particle of evidence to show. The structures where
they remain are aU of later date than that of the demo
lition of the waU, and the fair inference is that upon
the completion of the new outer waU the secular clergy
prudently secured the best sites across the old gateways
into the town, and as soon afterwards as their means
aUowed erected thereon each their new church. Hence
we have St, Nicholas, over the southern or St, Wer
burgh's gate, as it was of old named, St, Leonard's
over the western gate, St, Giles' over the north gate in
SmaU street, and St, Laurence and St, John's crowding
each other over the north Broad street gate ; whilst St,
Peter's commands the way down to the Newgate, so
that no person could enter or leave the town without
their cognizance.
That the priests were thus able to secure the above-
named eUgible sites proves that reUgion was infiuential
in Bristol at that period, for not only was every portion
of the site of the demolished waU speedily built upon,
but wherever it was practicable the hill on which the
city stands was burrowed into and ceUars constructed
therein. Those who, during the past few years, have
watched the erection of the new buildings in Stephen
street on the line of the most ancient waU wiU have had
ocular proof of this extensive ceUarage,

21 , The buUding of the new waU and the demolition
of the old was a work of some considerable labour, and
occupied much time. Salvage for sites then as now
would be high, but the moneys found for the building
of the new waU came from the imposition of a murage
toU upon every loaded beast or carriage that came
into the town, and secondly by the exemption by char
ter of the burgesses from the payment to the king
of the customs duty on imports, which money was
to be appUed to buUding or repairing the walls of
the town. These charters were very numerous, not
fewer than 23 were given to Bristol between the years
1231 and 1461, and they exempt the burgesses from
the payment of import duty for 170 years and 8
months out of the 230 included in those dates. Three
of these specific charters for the waUs in Henry III,'s
reign were as f oUow : In 1231 one of two years, in
1254 one of two years, and in 1266 one of six years.
There was also in the same year an exemption from aU
customs for eight years for repairing the castle. The
charters of exemption granted during the period be
tween the 10th Edward II, and the Ist Edward IV.
were one of three years for paving the town, dated
1316, one of three years dated 1316, one of five years
dated 1320, one of four years dated 1331, one of four
years dated 1337, and one of three years and eight
months dated 1340 ; these were for repairing the quay.
For the waUs there was one of flve years dated 1320,
one of four years dated 1334, one of four years dated
1337, and one of four years dated 1344. For the quays
and waUs combined there was one of six years dated
1347, and one of ten years dated 1377. For the quays,
waUs, and paving there was one of four years dated
1413, one of ten years given in 1431, and one of sixty
years given in 1445, In 1435 there was a license given
by charter by Henry VI, to purchase lands to the value
of £100 per annum in aid of the quays, waUs, pave
ments and bridge. And in 1438 there was another
charter of exemption granted for the quays, waUs, and
pavements, together with the farm of the town, for
twenty years. Lastly in 1461, 1st Edward IV,, there
was the grant of the Tolzey Court and of customs on
imports for repairing the quays, waUs, and pavements,
in fee.^ The above do not include the charters of confirma
tion which were during the interim twelve in number,
some of which speciaUy name "freedom from aU
customs," neither does the list include the charters by
which the towm was farmed to the burgesses, of which
there are only seven cases recorded, but the instances
were, as we shaU show, more numerous. For example,
1 Report of Municipal Corporation, 75 — 6,

132

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1251,

in 1241 Henry III, farmed the town for twenty years on
lease to the burgesses at the annual rent of £250, but
being in want of money in 1251, and having failed in
his attempt to obtain a tenth from the clergy on pre
tence of a crusade, he feU back upon the burgesses of
Bristol, amongst others, and, although ten years of their
lease was unexpired, he obliged them to take another
lease at the rate of 400 marks (£266 13s, id,).
22, The churoh of Al-HaUowen (All Saints) is of very
ancient date. It was, in 1216, assigned to the GuUd of
Calendars for their use, and among its muniments are a
number of old deeds, as weU as a most valuable book
containing the parish minutes of the 14th and 15th cen
turies. The oldest deeds are not dated, but the caUgraphy
is of the reign of Henry III,, and they are most of them
witnessed by the mayor of the year. Some few of the
mayor's seals remain attached. In 1248, Henry Lang-
borde by deed gives ground, lying between William le
Shoemaker and Eichard Langborde, to Walter de Panes,
on the tenure of a pair of white gloves of the value of a
sUver obelus, or a sUver obolus at their choice, at Easter,
in lieu of aU demands, &c. This document is witnessed
by Eeginald de Panes, the mayor of Bristol. The deed is
without date, but the year of his mayoralty is as above.
By the deed of 1264, Thomas Teler, of Calvestone
(? Alveston), gives to WiUiam Selke (rector of All Hol-
loen) and his heirs aU his right and claim in aU
that ground, with aU its buUdings, &c., in the suburbs
of Bristol, in ScatepuUe street, which said ground is
situated between lands of Thomas Long, tanner, on the
east and west parts, and extendeth itself from the street
forwards to the Lawditch backwards as other coUateral
lands do. Witnessed by Henry Adrian who was mayor
in 1264, The next is a deed poU of Isonda, relict of
Hugh, of Calveston (probably a daughter of Teler), who
in her lawful and absolute widowhood does give, grant,
and confirm to the said WiUiam Selke, rector of AU
Hawen, aU that ground in ScatepuUe, in the suburbs
of Bristol, with the buildings thereon, &c,, bounded, as
above described, to hold to said WiUiam, his heirs, &c,,
in fee for ever, under the yearly rent of 2s. sterling,
payable by the said WiUiam, his heirs, &c., to the heirs
of Eobert of Kerdiff at two feasts of the year (to wit),
12d. at Michaelmas and 12d. at Easter, and to the said
Isonda, her heirs and assigns, a pair of gloves, or an
obolus yearly, at her option, in lieu of aU customs,
services and temporal demands due to her and her heirs.
Witnessed by Simon Clarke, who was mayor in 1267.
By another deed Eobert, son of Eobert of Kerdiff, gives
to the said WUliam Selke the said two shiUings rental,
payable out of the premises in ScatepuUe for ever, at
and under the rent of half a pound of cummin, payable

to the said Eobert yearly in Ueu of aU customs, «fec. By
another deed, when John Lydeard was mayor, 1277,
WiUiam Selke gives, grants and confirms in fee (for the
souls of his father John Selke, his mother IsabeUa Selke,
and aU his predecessors and successors to the church of
AU Howen, in Bristol) to keep a lamp burning by night
in the said church ; the said 2s, rent of assize by him
bought of the said Eobert of Kerdiff, to hold to said
church of AU Howen, of his heirs and assigns freely,
quietly, peaceably and absolutely for ever.
Under feudal tenure, upon the death of a tenant,
certain payments for renewals, &c,, were claimed by the
lord from the inheriting vassal. Ecclesiastical corpora
tions never die, so that on aU lands acquired and held
by such bodies, the barons sustained a loss. In the
language of the law such lands were said to come to
dead hands {mortmain), which was the name given to
the statute when passed by Parliament in 1279, Hence
in one of the early confirmations of the Magna Charta
this clause was inserted, "It shaU not be lawfiU for
any to give his lands to any reUgious house, &c., upon
pain that the gift shoiUd be void, and the land shaU
accrue to the lord of the fee."
The civil law being against such gifts some way
had to be devised to enable ecclesiastics to evade the
law and yet obtain the land they required, Peter de
Worcestre, we learn, lived in the great stone house (in
High street) near the church of AU Saints (we wiU give
it its modern name), Eichard de Kalne, the then prior,
wanted a bit of land that lay between the two premises.
Peter wiUingly gave it, and at his death Hawisia, his
widow, on or about the feast of St, Edmund, the king,
granted and confirmed the gift which her husband had
made, providing also that neither herself or her heirs
should at any time molest or disturb before any judge
the said Eichard or his successors. And in case the
heirs of Hawisia should, contrary to her wish, make
such claim to the land, she did grant for herseK, her
heirs and assigns, that upon the single relation of the
ecclesiastical holder of the property, without oath or
other proof, or giving of any notice to her heirs, &c,, or
without judicial process, the Dean of Bristol should,
candles being lighted and beUs ringing in aU the
churches in Bristol, cause these her heirs to be publicly
and solemnly excommunicated, be proclaimed as excom
municated persons, and as such be shunned by all men,
until they should desist from such disturbance and pay
aU costs incurred in the matter, which costs, she agrees,
shaU be estimated by the ecclesiastic. And she did
" moreover subject herself, her heirs and assigns, volun
tarUy and freely, to the jurisdiction and restraint of the
said dean, wheresoever she or they should be at the

A.D. 1254.

BRISTOL GIVEN TO PRINCE EDWARD AND HIS WIFE.

133

issuing of the said excommunication against them.
For performance of this stipulation and agreement she
gave her faith to Gilbert, dean of Bristol, and Stephen
GnolmsaU, vicar of AU Saints, who with her annexed
their seals thereto." The seals are in good preservation,
the land is stUl held by the church, and the above deed
is most interesting, as it shows one of the methods by
which the reUgious orders acquired and retained their
great wealth, and brought upon themselves the detesta
tion of future generations.
In 1271, Margaret, daughter of WiUiam le Clerk,
gives by deed to Walter de Panes certain ground lying
between that of Lawrence the hangman, and another
piece of land belonging to the Dean of Bristol, extend
ing from Worshipcleepe street (Bridge street) backward
to the churchyard of St, Mary-le-Port, on the tenure of
one rose on the day of the nativity of St, John the
Baptist, and 3^d. on Hookday, and to the heirs of
Eobert Pithrain twopence sterling, or a pound of cum
min at Michaelmas, in lieu, &c. On Hoekday it was
the custom in Bristol for the women to saUy out into
the streets, seize upon the men, and bind them with
cords untU they ransomed themselves, with a smaU sum
which was termed Hock-money, This deed is interest
ing, as it utterly explodes an old tradition that Oliver
CromweU used to moor his barge to a post in St. Mary-
le-Port churchyard. Here, in a deed dated nearly four
centuries before the Protector's day, we see that there
was a street, having gardens behind its houses, between
the river Avon and the church. On the one side of the
street there were shops, and on the other side, nearer
the river, were the butchers' shambles. We shaU refer
again to other of these deeds on a subsequent page,
23. We have seen by the rise in the farm- rental of
4,000 silver pennies per annum, in one decade by the
king, how in the royal estimation Bristol was making
progress; and we find that in the same year, 1252,
Henry gave to the burgesses as their king a charter, as
fuU, liberal and free as that which his father John,
when lord of the honour only, had given to them
sixty-four years before. This charter is indeed, in one
respect, greatly in advance of the other. The Bristol, or
Huntingford, chase was near; it is a favourite hunting-
ground at the present time for Bristol men. The Kings-
wood forest lay at their gate. The chase of FUwood
was but a couple of miles to the south, all of them royal
deer parks, which must have offered a terrible tempta
tion to men whose skUl enabled them to hit the gold at
two hundred paces with shafts a cloth yard long. The
extraordinary measures for the increase and protection
of their game which the Norman and Anjevin kings had
taken, and the horrible punishments which they inflicted

on man and beast for an infraction of forest law, made
one clause in this charter a most valuable boon to the
burgesses. It enacted that " none of them for the future
shaU be molested by any justice of ours of the forest,
or by any other our baUiff, for venison found within
the waUs of the same town," This charter has a
goodly array of noble witnesses, the lay lords being
Eichard de Clare, Geoffery de Lezman and WUliam de
Valence, the king's half brother, foUowed by that of
Ealph Fitz Nicholas, whose signature being found in so
many Bristol deeds and charters of this age gives colour
to the thought that he was a son of Eobert Fitz Nichol,
to whom we have before referred in the early part of
this chapter,
24. In the summer of 1254, on the marriage of his
son Prince Edward with Eleanor, Henry settled on the
prince and princess, amongst other property, the town
and castle of Bristol, All persons having a yearly in
come of ten pounds were at this period forced to become
knights, or pay a flne to the king. The king had,
in the previous year, pledged the eternal safety of his
soul on his maintenance of the charter, in order to get a
supply of money from the barons. In the foUowing
year he pledged the kingdom to the Pope for 140,000
marks, in order to obtain the crown of Sicily for his son
Edmund. Being unable to get a grant of the money
from Parliament, he claimed from the clergy the tithes
of aU beneflces and the flrst fruits of those that should
become vacant, being, he said, a grant from the Pope to
enable him to repay his HoUness. An agent from Eome
attended before the Parliament and threatened excom
munication and a general interdict unless the debt were
immediately paid. Thus Pope and king were arrayed
against clergy, barons and people, and the whole land
was rapidly ripening for revolution. In 1244 the king
had declared that no man could serve two masters
(France and England), and those barons who had con
tinental possessions as weU as English were obliged to
relinquish one or the other. This separation made the
barons who elected to remain, not only Englishmen, but
also patriots. The clergy, by papal and royal exactions,
were alienated from both Pope and king, and had be
come, amidst all their luxurious corruption, a sturdy
race who battled for the priceless heritage of a free
state as bravely as the mailed barons. The burgess
class had steadUy, by its wealth and its guilds, grown
into an important factor in the State, viewed as yet
with Ul-concealed dislike by the nobles, the power of
the great towns was too great, and their money influence
too vast to be overlooked or treated any longer with
contempt, HaUam considers that the Pope's spoU in
1244 would be equivalent to a tax on the industry of

134:

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1258,

the kingdom of one miUion pounds sterUng, And the
king's continuous cry was that of the daughter of the
horseleech, "Give, give, give!"
In 1256 there was a great dearth in Bristol, and
wheat sold at 16s, a bushel, or 128s, a quarter, whereas
the ordinary price was 6d. a bushel, or 4s, a quarter, ^
In the same year Henry came to Bristol on a visit to
his son ; he stayed four days at the charges of Prince
Edward, and the cost of his entertainment amounted to
£34 9s. Id. and seven hogsheads of wine. The king
went from hence to Berkeley, where, being the guest of
the second Lord Maurice, he was pleased to "pardon
him and his tenants of Berkeley and of Eadeclyve street
their breaches of the assize of merohandizinge and
measures, belonginge to the Kinge (as supreame clarke
of the market) by reason of his passage through those
parts, "^
25, The Welsh, indignant at the king's attempt to
make them pay tribute, were ravaging the borders,
which probably was the cause of this visit of the king,
who was at Gloucester on JvUy 24th, where he signed a
charter he had promised a few days previously to the
burgesses of Bristol, which gave them authority to choose
a Coroner amongst themselves, for the purpose more
particularly of attaching and presenting pleas of the
crown to the justices itinerant when they came into that
part of the country, and for doing generaUy aU things
that belong to the office of a coroner. The office was held
to be of far greater importance then than it is at the
present time, and this exemption from the jurisdiction of
Somerset and Gloucestershire was the first step towards
making Bristol a separate county. Another privUege
confirmed by this charter was to secure to the heirs of
burgesses dying intestate the enjoyment of the property.
By ancient law and custom the effects of aU persons
dying without a wiU came to the king's or their lord's
hands. This right had been renounced by charter of
Henry I., 1100, and again by John, 1215 ; but that the
kings did sometimes exercise this oppressive right even
fifty years after this date is shown by Prynne ^ in the
case of Eichard Pynnock, the master of the ship Leissot,
of Bristol, who dying a natural death on board of his
ship during the voyage to Bordeaux, which was a part
of the dominion of Edward III., the goods of Eeyner de
Burfrei, with which the ship was laden, were seized by
the constable of Bordeaux, for the king, on the ground
that the master of the ship had cUed intestate. Alisia,
the widow and executrix of Eeyner, jjetitioned to have
the said goods and chattels returned to her, and they
1 Knight, Pop, Hist,, 369,
* Smyth, quoted in Seyer, II,, 55,
' Prynne Inst,, iv,, 232,

were ultimately given up. Either this charter was
ignored in this case or Eeyner was not a Bristol man,
and so could not plead it,
A year later, in July, the southern division of the
army, which was intended to act against LleweUin,
Prince of Wales, assembled at Bristol on St. Paul's
day. On June 23rd, 1257, a violent tempest and heavy
rain flooded the lands in the Severn vaUey, so that the
corn flelds were covered, their produce swept away, and
many lives were lost, especially of chUdren, Innumer
able flocks and herds of cattle perished ; and before the
end of the summer fifteen thousand people had died in
London of hunger, besides untold numbers in the country.
The harvest was so wet that much corn was spoiled, and
so late that in many parts of the kingdom it was not
gathered in by AU Saints' day. This calamity raised
food to famine prices and fanned the smoiUdering embers
of discontent into a fiame,
26, On the 2nd of May, 1258, the barons met in the
Great HaU at Westminster, and a commission of twenty-
four persons was determined on, twelve of whom were
to be selected from the king's council and the other half
to be appointed by the barons at a parUament to be
held at Oxford, On the 11th of June "The Mad Par
liament " accordingly met, and notwithstanding the
opprobrious nickname which interested historians have
affixed to them, it would have been well if aU our par
liaments had been as sane as they. The principle of
representation of the freeholders was then re-estabUshed
in the kingdom, Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester,
a foreigner who had married Eleanor, the king's sister,
and had become, notwithstanding the accident of birth,
more of an Englishman than the English barons them
selves, was nominated head of the council. Adored by
the commons, respected by the clergy and feared by the
king, De Montfort was soon a power in the realm,
Hume has blackened his character to the utmost; we
prefer to read it by the contemporary poem of the
scholar in his cloister. Protector gentis Anglia, by the song
of the English ballad-monger, Sir Simon the righteous,
and the pithy praises of the peasant. The man that
loves right and hates wrong ; The gift of the good lord,
&c., &c,
27, Forced by intrigues to leave England, De Mont
fort returned in 1263, and the seven years' war of the
barons with their king began, Gloucester was besieged
and taken by the confederates ; Prince Edward came to
the castle of Bristol, intending to secure it, and he
began to store it with provisions and to levy contribu
tions to the extent of £1,000 on the town and its neigh
bourhood. The Ribalds (as they were termed by the
king's party) of Bristol resented this infraction of their

A,D, 1260.

SIMON DE MONTFORT'S PARLIAMENT.

135

chartered rights, and soon there arose a violent quarrel
between them and the soldiers of the prince. Edward
retired into the castle, drew up the bridge, and stood on
the defensive ; but finding that the men of Bristol were
making a vigorous demonstration, and would besiege
him in his stronghold, he, by a dishonourable strata
gem, pretending to come to terms with them, escaped
to Windsor castle.
The prince gone, things returned to their normal
state. The king's soldiers held the castle, and the
townsfolk favoured the barons. The opposing armies
met in battle array near Lewes on the 19th of May;
Henry, with his brother Eichard (King of the Eomans),
and finaUy Prince Edward, were taken prisoners. This
battle was known as The Mise of Lewes, The prince, and
his cousin Henry, were detained as hostages for their
fathers, and were confined at first in WaUingford castle,
whence they were subsequently removed to Dover
castle. " Be thee willing, be thee lothe. Sir Edward,
Thou shalt ride spurless on thy hack
AI the ryghte way to Do vreward, "
The king sent word to the commander of Tunbridge
castle to yield it to the barons, refrain from further
hostiUties, and send his men away to their own homes.
He evacuated the castle, but marched the garrison across
the country and added them to the castle of Bristol,
which was held by staunch adherents of the king.
There were now at the least seven banners in that
castle, viz.. Sir John de Bassingbourne, Sir Eobert
Tipetot, Sir John de Mussegros, Sir Pain de Chawurthe,
Sir Patrick Chawurthe and Sir Eobert Walronde, The
seventh is not named, but it was probably Eoger de
Leebourne, who was, we know, constable of the castle
in 1260, These knights, hearing from the queen that
Prince Edward was confined in WaUingford, which
was but sUghtly garrisoned, left Bristol secretly with
300 horsemen, and appeared before the waUs of Wal-
lingford on a Friday (date not given), just as the sun
rose. They stormed the town close by the church of
Al-HaUowen, took the first ditch and broke through the
outer waU ; but the garrison, retreating into the castle,
stoutly defended it, and threatened that unless the
assaiUt ceased "they would with pleasure bind Sir
Edward (the prince) and cast him to them out of an
engine, and so they might take him with them. The
prince himself came upon the wall and bade them go
home again, otherwise he should be put to death.
When they heard this they went away, and returned to
Bristow,"^ The king, although not kept a close prisoner, was
* Robert of Gloucester and Packington, ap' Lei, Coll', 2-458,

carefuUy watched by the barons, and (writing under
compulsion) repeatedly commanded his friends to deliver
up the castle of Bristol to the adherents of the barons.
They steadily refused compliance, until Prince Edward
by letter ordered them to yield it and depart. The
townsfolk then took possession, and so "Bristol was aU
in Sir Simon's hand, the castle and the town,"
The wUy burgesses thought this was a favourable
opportunity to sue for a pardon from the king, which,
situated as Henry then was, he could not weU refuse,^
28, The great earl kept his Christmas at KenU worth
and in the king's name he issued writs for the meeting
of a ParUament, There were Anglo-Saxon precedents
for caUing others (theoreticaUy aU freeholders) beside
the prelates, great abbots, barons and tenants-in-chief
of the crown, to a great CouncU, but they had long been
in abeyance. In these writs of Simon de Montfort we
recognise something more than a return to Anglo-Saxon
customs, the Witan had been never elective in one sense
of the word, its members sat by right of their position,
or by special appointment of the king ; the utmost that
coiUd be said was that absent members often deputed
other members to represent them, StUl the Witan had
been founded on a broader basis, and was more repre
sentative of the various classes than the CouncUs of
the kingdom had been in this 13th century. The
novelty introduced by Leicester was that of direct re
presentation of the people. Whatever were his motives,
De Montfort sagaciously saw that the time had come
when the fiat of the king, controUed only by an assem
blage of nobles and dignitaries, and that only when his
will was at variance with their wishes, must be supple
mented by the introduction of freemen of business
talent and capacity, who possessed the confidence of
their f eUow-burgesses, Commercial pursuits had formed,
out of the mere trader, a class of men who, in shrewd
foresight, inteUectual vigour and receptivity and enjoy
ment of learning, had distanced the lordly baron of the
feud, and who, by their training in their guUds, were
in a degree fitted for the details of administration.
The king's writs were directed to eleven bishops, five
earls and eighteen barons, aU of De Montfort's party.
To fill the vacancies sixty-four abbots, thirty-seven
priors and five deans were also summoned. ' ' Writs
were also sent to aU the sheriffs in England command
ing them ' to cause two of the most discreet knights of
each county to come to this Parliament, ' ' ' ^ Similar writs
were directed to the citizens of several cities, and bur
gesses of several burghs, requiring each to send two of
^ Perdonatio pro burgens Bristoll de rebeUiouibus, — Rot' Pat'
49, m' 10, Seyer, II. , 63.
¦^ Brady's Introduction, &c,, 140 — 1,

136

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1265.

its most discreet and honest, wise and upright men.
Each of the Cinque Ports was commanded to send two
of its barons. In what manner these members were
chosen we have no account. But as they appeared as
the representatives of those by whom they were sent,
their expenses were to be borne by their constituents.
There was no division into two houses, but the sys
tem of direct representation thus begun has formed the
basis, with modifications and enlargements, of our
national ParUament for the
past six hundred years. This
fact alone testifies the sagacity
and wisdom of the great earl.
GUbert de Clare, Earl of
Gloucester, not being able to
agree with De Montfort, re
nounced the party, and, retiring
to his lands in the west, raised
a large force, with which he
watched the course of events.
De Montfort fortified Glou
cester, De Clare being then in
the Forest of Dean with his
men. On May 13th De Mont
fort, having Prince Edward in
free custody, marched to Here
ford, the Earl of Gloucester
foUowing and watching him at
a convenient distance,
29, The prince having se
cretly been furnished with a
horse of exceeding swiftness,
proposed one day when riding
that his attendants should ride ^
races for amusement, and when '^s
their horses were thoroughly
blown, he set spurs to his steed
and escaped to the Earl of
Gloucester who had planned
the stratagem and who received him joyfuUy. Edward's
escape speedily brought the malcontents amongst the
barons over to the royal banner. He took Worcester
without resistance, Gloucester in two days, but was
three weeks before he obtained possession of the castle.
Then with a large army he broke down the bridges of
the Severn and awaited his foe,
De Montfort retired to Newport, whence he "sent
urgent messengers to Bristol, ordering them to send
to Newport without delay aU the ships of burden
which they could procure, that he with the king and
the army might be conveyed to BristoU." The Earl of
Gloucester frustrated this scheme by sending three pirate

Simon de Montfort.

ships (gaUeys), which he anchored off Newport, putting
on board of them a great number of fighting men, who,
seeing the fleet from Bristol approaching the coast,
attacked them very violently in the sea, took or sunk
eleven of them, and forced the rest to return. After
this victory over the unarmed fleet, the earl and prince
crossed the Severn and marched to Newport, De Mont
fort's men burnt the bridge, and Edward, who had
sworn to observe the charters, hurried to KenUworth
where he met De Montfort's
son hastening with an army
from London to aid his father.
Him he defeated with great
slaughter ; then ordering one
part of his forces to march
with the captured banners dis
played to Evesham (which place
the elder De Montfort had suc
ceeded in reaching), he by
another route led the rest of
his men to the same place.
Deceived at first into a belief
that the first detachment was
his son's force approaching, the
stout old earl prepared for the
combat with Edward ; but soon
discovering his error, and no
ting the numbers and exceUent
array of his adversaries, who
had out - generaUed and shut
him up in a tongue of land
enclosed by the river, from
which there was only one pas
sage by a narrow stone bridge,
he cried out, ' ' God have mercy
on our souls, for our bodies
are Prince Edward's," He and
his men met their fate bravely,
no quarter was given, and the
conquerors disgraced their victory by mutUating the
remains of their faUen foe. The king who, on a war
horse, was in the battle, with difficidty saved his Ufe
by exclaiming when about to be struck down, "I am
Henry of Winchester, your King!" The battle was
fought on the 4th of August, 1265, in the midst of an
awful storm of thunder, lightning and rain, and the
people believed and asserted that heaven was displeased
at the death of their great champion, "About this time
Sir WilUam de Berkeley, knight, with some Welshmen,
entered Somerset, at Minehead, in a hostile manner ; but
he was put to fUght by Adam Gurdun, keeper of the
castle of Dunster, and was drowned,"

A,D, 1265,

HENRY'S COINAGES AT BRISTOL.

137

30. After this, in 1265, Prince Edward " took Bristol
castle from the barons, and the town was fined £1,000,"^
Henry died November 16th, 1272, whUst Prince
Edward was returning from a crusade,
31. In this long and eventful reign coin was first
made sterUng, husbandry was greatly improved, the
wooUen manufacture was increased, linen was first made
in England, coal was discovered at Newcastle, and a
charter was granted aUowing it to be dug ; the title of
"esquire" was conferred upon gentlemen of property,
coats of arms were impressed on seals, and arms were
fixed and became hereditary, the English language was
used in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Arabic notation was
generaUy introdu
ced, polite Utera
ture revived, night
watchers were ap-
pointed in the
great towns, and '
miracle plays were J
performed in j
churches to gratify |
the people, Eng- 2
Ush statute law i
and the first or- i j
ganised parlia- •;:
ment began 1265,
In the preamble
to the statute of
Westminster the
first mention of
the word "parlia
ment" occurs. These were the palmy days of the al
chemists, who sought the redoubtable phUosopher's
stone, which was able to turn any metal into gold.
The connection of Bristol with DubUn was stUl main
tained, as is shown by a deed in which John Taylburgh,
of DubUn, seUs to Peter le Marte, of Bristol, a messuage
in Mercate (now Merchant) street, in the parish of St,
PhUip and James, This deed is ratified by John de
Esseburne, mayor of DubUn,
32, At the close of this reign "there were twelve
furnaces for hammering and stamping perfect (sterUng)
money in Bristol." ^ Henry coined, in 1257, a penny of
fine gold of the value of 20 sUver pennies, but in 1264
its value was raised to 24 pence. There are only three
specimens known, they bear the London mint mark.
There were two issues of sUver pennies, the first or short
cross coinage, and the second or long cross coinage. Of
1 Seyer, IL, 67. " Evans, 65,

the first there are no specimens knowm of the Bristol mint,
but "in 1248 a writ was issued to the baUiffs and men
of Bristol ordering that in fuU town court, they should,
by the oath of twenty-four good men, chosen from
persons of the most trusty and prudent of their town,
for the office of moneyers there ; and other four like
persons for the keeping of the king's mints there ; and
two fit and prudent goldsmiths to be assayers of the
money to be made there ; and one fit and trusty clerk
for the keeping of the exchange ; and to send them to
the treasurer and barons of the exchequer, to do there
what by ancient custom and assize was to be done in
that case. Two out of these four moneyers are found
named on coins of
this issue, which
have come down
to us, viz,, EUis
and Jacob, The
name of the place
is spelt Brustol,
The only Bristol
penny in the Brit-
sh Museum of
Henry III, bears
obverse crowned
bust of the king,
full faced and
bearded. Beaded
inner circles on
both sides. Ob
verse legend, hbm"-
BICVS REX ANG (the
last word indistinct). Reverse, a long double cross
botone extending to the edge of the coin, three peUets
in each angle. Legend, elis on bbvst. Another penny
of the long cross coinage was among some coins found
on Tower hUl, March 1869, It bore, obverse, crowned
fuU faced bust bearded, no sceptre. Legend, heneicvs
HEX III, Reverse, same type as last coin. Legend,
JACOB ON BBVST, Beaded inner circles on both sides.
The weight and fineness of these pennies was about the
same as WiUiam I,"^
Henry III, appears to have had several ships of his
own. In 1242 mention is made of the king's gaUey of
Bristol, and again of the king's gaUeys in Ireland,
When, in 1253, this king ordered aU the ships in the
country to be seized and employed against the rebel
barons of Gascony, the number was above one thousand.
Three hundred of these are said to have been large,
1 Henfrey, 349.

Ncwpuvt Coitle.

[Vol. L]

K 2

CHAPTER YU

^ Tr?E ^ PL:5I]T^GE]]ET ^ E]^^. ^

THE HOUSE OF ANJOU.— PART III.
I. The Conduits of Bristol. 2. Edward I. ascends the Throne. His Crusade to the Holy Land, etc.
3. Eleanor de Montfort a captive in Bristol castle. 4. The Seals of the City. 5. Edward's Coins. His
visits to Bristol. The Jews banished for malpractices, etc. 6. Statutes passed by Edward. 7. The Welsh
rebel. Llewellyn's sons captive in Bristol castle. 8. Peter de la Mare builds a Cross in Old Market street.
9. Birth of the Prince of Wales. The King holds a Parliament at Bristol. 10. Edward restores the
Charter which he had seized. 11. Royal Marriage at Bristol. 12. Seizure of Ships by Bristol men.
13. The Charter of 1300. The Berkeleys dispute the jurisdiction of the Bristol burgesses in Redcliff.
14, The Scottish struggle : the son of the Earl of Mar sent to Bristol. 15. Simon de Burton and other
Mayors of Bristol. 16. Edward's Bristol Coinage. 17, Notable events and state of the Country.
18. Character of Edward I. 19. Edward II. : his character; he visits Bristol with Gaveston. 20. Bristol
surnames. 21, Increasing wealth of the country. Rise of Crafts' Guilds, and their struggles for supremacy
m the town. 22. The Great Insurrection : Bristol for three years an independent State. 23. Great Famine
and Murrain. 24. Twenty thousand men beleaguer Bristol in vain ; the Burgesses still resist the infraction
Of their Charters. 25. The town besieged and taken by the King's forces. 26. Reflections on the causes
that led to this struggle. 27. Edward's new favourite, Hugh Desfencer, has a grant of the Town' and
castle of Bristol. 28. The King confirms the Charter of Bristol. Sir Henry Wyllyngton and Sir Henry
de Montfort hanged there. 29. The Queen sides with the Barons. 30. The King makes Bristol his head
quarters. 31. The Mayor asserts the jurisdiction of Bristol in Redcliff. 32. The King in extremity leaves
for Lundy. 33. The Queen takes Bristol, and the elder Despencer is put to death. 34. The King taken
prisoner. Death of the younger Despencer. 35. Edward removed from Bristol castle : his death at Berkeley.
36. Bristol Mayors and Members of Parliament. 37; Edward III. confirms the Charter, sends a Commission
to judge between the burgesses and the Berkeleys, and by further Charter, endeavours to settle the disputed
jurisdiction. 38. State of the Kingdom. 39, Merchants of Gascony complain to the King. Quayage
granted. 40. Growth of the Woollen trade. Blankets probably a Bristol invention. 41. Merchants of the
staple. Their towns. 42. The Little Red Book, a compilation of Ordinances and By-laws relating to
Bristol. Some of its contents. 43. The War with France. Shifs. Battle of Cressy. New Charter.
44. The Plague desolates Bristol: a Murrain and Famine follow. 45. War and Pestilence pave the way
for greater freedom. 46. Bristol men sent for by the King. They obtain a new Charter. 47. Queen
PhiUppa's dower. Bnstol Town and castle. 48. Derby and Derneford farm the town. 49. Bristol
Shipping. 50. Bristol made a County by Charter. 51. The High Cross. 52. Bristol Mayors and
incidents of the time. SZ- Edward III.'s Death. His Character. SA- Accession of Richard II. Oppression
of the People, leading to Revolt. 55. Richard and his Queen at Bristol : he calls a Parliament.
56. Death of Tresilian. 57. Bristol incidents. The King's extravagance. 58. The King visits Bristol
on his way to Ireland. 59. York joins Lancaster. Bristol surrenders, and Scrope, Bushy and Green
are beheaded at the High Cross. 60. The Wycliffttes in Bristol. 61. Richard is taken prisoner on his
return to England. 62. Bristol Mayors, &c. 63. Richard and the Charters of Bristol.

A.D, 1267,

THE CONDUITS OF BRISTOL.

139

pT has been too much the fashion to decry
the monks and friars who, in the 13th
and 14th centuries, helped to mordd the
Ufe of Bristol. One of their good deeds
was the bringing a supply of pure water
from the surrounding hills into the town,
Leland, in his time, enumerates the con
duits then extant — " St, John's, hard by
St, John's Gate, The Key pipe, with a
very faire CasteUette, AU HaUow pipe, hard by the
Calendaries, without a CasteUe. St, Nycholas pipe, with
a CasteUette, EedcUffe pipe, with a CasteUette, hard
by EedcUffe Church witheowte the Gate, Another pipe
witheowi;e EedcUffe gate having no CasteUe, Another
by Port WauUe, without the WauUe,"i
St, John's conduit used to fiow from a buUding
inside the site of the eastern smaU archway under the
tower of the church of St, John at the entrance to Tower
lane. It was a gift from the CarmeUtes, "the fairest
of aU the Friaries in Bristowe, on the right ripe of the
Froom, over against the Key," founded by Edward,
Prince of Wales, in 1267, These good monks knew
the value of pure water, and brought to their new
home a plenteous, never-faiUng supply from a spring
on Brandon hiU, not far from the top of what is now
Park street, the reservoir being in a subterranean
quarry. This conduit is now under the care of the
Sanitary Authority for the city. [For description see
our Ecclesiastical History, 157.]
It has generaUy been supposed that the Quay pipe
was the gift of Walter Derby during his mayoralty,
in 1376, from the foUowing passage: — ^" Walter Derby
being Mayor, an agreement was made with Hugh White,
plumber, at his own cost during Ufe, to bring the water
to the Key pipe, AU Saints' pipe and St, John's pipe, at
the yearly sum of £10."^ It is evident that this is
merely a contract with a tradesman to keep these three
conduits, flowing from very different sources, in repair.
Whether the Quay pipe was constructed by lay or
clerical hands is unknown.
The water of this conduit is suppUed by two springs
in a withy-bed in the vaUey that lies between the Ashley
Down Orphanages, and Stoke House, not far from the
Ashley Eoad EaUway Station, The "BoUing WeU,"
an ever-bubbling fountain, is on the same level, a little
farther up the vaUey, The water from the two springs
is led into a cistern in the conduit house, and is thence
conveyed in iron pipes along the north bank of Hook's
MUl stream as far as Lower Ashley House, it is then
1 Lei, Itin., VIL, 71. ^ Evans, 94,

carried under the brook and across the fleld towards the
south-west to a spot on the bank of the Frome known as
"Botany Bay," Here there was a "second head," tech-
nicaUy known as "a horse," from which the pipe is
carried under the turnpike road, to Baptist MUls, and
thence onward under Newfoundland street, MUk street,
the Horsefair, over BrideweU bridge, along the north
side of Nelson street, which it crosses close to St, John's
church, and so on through Quay street to the flnal tanks
on the quay under the eastern end of the Tontine ware
houses, from which the water is drawn by two cocks,
UntU a few years since the casks of the shipping were
to a large extent flUed with this water on account of its
purity. During the 18th century the outlet was several times
changed in position. In 1717 it stood not far from Clare
street, then it was removed to make way for the fish-
market to the north side of St, Stephen's church nearer
the river; when, in 1770, St, Leonard's church was puUed
down the casteUette of this pipe was destroyed, but its
cistern has recently (1880) been uncovered during altera
tions at No, 5 St, Stephen's street. The keys are kept
by the Corporation, Ere we leave the history of this
conduit we would notice a very old covered weU of
pure water near its source under the shadow of the
trees on the hiU-top near Heath House, the stonework
of which is of great antiquity. In the adjoining field,
to the east, are several terraces, scarped out of the de
clivity, which have long been a puzzle to the antiquary,
Mr, Prebendary Scarth considers them to have been the
site of a Eoman sanatorium— the 14th iter of Antonine
having crossed the vaUey close by.
The source of AU Saint's conduit is a spring on the
Kingsdown hiU, on the north side of Maudlin street,
nearly opposite to the Moravian chapel. This spring
was in the 13th century in an orchard belonging to the
Priory of St, James; in the year 1400 the Superior
granted the overflow to the parish of All Saints. Its
course is through the premises of the Moravian chaj)el,
the Black Friars, Lewin's Mead, St. John's Bridge,
Christmas street, and Broad street, to AU Saints lane.
On page 92 of our Ecclesiastical History, in an engrav
ing of AU Saints' church, the two spouts of this conduit
may be seen in the basement of the buUding which
succeeded the Calendars' House, adjoining the Tolzey,
A feather of this pipe was carried down to St, Nicholas ;
the site of its casteUette may be seen in the bird's eye
view of Bristol Bridge on page 91, it stood on the slope
leading up to the bridge from Baldwin street ; it was
removed, together with the old gateway and church, in

140

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1366.

1762, and the water was cut off. This conduit is under
the care of the churchwardens of AU Saints' parish,
Eedcliff pipe was a boon acquired by the secular
clergy for the people of Eedcliff, Thomas, and Temple,
in 1207, In that year WiUiam, the chaplain of Eed
cliff, obtained as a gift from Lord Eobert de Berkeley,
"Huge WeU," a flne spring on Knowle hUl, for the
joint use of his parishioners, and of the brethren of St,
John the Baptist, whose house was in Eedcliff j)it, A
feather from this suppUed St, Thomas' pipe. The last
site of this conduit was in a lane on the south side of St.
Thomas' church.
Pryce says another feather supplied the house of the
Augustinian Eremites within
Temple gate. The reservoir is
on a farm at Lower Knowle,
about a mile and a-half dis
tant, from whence it is con
veyed in leaden pipes under
the New Cut to Eedcliff hiU,
"In the year 1366 Sir
John de Gourney, Lord of
Knowle, granted the ground
for an aqueduct from Pile
hiU to Temple gate near this
house, for the use of the friers
here, from a fountain called
EavenesweUe at a place caUed
Hales. " Temple conduit was built
1561, and in 1587 J, Griffen
gave two tenements to keep it
in repair. This water coui-se
is kept in very good order,
and the fountain head is
yearly visited by the parish
officers, and they have ex
pended great sums to preserve it at different times,
and to prevent the sidings from being stopped. You
enter the cavern by a door at the side of the hiU, on the
very back of the Avon on the left hand of the Bath road
at Totterdown, and passing through a narrow cut in the
soUd rock for 125 yards exactly in length, you come to
the reservoir or large trough of freestone, into which
three or four springs rising with force through crevices
in the bottom of the rock are continuaUy flowing in
bubbling streams, from hence the water is conveyed in
large leaden pipes laid at the bottom of the channel cut
in the rock, which pipes you walk upon in going to the
cistern, the roof above in the rock being from 10 to 20
feet high in some places ; the water is conveyed from

Dr. White's Almshouse and Statue of Neptune.

the pipe head through the fields next it quite to Temple
gate, where is a cistern arched over for public use: a
feather conveyed it to the religious house adjoining, now
belonging to Mr, Warren, From the gate it is now led
through Temple street to the Neptune [fountain], and to
a large cistern the south side of the church and from
thence with a smaU feather to the vicarage house, which
serves the street with great conveniency as weU as the
neighbourhood," ^
The water supply of this conduit appears to be en
tirely lost to the parishioners ; we believe the water
from the spring is now ntUised at the works of the
Great Western EaUway Company, Totterdown;
" The figure of Neptune
here mentioned has been the
subject of special enactments.
It formerly stood very near the
approaches to Bristol Bridge,
which, being about to be wi
dened, and the site occupied
by the statue required, a
clause was introduced into the
act for Neptune to be removed
to another place, in Temple
street, which, on the passing
of the act referred to, was
subsequently done, the new
situation being very near to
where Dr, White's almshouse
now stands. When the trus
tees of that charity were about
to rebuUd the front of that
house, the statue was found
to be in the way, and they
endeavoured to obtain its re
moval, but this was decUned
by the authorities unless the
trustees found a site for it,
which they did ; a piece of glebe land belonging to the
vicar of Temple parish being avaUable, the statue was
removed "2 thither, the trustees of Dr, White's Charity
pajing £3 per annum for the use of the glebe land.
In this dark corner, at the end of a narrow lane that
skirts the churchyard of Temple, the statue remained,
amidst the filthiest surroundings untU the year 1872,
when by the exertions of the vicar of the parish it was
again removed to its present site at the junction of
Temple street with Victoria street, being restored to its
pristine use, as an ornament to a fountain devoted to
the public, the water of which is, however, suppUed by
the Bristol Water Works Company,
1 Barrett, 553^4, ^ Pryce, 310,

A,D, 1268,

EDWARD'S CRUSADE TO THE HOLY LAND.

141

Tradition avers (and we see no reason to doubt it)
that this statue, which is of lead, was given to the parish
by a plumber, who was a parishioner, and who desired
thus to commemorate the destruction of the Spanish
Armada, Jacob's WeU is very ancient; it probably dates back
to the time when the Jews buried their dead on the slope
of Brandon hUl, nearly opposite to this famous spring.
It rises in CUfton hUl, and the weU is under the smith's
shop that faces the poUce station. The water is conveyed
in pipes to CoUege green, and is so famous that people
have repeatedly chosen to dweU in that locaUty because
of its purity and exceUence. It ran direct to the Gaunts
in Unity street, with a feather to the Eed Maids' school.
It is under the care of the Corporation.
2. Edward I,, surnamed Longshanks, was born at
Winchester, June I7th, 1239. He was married, in
1254, to Eleanor, daughter of Ferdinand IIL, King of
CastUe, he began to reign 16th of November, 1272,
but being absent from the kingdom was not crowned
untU 19th of August, 1274. Eleanor dying in 1299,
Edward married Margaret, the eldest daughter of PhUip
III,, King of France, who survived him ten years,
Edward had thirteen chUdren by his first wife, seven
of whom died young, and three by his second, two of
whom reached maturity.
In 1268 Henry III, had raised by subsidy and by
a grant of the tenth of the chirrch revenues for three
years a sum equal to half a miUion of our money.
These subsidies, which we shaU frequently have to
mention, as a twentieth, a fifteenth, or a tenth, &c,,
were a property-tax levied upon the movable posses
sions of the people. The one above named was a sub
sidy of one-twentieth of the value of aU the goods and
chattels in the kingdom, from the valuable stock of the
. wax chandler in the borough (one of the best trades of
the time, because of the lights used in the churches, &c,),
or the rich tanner in the suburb, down to the working
tools of the mason or carpenter.
In Eoberts' Sistory of the Southern Counties (192) we
find the foUowing inventory of the stock of Eoger the
Dyer, which was taken in the year 1300 for the purposes
of taxation. It portrays a low state of domestic civUisa-
tion, shows with how few articles of convenience a
thriving tradesman was surrounded, whUst his luxuries
consisted of a silver buckle and an extra gown. One
could almost fancy that the old nursery rhyme —
"Darby's son had a black gown.
Its silver buckle was worth a crown," &c.,
must have come down to us from this inventory. The
usual amount of a subsidy was one-tenth or one-fifteenth
of a man's movables : —

Roger the Dyer— had

In his treasury cupboard
1 silver buckle
1 mazer bowl
In his chamber
2 gowns
2 beds 
1 napkin
1 towel
In his house
I ewer with basin
Andiron 
In his brewhouse
1 quarter of oats
Wood ashes
Great vat 

s.

d.

... 1

6

... 1

6

... 20

0

... 6

8

... 2

0

... 1

2

8

... 2

0

.., 6

8

... 2

6

s, d.

In his kitchen
1 brass pot 
1 " skillet ...
1 " pipkin ...
1 trivet 
Other items
1 cow 
1 calf 
2 pigs, each Vid.
1 sow 
BiUet wood and firing

Sum total... £3 11 5

The fifteenth of this sum is 4s. M,, so that the tax was
nearly equivalent to the value of Eoger's cow.
With part of the money thus raised, supplemented by
a large amount borrowed of the King of France, and
secured upon the revenues of Bordeaux, Prince Edward
set out for the Holy Land. Many members of the most
powerful families in England accompanied him volun
tarily, others had an "assisted passage," whUst some,
from their complicity with the late Earl of Leicester,
were constrained, as suspected persons whose absence
from the kingdom would conduce to its quiet, to become
Crusaders, The French king stopped at Tunis to fight
out a famUy quarrel with the Bey, and died of dysen
tery, Edward reached the Holy Land, took Nazareth
by storm, and was generaUy successful. At Acre his
sixth child, Joanna, was born. Here occurs another of
those episodes which picturesquely enliven the pages of
history. The Emir of Jaffa, who had professed his
wiUingness to become a Christian, sent a messenger
with a letter to Prince Edward, and was admitted to
the prince's chamber. The perfidious Saracen, watching
a favourable opportunity, struck twice with a poisoned
dagger at the heart of Edward, who dressed only in a
loose robe, and without a weapon, received the wounds
on his arm, Edward, who was one of the most powerful
and athletic of men, seized the would-be assassin and
brained him with the tripod (tressle) that supported his
table. The wounds were with difficulty cured. One of
our chroniclers relates that his loving wife, at the risk of
her life, sucked the poison from the wounds. The story
is so tenderly beautiful, that although some say it has a
Spanish origin, we wUl continue to believe and cherish
it as a notable instance of royal wifely devotion.
Finding that aU was quiet in England, and that he
was unanimously considered as King, Edward delayed
his return for twenty-two months after his father's
death, landing in England on the 3rd August, 1274,
" In 1275 the sheriffs of London and Gloucestershire

142

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1275,

were ordered to cause two lawful men to be chosen in
London, Bristol and other parts as sub-coUectors of
the custom on wool,"^ (the export of which had been
prohibited during the war between the king and the
Countess of Flanders) evidently with an intention, which
we shaU see carried into effect in 1297, to hold the
material as a reserve fund for his treasury in case of
need, 3, LleweUjm, Prince of Wales, had been freed from
his homage to England by Henry, when Simon de Mont
fort wished to pass safely through Wales from Newport ;
but Edward refused to recognise the release, and, in
1276, he sent 300 maUed knights to check the incur
sions of the Welsh in the neighbourhood of Bristol and
to enforce his claim. The king came to the town on
the 20th of September, and on the 22nd of that month
' ' he issued an order concerning the navigation of the
Avon, between Bath and Bristol," ^ "From hence," says
one of the MS. Calendars, "King Edward with his
Queen, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, went to
Glastonbury, and tooke up the bones of king Arthur to
view them." ^
Edward then held in captivity in Bristol castle a
lady whose story is one of the romances of English
history. Simon de Montfort, shortly before he was
slain at Evesham, had become friendly with Llewellyn,
Prince of Wales, and had affianced to him his daughter
Eleanor, On the death of the Earl, she, with her
mother, sought an asylum in France, In 1275 the
young lady, accompanied by her brother Almeric, two
French knights and two friars' preachers, with a great
company, sailed for Wales to fulfil the engagement'
made by her father. The vessel was intercepted near
the Isle of SiUey, in Carmarthen Bay, by a Bristol ship
or ships (which were probably lying in wait for the rich
prize), and was, with its passengers, beguUed to Bristol,
where the captives were presented to the king, who, by
his constable, paid the captors £90 as a reward, [This
date is doubtful, Edward was in Bristol only two days
in 1275 ; he was here flve days in September, 1276.]
The king, considering that the marriage woiUd greatly
injure his interests, had determined, if possible, to
prevent it. An aUiance between Wales and the house
of Leicester boded iU for the peace of the realm. A
law had been speciaUy passed prohibiting the people
from holding Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, for
a saint ; moreover, he was brother-in-law to Henry III,
Almeric and his sister were conflned in the castle ; the
rest of the company and crew were liberated at the
request of the King of France.
LleweUyn indignantly demanded the release of his
1 Par, writs, 213, ^ Seyer, II. , 68, ^ Ibid,

betrothed, and a third time refused to attend a parUa
ment at Chester to which he had been summoned. He
offered a handsome ransom for Eleanor and her brother ;
but the crafty king, deeming that he could "trample
upon the independence of Wales through this ungen
erous outrage upon the affections of its prince, remained
inexorable," Edward led an ariny into Wales in 1277,
and bought over David, the brother of the prince,
FinaUy, LleweUyn had to submit to Edward's terms, and
promised to pay a tribute estimated at £50,000. Finding
it impossible to get the money, Edward obtained credit
for magnanimity by remitting the whole sum ; he also
deUvered up to LleweUyn his betrothed, assisted at their
marriage, conducted the prince to Westminster, and
there received his homage in the presence of the bishops
and barons of the realm.
4. Mr, DaUaway, in a letter to Sir Henry EUis,
published in vol, XXII, of The Archmologia, thinks
that the flrst seal of the city of Bristol was derived
from the above incident, and the general public have
accepted as fact the learned antiquary's poetical idea.
The seal is doubtless as old as the days of Edward I,
(indeed we should say from the absence of aU heraldic
insignia such as those blazoned in the next and undoubted
seal of Edward the First's time, the Lombardic character
of the architecture and the lettering of the legend, that
it is of an earlier date, probably of the 12th century) ;
but the type is a conventional one, and is simUar to
some eighteen or twenty seals granted to other cities
and towns. The late Somerset Herald, J, E, Blanche,
has satisfactorUy demoUshed the legendary connection.
We shaU hereafter return to this subject in our article
upon the City EegaUa,
5, In the previous reign the short cross coinage,
together with the older coin of the realm, had been so
clipped as to be absolutely of no recognisable standard.
value. Its circulation was now prohibited, and the
king borrowed a large amount of sUver from his brother
Eichard, and with it issued the new long cross coinage
of 1248. But this measure was ineffectual: there was
more scope for fraud when aU the coins were new and
perfect, and the greater part of this money was soon
defaced and lessened by cUpping, The Jews were the
chief malefactors, and in November 1278, Edward
"caused aU the Jews in the kingdom to be arrested on
one and the same day for treason in clipping the king's
coin ; and very many Christians, goldsmiths and others,
were accused by the Jews as consenting to their wicked
ness, and particularly some of the nobiliores of the Lon
doners, On this account 280 Jews of both sexes were
hanged in London, and in other cities a very great
multitude; and for the release of the Christians the

A,D, 1280,

STATUTES PASSED BY EDWARD.

143

king received an inflnite sum of money, yet some of
them were hanged, , . , Next year the coin was
changed for the better ; for whereas the penny used to
be broken in two parts for halfpennies, and into four
parts for farthings, it was ordained, in order to take
away the opportunity of diminishing, that pennies, half
pennies and farthings should be made round," Another
MS, Calendar says "Edward I, altered the coynage of
money, causing it to be made round and entire, whereas
before pence were made on purpose to be broken into
halfpence and farthings. Of this new coyne
" The King's side, was his head and his name written ;
The cross side, what city it was coyned and smitten,''
Another says, ' ' The new coinage of halfpence in sUver
was brought to this city in 1280."^ That coins were
purposely indented in order to be broken into smaller
denominations is now thought to be a mistake, thousands
of coins of the earUer kings prove the contrary ; there is
no cross indentation, and Florence of Worcester states
that Henry I, coined round halfpennies and farthings.
At the same time we must aUow that, although not in
tended to be broken, it may have been the practice.
Indeed we have proof in a quarter of a gold angel
dredged up from our floating harbour in 1880, that in
the reign of Henry VI, the practice was continued on
coins of greater value.
Edward came to Bristol from Gloucester on AprU
19th, 1280. He stayed three days at Berkeley and was
certainly here on the 24th, how long he stayed we
know not, but he was at Stapleford on his way to
Westminster on the Ist of May, He also spent the
Christmas of 1281 in Bristol, In 1284 he was at
Haverfordwest, on the 29th November, whence he came
to Bristol, probably by sea, on the 1st December. On
the 3rd he was back in Wales at Carmarthen, thence
making a progress to Strigoyl (Chepstow), where he was
on the 18th, On the 21st he was again in Bristol, He
spent his Christmas here, and left on the 2nd of January
for Bath. Here the records are incomplete.
In 1286 "Eobert Sturmy, of Bristol, was bound to
Isaac, son of Deulecres, a Jew of Norwich, in 15 marks,
and the said Jew demanded of him various penalties and
usuries, besides the principal debt. The king, by special
favour, being wUUng to procure Sturmy's indemnity, re
mitted and pardoned the said penalties and usuries, and
commanded the barons to grant him a termination with
regard to paying the said debt to that Jew,'"* In 1290
the king seized upon the real estate of the Jews, and
commanded them, by proclamation dated July 27th, to
leave the kingdom by AU Saints' day. It is estimated
that about 16,000 of this revUed people were thus driven
1 Seyer, IL, 70-1, » Ibid, 71,

out of the land in which many of them had been born,
to find other homes in more hospitable countries. This
termination of a series of persecutions, which they had
for centuries been subjected to in the name of the
reUgion of Him who was Himself a Jew, the Christ of
God, whose very name is Love, is one of the most re
markable instances of the perversion of true religion
that history records. By writ the Sheriff of Gloucester
was commanded to make proclamation — "That no one
should presume to hurt the Jews, nor take from them
those goods the king had aUowed them to keep, but, on
the contrary, furnish them with a guard, provided they
would pay for it, which might secure their passage to
London, in order for transportation, provided also that
before their removal they returned aU their pawns or
pledges to such as were wUling to redeem them," ¦'¦
6. In 13 Edward I,, 1284, a statute was passed
against forestaUers {i,e, middlemen who traded between
the producer and consumer). Twenty miles' distance
would frequently make a considerable difference in the
price of corn, &c. These middlemen, who were reaUy
the shrewd, practical business traders of the age, were
prohibited from meeting and offering to buy the com
modities of merchant strangers. Or teUing them where
they might seU for more money.
The forestaUer, regrater and engrosser, were in
reality the economical distributors, who by preventing
waste prevented want. They fiUed their granaries and
stores in a time of plenty and cheapness, and emptied
them in times of higher prices and 'scarcity. To the
working of the above absurd law must be attributed
much of the misery caused by the frequent famines that
at intervals for three centuries devastated the land.
Laws against forestaUing and regrating were renewed
and re-enacted up to the end of the 16th century, and
were a misdemeanour at common law, punishable by
fine or imprisonment, untU aboUshed by 7 and 8 Victoria,
cap. 24,
"In 1297 Edward, being in want of money, seized
great quantities of wool and leather belonging to the
merchants. At the same time, by mere force he took
immense quantities of corn and great multitudes of
cattle for the use of his army. He also, at one time,
seized all the money and plate in the monasteries and
churches, and at another aU the possessions of the clergy
for refusing to grant him a subsidy." ^
Proceeding a step further, he enacted the first statute
of Mortmain, by which aU the lands given in Mortmain,
that is, into the dead hand of the church, without the
king's special Ucense, were forfeited to him, Eeligious
' Evans, 69, who gives the date 1287,
= Heming, L, 107, 110, 111,

144

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1283,

bodies, being corporations, had perpetual succession, so
that the king and the former lords of the lands lost the
benefit of their tenants' services, fiines for inheritance,
&c,, when the property passed into the "dead hand,"
which, as Coke observes, "yielded no service," The
most difficult lesson which the English kings had to
learn was that which in after years cost one of them his
head, viz,, that the monarch has no right in any property
of his subjects unless it is granted to him by them
selves or their representatives.
The maxim that "the king can do no wrong" was
most loyally foUowed by Edward's servants. In 1275
the statute of Westminster enacted that no king's officer
should take any reward to do his office, yet within 14
years after this not fewer than thirteen English judges
out of the whole fifteen were convicted of bribery
and extortion. That statute had many precious germs
of Uberty enshrined within it, giving evidence of the
new and practical Ufe infused into the parliament.
No man could be compelled thenceforth to lodge and
feed barons and their retinues when travelling. If
anything, even a cat, escaped alive from a ship cast
on shore, the said ship was not to be deemed a wreck.
Freedom of election, from interference by menace or
arms, was asserted. Devisers of slanderous news were
made subject to prosecution for libel. This year also
the commissioners were appointed to summon juries of
boroughs and hundreds, and inquire into the rights and
prerogatives of the Crown, &c. They came to Bristol,
and the jurors, in answer to one of the questions, say
that Bristol men were entitled to certain rights of com
mons in Clifton, &c,^ In 1283 the statute of Merchants
gave to traders, for the first time, a legal right to recover
debts on the day assigned for payment. In 1285 the
statute of Winchester made the Hundred answerable
for robberies within its limits ; it also pro'vided for a
night watch and for the closing of the gates in a waUed
town from sunset to sunrise ; it ordered also that a space
of 200 feet in width should be kept clear on each side
of the roads leading to market towns, and made the
lord of the land liable if a robbery had been committed
through neglect of this precaution. Every man also
was to keep the arms of his degree in his house ' ' for to
keep the peace after the ancient assize, hauberk, sword,
knife, or bow and arrows," No man was to leave his
county or to be sent abroad against his wUl,
By the statute of London, 1285, none were to wander
armed through the streets after curfew from St, Martin's-
le-Grand, and no tavern for the sale of wine or ale was
to be open after that hour. The statute of Quo War
ranto was passed in 1280, Edward needed money, and
1 A. S, EUis, Brist. and Glouc. Arch. Proc, I., 215.

in order to fill his coffers he appointed commissioners to
examine into the titles by which the barons and others
held their lands. He thus by fines and compositions
for defective titles added to the royal demesnes and
recruited his exchequer. But a stop was put to this
inquisition by the old Earl de Warren, he who in
Edward's absence had, on the death of Henry, been one
of the first to head the barons and to swear fealty to the
crusader Prince. When the commissioner demanded to
see the instrument by which he held his estate, he took
down the rusty sword with which his forefather had
fought at Senlac, and drawing it from its scabbard,
said, ' ' This is the instrument with which my ancestors
gained their estate, and by which I wiU keep it as long
as I live," This answer induced Edward to revoke the
commission, 7, The Welsh have ever been sensitive to ridicule
and impatient of foreign control. When the chiefs of
Snowdon, in their quaint sheepskin dresses, accom
panied LleweUyn to Westminster, the prince could
with difficulty repress their indignation at the jibes of
the perfumed, bejeweUed popinjays of Edward's court,
who mocked at their costume and sneered at the plain
ness of their food. The insults stiU rankled whUst the
freedom of their mountain air, the thrUUng songs of
the bards, the harsh haughty conduct of the lords'
marchers, and above aU their own passionate love of
liberty, induced them at this time to make another
effort to throw off the hated yoke of England, Edward
was not displeased, he was awaiting a pretext to com
plete the conquest of their country. In 1282 he entered
Wales with an overpowering force, and after a brief
struggle LleweUyn feU in a skirmish at BuUth, in the
vaUey of the Wye, Unrecognised by the knight who
had surprised his party, the prince's rank was not at
first discovered ; when it was known his head was sent
to Edward, who placed it on the Tower of London
crowned with an ivy wreath, in mockery of a prediction
of Merlin, "that when EngUsh money became round
the Prince of Wales should be crowned in London,"
His brother David, who was an English peer (Earl of
Derby), escaped for a while, but being betrayed he was
tried by his peers and condemned to death. His borrible
execution formed a precedent for that of traitors for
many subsequent years; he was " dra-wn at the taU of
horses through the streets of Shrewsbury, then he was
hanged, then beheaded, and then his dead body, without
the head, was divided into four parts, and his heart and
his bowels were burned. The head being adjudged to
the city of London, was set up on a pole over the tower
near to that of his brother, Winchester and York con
tended which should have the right hand quarter. It

A,D, 1279.

PETER DE LA MARE BUILDS A CROSS.

145

was at length aUotted to the citizens of Winchester, who,
having gotten it, quickly returned home ; the other
quarters were sent to Northampton, York and Bristol."^
The two sons of David, LleweUyn and Owen, were
committed to the custody of Peter de la Mare, and were
brought by him to Bristol castle; he was aUowed 6d. per
day for their maintenance, and 6d, per day wages for
three servants to guard them. After five years' impri
sonment LleweUyn died, Owen survived his brother
many years. In the Liberate EoUs there is a record of
the moneys expended for him down to the item of Is. for
a pair of shoes. How long he remained a prisoner we
know not, he was probably only released by death. In
1304, when he had been 21 years a captive, he attempted
to escape. That Edward dreaded the influence his name

constable of the castle, and his men, for breaking
sanctuary and taking one WUUam de Lay, who had
fled for refuge to the churchyard of St, PhUip and Jacob,
from thence, throwing him into prison in the castle,
and finaUy beheading him. The men involved in this
breach of the law were sentenced to walk to that church
for four weekly market days, in their breeches and shirts,
from the church of the Minor Friars, in Lewdn's Mead
(now Unitarian chapel), and to be flogged aU the way,
Peter de la Mare was further ordered to build a stone
cross, at the expense of one hundred shiUings at the
least, (not less than £100), one hundred poor to be fed
around it on a certain day every year, and that he should
flnd a priest to celebrate mass every day during his life
where the bishop should appoint. The stone cross is

Bristol from Brandon Hill. lUh Centitry.

and lineage might have over the Welsh is clear, for in
a memorandum to the constable of the castle the king
orders him "to keep Owen, son of David ap Griffin,
more secure for the future, and to cause a wooden cage,
bound with iron, to be made to put him in at night," ^
A pitiable fate for the young eagle of Snowdon to pine
and perish thus : not stricken in his eyrie by the arrow
of the fowler, but doomed to lead an insipid Ufe within
imprisoning waUs, and to die in a cage, a boy's remem
brance his only knowledge of liberty, his only freedom
the Ulusions of his dreams. Amongst the peers who
sat in judgment on Prince David we find the names of
Peter de Eumney, mayor, Eichard TunbrUl and WiUiam
WitchweU, seneschals, and Peter de la Mare, constable of
the castle of Bristol,
8, On September 12th, 1279, a process was issued
by the Bishop of Worcester against Peter de la Mare,
1 Seyer, II,, 72-3, from Matth, West,
2 Close RoUs, 33 Edw, I,, from Arch, Journal, VI,, 262,
[Vol, I,]

thus mentioned by WiUiam Wyrcestre — "the high
cross near the moat of Bristol castle," It stood on the
south side of the Old Market,. near the corner of Tower
hUl, "The Barrs (now Barrs lane) was at this time the
residence of common women, who were not suffered to
come nearer the town,"^
9, On the 25th of April, 1284, the Queen was delivered
of a male child in Carnarvon, the castle of which place
Edward had then just commenced to build. By thus
giving to the people a native-born Prince of Wales, and
by making the laws in every sense equal to those of
England, Edward did more to secure the aUegiance of
the Welsh than by aU his massive fortresses and power
ful armies. The king, on leaving Wales, spent his
Christmas in Bristol, and one of our MS, calendars
adds ' ' with much content and held a ParUament ' ' — " not
general or universal, but, as it were, particular, or
1 Evans, 67,

146

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1293.

special, with certain magnates of the realm, and having
left his chUdren in the same place, whom he brought
with him out of Wales, he went to London, which he
had not entered for almost three years," ^ Smyth
informs us that during this visit the King granted a
favour to Thomas, Lord de Berkeley,
10, Kings are but human, and it would be expecting
too much of Edward to suppose that he easily forgot or
forgave the grave offence of which the burgesses of
Bristol had been guUty in besieging him in the castle
in his father's reign. Undoubtedly the men were a
troublesome race to those who violated their privileges,
they had never rested content under the cocket imposed
upon them in 1212 by John, which was manifestly a
breach of their charter, and at a time when fish formed
so large a portion of the food of the people, and when
herrings and mackerel abounded in the Bristol Channel,
it was felt to be a great hardship that an indefinite por
tion of every such cargo as arrived in the port should be
arbitrarUy claimed by the constable of the castle. The
disturbances which this demand continuaUy caused,
together with their former deUnquencies, had led
Edward "to seize upon their charter and to deprive the
town of its privUeges, He had also turned out the Mayor
for aUeged unla'wful practices with the bakers," ^ WeU
pleased -with his Christmas entertainment, and ¦^ith the
aid the town had given him in his war with Wales, the
King on this visit restored to the burgesses their charter,
and issued an order regulating the number of fish of
each kind which every boat should pay to the constable.
"Be custumd de qudlibet batelld pisces frescas portante in villa
B' regi debitd ; quot pisces de quolibet genere piscium quilibet
battelus debet reddere Constabulario Castri. Inquis' 13
Miv' 7," 3
This is the visit which Chatterton describes in his
Poem of The Tournament, but he gives a later date
by two years.
In 1288 the tyne of beer, amounting to £23 9s, lOd,,
paid by the burgesses, was received for the king by
the constable of the castle, Bartholomew Baddlesmere,
who had succeeded Peter de la Mare, Eoger Bigod,
son of Hugh, nephew and heir to the last Earl, had a
grant of the castle of Bristol for life, which, however,
he surrendered to Edward in 1291, when it was as
signed by the king as the residence of Joanna, his
third daughter, who was now the widow of Eichard de
Clare, Earl of Gloucester, Our authority adds that in
1289 there were 12 furnaces erected for coining ham
mered money in Bristol,*
^ Mr, Alderman Haythorne's MS,, quoted by Evans 68, Also
Chron, Thos, Wikes, Ann Osney, 300,
2 Chron, Fabian, = Seyer II, 75 (iu note), * Evans, 69.

11. The year 1293 as it drew to a close was a time
of rejoicing for the burgesses. Their town was honoured
by being chosen as the scene of a royal marriage.
Eleanor, the King's eldest daughter, was married in
Bristol to Henry, Earl of Barr, The ilite of the land
crowded into the town. Writs are extant, by one of which
the Chief Justice of Chester is commanded to invite the
principal knights of that county to attend the ceremony,
another commands the attendance of the Bishop of
CarUsle, &c,, &c. In the Pat, and Close EoUs, 21
Edw. I,, are several writs bearing date at Bristol, Sep
tember 23rd and 30th. One from Winterbourne (6 mUes
from Bristol), October 1st; one from Sodbury, October
2nd; one from Tetbury, October 3rd; another from
Woodstock, October 8th ; these show the King's route
to London, " There is also an order dated from Winter
bourne, October 1st, for the payment to the Earl of Barr
of his daughter Eleanor's marriage portion of 10,000
marks, on his giving a receipt for it by his letters
patent," ^ which, no doubt, the Frenchman very wiU
ingly signed,
12, UntU Edward, in 1294, organised measures for a
defence of the coast by laying the foundations of a navy,
the piratic habits of the old seaport towns had led to a
series of quarrels, which often ended in a seafight, and
which imperUled at times our treaties with foreign
powers. The Cinque ports went to war with the men
of Yarmouth or Bristol without regard to the King's
peace, or with the Flemings, regardless of international
obligations. Without doubt the Bristol men were also
at times the aggressors ; for instance, on Trinity Monday,
1294, Walter Hobbe, of Bristol, seized a ship and goods
belonging to one Hugh Muland, a merchant of HoUand,
Muland sued Hobbe, who claimed to have bought
the ship, half of one person, and half of others ; this
being found to be a pretext for deferring justice, the
Constable deUvered up the ship and committed Hobbe
to close custody, "It being a thing of great danger,
and such as might occasion a war to suffer alien mer
chants to depart without justice, Hobbe was ordered
to be imprisoned in Winchester gaol until he made fuU
satisfaction," and the Court of HoUand was requested to
select good and legal men and merchants to assess the
value of the cargo when shipped for England, Hobbe,
on the 25th August, 1295, paid or gave security for 65
pounds of silver to the plaintiff in fuU for damages sus
tained, WiUiam Eandolph, who was, it is said. Mayor in
that year, being one of his bondsmen.
From the same authority^ we learn that at a later
date, viz,, 1314, John le Long, who was seneschal of the
borough in 1288, 1297, and 1306, seized a ship whUst
1 Seyer, IL, 75. = g,olls of Par,, 137,

A,D. 1300.

THE CHARTER OF 1300.

147

she lay in DubUn harbour belonging to WUUam de
Huntyndon, who complains to the King " that while he
was paying the custom to the BaUiffs of that city, John
le Long, of Bristol, and some other rogues and pirates
seized and carried off his ship with aU the goods and
merchandise on board, and afterwards burnt the ship.
Order was given to the Justiciary of Ireland to make
enquiry into the facts, and to return the Inquisition into
Chancery," Seyer is incUned to think that as this hap
pened during "the Great Insurrection, the burgesses of
Bristow added piracy by sea to rebeUion by land," ^
We have no doubt that there were rogues in Bristol
in those days as keen after wealth dishonestly acquired
as in every other age and towna. But from the standing
of the accused we think that it is far more likely that
this circumstance arose out of some breach of privUeges
claimed by the burgesses of Bristol under the charter
given to them by Henry II,, in 1172, It is possible
that its usages had lapsed, and that the Bristol men
seized the opportunity, the King's authority being in
abeyance and themselves in open rebelUon for the main
tenance of their rights, to assert their ancient claims on
the commerce in DubUn, We presume this aUeged
outrage was condoned by the King, together with the
other offences of the townsmen, in the pardon granted in
1316. 13, We have now to return to the subject of the
disputed jurisdictions in EedcUff. In the year 1300
the king signed at Westminster a charter confirming
the charter of Earl John, to which special reference is
made, as weU as to those granted by Henry III, It
is granted to the burgesses of Bristol, within and with
out the waUs, as far as Brightnee bridge, it exempts
them from murage,^ staUage,^ and pannage* through
out his whole realm and power. It further enacts that
they shaU choose their mayor, and, except in time of
war, shaU present him to the constable of the castle,
instead of as usual before the Barons of the Exchequer,
Among the noble names subscribed as witnesses to
this charter are two that may be noted — Earl de
Warren, hero of the rusty sword incident, and Hugh
Despencer, who twenty-six years later was barbarously
hanged in Bristol, The burgesses paid for this confir
mation 300 marks. After the king's return from Scot
land, in 1304, he imposed a taUage of the sixth penny
on his demesne, cities and boroughs. For this the town
paid £400 to the treasurer,
1 Seyer, II,, 77,
'' A tax for a loaded beast or carriage paid on entering a
waUed town, ^ A fee paid for setting up a staU in a market or
fair, * Rent paid to lord or king for liberty to let swine feed in
the woods and forests.

In this taUage Eedcliff was included. The mayor
and burgesses of Bristol held a court in Eedcliff street,
and had a prison there, they moreover endeavoured to
put a stop to the weekly market held on that side of the
river, and to aboUsh aU distinctions between the two
portions of the vUl. But the lords of Berkeley denied
the jurisdiction of Bristol in their manors of Bedminster
and EedcUff, and exercised their right to hold courts,
both civU and criminal, to have a prison and a pUlory,
&c. The Templars had obtained from the Berkeley
f amUy the subordinate manor of Temple, and the knights
exercised manorial rights there, foUowing the usage of
the Earl of Gloucester and Eobert Fitzharding, But
in the year 1304 there was sent to Edward a petition
by the mayor and burgesses of Bristol, " praying
that the men who held the lands and rents of the
master and brethren of the Temple, in the viU of
Bristol, may bear their share in the taxation of the vUl,
inasmuch as they trade and have used aU the Uberties
and aisements that belong to the town of Bristol," '^
The king granted the petition, ordered distraint for the
said taxes, and justice to be done to the complainants,
for which purpose a writ of chancery was sent to the
mayor and baUiffs of Bristol, Complaints were made
against the second Lord Maurice and his son Thomas,
that they took wrecks of the sea, broke the bushel-
measures, &o,, of the Bristol courts, compeUed the use
of standard measures of their own choosing, and amerced
the freeholders and tythings in their absence, without
any warrant.
These rights however appear to have been acknow
ledged in earUer times, for on the 22nd June, 1261,
Henry pardoned Lord Maurice an amercement of 100s.
laid on him by the justices-itinerant at Bristol for
the escape of a felon out of his prison in EedcUff, in
Bristol; and on Eichard Hayward being accused of
having stolen a piece of blue cloth, which he affirmed
he had bought of Margery Slip, she in the court of this
lord in EedcUff street denied the sale ; upon which the
free suitors hanged him without any trial by jury,
against the law and custom of England, For which
false judgment the suitors were fined 40s, ^
This unsettled conflict of jurisdiction between these
lords on the one hand and the commonalty of Bristol on
the other, led to divers quarrels, which in the year 1304
culminated in a petty civU war, in which each side
harassed the other with armed forces, and invaded in a
mUitary manner each others' territories,
1 Seyer, II. , 135,
2 Seyer, II, , 78-9, There are recorded proofs of their claims in
the Inquis, 9 Edw, I,, 1281, and one later stiU, Inquis, 15
Edw, II,, 1322,

148

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1304,

The third Maurice, Lord of Bedminster, which had
been given to him by his father. Lord Thomas, peti
tioned the king as foUows : " That whereas his Majesty
had taken him, his men, lands and goods, and aU that
he had, into his protection and defence while he was
with him in Scotland in his wars, inhibiting aU men
under his seal from doing him any damage or wrong ;
notwithstanding Thomas de la Grove (mayor, 1303), of
Bristol, and twenty-three others [named in the record],
and many other malefactors and disturbers of his peace,
caUed together by the ringing of the common beU of
Bristol, in hostUe manner came to his manor of Bed
minster, assaulted and entered into, and the doors and
gates of the house brake, and his goods to the value of
500 marks from him did take and carry away, and
violently rescued one Eobert of Cornwall, attached by
the baUlies of him, the said Maurice, for the death of
Joseph of Winchelsea, there slain ; not permitting him,
his men or tenants to hold court, or to do suit to his
manor of EedcUff street, nor to destrain them for their
defaults, nor him nor his to buy or seU there corn,
victuals, or any other ware, &c., &c."
Whereupon the king granted a commission to Walter
de Gloucester and WiUiam de BeUo-fago, dated the
12th of March, 1305-6, giving them power to enquire
by a jury of Somerset freeholders into the truth of
these matters, to determine the same and to punish as
they found cause.
There is no record of any decision by this commis
sion, which from its constitution would certainly not be
an impartial court,
MeanwhUe the Bristol men were not idle, they by a
petition "signed by persons worthy of credit," prayed
the king, " shewiag that the Lords of Berkeley had
usurped fee and dominion in the street of EedcUff, in
the town of Bristol, and in the waters of the Avon,
That with great multitudes of horse and foot they had
enforced the burgesses to do suit to their court of
Eedcliff street, had beaten those that refused, had
drawn many such out of their houses, and had cast
them into a pit, and had trodden under foot the wives
and maidens who had come to their husbands' help, so
that many of them were wounded and died. That they
had kUled a Bristol baiUie at Frampton-on-Severn ;
had beaten and imprisoned Bristol burgesses attending
Tetbury fair ; had taken from the custody of the Bristol
officials three thieves, and by subornation and perjury
had caused a jury at Somerton to acquit them, had
entered certain ships waiting at St, Katharine's PiU for
a fair wind, and had cut their ropes and seized their
anchors and saUs, they thus claiming dominion of that
water, &c," At the same time a petition was exhibited I

by Adam the Cheesemonger, a burgess of Bristol,
showing that Lord Thomas and Sir Maurice, WiUiam
Parker, clerk, and others, had assaulted him in his
house at Bristol, beat, wounded and dragged him from
out of his house and cast him into a pit, &c.
This severe treatment did not prevent the worthy
cheesemonger from attending Dundry fair, for WUUam
Eandolph, the late mayor, by a third petition informs
the king that the Berkeleys, usurping fee and juris
diction in Eedcliff street, which is in the town of
Bristol, had taken and beaten divers men of that town
because they would not do suit to their court or appear
there ; and that he, the mayor, defending the said men
and burgesses, as he ought for the honour of his
Majesty and according to his office, the said lord and
his son Maurice and twenty-six others, particularly
named, at Dundry fair, in the parish of Chew, in the
county of Somerset, did assault the said Adam the
Cheeseman, and brake his legs in such a pitiful
manner that the marrow came out of his shin bones,
&c,, &c. At the same time, 17th of February, 1304,
the mayor, Simon de Burton, and the burgesses, pre
sented a fourth petition to the ParUament, "praying
to have remedy of divers wrongs done to them by these
lords, who by reason of tenements which they have in
Eedcliff, in the suburb of Bristol, claim fee and juris
diction to the disinheritance and prejudice of the king
and his crown," recounting the above specific injuries,
adding thereto an account of an assault on WUUam
Eandolph (who is styled mayor, but who does not
appear in the list except since 1297 and again in 1306)
at Dundry fair, who was at nine of the clock, by their
orders, beaten and shamefully wounded, Ukewise that
they beat WiUiam le Lunge, the king's servant, on the
king's highway, as he came from Gloucester to Bristol,
and that the said burgesses cannot go out of the town
safely to foUow their merchandising, &c.
The king and parUament hereupon appointed a com
mission, consisting of John de Bottetourt, WiUiam
Haward, and Nicholas Fermebraud, constable of Bristol,
to which was afterwards added Peter Malore and another
judge, with instructions to hear and judge the matter.
By their judgment the manor of Bedminster, with
EedcUff street, juxta Bristuit with the Hundred, was
seized into the king's hands, and not restored untU
1 Edward 111,^ Lord Thomas and his son were further
fined 1,000 marks; in lieu of payment he, by deed en-
roUed in Chancery on the 11th of July, 1305, engages
" to serve the king in his present war of Scotland with
ten armed horsemen under his son Maurice, or some
other fit captain, at his own charges, against Eobert
> RoUs of Par,, II,, 432.

A.D. 1305.

SIMON DE BURTON AND OTHER MAYORS OF BRISTOL.

149

Bruce, from St. Lawrence Day next, as long as the king
shaU be in Scotland in his own person, &c." ^ Where
upon they received the king's pardon.
Smyth, the Berkeley historian, says the fine was
3,000 marks. After aU, the matters in dispute were not
determined, and the two concurrent jurisdictions re
mained to breed fresh tumults and strife.
14. Edward, in 1305-6, entered Scotland with his
army, and was successfiU in taking StirUng castle, and
greater triumph stUl in taking prisoner the bravest leader
of the Scotch, the heroic WiUiam WaUace, together
with other of the principal leaders, whom he sent to
different castles in England for safe custody. The son
and heir of the Earl of Mar was brought to Bristol
where he was detained untU 1314, The foUowing is a
copy of the writ issued for his safe custody: — "Item.
That the chUd who is the heir of Mar be sent to Bristend,
and there guarded in the castle of that place ; providing
that he shall always have Uberty to go into the garden
of that Castle, and elsewhere within the Close ; and that
the Constable shaU appoint some trusty and sufficient
man, who may take charge of him ; and that the Con
stable of the Castle shaU be charged with the safe
custody of the said chUd, so that he may not escape by
any means ; but that he shaU be out of irons on account
of his tender age." WaUace, the undaunted, and BaUiol,
the puppet king, were both of them dead. The dagger
of the younger Bruce had let out the heart's blood of
Comyn to pave
the way to the
Scottish crown,
and the EngUsh
king had sworn
before "God
and the swans"
that he would
revenge the murder of Comyn and punish its author.
But "man proposes and God disposes," Edward, on
his march, feU sick, and died at Burgh-on-the-Sands on
the 7th of August, 1307, leaving instructions in his wiU
that his flesh was to be boUed off his bones and the latter
taken with them by the invading army into Scotland,^
16, During these eventful times we have the flrst
tangible record of a mayor, one who left something
more than a name; Simon de Burton, wielded a sceptre
of authority six times, in 1291, 1294, 1296, 1302, 1304
and 1305, He has, however, a higher claim to notice
and regard as our annals relate.
"In 1294, being then mayor, he began to buUd'' the
1 Claus. 34 Edwd, I, ' Creasy's Great Events, date 1307,
= Rioart's Calendar, but not in Rioart's handwriting. This
should read "re-build," — Ed.

Fmir-leaved Mouldings. From Spycer's Hall.

Ball Mouldi/ngs. lUtli Century.

church of St, Mary EedcUffe, and the almshouse in
Long row, St, Thomas street, for sixteen women, in
which he was buried,"
Simon de Burton resided in Corn street, within
St, Leonard's gate, and his almshouse, at once his
memorial and his burial-place, was at that period
pleasantly situated amongst gardens, orchards, and
pasture land.
Burton does not appear to have been at aU involved
in the quarrel with the lords of EedcUff, but WiUiam
Eandolph, who was mayor in 1297,'- 1306, 1310 and
1315, and John le Taverner, in 1308, 1309 and 1313, were
men of a more restless and unquiet character,
16. In the year 1300 an order was given for the
buUding of houses for the workmen engaged in coining
money for the king
in Bristol, and for
sending beyond the
sea for skUled men,^
As might be expected
from these prepara
tions, the coinage in
Bristol in this reign
was considerable. Several changes in the types of
the coins were introduced, and sUver halfpennies and
farthings were made here for the first time. The foUow
ing is an exact list of the Bristol pieces of Edward,
It wUl be observed that the name of the moneyer
disappears, and that the reverse inscription on aU is
a Latinised form of the name of the towm : villa
bristolie (the town of Bristol) : —
Pennies, No, 1, Obverse, full face bust of the king,
crowned, with drapery on the shoulders, AU within a
beaded inner circle, A cross patee at the commence
ment of the legend, which is edw b' ahgl' dns hyb.
Reverse, a large cross extending to the edge of the
coin. In each angle of the cross are three peUets,
within a beaded inner circle. Legend, villa bristollie.
This is a rather common coin. No, 2, The type of both
sides is simUar to No, 1, but the letters and the coin are
both smaUer, and the legend on the Reverse is till
bristolie. No 3, SimUar to No, 2, but with a star upon
the king's breast. Halfpennies, No, 1, Obverse and
Reverse exactly as in No, 1 penny; weight 8-9 grains.
No, 2, Obverse, bust, &c,, as before. Legend,
edwaedus eex. Reverse type as No, 1, Legend,
till bristolie; weight 7 grains. Farthing, Obverse,
king's bust, fuU faced, crowned. Drapery on shoul
ders. No inner circle. Legend, e, e, anglie, preceded
by a cross patee. Reverse, large cross, peUets and
inner circle as on the pennies. Legend, villa beis-
1 Eicart, " Numismatic Chron,, N.S,, XI,, 265,

160

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

a,d, 1297,

tollib ; weight 5 graias (very rare). SUver of the old
standard,^ 17, During this year (1272) the first foreign treaty
of commerce was made by England ; it was with the
Flemings. The next year coal was prohibited in London
as injurious to health. In 1274 Parliament aUowed
the king customs on imports and exports. Coroners
were appointed for every county in 1276, TaUow can
dles began to be generaUy used in 1290, Pleaders at
the Bar were first appointed in 1291, Humphrey Bohun,
Earl of Hereford, and Eoger Bigod, Earl of Norfolk,
were to Edward what Hampden became to Charles I,
When the king was exacting ruinous sums from the
clergy, taxing wool and hides at an unprecedented rate
in the towns, seizing in wanton purveyance merchandise
and produce in exorbitant quantities without prompt
payment at the seaports, these two earls caUed upon
the sheriffs of the counties to levy no more taxes untU
the charter was confirmed without any ruinous reser
vation of the rights of the Crowm, and openly resisted
the king's command that they should saU with a rein
forcement of troops to his army in Flanders, "By
God, Sir Earl, you shaU go or hang!" swore the king.
" By God, Sir King," was the cool reply, " I wUl neither
go nor hang!" The flery Plantagenet, more wise in
his generation than the Ul-advised Stuart, yielded, ' ' and
from that day (October 10th, 1297) the sole right of
raising supplies has been invested in the people," ^
Edward greatly encouraged archery, and many of
the manors granted in his reign were on archery tenures.
The pay of an archer or cross-bowman was 2d. per day
(2s, 6d.); of a knight, 12d. (15s,); of a captain of
archers, 4d. (5s,); of a constable or commander of 100
archers or bowmen, 6d. (7s, 6d.)
18, Edward was conspicuous for his great abUity;
so many exceUent laws were passed in his reign that he
received the title of the English Justinian, He was in
every sense a national king ; his golden hair and lofty
stature endeared him to his subjects ; he was the first
EngUsh king since the Conquest who showed any love
for his people and desired to have theirs in return.
His temper was imperious, hasty, self-wUled, at times
unjust and cruel, proud, stubborn and tenacious of his
kingly rights ; yet for the most part honest, unselfish,
conscientious, truthful, temperate, reUgious and gen
erous, "No man ever asked mercy of me and was
refused," he said in his old age. Devotedly attached to
his wife and famUy, he forms a striking contrast to the
Angevin kings.
In his quarrels with his people, neither disputant
doubted the worth or affection of the other ; and Edward
1 Henfrey, 350, ^ Knight's Pop, Hist,, I,, 413,

never rose so high in the estimation of the EngUsh as
when he stood face to face with them in Westminster
haU at the close of the long contest over the charter,
and, with a sudden burst of tears, frankly owned that
he was in the wrong, A born soldier, an able general,
a model knight, he had his share of conflict, and more
than once saved his Ufe by his personal prowess, " He
shared to the fuU his people's love of hard fighting;"
but his devotion to chivalry narrowed his sympathies
to a class, and from it the peasant and the craftsman
were excluded. It is the knight without reproach who
sees in WiUiam WaUace only a "common robber."
The " deflance " by which a vassal renounced service to
his lord became, in his view, treason ; feudal customs
were quietly dropped when adverse to the ruling powers,
but hardened into written law when in their favour;
aUegiance became subjection, and conditional service a
deflnite vassalage. Obligations that were unrecorded,
rights, privUeges and Uberties unregistered in charters,
were valueless in his eyes ; and, as we have seen, he
exercised a despotic power, seizing these at his wiU by
way of punishment. His whole character is a strange
anomaly of justice and wrongdoing, of nobleness and
meanness, of mercy and cruelty ; these were based upon
a rough soldierly nature, and accompanied by a frank
ness of speech which was thoroughly EngUsh.
19, Edward II,, surnamed of Carnarvon, the first
EngUsh Prince of Wales, was born in the castle of Car
narvon AprU 25th, 1284, and began to reign July 7th,
1307, at the age of twenty -three years. Unfortunately,
for the formation of this prince's character, Eleanor died
when her son was only seven years old, A motherless
boy, of a mobUe affectionate temperament, wdthout
decision of character or firmness, surrounded by the
parasites of a court, with wealth at command and a
father absent in war, or too busy to waste time upon
the training of his chUd, would be moraUy certain to
form evU habits and become the tool of ambitious
sycophants, A clever Gascon, Piers de Gaveston, became the idol
of the prince. He was accomplished in chivaMc games,
and at a tournament had unhorsed in succession the
four greatest earls in England, Lancaster, Pembroke,
Warwick and Surrey; moreover, he had a tongue as
trenchant as his sword, and an unhappy facUity for
giving nicknames that clung to the revUed, but which
sharpened the axe that ended his own life, Edward I,
had imprisoned his son Prince Edward when sixteen
years of age, together with Gaveston and others, for
riotously breaking the park of the Bishop of Chester
and destroying his game. When the prince was twenty-
one he had another quarrel with the same prelate, for

A,D. 1313,

BRISTOL SURNAMES.

151

which his father forbade him his house and stopped
his suppUes. In February, 1307, at a parUament held
at Lanercrost, near Carlisle, Gaveston had been ordered
to be banished from the kingdom for ever as a cor
rupter of the Prince of Wales, Five months after this
date the prince ascended the throne. The transition
from Edward I, to Edward II, brings us into a new era,
new men, new manners; new ideas, men of meaner moral
statm-e, owing to the influx of foreign manners, Edward
n, was incapable of recognising the idea of kingship ;
he was indeed the rex illiteratus whom his ancestor,
Fulk the Good, had declared to be " no better than a
crowned ass,"^ One of Edward n,'s first acts as king
was to revoke the sentence passed by his sagacious
father, and to recaU his minion, Gaveston. He loaded
him with wealth and honours, married him to his niece,
Margaret, and appointed him Eegent of the kingdom
when he himself went to France to marry IsabeUa,
At the Coronation aU precedents were set aside, and
the place of greatest honour was given to the favourite,
who carried the crown walking in procession before
the king. Three days afterwards the offended nobles
petitioned for Gaveston's banishment. The matter was
referred to Parliament, who decreed his exUe, would
listen to no compromise, and the Gascon was compeUed
to take a solemn oath that he would leave the kingdom
and never return. The king confirmed the sentence by
letters patent, but as soon as the Parliament was dis
missed, he granted Gaveston fresh estates in England
and Gascony ; and when he found it impossible to retain
him near his throne without incurring the censures of
the church and the dangers of civU war, he evaded the
decree by making him Lord Lieutenant of Ireland,
Edward came to Bristol with Gaveston on 23rd June,
1308, and saw him embark, and stayed untU July 2nd;
but unable to endure his absence he used aU his arts to
soften the barons, prevaUed with the Pope to absolve
the exUe from his oath, and flew with joyful impatience
to Chester to meet him on his return in June, 1309,
More arrogant than ever, raised almost to royal dignity
as Earl of Cornwall, Gaveston was again banished in
1311, but was recaUed from Flanders by his infatuated
king the ensuing year. This return was fatal, Edward
and he spent a few halcyon days at York, heedless of the
ominous storm that, gathering aU over England, was
rapidly nearing them. It soon burst ; Gaveston was taken
at Scarborough on the 19th of May, and was executed by
the barons at Blacklow hUl, Warwick, on the 1st of July,
"The blood of Gaveston, UlegaUy shed, was the first drop
of the deluge which, within a century and a half, carried
away nearly aU the ancient baronage and a great portion
1 Stubbs, Constit, Hist,, II,, 318.

of the royal race of England, Edward, in revenge,
mingled the blood of Lancaster with the rising stream," ^
The king and his barons were outwardly, to aU ap
pearance, reconcUed in October, 1313; and at the Parlia
ment held on that date (the members of which were
aUowed 2s, 6d. per day for their expenses by their con
stituents in Bristol), it was decreed that no one should
be appealed of the taking or death of Gaveston, and
that aU who had been his adherents should be amnestied.
The property found in his possession was given up to
Edward. The gifts, of which the infatuated king had
despoUed his treasury, were thus restored. The coUec
tion comprised 196 items of great value; among them
were heirlooms and gifts from the Queen's mother to her
son, sacred reUgious reUcs, one ruby estimated at the
worth of £1,000, diamonds, sapphires, emeralds, chains
of gold and enamel, crosses, rings, cups, buckles, girdles,
and sets of massive gold and silver plate. Some of the
dresses this man wore would have been a fortune for a
nobleman, 20, The use of surnames had now become almost
universal, but they could not be said as yet to be
hereditary, although doubtless the great majority of
them became so. They seem to have been given or
assumed either from the occupation, the birth-town, or
from some pecuUarity of the individual. For instance,
we have amongst our earliest recorded names in Bristol
of the first class Langboarde, Shumakre, Spycer, Coke,
Webber, Tucker, Weaver, Blanket (these four from the
wooUen manufacture), Taverner, Hosteler, Turtle, Scriven,
Colepitt, Hatter, Eoper, and a host of others whose
derivation is self-evident. Those of the second class are
of equaUy definite origin, Eichard de WeUes, de Kerdiff,
de Frampton, le Derby, de Cheddre, Mahnsbury, Ax-
brugge, Ottery, Wicombe, &c. From peculiarities of
individuals, or some accidental or acquired gift, excel
lence, defect, complexion, stature, or character, &c,, we
get Wellshotte, Springam, BeUeyeater, Snake, Pick-
rage, Free, Freebody, Winfield, Sharpe, Seeley, Lang-
leg, Updish, Holdbush, Woodrover, Wen, Moneypenny,
Vinepenne, Beaupene, Winpenny, Browne, Whitt,
Blacke, Eede, &c, ; Long, Short, Eound, Flatman, Cut,
Soar ; whilst WiUson, Jackson, Tomson, come evidently
by descent. The old deeds of All Saints give us some
valuable information showing how names were acquired,
and the manner in which they underwent changes in
successive generations. In 1310, John Wyzche, iron
monger, a burgess of Bristol, grants 10s. a year which
he receives as rent out of a tenement in Worchlype street
(Bridge street) to Humphrey Wen, of Cirencester, hang
man, and a co-burgess of the said city (so that we see
1 Stubbs, Constit, Hist,, II,, 332,

152

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1357.

TjWJJwwjWW^m'.'
17W, — ^ 

TumrmK} hnrwrn^X ^ii\mi!rj\^ ii"' '^r-n]{ hnnmmjl \7f^JWf){^

'•''T

+

Bristol at that date was occasionaUy termed a city).
Three years later the hangman. Wen, grants the said
10s. per annum to Eichard de WeUes, In 1357 Joanna,
¦widow of the son of Eichard de WeUes, grants for her
life a shop and ceUar on this property to Simon Halway,
on condition of his bringing her yearly one red rose.
In the next deed she is referred to as the wife of Thomas,
son of Eichard Eicheman, of WeUs, who had by thrift
evidently left her considerable property. She granted
20s, a year out of a shop, cellar and tenement in
Worschep street to Simon Halway, and 'on the next
Sunday after signature she executed a lease to him of
aU that her shop with its
appurts, situate in Worshype
street, in the parish of St.
Peter, aU those four haUs, five
shops and two ceUars situated
in the same street, also on
the Monday she leased to John
Whyte, Butcher, and to Maud
his wife, one haU, with one
shop adjoining, in the same
street, for 15s, yearly, the rent
to begin in 1360, or three
years after date. In the sub
sequent deeds Eichman has
become the fixed family name,
and the descendants bear it
honourably in Somerset to
this day,
21, The wealthy, both in
town and country, during the
12th century had indulged in
profuse hospitaUty, The Earl
of Leicester expended in one
year money equivalent to
£150,000 of present value,
one item alone, that of wine,
is enormous, 37 1 pipes being consumed. The produce
of the domain, and the revenues from the land were
principaUy spent in the castle, the doors of which
were open to aU strangers of condition. At Martin
mas the supply of fresh meat ceased, except on rare
occasions. Oxen, sheep, swine, and deer, were kiUed in
prodigious numbers for each baron's household and
salted do'wn in immense tubs for the winter's provision.
The hides were made into rude leather, the fat was
melted for candles. Wines were laid in from Bristol,
hugh stacks of brushwood for the ovens, and logs of
wood for the hearth surrounded the dweUing, The
household servants were many, they and the farm
inmates fared not amiss, but the serf-born thralls.

f—^YT-jm

E2!20IZO=3^

ww,

Lectilre on Anatomy.
From an ancient MS. on Surgery preserved in the City Library
Bristol. Circa 1S80-UOO.

bondsmen of one manor, aU whose goods belonged to
their master, and who could be sold ("in this year we
sold one slave by birth, WiUiam Pike and aU his famUy,
and received one mark from the buyer" ^) at the wdU of
their lord, were left in a pitiable condition both for food
and raiment.
The rise of the craftsmen and their struggle for
a share in the power hitherto monopolised by the
older burghers in the towns, and especiaUy in Bristol, is
a characteristic feature of this age. Every man per
manently resident within the waUs of the burgh was
either by birth or by service a freeman, his rights were
as rigidly defined as were those
of the Lord of the Honour, he
could demand a fair trial on any
charge, and that justice should
be administered only by his
f eUow - burgesses, or in their
presence by the King's justi
ciaries, Wlien the town's beU
rang out, the burgesses
gathered in the Common
HaU for deUberation and
free speech, AU towns
men stood on one common
footing, but there were
as great differences, as
now, in condition, degree,
and wealth. The Frith guild, now
grown into the Merchants' guUd,
regulated trade, assessed the
sums payable by each burgess
for dues and taxes, and were
continuaUy on the qui vive to get
privUeges for the town, as weU
as to keep the unruly, headstrong
members of the community in
treasury was often fUled as the
These, by repeated additions and

order. The King's
price of a charter.
confirmations, publicly recited to the burgesses, infused
a spirit of independence and of progress that was un
known to their less favoured countrymen employed in
agriculture ; their commercial privUeges were most ex
tensive and valuable, exemption from toUs was an
immense boon to a town that imported foreign produce,
and whose burgesses attended most of the estabUshed
fairs (at these fairs, which often lasted for a week, or
even two, aU the shops of the town in which they
were held were obUged by law to be closed, and nothing
was bought or sold but in the fair itself) , The burgesses
^ Annals Dunstab,, 1283,

A,D, 1312,

THE CRAFTS' GUILDS.

153

also framed their o'wn laws, had control of their markets,
and estabUshed courts for the recovery of debts.
As the necessities of trade, and the growing in
crease of commerce demanded, strangers, escaped serfs,
artisans, and traders without landed holdings, were
tolerated within the waUs; the increase of an indus
trious population meant an increase of wealth and of
power. The wealthier burgesses purchased land, grew
select, and undertook the larger commercial operations
only. Hitherto the term merchant had been appUed
indiscriminately to shopkeepers and tradesmen, but
thenceforth it was graduaUy wdth-
drawn from the craftsmen and
traders. These latter now formed
themselves into trade or craft
guilds, the admittance to which
was an absolute apprenticeship
of seven years to the trade cho
sen, and no man who had not
served his apprenticeship was
aUowed to carry on any trade in
the borough.
The guUd master and his
court inspected aU work done,
fixed prices, confiscated unlawful
tools, or bad work, and punished
disobedience by fines or ex
pulsion, which was absolute
ruin (wholesome despotism
in some respects, certainly
not an unmixed evU).
A commonf undwas raised
by the weekly payments of
the members, and in order to
proceed legaUy a royal charter
was obtained as soon as practi
cable. Then began the struggle
between the merchants' guUd
(the greater folk) and the trades'
guUds (the lesser folk), the weight of numbers finaUy
prevaUed, and the control of trade finaUy passed into
the hands of the trades, or as they are more commonly
termed, the crafts' guUds. Under the barons' war, the
contest of the guUds raged in London with this result,
that every trade won its charter, was properly enroUed,
and had its livery appointed, forming what are now
known as the "Livery Companies of the City," In
Bristol the struggle came later, Eicart says ^ " Foras
much as at aU times this worshipful town of Bristol
hath take a precedent of the noble city of London in
¦ Eicart's Calendar,
[Vol, I,]

exercising their laudable customs," &c,, &c., so now
the contest that culminated in what is caUed the Great
Insurrection in Bristol, arose it seems to us, originaUy
from a difference between the older wealthy burgess'
or merchants' guUd, and the crafts' guUds, with whom,
ambitious to become leaders, some of the wealthy mer
chants of standing had aUied themselves.
As there wiU come before us prominently the name
of one man whose business is not held in such repute at
the present time as to make it reasonably Ukely that one
of his caUing would be chosen as Mayor on three
separate occasions, and also to
represent the burgesses in three,
if not four, different Parliaments,
viz,, 1295, 1298, 1306, and ac
cording to some returns, also in
1322, we wUl briefly explain the
position that was held in the be
ginning of the 1 4th century by a
taverner, hosteUer, or innkeeper.
We have mentioned the pro
fuse hospitality shown by the
noble and wealthy to those of
the Uke condition when tra-
veUing. The burden in the country
had become onerous, but in
the towns it had, of course,
ceased. When, for instance,
earls, barons, bishops, rich
abbots and priors were sum
moned to a Parliament and
brought with them necessari
ly, according to the custom of
the time, a large retinue of
foUowers, it became impossi
ble to flnd free quarters for
such an assemblage. Hence
arose a new trade, that of the
taverner, or hosteUer, who
found accommodation for the strangers for recognised
rates of payment. They would, therefore, be men of
good standing among the merchants of the town. To
these houses also the burgesses would resort to drink
their evening cup of wine. The homes of the burgesses
for the most part were neither clean nor comfortable,
and few of them kept wine in stock, cheap though it
was, 22, Such would be the condition of the great mass
of the townsfolk, and especiaUy of the crafts' guilds.
In London, as early as 1261, the craftsmen had forced
their way into the town mote, had thtust aside the
L 2

Ccr^ino ^^Hit\G l*jc\.(l^ ^<?
f rt V tit iww""""" ¦ "¦

tmm^

a Fractured Limb,

From an ancient MS. on Surgery preserved in the City Library,
Bristol. Circa ISSO-UOO.

154

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1312.

aldermen, and had chosen their own mayor. The
craftsmen of Bristol herein foUowed the example set
them by the London citizens, as we flnd repeated in
stances about this period of craftsmen being chosen
both for mayors and seneschals. Taverner, Spycer,
Hose, SeUer, Wineman and Mariner are examples.
A most interesting account of this struggle, derived
from the Rolls of Parliament, I., 309, and from Thomas
Hearne's Annates de TrocMowe, with copies of the
original documents in Latin, may be seen in Seyer,
IL, 89, 90-1-2-3-4-5, to which we refer the curious
reader. They narrate somewhat at length the foUow
ing facts. Fourteen of the principal burgesses had assumed
the direction, collection and management of the revenues of
the town, and arrogated a prerogative and superiority over
their fellow -bur gesses, who tvere possessed of, or rather en
titled to, equal rights and privileges. The names given are
WUUam Eandolph, who was four times mayor, John
Snow, twice mayor, John de Celer, mayor in 1311,
Peter le Frauncis (several of this family had been
mayors and senestors), Laurence de Cary, senestor in
1313, Eobert de Ottery, senestor in 1293, 1305, 1309,
Eaymund Fermbaud, constable of the castle in 1304,
John de London, Martin de Horncastle, WUUam de
Kerdiff, WUUam de Hanyngfleld, bailiff in 1320, Eichard
de Camera, Stephen de SaUsbury, the baker, John
le Parker, WiUiam Gylemyn, clerk, John, servant to
Laurence de Cary, John Wodelok, Adam du Temple,
Eoger de Stanes, clerk, John Eussel, Henry Fraunceys
and John de Chen. These names given are twenty-two
in number, and it is probable they were aU of them on
the side of "the greater folk." Three of them were
certainly servants of the Crown, viz,. Temple, Laurence
de Cary and his man ; they were undoubtedly persons
of consequence in the town, are distinctly said to have
been all of them burgesses, and were men who had
a considerable and influential foUowing, although not so
numerous a one as their opponents. They were more
over supported by the castle influence, and were pro
tected by the constable. There can be little doubt that
they were the principal men in the Merchants' Company
or GuUd, which we have seen existed in 1218 and 1235
(see pages 90 and 119). The malcontents were not led by
mere demagogues, the leaders are termed " mqjores communi-
tates," principal men of the commonalty — men who, if not
wardens of the crafts' guUds, had evidently cast in their
lot with them.
The chief leader was John le Taverner, who, having
been mayor in 1308 and 1309, was re-elected in 1313,
and was supported by John de Horncastle and Eichard
Legat as baiUffs, and John Hasard as coroner; these
men, it is said, all exercised their offices independently

of the royal authority. This list is taken from the
accusation of these men, and differs from the one given
in the Mayor's Calendar, from which we gather that
there were confUcting appointments of magistrates by
both parties.
The immediate cause of the tumult which led to a
violent outbreak in February, 1312, was the attempt to
impose certain tolls in the ma/rlcet and to le"vy the cocket
imposed contrary to the charter given by Earl John just
100 years previously, and which cocket Edward I, had
arbitrarUy conflrmed in 1284, The to-wn being in a
state of tumult, Edward II,, who had ordered a new
taUage of one-flfteenth of movables and one-tenth
of rents, and who was at issue with his barons on
account of their having put his favourite, Gaveston, to
death, sent letters to the constable of the castle and to
the mayor of Bristol, enjoining them to be upon their
guard against certain persons who were coUecting com
panies of men without his authority. He soon after
wards,, by an exercise of his prerogative, took the govern
ment and revenues of the town into his owm hands,
and appointed a custos, whose authority was to control
or, if necessary, supersede the regular administration,
WiUiam Eandolph, who had been four times mayor,
assumed the coUection of the revenues of the town, in
which he was assisted by Bartholomew de Baddlesmere,
a baron of great power and property in Kent and else
where, constable of the castle of Bristol, who was
appointed custos on September 30th; the farm of the
town at an annual rent was granted to him, he was
authorised to coUect aU the rents, customs and proflts,
to hold pleas, to keep the prison, &c,, &c,, and a writ
directed to the mayor and bailiffs of Bristol, informing
them of his appointment and requiring their obedience
and assistance, was deUvered on October 6th, John de
Celer, who was just out of office, WiUiam Hore, the new
mayor, with John Beauflower and Thomas le Spycer,
the new baUiffs, would not obey, declaring that they
would keep the town safe as they had been ordered for
the king's use, so that neither the Gustos nor his officers
could enter the to-wn or exercise any jurisdiction therein.
Thereupon the king, in May, 1313, sent a mandate to
the sheriff of Gloucestershire ordering him no longer to
make a return of writs to the mayor and baUiffs of
Bristol, That year John le Taverner was chosen as
mayor, and John de Horncastle and Eichard Legat as
baUiffs by the malcontents, but Laurence de Cary and
Eichard White were appointed by the other side. The
king then, in answer to petitions sent to him by both
parties, appointed four persons to act as judges in the
matter, who were authorised to settle aU disputes and
put an end to the disturbances. The constitution of

A.D, 1313,

GREAT FAMINE AND MURRAIN.

155

this commission was, it is evident, very unfair, Thomas
de Berkeley, he who had been at feud -with the Bristol
men and had lost his estates and been so hea-vUy flned
for his Idches, was at its head ; , associated with him
were John de WyUyngton, lord of another Gloucester
shire manor, John de Button and Eichard de Abington,
a priest. They met the burgesses in the GuUdhaU, but their
jurisdiction was objected to on the ground "that the
fourteen had procured foreigners to be associated -with
them in the inquisition, and that it was not right that
questions relating to their local rights, customs and
pri-vUeges should be submitted to such persons as
judges," No notice being taken of their objections
some of them went outside and told the people that the
judges were in the interest of their adversaries, that the
dispute would be settled by party prejudice and not by reason,
and that in all probability their liberties and privileges would
be utterly lost. Then arose a terrible tumult, the common
to-wn beU swung out its summons, aU the burgesses and
commonalty gathered, the rabble burst into the GuUd
haU and with flsts and sticks attacked the opposite party.
Nearly twenty men were kiUed on the spot, and so great
was the terror that many, rich and poor, got out of the
¦windows, and leaping or faUing from the penthouse, or
the leads, some broke their legs and others were grievously
wounded. The judges were in great danger, but at
length the mayor so far restrained the madness of the
populace that they were suffered to depart unhurt. The
commonalty were accused of imprisoning them, possibly
the authorities shut them up awhUe to save their lives.
About eighty persons were indicted for this riot before the
Mng's justices at Gloucester, and refusing to appear they
were outlawed. This gave them Uttle trouble, the main
body of the burgesses sided -with the men who had
defended the Uberties of Bristol, and who now had the
uninterrupted management of its affairs in their o-wn
hands, and they immediately took measures to defend
the to-wn from an attack from the castle,
WUliam Eandolph and his party escaped into the
fortress with their wives, children, vassals and tenants.
In vain did Edward send his mandate ordering the
commonalty to re-admit them and to use them favour
ably as their feUow-burgesses, the order was treated
¦with contempt, and -wine, salt, goods and chattels be
longing to them were wasted or stolen to the value of
£2,000, The king's officers and baUiffs who ventured
into the town were imprisoned (Geoffry^ Justice and
Laurence de Cary for upwards of seven weeks, and
then driven ignominiously out of the town) ; Alexander
de Overton, Henry de Caerwent and Walter de Bey-
field, king's servants, were expelled ; but three others.

Adam de Temple, Eichard de Langeton and John Swyft,
they kept in prison for a long time, suffering no coUec
tion of rents or customs in the town or port for the
king, but applying the same to the use of the town.
Whether or no there may, at that time, have existed
an outer waU to the castle in advance of the barbican
and of Newgate, cutting the hUl-top by Chequer lane,
certain it is that the burgesses now built one in the line
of Dolphin street to guard against salUes from the
stronghold, and from this spot they kept up an irregular
warfare against the castle with the bolts from their
crossbows and cloth-yard-shafts from their long bows,
so that no one could come into the town from thence
but by permission. They of the castle were by no
means slow in returning the compUment, For two
years and more the Bristol insurgents maintained this
position of revolt against authority. The pusUlani-
mous weakness of Edward for his favourites having
involved him again in war with the barons, gave the bur
gesses a favourable opportunity to defy the king, when
he sought to make this contention between two factions
of the town a means of asserting a prerogative which
in stronger hands than his had been at times successful,
WiUiam I,, Henry II, and Edward I. never struck
such a blow without the warrant of a strong arm,
backed by a determined wiU, Edward II,, naturally
impulsive, weak and passionate, a prey from his youth
to the insidious -wUes of flatterers, and personaUy given
to excess in ¦wine, could threaten, but was powerless to
enforce. From that riotous day in 1313 until the early
autumn of 1316 Bristol was practicaUy an independent
State, an imperium in imperio, making and executing its
own laws and coUecting and expending its own revenues.
23, There is no record of the men of Bristol assist
ing in the strife of the barons with the king, and when
peace was made between the beUigerents in October,
1313, the monarch was too busy with the Scottish war
to enforce his demands on Bristol, The fatal day of
Bannockburn (June 24th, 1314), when the Scotch, with
a sacrifice of 4,000 men, slew 10,000 English, was fol
lowed by a deficient harvest. The tUlers of the soil
had, during the previous three years, been drawn off
into the armed ranks of king or barons, and now in
1314-15 famine stalked openly through the land, fol
lowed by her twin sister, pestilence. Wheat reached a
price equivalent to 20s, per bushel ; and the Parliament,
with an ignorance of poUtical economy that was not
confined to that age, fixed a maximum price on provi
sions. An ox was not to be sold for more than 16s. ; a
cow, 12s, ; a sheep in the wool, 2()d. ; a shorn sheep,
14(^. ; a goose, 2^d. ; capons, 2d. ; a hen, \d. ; 24

156

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1316,

Id. ; and a quarter of wheat, peas or beans, 20s,
This enactment simply closed the barn door and the
staU-gate and increased the distress of the starving
poor. The next season was even worse. A murrain amongst
the cattle followed the general pestUence ; the brewing
of beer from grain was suspended ; the nobles cleared
their castles of the swarms of hungry retainers, for
whom they could find no food ; and the land was
fiUed with the dead, the dying, and those who sought
by plunder to maintain their existence. The prisoners
in Bristol " did pluck and tear those who were newly
brought in, and devoured them half alive ; and men
and women were fain to eat their own children towards
the borders of Scotland by reason of the Scotts." ^
In such a crisis no wonder "horseflesh and dogs'
flesh was counted good meat." Another of our MS.
Calendars states that both the summer and autumn
were very wet, and that the dearth of corn was such
that wheat fetched 40s. per quarter. Knighton says it
reached " 44s, in Leicester, and many who were rich
and abounding in aU goods were reduced to irrecover
able poverty and subject to beggary," If we take
Hallam's standard for the relative value, we shaU flnd
that the maximum price of wheat was equivalent to
£5 10s, or £6 per bushel.
This fearful state of the whole land and the raids
into England of the -yictorious Scots, are sufficient to
account for the fact that, beyond sending to Bristol
repeated mandates commanding the burgesses to return
to their obedience, Edward coiUd do nothing effective.
These commands the townsmen refused to obey, assert
ing that " every so-caUed legal process against them
was unjust and nuU, as being contrary to their charter
pri-Tileges and rights." About the end of the year
1313 -writs were ordered to the sheriffs of the counties
of Gloucestershire, Somerset and Wiltshire to raise the
posse comitatus of each county to march against Bristol aud
to reduce it to obedience,
24, A force of 20,000 men under the Earl of Glou
cester, appeared before the town ; but so undisciplined
a mob of men could effect nothing save to beleaguer its
gates, which John le Taverner, backed by his armed
co-burgesses, had shut against them. He knew right
well that the king wanted aU the men he could raise
for his war in Scotland, and many of the poor feUows
who in the spring of 1314 camped in the meadows
around Bristol feU on the bloody fleld of Bannock
burn on Midsummer's Day, In fact, we learn from
the Close Rolls of Edw. IL, 7 m. 26, that the earl had
received private orders not to proceed to extremities
' Seyer IL, 109,

against the town. This flrst siege was, it is e-pident,
merely a device to raise men for the king's army.
In 1316 another name appears in the story, that of
one whose cruel treatment and death have left an in
delible, but we hope to prove an undeserved, stain upon
Bristol's escutcheon. Hugh Despencer, the elder, in con
junction with Baddlesmere, who, as warden of the castle,
had made himself most unpopular, summoned once more
the mayor and burgesses to appear at Gloucester, there
to answer for their misconduct, to which they replied,
"It is contrary to our pri-vUeges," and again the empty
sentence of outlawry was fulminated against them. On
the 30th of March, 1316, the king issued another writ
to the commonalty of Bristol, ordering them to send at
Easter next six discreet persons, such as had not been
outlawed by any preceding judgment, to give informa
tion concerning what had passed and to receive the
king's orders thereupon. On the appointed day the
commonalty returned their writ before the king's council
at Westminster, and sent (we presume under a safe
conduct) six such persons, with a letter patent under the
common seal, viz,, Nicholas Eoughborow (senestor 1302,
1305, both years of the mayoralty of Simon de Burton),
John le Hunt, John Veys, Eoger ThornhUl, Eobert
Hampton and Vincent Gower, Three prosecutors on
the king's part accused the commonalty of acts of re
beUion, which the six deputies denied or justifled.
Whereupon a -writ was issued to the sheriff of Glouces
tershire ordering him to bring to Westminster a jury of
twenty-four persons a fortnight after Trinity, by whom
the truth of the accusation might be inquired into. This
jury (as might have been, and doubtless was on both
sides expected, seeing how and whence it had been im-
panneUed) found the commonalty guUty of rebeUion in
protecting those eighty men, who were the original
authors of the mischief, and guUty of aU the enormities
recited ; that it had been disobedient to the king and
rebelUous, and was stUl disobedient and rebeUious; and
that the six deputies were guUty as associates and
abettors. Plain sailing this at Westminster, and equaUy plain
was that at Bristol, where Aylmer de Valence, Earl
of Pembroke, came as a last messenger from the king
and told the principal persons who attended his sum
mons "that the king was satisfied of their guilt, and
advised and commanded them to submit to law, ' Give
up these mm-derers,' said he, ' and you and your town
abide in peace. If you will do so I undertake that you
shaU find our lord the king weU inclined to mercy.' ' ' We
may differ in opinion as to the conduct of these men, but
cannot but respect the stirrdy independence that denied
being the authors of any breach of the law, stood by

A,D, 1316,

THE TOWN BESIEGED AND TAKEN.

157

their champions and refused a mercy which would imply
their guilt. They repUed, " We are not the authors of
this injury, ^or have we committed any offence against our
lord the Icing, Certain persons endeavoured to deprive us of
our rights, which we defended as it was our duty to do.
Therefore, if our lord the king will remit those imposts
that were laid upon us, if he wiU grant us life and limb,
rents and lands, we wiU obey him as our lord and do
whatever he shaU require. Otherwise we wUl go on as
we began, and wUl
defend our Uberties
and privUeges even
to death," 25, Upon receiv
ing this answer,
Edward resolved to
subdue the town by
force of arms, Mau
rice de Berkeley was
ordered to cut off
the communication
by sea ; John de
Cherlton, the king's
chamberlain, Eoger
de Mortimer, John
de WyUyngton, who
had been iUtreated
in the melee at the
guUdhaU, Bartholo
mew Baddlesmere,
and many other bar
ons and knights be
sieged the town by
land. They raised
bulwarks against
the walls (the chatte
mo.Ht probably is
meant here, it was a
machine constructed
of timber by which,
when it was thrust
against a waU, the
assaUants could undermine the same, being themselves
protected, or could use the machine as a bridge to sur
mount the defence), battering-rams were also brought
into play from the castle. For some days the to-wns
men resisted, hoping to tire out the assaUants, as
they had previously succeeded in doing; but when
they found that the waUs as weU as their houses were
being shaken, and that there was no hope of a suc
cessful defence, they surrendered to the king's mercy,
Taverner made his escape or he doubtless would have

Newgate at the close of the 18th Century, showing the Almsboxfor Poor Prisoners.

been hanged, the principal burgesses were thro-wn
into Newgate and many of them were committed to the
Tower of London, The king took the town into his own
hands and held it untU December, 1316, making Maiuice
de Berkeley custos, who put in as his deputy Sir Simon
Warde, In the above-named month Edward signified
in councU his pleasure to grant the commonalty, with
the exception of John le Taverner, Thomas his son, and
Eobert Martyn, a pardon for aU their offences upon
payment of a fine,
WTiereupon twelve
deputies were order
ed by the common
alty to attend the
king, viz,, WiUiam
Eandolph (who had
returned to the town
and been appointed
mayor), Thomas de
la Grave, Eoger
Turtle (this name
occurs nine times in
the list of mayors
between 1289 and
1 341), Henry le Mar
iner, Eobert Horn-
hurst (senestor with
SimonBurton, 1 304),
Eobert de Ottery
(senestor 1294, 1296
and 1305 with Bur
ton, again 1309 with
Taverner, apparently
a man of the same
kidney as the Vicar
of Bray), John WeU-
shott (bailiff that
year), Eichard le
Wythe, John de
Axebrugg, Eichard
de WoodhuU and
Gilbert Pickerill

(senestor with Taverner in 1308 and bailiff in 1320),
went to plead with Edward, Some of these men had
been unquestionably loyal to their principles, others of
them had been among the malcontents. Now united
in their efforts to restore peace and good order in
Bristol, "they carried with them a letter patent under
the common seal, dated December 20th, 1316, expressed
in reverential terms, imploring the king's favour, and
professing themselves ready to submit to any conditions
to which the said twelve persons as their attorneys

158

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1316,

should agree," Hereupon a fine of 4,000 marks was
imposed on the town, one half of which was to be paid
at certain times then agreed on, and the other half was
to remain on good behaviour, which fine is expressed to
be for a pardon to the town and to aU individuals (with
the before-mentioned exceptions) concerned in the dis
turbances from the 2nd of February, 1311-2, to that
date, and for the king's pardon of the outlaws and those
who had protected them, and for the burgesses having
their liberties and franchises restored. Nevertheless
the king held firm to the obnoxious cocket or fish tax,
Taverner and Martyn had their property confiscated,
Maurice de Berkeley, although he must have had a
grudge against the Bristol men, apjiears to have acted
with great moderation. Smyth speaks of the matter as
an "intestine uproar, wherein one half of the townsmen were
for some years rebellioitshj in arms against the other," and
gives a large number of references to the roUs. That
Maurice de Berkeley did not always at this time comport
himself with moderation towards those who could not
resist him is shown by the following : —
Somewhere about 1316-7 Lord Maurice Berkeley
fancied a bit of land and divers houses in the suburbs
of Bristol that "lay fit to his manor of Bedminster."
They belonged to Eichard Bolour, in right of his wife,
Joan, Lord Maurice carried these good people to his
castle of Berkeley, and there, to use the language of
Smyth " entered into covenants, that they should pro
secute a writ ' quod ei deforeiat ' against Eoger Apleby
and others who held the said lands, &o., untU they
should recover ; and this suit be at the charges of the
said Lord Maurice and his counseU ; and that they
should use no other counseU but his and such as he
appoints ; and that after recovery they should within 15
days grant the same to him, the said Maurice, and his
heirs, reserving to the said Joan her Ufe in one of the
said houses, and to have £10 in money from this lord :
for performance of which covenants this lord took of
them a statute of £100," The honest historian con
tinues: " I leave the censure of this to the divine rule
(fuod tibi fieri non vis, alteri ne feceris. To prevent aU
presentments against him in the commission of Trail-
baston against intruders into other men's lands, extor
tioners, oppressors, champerners, and the like offenders,
this lord bribed the jury for Portbury Hundred with
the guift of 20s. ; and such as would have given evidence
against him with 49s., pro farore habendo coram jtistitiariis
de TraiThaston in negotiis suis ibidem," -"^
26. Long consideration and study of this sad out
break only confirms our opinion that it was a fight for
1 Smj'th, 211. Comp de Portbury. 2 Edw. II, in Castro
de Berkeley.

the mastery between the merchants' guUd and the crafts
men (certain Unes that we have itaUcised bear only this
interpretation) to which quarrel the king was made a
party by the refusal of the burgesses to pay a fish tax
that was imposed contrary to their charters, but which
the merchants, being of the king's party, were -wUling to
pay. The king persistently in his pardon demands that
this payment shaU be continued ; but aU local matters,
such as coUection, direction and management of the
revenues, arrogated superiority and prerogatives over
their feUow-burgesses, and certain toUs in the market,
his majesty does not mention, they being evidently local
exactions. Had it been a rebeUion in the ordinary
acceptation of the word, the burgesses would have caUed
in the aid of the barons, who were not reconcUed to the
king until after this outbreak. This, no doubt, Edward
remembered, and it won for them more favourable con
sideration. The names of the men are significant. Most
of the fourteen have place names indicating a higher
rank by the de or le, whereas the few names given of
their oiiponents, or associated with the leaders in office,
are names derived from occupations, such as Taverner,
Legat (lawyer), Martyn, Hunte, Beauflower (fine flour),
Spycer (grocer), &c.
Above aU, the easy terms on which the king received
them to grace, without a single execution, and making
one half of the flne imposed conditional upon their
maintaining the peace, corroborate, we think, our view
that the monarch did not look upon this primarUy as an
insurrection against the royal authority. Nor must we
forget the notable fact that Eicart himself, one of the
GuUd of Calendars, who Uved in the middle of the
foUowing century, and whose business it was to record
all events connected with the history of Bristol, is signi-
flcantly silent about transactions which in the temper of
his age would be considered a disgrace to his class and
to the city. The fact that Taverner, twenty-one years
afterwards, took the flrst opportunity of petitioning a
new king, Edward III., for a restitution of his property,
that he does not in his petition admit any breach of
the law, but respectfuUy, yet firmly, defends his acts,
and that Edward III. ordered the Justices of the
King's Bench to inquire info the matter, is, we think,
strongly corroborative of our opinion. The petition is
as foUows: — from "John Taverner and other citizens
of BristoU, showing to the king and his council, that
whereas the earle of Glouc' came before BristoU with
twenty thousand men and more, and demanded the
same city to be delivered to him, which hee (being then
Mayor) and the other citizens denyed, and defended the
city : whereunto the said Earle by the CounseU of Hugh
Spencer, the father, and Bartholomew Baddlesmere

A,D. 1318,

THE KING CONFIRMS THE CHARTER OF BRISTOL.

159

purchased of the king oyer and terminer against them
to be enquired of, at Gloucester, contrary to the liberties
of their city : and for that they appeared not, and the
sheriffs returned falsely ' Non sunt inventi,' they were
outlawed and their lands and goods seized for the king ;
they pray that it would please the King and his Council
to cause the record and process to come before them, or
to command the Justices of the King's Bench to reverse
the said utla-wry, and to restore them to the common
law, that they may recover their lands and goods," ^
It is answered thus: — "Let them have a -writ in
Chancery to the Justices of the King's Bench, that they
proceed in the process laid before the said justices upon
the premises; and if there bee error found in the record
and process of the foresaid utla^wry, then that they should
cause that error to be amended,"
Not a word of confession of fault, or a sueing for
pardon in the above petition, but a manly defence of
acting within the rights of the city and its citizens
(five times they are thus termed) and a simple prayer for
a restoration of their pri^vileges and property, which
had been seized UlegaUy. Edward III,'s answer is in
accordance with his noble character, but we have sought
in vain for the resiUt of the proceedings. As we have
before stated, some returns give Taverner's name as one
of the members of ParUament in 1322, from which it
would appear that he had returned to Bristol, and was
stUl in high repute in the burgh,
27. The weak, irresolute king, Edward II, , was in
1318 again at issue ¦with his ParUament. Unable to
exist -without a favourite, he had fixed his affections
upon the Despencers, father and son, both bearing the
same Christian name — Hugh, Men of good famUy,
already rich, Edward soon largely increased their pos
sessions. He made the younger his chamberlain, and
married him to the daughter of the Earl of Gloucester,
who had been slain at Bannockburn, and thus conferred
upon him the greater portion of the county of Glamorgan,
Despencer was soon embroiled with his neighbours,
the Earls of Hereford and Lancaster ; these joined the
lords of the Welsh borders and marched with an army
to St, Albans, where Edward then was, plundering as
they went the manors of the elder Despencer. They
demanded of the king the banishment of this man,
the ablest and most faithful of Edward's friends, whom
they looked upon as a deserter from their cause, and of
his son Hugh, the younger, a man of parts, who had
attempted to form a league by which the despotic wUl
of the king should be limited, and who held that it was
to the Cro-wn, rather than to the person of the king,
that the subject is bound to pay honour and aUegiance —
' EoU, Par. II,, 434,

that if the king did wrong it was the bounden duty of
the subject to put him right, &c.
On Edward's refusal to grant the barons' demand
they continued their march to London, where the
Parliament was then sitting, and procured from it a
sentence of exUe against both Despencers, who were
accused of arrogating to themselves royal power, of
leading the king to act -with violence, of preventing his
showing himself to his people or giving audience except
at their pleasure, of removing good men from office and
appointing e-vil counseUors and unlearned justices for
bribes, of exciting to ci-vil war and inducing the king to
exact unreasonable flues, and of extorting moneys from
newly-created bishops and abbots before they were
aUowed to see the king. This was in March, 1321, at
which time Despencer, the younger, was in possession
by grant from the king, of the castle and town of
Bristol, drawing from the latter a rent of £210, On
his banishment the grant was it appears transferred to
Matthew de Clendon and John his brother. Having, in
1321, failed to gain the support of London, Edward
came to Bristol, whence he issued orders to Thomas
de Berkeley for preservation of the peace of the town, ^
In May the king issued another mandate from West
minster, directed to the mayor, baUiffs and commonalty,
to the same effect, and ordering them not to suffer any
suspicious persons to enter the town,^ The Earl of
Hereford had sent a mendicant friar to persuade the
burgesses to give their adhesion to the barons ; but in
this case, as in the previous war, they declined the
aUiance,^ Edward having been successful and overcome the
barons, the Parliament at York annulled the sentence
of exile against the Despencers on the ground of coer
cion by force of arms, and carrying their acquiescence
with the king's wishes to the extreme of servUity, they
"repealed aU ordinances and provisions that had cur-
taUed the royal power of the ancestors of our lord the
king." The Despencers returned to England and reigned
supreme in the palace, the escheats of the attainted
barons were assigned to them, and Hugh Despencer,
the younger, had a re-grant of the castle and town of
Bristol for his life.
On the 22nd AprU, 1320, the king granted two
charters by which the burgesses had the customs on
imports for flve years for repairing the waUs and the
quay. These seem to have been renewals of former
charters granted by him for three years on February
19th, 1316, for the same purposes,
28, On February I7th, 1321-2, a month before the
decisive battle at Boroughbridge, Edward, for a grant
1 Claus, Eot,, 14 Edwd, IL, m, 2, = lUd, => Ibid,

160

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1321,

of money and men, confirmed the charters of Bristol
-without specifying any new privilege. The above battle
was fought on March 16th, and great numbers of the
confederated barons were taken prisoners. Many of
these were sent for execution to different large towns,
and Bristol was favoured with two of these hideous
presents. Sir Henry WyUyngton, lord of the manor of
Culverden, Gloucestershire, and Sir Henry de Montfort
were hanged and quartered here in AprU, 1322. The
cause in which they feU was popular with the masses of
the people, and miracles were said to be -wrought at the
place of their execution, A year and a quarter at least
after these men had suffered, a proclamation was issued,
viz., between July 7th, 1323, and July, 1324, to this
effect : — " Know ye that Henry de Montfort and Henry
WyUyngton, our late enemies and rebels, were hanged
at Bristol, and their bodies are to remain on the gaUows
as long as they endure . , , and that Eeginald de
Montfort, W, de Clyfford, W, Curteys and John, his
brother, went many times to the place and falsely feigned
that miracles were there -wrought," '^
At this time also perished a man whose name wUl
have become famUiar to our readers — Bartholomew
Baddlesmere, He was nephew to the Bishop of Lin
coln, had been the king's constable of Bristol, and had
received at the monarch's hands one of the ancient
castles of Eobert, Earl of Gloucester, -yiz,, Leeds, in
Kent, This man had deserted the king and wished to
join the party of the barons. His constable at Leeds
refused admittance to the Queen IsabeUa in 1321, who
thereupon besieged and took the castle whUst Edward
was absent, the barons refusing to assist Baddlesmere ;
in fact, Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, popularly named
"the good," refused to join their cause if he were
aUowed to continue in their army,
"After the battle of Boroughbridge the king excepted
Baddlesmere from the general pardon. He was taken
prisoner at Stow park, drawn from Canterbury to the
gaUows at Bleen, and there hanged on AprU 14th, 1322,
Afterwards his head was cut off and fixed on a pole at
Burgate and his body again hung up." ^
The king made a flying visit from Gloucester to
Bristol in one day, 26th January, 1324, returning by
way of Iron Acton. He came again on the Ist of
February ; on the 3rd he was at Berkeley, on his way
back to Gloucester ; on the 8th he came again, appa
rently to consult Despencer, These rapid movements
betoken his agitation and distrust,
Eoger de Mortimer, lord of Wigmore, ' ' was kejit in
a fil thie prison verie discourteously; at length he died in
1 Pat, 17 Edwd. II., Par. I., m. 15.
^ Seyer, II, , 112, from Leland and others.

1324, and was buried at Bristow." His nephew Eoger
escaped the extreme penalty of treason and was im
prisoned in the Tower of London, from whence he
escaped to France, where he became the paramour of
Edward's queen, IsabeUa,
29. Being sister to the King of France, IsabeUa had
been despatched to that kingdom by her husband, osten
sibly to conclude a treaty with her brother ; and ha-ving
got her son, Prince Edward, in her power, she renounced
every sentiment of love and loyalty to her husband,
refused to return to England, asserting that the Despen
cers were her bitter foes, entered into Ulicit relations
with Eoger de Mortimer, whom she made the chief of her
household, kept the prince with her, notwithstanding
the entreaties and commands of his father that he
should return, and gathering around her the EngUsh
who had escaped to the Continent she, with only 300
men, landed at OrweU on September 24th, 1326, and
proclaimed war against her husband, the king.
Edward's mania, for it was nothing less, had worn
out the patience of even his relatives. His brother,
the Earl of Kent, the Earls of Suffolk, Eichmond,
and a number of barons and bishops joined IsabeUa in
this odious and unnatural war, A wife in arms against
her husband, a boy employed as a tool to ruin his father,
a people thirsting for revenge upon an indolent, incap
able, and, we may add, a maudUn king, EngUsh history
has not its paraUel,
30, Edward's party rapidly losing adherents, the
king retired into the Tower of London, and sent
circular letters to the seaports ordering the authorities
to search for letters coming from beyond sea and to
arrest and commit to prison aU suspected persons
arri-ving from abroad. One of these letters was ad
dressed to the mayor, baUiffs and commonalty of Bristol,
On the 27th and 28th September the king issued pro
clamations against the Queen, his son Edward, his
brother the Earl of Kent, and Eoger de Mortimer, ' our
traytor and mortal enemy ; " he ordered the Queen's
letters to the towns to be sent to him unopened. One
of these proclamations is directed under the Great Seal
to the mayor and baUiffs of Bristol, London being
thoroughly disaffected toward him, the king resolved to
retreat westward and to make a stand at Bristol, On
October 12th he sent a writ to WUUam Tracy, Sheriff
of Gloucestershire, ordering him to victual immediately
the castles of Bristol and Chepstow, This was done,
for Tracy petitioned Edward III,, in 1 330, for payment of
£24 15s, Qd, for provisions delivered to Eoger Barnard
at Chepstow, and for a fui'ther sum of £84 12s, Qd, for
provisions sent by Edward II.'s orders to Donald, Earl
of Mar, the governor of Bristol castle. Mar had been

A,D, 1325,

THE JURISDICTION OF BRISTOL IN REDCLIFF.

161

Uberated at the demand of Eobert Bruce after Bannock
burn. He seems from this to have so well liked his
cage as to return voluntarUy to it, and to have been
highly in favour with Edward,
London opened its gates to the Queen, but she stayed
there only a few days, steadUy foUowing the king with
an ever increasing force, MoraUty in high places was
at a discount, and noble and prelate were ready with
pen, sword, and voice to defend the conduct of an adul
terous, rebeUious -wife. There can be Uttle doubt that
the people felt that any change of rulers must of neces
sity be for the better. At WaUingford a manifesto was
issued in the names of the Queen, Prince, and Earl of
Kent, detailing the tyranny and unla-wful oppressions
of Hugh Despencer, Eobert Baldock and others, and
justifying the step the aUied parties had taken. At
Oxford the Bishop of Hereford preached before the
Prince and the chiefs of the party from the text, "I
-wiU put enmity between thee and the woman," He
drew a resemblance between the Queen and Eve, and
between ChanceUor Baldock and the devil, and in the
course of his sermon he read the WaUingford proclama
tion, 31, Lord Maurice de Berkeley, ha-ying taken part
against the younger Despencer, was thrown into gaol at
WaUingford castle, where, after an ineffectual attempt at
escape, he died on the 31st of May, 1326, During hisim-
prisonment Eichard TiUey, the Mayor of Bristol 1319-20
and 1321, and the burgesses revived the old struggle with
Berkeley's tenants of EedcUff, committing some to gaol
and Ul-treating others. Upon the complaint of these
sufferers special commissions were awarded under the
great seal to two judges of the King's Bench to enquire
by juries of Gloucestershire into the causes of these
commitments and pUlage, whereupon ten or more were
baUed and discharged, and many found to have been
unjustly committed, to the reproof of the mayor. No
doubt his worship thought that he had got weU off with
only a rebuke, A Gloucestershire jury would be inimical
to any claim of jurisdiction by Bristol over " Berkeley's
men of Eedcliff," The evUs of a divided jurisdiction
wiU be. apparent from a petition sent to the king and
his council in 1325 by the mayor and commonalty of
Bristol, which sheweth "that whereas the said town of
Bristol and its suburbs is within the county of Gloucester
and is obedient to the sheriff of that county, except
parcel of a street caUed Temple street, which is within
the waUs, and the inhabitants of the said street are
burgesses of the said town of Bristol: which street
is obedient to the sheriff of Somerset ; therefore when
our lord the king commands the Sheriff of Gloucester to
make his executions, the people of the town of Bristol
[Vol, L]

cause their goods to be removed to the said Temple
street, which is in the county of Somerset ; so that
neither the Sheriff of Gloucester nor the baUiffs of the
said town are able to make execution of the mandates
of our lord the king, to the great damage of the king
and of aU the commonalty. Wherefore the said Mayor
and commonalty pray our lord the king that he would
please to grant them that the said street may be obedient
and respondent in all cases there where the other people
of the said town of Bristol are respondent, and nowhere
else, so as at any time the progenitors of our lord the
king granted by their charter, that Eadcliff street should
be obedient to the said town as in their charter is more
fuUy contained," The king answers, "Let John de
Stonore, with John de Clyveden, John de Anesley, or
any two of them, so that Stonore be one, be assigned
to inquire in presence of the sheriffs of Somerset and
Gloucester, and of the men of Temple street, of what
damage to the king it may be if the king should grant
the contents of the petition,"^ The Templars' manor,
at their dissolution in 1312, was granted to the knights
of St, John of Jerusalem, who exercised certain manorial
rights therein until the Eeformation, The Calendars
state that in 1543 Temple fee was broken and incor
porated in the city of Bristol,
Maurice was succeeded by Thomas de Berkeley, who
had been liberated by the queen from his prison in
Pevensey castle (for he, too, had fought against the
Despencers), and in gratitude had joined her at Ox
ford, He accompanied her to Gloucester, and thence
went with her to Berkeley which she appears to have
restored to him, " Her forces increasing Uke a snow-
baU, she came before this great and goodly city of
Bristol about the 22nd of October," "Great damage
was done," Smyth says, "to the tenants of Berkeley
and to the neighbourhood by the number of soldiers
who, coming from the north to join the queen, passed
through Berkeley," The estate had been given to the
younger Despencer, which probably was the cause of
the spoliation of property,
32, Edward finding himself in danger in Bristol left
it ere the queen's forces arrived ; Hugh Despencer, jun.,
and ChanceUor Baldock accompanied him, leaving Hugh
Despencer, sen,, a man ninety years of age, in command
of the castle and town. The king fled by sea, intending
to take refuge in the Isle of Lundy, which he had forti
fied ; but the very winds and waves, like aU his late
subjects, were against him, and after beating about the
channel for many days, he landed first at Chepstow and
finaUy at Swansea,
33, The Bristol men had been thus far faithful to
1 EoUs Par, I,, 434, Seyer, IL, 135. M

162

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1326,

their faithless king, but it is evident that his favourites
were as unpopular here as they were in other parts of the
kingdom. Nevertheless, the burgesses did not at once
yield to the Earl of Kent who, -with Su- John Henneque,
was in command of the besieging army. For three days
they sought to obtain terms for the king's friends, but
the queen demanded an unconditional surrender with
which they were obUged to comply. As soon as the
queen's forces had obtained possession of the town the
unfortunate old Despencer was brought to trial before
a court martial. Sir Thomas Madge, the provost mar
shal, recited a short statement of the crimes laid to his
charge, of which they aU pronounced him guUty, and
-without further process condemned him to death.
The circumstances attending his execution exhibit a
degree of ferocity that is appaUing. Stowe says, "He
was drawn to the gaUows and hanged in his armour,
taken do'wn alive and disemboweUed, his bowels burned
and his head smitten off and his body hanged up again,
and after four days cut aU to pieces and east to the dogs
to be eaten; but his head was sent to Winchester," of
which city he was count, Bristol was the theatre on
which was enacted this cruel tragedy; but her burgesses
are guiltless of the blood of this aged nobleman, who,
whatever his demerits, was treated in a manner dis
graceful to a professedly Christian land.
The list of the council which sat in Bristol the day
foUo'wing its surrender, and whose members sentenced
him and witnessed his execution, is as foUows : —

The Archbishop of Dublin,
Bishop of "Winchester,
" Ely,
' ' Lincoln,
" Hereford,
' ' Norwich,
and other prelates ;
Thomas Earl of Norfolk and
Edmund Earl of Kent, the
king's brothers.

Henry Earl of Lancaster and
Leicester,
Thomas Wake,
Henry de Belmont,
William la Zouche de Assheby,
Eobert de Montalt,
Eobert de Morle,
Eobert de Wateville,
and other barons and
knights.

On the very day that the Earl of Winchester (the
elder Despencer) was hanged, IsabeUa had her son
Edward proclaimed guardian of the realm which the
king had deserted. Prince Edward issued writs, from
Bristol, for a parliament in his father's name on the
28th of October, In these he stated that on the day
named for their assembling, December 15th, the king
would be absent from the kingdom, but that the business
would be transacted before the queen, and her son as
guardian of the realm. After the great seal had been
wrested from the king the meeting of ParUament was
adjourned to the 7th of January.
34, The escape of the king from Bristol disapjiointed
the queen's party. "Early in the morning of October

1 6th he had got on board a smaU vessel at the water-
gate (Queen street) with a design to get to the island
of Lundy, in the Bristol channel, a place plentiful of
provisions, abounding with conies, fish and fowl, and
the island hard of access, as having only one place in it
where it could be entered, and that so narrow that a
few might easUy keep out many," On the 29th he
was at OaerphiUy, endeavouring to induce the Welsh
to rise and aid him. Failing in this, aU other resources
gone, he sought a shelter in the abbey of Neath, and
on November 10th he sent the abbot with a retinue to
the queen. He surrendered, on receiving a letter of
safe conduct and a promise of protection from IsabeUa,
to the Earl of Lancaster, WiUiam de la Zouche and
Eiee ap HoweU, at Monmouth, on November 20th,
when the great seal was forced from him, on receiving
which the queen by easy stages, returned to London,
and was there received with great joy as the deUverer
of the nation. There is some doubt whether Bristol
castle was surrendered at the same time as the town.
One writer states that it was kept untU the queen
brought her unfortunate husband before its gates and
told the king to give orders for its surrender. ^ Leland
corroborates this ¦view in these terms, "Donald Earl of
Marre was made by King Edward guardian of the
Castle of Bristow, the which he delivered to the Queen,
and so repaired to Scotland."^ It would seem from
these statements that the elder Despencer had been in
the town when it surrendered (not in the castle), and
reasonably expected to share in the promise of life and
liberty granted to the inhabitants.
Eobert Baldock, the king's chanceUor, was taken
with Edward, being a priest he escaped immediate
execution. He was claimed by the Bishop of Hereford
who confined him in his own hotel, but the populace of
London broke into the hotel, carried him off, and he
was thrown into Newgate where he soon died, under, it
is said, very severe usage.
The privileges of the clergy were very great. They
claimed, when apprehended by civU officers, to be de
Uvered to their bishop for trial, and not to be kept in
prison. The Bishop of Hereford, before mentioned,
when taken in arms at Boroughbridge, had pleaded his
pri-silege as a clerk not to be tried by laymen; and when
the king attempted to bring him to trial before the court
of King's Bench, the Archbishops of Canterbury, York
and Dublin came into the court, with crosses borne in
procession before them, and carried him off in triumph
to live and consummate his treason by joining Mortimer
and the queen. This was the prelate who, in addition
to his notable sermon before the prince and the leaders
1 Harl., Miscel, L, 84. ^ Lei., Col. II. , 550.

A,D. 1326,

EDWARD REMOVED FROM BRISTOL CASTLE.

163

of the insurrection at Oxford, wrote afterwards the
famous letter to the keepers of Edward II, at Berkeley
castle, " Edwardum regem occidere nolite timer e bonum est,"
which may be rendered, " Fear not to kiU the king, 'tis
good he die," or, " KUl not the king, 'tis good to fear
the act," having pre^viously preached before the queen
on the text " doleo caput," signifying that a distempered
head should be removed.
The hated and most obnoxious favourite, Hugh
Despencer, jun, and another, were taken in the wood
of Llantressan, and brought before the queen ere she
left Hereford, ' ' He was set upon a lean, miserable hack,
despoiled of aU his rich apparel and clothed in a ragged
tabarce, a garment worn by thieves and rascals, and so
was led
through
aU the mar
ket towns
and vil
lages ¦with
trumpets sounding,
and aU the
disgrace that could
be de^vised
heaped up
on him," ^
The inten
tion was to
thus lead
him in
triumph to
London,
but he de-

Cliepstow Castle.

feated the design by refusing food and drink, so that
for very feebleness he could not travel. He was exe
cuted therefore in Hereford, being drawn to the gaUows
(50 feet high), clothed in a vestment, with his coat of
arms reversed, and on his breast was written the first
six verses of the 52nd Psalm, "Whj boastest thou
thyself, thou tyrant," &c. They crowned him with
nettles, and after hanging he was quartered, as his
father had been previously. Never was gathered such
a concourse; every man blew a horn, or shouted " Hue!
Hue!" heaping upon the miserable every form of con
tumely and insult, Simon de Eeading was hanged on
the same gallows, but 10 feet lower to show the dis
parity of rank, 2 Edward's faithful friends, Arundel,
Charleton and others, were also hanged, some at Here
ford and others elsewhere,
^ Harl, Miscel,, II,, 84, ¦> Lei. Col,, IL, 468, Knyghton,

35, From Hereford Edward was taken to Kenil
worth, where on the 20th of January he was compeUed
to resign his crown. In April he was removed out of
the custody of the Earl of Lancaster, who, being his
cousin, had treated him courteously, and delivered by in
denture to Thomas, Lord de Berkeley, who had married
the daughter of Eoger de Mortimer, had suffered much
at the king's hands, and was not likely, it was supposed,
to err on the side of leniency.
But with aU their faults there was a true nobility of
soul in these rough Berkeleys, they could fight, whether
for the right or the wrong it did not much matter ; but
they did not care to trample upon the faUen, Sir John
Maltravers and Sir Thomas Gonrnay were associated
with Ber
keley as
the king's
keep ers.
These kept
him each a
month in
turn. Thus
hewasshif-ted "by
night, thin
ly clothed,
and with
out head
covering,"^
from castle
to castle —
Corfe,
Bristoland Ber
keley,
For ten months the miserable king was thus bandied
about, only finding any degree of comfort when with
Berkeley, who by universal testimony treated him
kindly. Meanwhile a reaction had set in. The queen
and Mortimer were beginning to exhibit their true
characters, disgust succeeded to laudation, and pity
began to override vengeance. Schemes were devised
by the people of Bristol and the Dominican Friars for
setting Edward at liberty,^ His keepers, Maltravers
and Gonrnay, on this alarm, removed him from Bristol
castle, ' ' These champions, ' ' says Stowe, ' ' bring Edward
towards Berkeley, being guarded by a rabble of heU-
hounds, along by the grange belonging to the Castle of
Bristowe ; where that wicked man Gorney, making a
crowne of haye, put it on his head ; and the soldiers
that were present mocked him, saying, 'Tut — prut avaunte,
1 J, de la More, 600. = Lei. Itin., II., 475.

164

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1326,

Sir King!' , , , , They feared to be met of any that
should know Edward; they bent their journey towards
the left hande, riding over the marish grounds lying by
the river Severne ; moreover, desiring to disfigure him
that he should not be known, they determined to shave
his head and beard," (The king was very choice of his
whiskers and beard, which curled, the latter in three long
curls from the chin,) "Wherefore, as they travelled by
a little water that ran in a ditch, they commanded him
to lyghte from his horse, to be shaven with the said cold
water by the barber, who said ' that water must serve
for this time,' Edward answered, 'Would they, nould
they,' he would have warm water for his beard, so shed
tears plentif uUy,"
Alas ! poor king ! he was learning the " alphabet of
tears," but there was worse adversity in store. The
Lord of Berkeley was commanded by letter to use no
famUiarity with his captive guest, but to deliver up his
castle unto his feUow custodians. In a half-round tower
of the Norman sheU Keep, at Berkeley, which projects on
the south into the inner ward, is a room which is shown,
traditionaUy, as the chamber into which the king was
thrust by Sir Thomas Gonrnay and Sir WiUiam Ogle, who
was now to be associated with the gaolers in one of the
darkest deeds that defUe any history. Under this room
is a circular dungeon, 25 feet in depth, into which it is
said the "viUains had thrown a quantity of dead carcases,
hoping that the stench would produce a mortal disease.
Disappointed in this they removed the king to a smaU
chamber on the waU, remote from the usual residence
of the famUy, where he was murdered by Gonrnay and
Ogle at the instigation of Eoger de Mortimer, The
method adopted by these miscreants in order to secure
their end, yet conceal their crime, is one which makes
humanity shudder at the thought and aU but paralyzes
the hand that has to record it,
A piece of red hot iron was thrust through a horn
up into the body, leaving no outward mark of violence.
Then reverberated within the massive waUs, and weUed
out into the murky night, through the narrow loopholes,
the "shrieks of an agonizing king," so that the sleeping
peasants, starting from their slumbers, cried, "Now God
be merciful to the poor king."
Next day certain of the principal inhabitants of
Bristol and Gloucester were sent for to view the body,
who seeing no visible signs to the contrary, and utterly
unconscious of the tragedy that had been enacted,
testified that Edward had died a natural death. This
examination, carefuUy attested, was immediately dis
persed over the whole kingdom. Thomas, Lord de
Berkeley, justified himself from any knowledge of this
horrible affair which occurred on September 22nd, by

asserting before Parliament in the ensuing reign that
he was lying sick and in danger of death at the time at
BracUey.i On Michaelmas day he was stUl there, and
on the evening of that day he sent Sir Thomas Gournay
with the news of the death of the king to Nottingham,
where IsabeUa was with the young king.^ The mes
senger brought back word that the fact was to be kept
secret untU AU Saints' day, when it was first pubUshed
in the ParUament at Lincoln,^
The abbots of Malmesbury, Kingswood and Bristol
decUned to take charge of the funeral ; but the monks
of St, Peter's, Gloucester, had more courage, and the
murdered remains were buried with solemnity in the
church of their convent. There are several sculptured
memorials of this king in Bristol, notably a head recently
discovered in the most ancient portion of the crypt of
St, Nicholas, under the High street. It is a deUoate
face, forehead high but very narrow, frontal bones pro
jecting over the eyes; nose aquUine ; lips thin, weU
curved ; chin smaU, but rather long apparently ; mous
tache, beard and whiskers in curled flowing ringlets,
A physiognomist woiUd at once decide that such a face
betokens weakness and irresolution, that of a man who
could form ardent attachments, and whose fate for good
or for evil would depend not upon himself so much as
upon his surroundings. This opinion we have verified
from a cast taken and sho^wn to those who had no idea
whose "fair counterfeit" it was they judged, Em
phaticaUy, a creature of circumstances, Edward's cruel
treatment and most foul murder, excite our pity and
tend to soften the harshness of our judgment,
[Whilst we write a controversy has arisen in Mtes
and Queries on this subject (6th S. II. , Nov. 13, '80),
A letter is said to have been discovered in a cartulary
which belonged to the Bishopric of Maguelone, at Mont
pelier, which was ¦written by Manuele Fieschi, Canon
of York, Notary of the Pope, and was addressed to
Edward III, (the Fieschies were undoubtedly personal
friends of Edward II. ), in which he states that a faith
ful servant exchanged clothes with the king in Berkeley
castle, that in this disguise Edward II, escaped, having
kiUed the porter at the gate. That he then fled to Corfe
castle, where he was concealed by the keeper without
the knowledge of its lord. Sir John Maltravers, That
on hearing that his brother, the Earl of Kent, had been
beheaded for asserting his (the king's) existence, he
sailed for Ireland, where he, lived nine months. That
then, in a hermit's dress, he marched through England,
crossing from Sandwich to Sluys, thence traveUing vid
Normandy and Languedoc to Avignon, where he had an
interview with the Pope, John XXII., who entertained
' EoUs Par. IL, 57, 4 Edw. Ill, « Smyth, 260, " Knyghton,

A,D. 1326,

EDWARD'S DEATH AT BERKELEY.

165

him secretly for 15 days. Thence he went to Paris,
Brabant, and on pUgrimage to the tomb of the three
kings of Cologne, He then crossed through Germany
into Lombardy, and from Milan he went into a certain
hermitage in the castle of Cecima, belonging to the
diocese of Pavia ; there he
"remained in strict seclusion
for two years, Uving a life of
penitence and praying God
for us and other sinners,"
from which we suppose he
was dead at the time the letter
was written.
The would-be murderers
are further said in the letter
to have put the body of the
slain porter in a coffin and to
have passed it off for
that of the king, who
had been so disfigured
by the loss of his
beard, &c,, that it was
easy to deceive the
Bristol burgesses who
had been called to
verify his death. In
testimony of the truth,
Fieschi stamps the
letter with his seal.
There is no evidence
that this letter, or a
copy of it, was ever
delivered to Edward
III, The subject is in
teresting, and this view
is not without corrob
orative evidence ; for
instance, Eoger de
Mortimer, at his exe
cution, declared that
Edward, Duke of Kent,
was innocent, and
publicly asked pardon
of God for the death of
the earl. Again, Smyth
says that "Thomas
Berkeley was not sick at Bradley when the king was
murdered, that he never came there tUl the Michaelmas
foUowing, nor had he lost his memory ; for he sent
Gurney, the regicide, at the very time with letters of
the king's death to the queen and Mortimer at Notting
ham castle, and upon second direction, from thence

brought back by Gurney, kept secret the king's death
tUl AH Saints," ^
Moreover, " Berkeley concealed Gurney till his
own trial was over, and then, upon a private letter of
attorney of his lands of Beverstone, Over, and others
for his life, he furnished him
with money and other requi
sites for his fiight," Berkeley's
trial, Smyth adds, was infor
mal ; he was tried before an
ordinary jury and not by his
peers, Gournay fied to Spain,
was finaUy captured at Mar-
seiUes, and died on his voyage
to England, And it is not
beyond the bounds of proba
bility to suppose that another
historical romance
may yet be expunged
from our annals, and
that Edward II. died
a peaceful death in a
monk's ceU instead of
in frightful agony in
Berkeley castle.]
36. Edward II,
coined no money in
Bristol, unless, as is
probably the case, he
used the dies, &c., of
his father ; the com
merce of the town had
largely increased. Like
his predecessors, the
king claimed a right
to the service of ..aU
merchant ships ; he re
monstrated with the
king of Norway be
cause he had detained
three English vessels.
"He cannot," he says,
"quietly put up with
the detention of vessels
belonging to his king-
Tomb of Edward II. in Gloucester Cathedral. dom which OUffht at
all times to be ready for his service, being detained in
foreign countries," "
Etymologists are not agreed whether the turtle soup
delicacy, for which for centuries Bristol has been famous,
'¦ Fosbroke's Berkeley MSS.
' Macpherson's Annals of Commerce,

166

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1327,

derived its name from a Bristol mayor, or the mayor
from the amphibious luxury, Eoger Turtle was mayor
in 1289, 1299, 1326, 1330, 1332-3, 1335, 1340-1, and
in one old MS, calendar the name is given as mayor
also in 1319. There were probably three men of the
name who filled the office during these fifty-two years.
But although the Turtles have left only their name in
our annals, it has become indelibly associated with
gastronomic feasts, civic banquets and sumptuous enter
tainments, Eichard TiUey, who was mayor in 1320-1,
is charged with ha^ving required a present from every
ship that came to the quay, in addition to what was paid
to the constable. This is the earUest mention that we
have of the mayor's dues,^
WiUiam Hore, mayor in 1312, we have seen resisting
the Government at the Great Insurrection, pacifying the
rioters when they burst into the GuUdhaU, and also
having great infiuence, from his dignity as mayor, in
saving the lives of the justices.
The first regular summons by writ requiring that
two persons should be sent to the ParUament was issued
to the mayor of Bristol in 1283, But the list of members
does not commence tiU 1295, when John le Taverner was
elected, and thrice subsequently. His large experience
in the National Assembly probably suggested his com
petency to efficiently serve the office of mayor, to which
dignity he was appointed three times,
37. Edward III. began to reign on January 25th,
1327, and was crowned at Windsor on February 1st,
being then scarcely 15 years old.
On the 21st of April in the same year Sir Maurice
de Berkeley, the second son of the late Lord Maurice,
being then constable of the castle of Bristol, was ordered,
with two others, by Edward, to bring from Bristol castle
with him into the north parts, where the king then was
with his army, "such armories and other munitions as
were there, with a mandate to aU sheriffs and other
subjects to be aiding them in that service, and to pro
vide them with carriages," &c. One of Maurice's aids
was his brother John, and as a return for good service
from father and sons, Edward this year restored aU
their lands which had been seized by the late king. ^
On the 14th of December, 1330, the burgesses
obtained by charter the farm of the town for five
years, and on the 20th of January foUowing the king
granted them a confirmation of their charters, amongst
the rest that of Henry III. which decreed that Eed
cUff street (that part within the Port waUs) should
answer to the jurisdiction alone of Bristol, This re-
•vived the feud with the Berkeleys, and Thomas, Lord
de Berkeley, complained to the king, "that whereas he
1 Eobert's Social Hist., 4, " EoUs Par,, IL, 422- 3-32,

had in certain places within the suburbs of the town
of Bristol, amongst his tenants and inhabitants there,
the reformation of the assizes of bread and beer, pUlory,
tumbreU, and other liberties ; that the maior and bay-
lyes of the towne and the cominalty there by ringing
of the common beU assembled themselves togeather,
and ryotously assaulted and wounded his baylyes there,
and with an armed power destroyed the tumbrUl and
piUory, and took John Hind his bayly, carried him to
their GuUdhaU and compeUed him to swear not to exe
cute any judgement in the courts there at any time
after. Whereupon a Commission was sent to the three
Judges of the land to enquire of the truth of the pre
mises by a jury of the county of Gloucester,"^ Thomas
had spotted a weak place in the Bristol men's authority ;
they had no written acknowledgment in any charter to
warrant their ancient practice of holding view of frank
pledge (a court leet), a pri^vUege which they claimed to
have exercised as a right from time immemorial. No
chicken-hearted race were these old ancestors of ours,
when the " trumpet of insurrection " sounded its
stirring notes, the shops were left to the care of the
mistresses and maids, the masters each joined his GuUd,
The cry, " Clubs ! 'Prentices ! Clubs ! " rang from
street to street, and in force they marched to the GuUd
haU, where the burgesses were armed from the armoury,
and headed by their magistrates, and with a cloud of
light skirmishers in the apprentices, ripe and ready for
the fray, they crossed the bridge into Eedcliff to main
tain their rights by force of arms.
Chatterton, although he pitched upon a most unlikely
man to run a tUt in a tournament (Simon de Burton),
was not far ¦wrong when he supposed that Bristol men
were not only spectators but were often actors in such
knightly pastimes. They often j oined in the play of war,
and this made them ready to take their part in its stern
realities. There is a record of a gift by this very Lord
de Berkeley of 28s, %d. to his squires for a tournament at
Bristol. In order to set the question of legality at rest
for ever, the Bristol commonalty, for a fine of £40, ob
tained from the king at Westminster, 16th October,
1331, another confirmation of their charters, in which it
is especiaUy mentioned that non-usage of any of their
liberties hitherto shaU not involve a forfeiture of them;
that the goods or freeholds of orphans which have been
alienated and A\'asted by guardians who have withdrawn
from the town and suburbs and have not left property
in the place, from which the justices could recoup the
orphan, the mayor shaU for ever have power to seize
and to restore, -without regard to the parties into whose
hands they have faUen ; that two of the king's justices,
^ Seyer, II. , 131,

A.D, 1329,

STATE OF THE KINGDOM.

167

WUUam ShareshaU and Eobert de Ashton, having ex
amined by the king's command, and found that from
time of which there is no memory the burgesses have
always held the court leet in the town and suburbs,
together ¦with all things appertaining to such view of
frankpledge, of the men who dweU in Bristol (EedcUff
and Temple), and whereas the said burgesses fear that
they may be molested or impeached for the same, be
cause they can show no special warrant for the practice
in any charter, the king confirms their power to hold
the court in the to^wn and suburbs, together with aU
their liberties for ever. One would think this settled
the matter, but Lord de Berkeley would not relin
quish his claim or own himself beaten. In 1333 he
brought a writ of escheat against WiUiam 
a burgess of Bristol, and demanded a messuage in the
suburb of Bristol which was his, forasmuch as Eobert
de Lardiner held of him by certain services, and now
the said Eobert having committed felony and forswore
the kingdom, the messuage should revert to him Thomas,
Lord de Berkeley, as his escheat. Whereupon stepped
in the baUiff of Bristol ¦with the new charter and de
manded cognizance of the plea in the court of Bristol,
Again, there was a suit over John le Taverner's
property in 1340 ; Taverner had fled the country in con
sequence, as we have seen, of the part he took in the
Great Insurrection, his land in Eedcliff, Lord de Berkeley
claimed as his escheat by ancient grant from the crown.
The land was held by John Fraunces (Mayor 1330)
either as heir, assignee, or offlciaUy, more probably as
an escheat due to the mayor and commonalty of Bristol,
There is no record of the result of this suit unless it be
that it was the cause of the foUowing incident : — In the
year 1342, in execution of a process from the court of
Bristol, John Neel and others took away £100 worth of
this lord's goods at Bedminster, under the king's pro
tection he asserted, and beat and imprisoned his man
Woodesend, then in defence thereof, whereby he lost
his service, &c, ^ How this dispute ended we are not
informed, further than this, ' ' that Berkeley sped the
better because the commission was issued to John Fitz-
nichoU, his next neighbour, and other of his approved
friends," The influence of the town graduaUy prevailed
over the controverted jurisdiction of EedcUff, and in
1373 the charter, which made the town and suburbs a
deflned boundary as a county with county courts and
officers of its own, settled the dispute for ever.
By the machinations of Mortimer, Edward, Earl of
Kent, inveigled into a belief of the existence of Edward
II. , was con^victed of treason, and was most unjustly be
headed on the 21st of March, But the young king was
'¦ Smyth, 290,

tired of being kept in leading strings, and knowing that
the nation had become disgusted with the open profligacy
of the queen and her paramour, he determined to assert
his authority. By a stratagem, IsabeUa and Mortimer,
Earl of March, were seized in Nottingham castle ; the
queen was imprisoned for her life in her manor of
Eisings, and Mortimer, being condemned by a parUa
ment held at Westminster, was hanged at Tyburn on
the 26th of November, 1329,
38. A coarse, rough kind of wooUen cloth had been
woven in this country ever since the Conquest, and many
weavers' guilds were established ; but an impetus was
now given to the home manufacture by the settlement of
seventy famUies of skUled Flemish weavers and fullers
in England in 1331-2, at the invitation and under the
special protection of the king. The exportation of wool
or sheep was forbidden in 1337 and was made an act of
felony; but it is affirmed that a flock of sheep smuggled
out of the country at this time became the source of the
famous merinoes of Sj^ain, The chief article of export
from England hitherto had been its wool, its length of
flbre and fineness being unequaUed upon the continent ;
these quaUties caused it to be in great demand with the
Flemings. When Edward, in 1338, began the war with France,
the Parliament voted him one half of the wool for the
year, estimated at 20,000 sacks, as a subsidy. Knyghton
says it was coUected and sold for £400,000.^ In aUusion
to this Edward's adversary, Philip de Valois, gave him
the nickname of "the wool merchant." In 1340 the king
received a further grant of 30,000 sacks upon giving his
consent to the demand of his people that thenceforth
ministers should be responsible to Parliament, and that
the acts of Government should be examined every
session, a privilege cheaply purchased and tenaciously
held. The people were steadily rising into a higher
stratum of liberty. At the Parliament held in West
minster, in 1332, the prelates and inferior clergy con
sulted apart, the barons and knights of the shires formed
a second conclave, and the citizens and burgesses a
third; these united and amalgamated their reports into
one general advice which they presented to the king.
The inferior clergy were the flrst to object to this
system, which they did upon the ground that they were
overborne by the laity, and compeUed to give more than
their share in grants to the crown than they would have
done in convocation. Again, the barons, who sat in their
own right, had little sympathy with the knights, who,
sitting by election, had in some degree to consider the
interests of their constituents. The result was that the
knights were driven to coalesce with the burgesses, and
1 Knyghton, 270,

168

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1332,

the prelates, deserted by the inferior clergy in the house,
identifled themselves with the barons, so that in 1343,
at Westminster, on the 23rd of April, upon the question
of peace with France, the prelates and barons were
desired by the king to deliberate by themselves, and
the knights and commons to meet in the painted cham
ber, and form their own conclusion ; both parties to meet
in fuU Parliament on May 1st and to report to the king.
In the first or upper chamber there were only the
clergy and laity who held of the crown by barony, and
who were summoned by ¦writ directed to each personaUy,
In the second chamber were the representatives of the
lesser barons or county freeholders, the citizens and the
burgesses. This division into the two houses of Lords
and Commons was as happy a conception as it has been
durable and beneficial. The members of each house,
being nearer in social rank, deliberated more calmly,
the hauteur of the barons could scarcely be expended
on their o-wn class ; whilst the commons, freed from
their presence, spake out freely, and graduaUy acquired
weight and influence.
The advantage of two distinct assemblies, jealous of
each other's power and watchful over each other's con
duct, was seen in this ; every law underwent close ex
amination ere it was presented to the king for his assent;
each House was a check upon the other, and both of
them were watchful over the prerogatives of the crown.
In 1332, Edward was engaged in a war with Scotland,
seeking to put BaUiol upon its throne. The regent,
Donald, Earl of Mar, whilom a prisoner in Bristol castle,
and afterwards its governor and the friend of Edward
II., was defeated in two bloody battles near Perth on the
1 1th and 12th of August, and slain. Young David Bruce,
the rival of BaUiol, fled to Scotland, and helped to com
plicate stUl further the relations between Philip and
Edward. 39. In 1334 the merchants of Gascony complained
to the king that, contrary to their charters of protection
granted by his father and grandfather, many grievances
and hardships were imposed upon them, more especially
by the towns of London and Bristol, which, if they were
not remedied, would prevent their coming with wines
and merchandise to England ; thej' prayed that the king
would send a sergeant-at-arms to make proclamation in
these towns, that they are under the king's protection,
and that he would cause these outrages to cease, and
the offenders to be punished. Amongst other causes of
offence we find that the Bristol men had attacked an
Italian ship carrying wine to HoUand and robbed it of
£40, for which they were duly punished.
"About this time, January 28th, 1331, and again
in 1334," says Seyer, "the king gi-anted letters patent

to the to-wn for the purpose of repairing the waUs and
the quay, to be coUected from aU ships and boats laden
with merchandise, from some one penny each and from
others twopence, which aid was to continue six years.
Whereupon one Philip de Whitton procured a charter
from the king whereby he was appointed to the office of
Quayager for his life, with a profit or salary out of the
above duties, which office was supposed to be perpetual.
Upon which the mayor and bailiffs presented a petition
to the king representing the affair, and praying him to
annul the charter granted to WiUiam Whitton" {i,e,
granted to the father and held by WiUiam). Inas
much as the town had charters granted for the above
purpose continuous^, and renewed at dates that ex
tended from 1330 to 1334, 1337, 1340, 1344, 1347 and
1353,^ this grant would appear only to have been to
the office of coUector at a salary, or by a commission on
the amounts realised, which WiUiam Whitton, the son
of PhUip, sought to make hereditary,
40, The growth of the wooUen cloth trade was now
most rapid, and Bristol appears, in 1341, to have con
tributed its full share ; in the grant of 30,000 sacks to
the king to aid him in his war -with France, Bristol is
rated at 63J- bags, 4 stone, lOJ lbs, Thirteen-four-
teenths of the custom's export duty in 1354 was on
wool ; it exceeded 40 per cent, on the value : only one
provincial town exceeded this — Newcastle was rated at
73i bags, 2 stones, 3f lbs. ^ In 1337, when the export
of wool was prohibited, cloth workers were permitted
to settle in England, from whatever country they might
come, and it was ordained that none but the king,
queen, and a few privUeged persons, should wear cloth
made beyond sea. The chief EngUsh-made cloths up
to this period appear to have been bluett, russet, and
faldings : the first two apparently woven of the undyed
wool, the other a coarse cloth dyed in the piece ; there
was also a striped cloth for servants, with a long nap,
caUed Bristol cotton, that could be re-shorn when the
garment grew shabby. The name cotton, as appUed
to the produce of the shrub Gossypium lierbaceum, was
derived from this fabric.
Now an enterprising burgess of Bristol, with greater
foresight than his fellow townsmen, began, with the aid
of some of these foreigners, to introduce into Bristol a
new manufacture, which eventuaUy gave him a name
and immortalised his fame.
The vast mass of the community had hitherto been
confined to the above-mentioned cloths for personal use.
Thomas, henceforth known as Thomas Blanket (Blan-
chette, a white cloth), set up looms in his house, with
other inhabitants of Bristol, and hired weavers to make
1 Eeports on Municipal Corp., 75, « Seyer, IL, 137.

A.D, 1339.

MERCHANTS OF THE STAPLE.

169

a better kind of fabric, bleached in the wool, close
woven, almost Uke felt, and fairly waterproof. As a
matter of course there was an outcry against this, the
authorities, and the weavers in particular, did not Uke
to see foreign and better skiUed artizans brought into
their town, so the mayor and bailiffs levied a rate upon
them for the setting up of their machines. The king,
however, had more perspicacity than they, and by the
foUo^wing letter reUeved the young manufacturers from
the impolitic burden. It is addressed to the mayor and
baUiffs of the to^wn of Bristol: — "WTiereas lately with
the assent of the prelates, earls, barons, and others
being at our parliament then assembled at Westminster,
it was ordaiaed and agreed, that wool should be made
into cloths -within our kingdom, and that aU those who
were wUUng to make and work cloths of this kind,
should be enabled to make them in aU places of the
kingdom ¦without any kind of hindrance ; and whereas
now we have heard on the part of Thomas Blanket and
others, burgesses of the said to^wn, that whereas they by
favor of the aforesaid agreement and ordinance and of
a proclamation made thereupon on our part (as it is said)
have caused various machines for wea^ving and making
cloths of this sort to be made in their own houses, and
have hired weavers and other workmen for this purpose :
but that you, not considering the premises, exact divers
sums of money from the said Thomas and the others, on
account of the making and setting up (levationis) the
aforesaid machines, and that you trouble and aggrieve
them in various ways on that account, unjustly, as they
assert, to the no smaU expence of Thomas and the others,
and contrary to the ordinance, agreement, and proclama
tion aforesaid ; whereupon they have petitioned us, that
a suitable remedy in this respect may be provided for
them by us ; We considering that the said ordinance,
agreement, and proclamation, if they should be holden
and observed in our kingdom, may turn out to the great
advantage of us and of aU the people of our kingdom,
and being ¦wUUng that the said Thomas and the others
who have chosen to work and make cloths of this sort,
and also the workmen, should be protected and defended
from injuries and improper exactions on that account.
Order you, that you permit the said Thomas and the
others who are wiUing to make cloths of this kind to
cause machines to be erected in their own houses at their
choice for the weaving and making cloths of this kind,
and to have and hold those workmen in the same place,
without making on that account any hindrance, or re
proach [ealumnid^ or undue exaction : not molesting or
aggrieving them in any respect contrary to the form of
the aforesaid ordinance, agreement and proclamation.
Provided always, that the Customs and other profits due
[Vol. L]

to us from such cloths, if there be any, shaU be paid to
our use, as is proper. Witness the Eegent [ Cusfode'] of
England at Langele xxv day of Nov,"^
From the fact that this letter is ¦written in 1339, it is
evident that Blanket must have begun his new trade
before, or at least very soon after the passing of the
statute of 1337. The king's ¦wise letter brought peace
between the parties in Bristol, and his favour speedUy
exalted Blanket in the estimation of his f eUow-burgesses,
inasmuch as they chose him as one of the bailiffs in
1341. Edmundus Blanket was also chosen baiUff in
1350. The strife against the foreign weavers continued
longer in London, The men were cruelly insulted and
their Uves endangered, so that " in 1344 the king issued
his mandate to the mayor and sheriff of London com
manding them to apprehend any person who disturbed
the clothweavers, commit them to Newgate, and send
him their names that he might punish them,"^
The king's favour caused the wooUen manufacture to
develop rapidly in Bristol and the West, new kinds of
cloth were woven, and soon we read of serges, broad
cloths, medley and Dorset kerseys, Dorsetshire dozens,
and single bays. The Bristol cottons were also woven at
Bridgwater and Taunton, their long nap and fluffy face
was the reason why their appellation was in after years
transferred to a very different material.
The men employed in the cloth trade were weavers,
Webbers, tuckers, walkers (who thickened the cloth by
walking and stamping upon it), fuUers, miUmen, shear
men, dyers, forcers, carders, and sorters of wool, spin
ners and spuUars of yarn, &c. The colours which were
in general use in the West were black, blue, bottle
green, invisible green, scarlet, tawney, russet, sadnew,
Asewer, Watchet (sky blue), sheep's colour, lion colour,
crane colour, old medley, marble grey, iron grey or
motley, puke or dark grey, friars' grey, &c. Some of
these trade names and colours are of a later date.
41, We have abstracted the foUowing from Mac
pherson's Annals of Commerce and Craik's British Com
merce, in order to show the pitiable condition of the
merchants who dealt in staple goods, and the difficulty
they must have experienced in such a series of changes,
to know when and where to charter their ships : —
" The merchants of the staple (otherwise the merchants of
England, being all natives of the country, and so called to dis
tinguish them from the merchants of the Steelyard, the mer
chants of Cologne, &c,), were incorporated in 1313 by Edward
II, to purchase and collect all that could be spared of the chief
commodities of the kingdom, wool, woolfells (sheep skins) and
leather (tin and lead were afterwards added), and to convey the
same to certain towns which were called staple towns, in order

Seyer, IL, 138, 139,

Eym, Eoed, 5, 429.
M 2

170

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1344.

that the king's customs might be collected with ease, and that
foreign merchants might know where to meet with a supply. Also
to export these wares to foreign countries in return for goods,
coin, and bullion. Merchants of the staple were exempted from
the jurisdiction of the ordinary magistrates and subjected only to
the authority of a mayor and constable of the staple chosen
annually in each of these towns, who were to judge in all disputes
by merchant law, and not by the common law, ^ It was, in fact,
a combination of the principle of the guild and of the royal pri-
¦vUege of establishing fairs and markets. Correctors were chosen
iu each staple town to register all bargains, who were paid by fee.
Six mediators, as a jury, were also appointed, two being Germans,
two Lombards, and two Englishmen, who were to settle all dis
putes in the presence of the mayor and constables of the staple.
Many privileges and immunities were conferred upon this incor
poration, and it was made felony to attempt to deprive it of its
privUeges, "2 Antwerp was made the first staple, then it was re
moved from the Continent and, in 1326, Cardiff, which was at that
date the property of Hugh Despencer, the younger, was one and
the only one of the towns whose name has been preserved, probably
Bristol, however, was another. In 1328 Edward III, ordered that
all staples beyond sea and on this side should cease, and all trade be
carried on upon the principles of the great charter. In 1332 they
were re-enacted, as far as certain English towns were concerned.
In 1334 again abolished by Parliament at York. In 1341 re
established at Bruges, in Flanders. In 1348, because the young
Elemish Earl refused to marry Edward's daughter, the privilege
was withdra-wn, and Calais, being then most thoroughly English
(aU natives with the exception of one priest and two lawyers had
been removed), Edward, anxious to people it with Englishmen so
that he might have a gate into France or the Low Countries and
keep the command of the Channel, made it the staple town for tin,
lead, feathers, English-made woollen cloths and worsted stuff for
seven years. In 1353 the staple was again removed by Act of
Parliament from the Continent and fixed "for ever" to be for
England at nine towns, Bristol being one of them; at Carmarthen
for Wales ; and Dublin, Waterford, Cork and Drogheda for Ireland.
The "everlasting" of Parliament, it seems, lasted 10 years exactly,
for in 1363 the staple was once more shifted to Calais on their plea
of decaying trade. During the French war it was conferred upon
towns on the east and north-east coasts of England, and also to
Bristol ; it was given back to Calais upon the same old plea, in
1376, with the addition of cheese, butter, honey, tallow, peltry
(skins of aU kinds) and gaidce, which are supposed to have been
osiers for basket weaving. In 1378 a breach of the Act was made
in favour of Genoa, Venice, Catalonia and Arragon, which towns
were permitted to trade in goods of the staple at Southampton, by
paying the Calais scale of duties. In 1382 all merchants -w-ere
aUowed to carry wool, leather and woolfells to any country except
France upon the same condition. In 1384 the staple was shifted to
Middleburgh. In 1388 it was given back to Calais. In 1390 it was
brought back to Bristol and the other towns, as iu 1353. In 1391
it was again shifted, and was ordered to be where the lords of the
council should direct, but for at least a part of the year the staple
of tin and wool was to be at Calais. Finally, in 1538, when the
French recovered that town, it was fixed at Bruges, by which
date, however, the staple laws had become, to a great extent,
inoperative, Bristol StiU possesses the seal granted her by Edward
in. for the mayor of the staple, who appears always to
have been the mayor of the town for the time being.
From these beginnings the wooUen trade in Bristol
1 Statutes 27 Edw, III, ° Statutes 21 and 24 Edw. III.

greatly increased and became a source of wealth to the
town. The weavers dwelt chiefly in Thomas and Temple
streets, where they had a chapel for their craft between
the two, and another in Temple church. Tucker street
was the home of the tuckers or fuUers who, by beating,
thickened the cloth ; two of the rack hays, or fields,
for stretching the cloth, still retain the name, and a part
of High street was called the Drapery, Many sums of
money were, in subsequent years, bequeathed for the
purpose of being lent, free of interest, to young clothiers.
In 1377 the citizens of Bath, being many of them cloth-
makers, complained of the jealousy of the Bristol manu
facturers, and they procured an order from the king pro
hibiting the men of Bristol from holding a fair on the
same day that the cloth fair was held in Bath, ^ Skelton,
the poet, in the reign of Henry VIII,, mentions, as part
of the dress of a lady, "her kirtle was of Bristol red."
Watchet was famed for its flne Ught blue cloth. Some
of our most notable citizens, it wiU be seen hereafter,
were connected with this trade.
Edward persisting in his claim to the throne of
France, as being the nearest male heir (he claimed
through his mother IsabeUa), gathered, in 1344, troops
from aU quarters, and Thomas, Lord de Berkeley, was,
with others, authorised to raise and arm at first 222
men, and afterwards 400 more out of the county of
Gloucestershire and the town of Bristol, Many of these
were among the heroes and the bombardiers of Cressy,
which was fought in 1346.
The king, in 1344, granted to Maurice de Berkeley,
for some unrecorded piece of service, two hogsheads of
wine yearly, for his life, out of the port of Bristol;
probably the above-named le-vy wiU supply the reason
for the grant ; a warrant was given to his officers there
to deliver the same,
42, WiUiam de Coleford, the recorder, at the request
of the commonalty of Bristol, drew up and recorded in
writing, in 1345, the ordinances, customs, liberties, and
by-laws of the town [foUowing the precedent example of
the citizens of London for whom, in 1274, the liber Antiquis
Zegibus of London had been written]. This is stiU in
existence, and is known as the Little Red Book, The fol
lowing is the heading in Latin to a body of ordinances
begun at folio 13 (it foUows after a copy of the Routes de
Oleroun" in Norman French) :—"/« honorem dei omnipo-
tentis et pro tranquillitate pads viUam B, inhabitantium,
^ Warner's Hist, of Bath, 174.
^ These rules were, for many years, the accepted code of law
for the government of shipping, they lie at the foundation of our
naval common law or custom. They were terribly despotic and
severe ; for instance, " If a captain discovered that a pUot had
played him false he might take him to the lee side of the ship
and without form of trial behead him,"

A.D. 1345,

THE LITTLE RED BOOK.

171

ad rogatum communitatis ejusdem ville, ego W. de Colford
extunc ibidem recordator 18 Edw, III,, ordinaciones consuetu
dines ac libertates subscriptas pro communitate ville predicte
factas recordari feci et in presenti papiro, Sfc, ascribi, Sfc,"
Upon the outside of this remarkable book is the fol
lowing, written by Eobert Eicart upon parchment and
preserved by a covering of horn (a veritable horn-book,
showing the way in which desirable mementoes were
preserved) : — Liber riibeus ville Bristollie, in quo con-
tinentur plurime libertates franchesieque, constitucione\_s'\
dicte ville, Ordinaciones diuer sarum arcium, composiciones-
que pluri[m']arum canteriarum, ac aliarum multarum car-
tarum libertatum a tempore quo non existat memoria impe-
tratarum. Its chief contents are — The Oath of the
electors to the CouncU, Eentals of the Town, lists of
the Mayors and of the 48 electors, EedcUff Charters,
Lex Mercatoria, Ordinances of the Crafts, the Estatuz
de la Myer, the towns within the jurisdiction of the
Admiralty of Bristol, Copies of Bristol Charters, Com
positions of Chantries, enrolments of the Charters of
other to-wns for aUocatio, Oaths of Officers, an order to
proclaim "The leege taken bytwixt Englond and Castyle
12 July 7 Edw. [IV,]," Proclamations to be made in
the town periodicaUy, ^ besides the Ordinances and the
Eoules de Oleroun before mentioned. As the last date
is 1574, many of these, it is evident, were added by
Eicart and others. There are many subjects of interest
in the above enumeration, one especiaUy sho^wing what
indeed we had a hint of in the Great Insurrection, that
the burgesses had formed a common council twenty-
eight years before it was established by charter in 1373,
and that the number flxed upon continues to the present
day, notwithstanding the enormous increase in the popu
lation, Seyer thought that he had discovered a palpable
error in this record which states that the commonalty
had agreed on many useful laws, &c,, which were con
firmed by the charter obtained from Edward on the 16th
of October, 1331. He says, ordinances made in 1345
could not be confirmed in 1331. It seems to us to mean
that they aU (men of Bristol, EedcUff and Temple),
as co-burgesses, were simply agreeing together that the
said charter of 1331, which united the contested jurisdic
tions, should be read and confirmed by themselves, as
the Mayor and Commonalty, in 1345, and being put
upon record should form, as indeed it did, a basis for
that permanent settlement which was subsequently con
firmed by the king and carried out when Bristol was
made a county in 1373. One of the regulations enacts
' ' that no leprous man stay within the precincts of the
town, nor any common woman within its waUs ; and if
1 Eicart's Calendar, Ed, Lucy Toulmin Smith, xxv.

such women be found residing there, then the doors and
windows of the house shaU be unhung and carried by
the Serjeants of the mayor to the house of the constable
of the ward, and there be kept tiU the women be re
moved. That no whores should ever appear in the
streets, or even within the Barrs without their head
covered," The law of 1353 compeUed such persons to
wear striped hoods and dresses turned inside out. The
Barrs lay between the house of the Dominican Friars
and the priory of St, James, and was a leading high
way into Gloucestershire ; it continued to be, until 1480
at least, the residence of the class aUuded to ; it is stUl
known as Barrs lane.
The great highway of nations was at this period in
fested not merely with pirates who preyed upon and
captured ships of other nations than their own, but
ships belonging to England were actuaUy fitted out for
piratical attacks on their feUow- countrymen haUing from
different ports ; thus, "in 1342, the men of Yarmouth
were fined 1,000 marks, because that in conjunction
with the men of HuU they had sent out marauders
against the shipping of London and Bristol," ^
43, The royal navy at the time of the war consisted
of only 25 ships, and in order to convey his troops to
the continent the king had to rely upon his seaport
towns for the means of transport. The foUowing is a
list of ships and men furnished by the named ports : —

Bristol London ,..
Sandwich...FoweyYarmouthIlfracombe

Ships. 2222 22
47 43 6

Men. 608 662508770
1,950 79

Cardiff ... .

Ships. 1 .

Men. 51

Bridgwater HuU 

1 ,
, 16 .

. 15
. 466

Southampton .
Looe 

. 21 .
. 20 .

. 576
. 315

Dartmouth

. 32 .

.. 756

The total number of ships (the term ships includes
vessels of every kind of rig then known) taken up was
477 ; the complement of mariners for each was 20, Not
only were men and ships required, but money was sorely
needed; the king, in 1345, directed his commission to
Thomas, Lord de Berkeley, and others, who were to
inquire upon oath what each man's estate in lands in
the county of Gloucestershire and the town of Bristol was
worth from £5 to £1,000, Smyth considers that Lord
de Berkeley had scruples as to the legality of this com
mission, some of the returns being stiU left in Berkeley
castle ; this is most probable, for Edward frequently ex
torted money by his own authority from his subjects,
and even maintained his right to impose taxes for the
defence of the realm without the consent of Parliament
or people ; but he was too sagacious to push the matter
to extremity, hence when he found a strong, determined
' Eobert's Social Hist., 76,

172

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1346,

opposition, he let the right which he claimed lie in abey
ance, and adopted more suave measures,
England was at this time prosperous, wealthy and
victorious. At Cressy on August 26th, 1346, Edward's
little army of 5,500 men, every man on foot, had stood
shoulder to shoulder fighting, EngUsh prowess left
of the enemy dead upon the field 11 princes, 80
bannerets, 1,200 knights, and 30,000 soldiers. At
NevUle's Cross in the same year, on October 17th,
Queen Philippa defeated with terrible slaughter the
invading Scotch army, and took their king, David
Bruce, prisoner. These victories were won by the Eng
lish archers. " Every English archer," said the Scottish
proverb, " carries under his girdle 24 Scottish lives,"
aUuding to the number of arrows carried by them, and
to their skUl with the bow,
Edward, himself the very soul of chivalry, which was
the nobleness of feudaUsm, became practicaUy its de
stroyer. On the proud day of Cressy the yeoman of
England learned that in fair flght he was the equal of
the haughtiest knight. Churls had smitten down
nobles, bondsmen had sent their arrows through cors
lets of maU and their long knives into the hearts of
princes and barons. The whole poUtical mUitary fabric
of feudalism was doomed when PhUip, with the bare
remnant of his chivalry, turned and gaUoped away from
" the base EngUsh churls," who stUl stood an unbroken
phalanx on the Uttle hiU close by the viUage of Cressy.
The shouts of exultation that rang throughout England at
the glorious news from the vaUey of the Somme, nerved
the arms of the men who routed the Scottish host, and
took captive their king. But the cUmax was reached
when a handful of famished men, about 7,500 in number
(camp foUowers included), encountered, in 1356, amidst
the vineyards of Maupertuis, the flower of the chivalry
of France, in a second trial of strength, and, after slay
ing 8,000 of their foes and taking the French king, a
host of his nobles and 2,000 men-at-arms prisoners,
pursued the remaining 3,000 to the very gates of Poic
tiers, From that hour the feudal pretension of the
knights to be the only men who knew how to flght was
shattered. "The EngUsh had t^wice conquered France
with a handful of yeomen," henceforth the mUitary power
must be sought in the people, and in many a desperate
struggle from Cressy down to Eorke's Drift, and from
Agincourt to Innkerman, the rank and fUe of the British
army have verifled the pettish exclamation of the greatest
warrior of the 19th century, "These English, they
never know when they are beaten ! "
In 1347 Edward besieged and took Calais, and ex-
peUing the inhabitants, aU but one priest and two
lawyers, colonised it with Englishmen. Bristol fur

nished 22 ships and 608 men to aid in this undertaking,
for which, and taking advantage of the king's need of
money, and the unsettled state of the kingdom, the
burgesses now obtained the foUowing charter : —
" Edward by the grace of God king of England and France
and lord of Ireland to all, to whom these present letters shall
come, [sendeth] health. Whereas, as we have heard, very many
evil doers and disturbers of our peace wander and run about by
day and night in the town of Bristol doing harms, mischiefs and
excesses in various ways to our subjects of those parts, to the no
small terror of our people there, and to the manifest breach of our
said peace ; We, desiring that our peace should be strictly kept
in the town aforesaid as in the other places of our kingdom of
England, and willing that the disturbers and violators of the same
our peace should be duly punished, as is right ; have granted for
ourselves and our heirs to our beloved the mayor, bailiffs and good
men of the said to-wn of Bristol, that they be empowered to make
anew and to have and hold for themselves and their successors for
ever one place of confinement for prisoners within the to-wn afore
said, in order to imprison in the same such evil doers and distur
bers of our peace, if any shall happen to be found in the same
place wandering about by night, in the same manner as is usual in
our city of London, We have also granted for ourselves and our
heirs to the same mayor, bailiffs and good men, that they ajid their
successors aforesaid for the better keeping of the assize of bread
to be made in the town aforesaid, shall be empowered in future to
inflict such a punishment on bakers who break that assize in the
same place ; viz., to draw such bakers who oflfend against that
assize upon sledges thro' the streets of the town aforesaid, and
otherwise to punish them, as is practised in like manner with re
gard to such bakers in our city of London. In witness whereof
we have caused these our letters to be made patent. Witness,
our most dear son Lionel, guardian of England. At Eeading the
24th day of April, in the 21st year of our reign of England, but
of our reign of France the 8th,"
44, But now, when exultant with victory and rejoic
ing in material prosperity, our countrymen had to meet
with and combat unarmed a sterner, deacUier foe, to
whom their ignorance of sanitary measures had every
where shown an open door, and whose desolating march
swept the whole world from Eastern India to the shores
of the Atlantic,
We give a summary from historians of this terrible
visitation: — This year and the foUowing there was a
general mortality of men throughout the whole world. It
flrst began in India, then it came to Tarsus, then to the
Saracens, and lastly to the Christians and the Jews ; so
that in the space of one year, i,e,, from Easter to Easter,
as the report prevaUed in the coui-t of Eome, there died,
nearly by a sudden death, in those remote regions eight
mUlions of persons besides Christians, . . . There
died at Avignon (the residence of the Pope) in one day
1,312 persons, and on another day more than 400 persons.
Of the Friars Preachers in Provence there died 358 in
Lent; and at Montpelier out of 140 friars there re
mained only 7, At Magdalene out of 1 60 there remained
only 7 friars, and yet there were enough. At MarseiUes

A,D, 1347.

WAR AND PESTILENCE.

173

out of 1 60 and 1 0 Friars Minors there did not remain a
single one who might inform the rest, which was weU,
Of the CarmeUtes, there died at Avignon 66 before the
citizens discovered what had happened, for they thought
they had kUled each other. Of the hermits of England
at A^vignon there did not remain one ; and no matter, ^
, , , At the same time the plague prevailed in Eng
land, beginning in autumn at some places, and, running
through the country, it ceased at the same time next
year, ... It entered the maritime parts of the
country by Southampton and came to Bristol, and there
died in a manner the whole strength of the town, seized,
as it were, by a sudden death ; for there were few who
kept their bed more than three or two days, or half a
day ; afterwards cruel death itself broke out aU around
them according to the course of the sun, , , , The
plague raged to such a degree in Bristol that the living
were scarcely able to bury their dead. The grass grew
several inches high in High street and Broad street, for
the pestilence raged at flrst chiefly in the centre of the
city, scarce the tenth person was left aUve male or
female. The Gloucestershire men would not suffer the
Bristol people to have any access to them. Neverthe
less the "Black Death" reached Gloucester, Oxford and
London, where it was equaUy fatal, and it is computed
that one half of the people of England perished in one
year. The churchyards were not sufficient for the dead,
and other places had to be appointed. The churches
were without officiating priests; before this a man might
have a chaplain for two marks a year and his board,
after this awful ¦visitation scarce anyone would accept a
vicarage at £20 per annum, , , . Then foUowed a
sacerdotal infliction on the land such as once befel the
Israelites of old. Multitudes of UUterate men and
¦widowers flocked into orders "for a morsel of bread,"
men who could scarcely read, and who were to a great
extent ignorant of the sacred duties, and far more desti
tute of the spirit in which they should have been per
formed. ... At the same time there feU a great
murrain upon the beasts and sheep aU over the king
dom, in one pasture there died 5,000, which putrefled
so that neither bird nor beast would eat them.
Prices ruled very low through fear of death, for few
in their despondency cared for wealth ; a man might
have a horse worth 40s, for 6s, 8d,, a large fat ox for
4s,, a cow for Is,, a heifer for 6d,, a fat wether for 4d,,
a sheep for Sd,, a lamb for 2d,, a large hog for 5d,, and
a stone of wool for 9d, The sheep and oxen wandered
untended amongst the flelds of corn, and died in incal-
^ Knyghton was one of the canons regular, his inhuman glory
ing over the death of the friars shows the "brotherly love" that
united these sections of the Eomish churoh.

culable numbers in ditches and hedges, uncared for
"because there was so great a want of slaves and ser
vants that there was no one who knew what to do,"
45. As Cressy had liberated the yeoman and enabled
him to set a value upon himself, so did this calamity,
horrible as are its detaUs, set the poor bondsman free,
or at least show him a road that led out of serfdom.
The foUowing autumn mowers asked Sd, and reapers Is,
per day, sums that may be multipUed at least by 15 or
perhaps 20 to flnd an equivalent at the present time.
Much corn, of course, perished in the flelds. There was
a surplus of material for trading purposes, but a de
ficiency of labour and artisans. Barns and houses in
country and town f eU to pieces for lack of repairs, build
ings as yet were chiefly " treene " {i.e, wooden from the
ground floor upwards). ViUages were deserted, and
many a hamlet, whose green had been wont to resound
on Sundays and on a summer's eve ¦with the noisy sports
in which a servile race are apt to seek relief from the
cowed labour of daily life, was now silent and deserted.
The antiquary occasionaUy finds sites once busy ¦with
country life, whose worn foundations point to a time of
sudden extermination of their inhabitants, and supersti
tion haunts them with shades of the long since dead.
The foUowing winter, agricultural servants were at
a premium everywhere, flocks were shepherdless, swine
roamed at wiU in the pannage, and not even a herdboy
could be found to tend the beasts. In consequence of
this scarcity of workmen and servants all kinds of food
and goods went up to famine prices, as much as 400 or
500 per cent, above the ordinary rates. The lords who,
by custom, largely took the value of their rentals out in
service by day's work from their tenants, were compeUed
to remit or excuse them, or consent to take a smaU
money rent, rather than aUow the lands to go altogether
uncultivated and the houses and buildings faU into ruin.
By the extravagant demands of the thus emancipated
labouring class and the bands of landless men who
wandered about seeking professedly for work, but acting,
as occasion served, the part of sturdy beggars, highway
men, or bandits of the woods, the labour market had
been completely changed. The populace were every
where masters of the situation, and this for the flrst
time in England's history. To remedy this the Statute
of Labourers was passed, which enacted that every man
under three score years of age, not possessed of lands or
private means, should be compeUed to serve any master
who required his services, and that at the rate of wage
whichhad been customary in 1 346, Eefusal, tobepunished
with imprisonment. This proving inefficient every man
was once more tied to the soil, being forbidden to leave
his parish in search of better paid employment on pain

174

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, I35I,

of being declared a " fugitive," and as such liable to
imprisonment. Fines and forfeiture to the king were
inflicted upon aU who engaged such men, or any servant,
at an advanced rate of wage, StiU, where a man by his
labour at the old rate could not earn enough to buy
himself food, this law necessarily faUed, although for a
time it largely increased the royal revenue. Employers
joined with the men in evading it. Then runaway
labourers were branded in the forehead with a red hot
iron, and the harbouring of serfs in towns was put down
with rigour. In the towns strikes and combinations of
artisans became, for the flrst time, an acknowledged
fact. In the country the allied viUans and free labourers
combined, organised an armed resistance, and were
helped with funds by the wealthy yeomen. It culminated
at last under the leadership of John Ball, the "mad
priest," as Froissart terms him, who preached openly
the rights of man. It was, in fact. Communistic Socialism
defying the tyranny of property. The shrewd wit of
Englishmen condensed BaU's leveUing doctrine into the
popular rhyme — ¦
' ' When Adam delved and Eve span.
Who was then the gentleman ? "
This struggle, which lasted to the death of Edward IIL,
a period of some thirty years, wUl be again aUuded to.
In our own neighbourhood the conflict began early,
Thomas, Lord de Berkeley, had special commissions sent
him to suppress the violence that arose; and "nothing
gave him more trouble than the appeasing and punish
ing of a very great assembly of most riotous and re
beUious persons of the counties of Gloucester, Somerset
and Bristol, who had taken upon them regal power, and
chosen a captain in the nature of a king to govern them;
and, after proclamations by them made, had entered upon
divers ships laden with corn and other provisions ready
to go by the king's command to Gascony (held at that
time by the Black Prince and his English soldiers), and
by violence had taken the same away, and had beaten
and wounded divers mariners," ^
One wishes naturaUy for some more deflnite record
of this Bristol Jack Cade and particulars of his exploits,
but the chronicles are mute. Only one name is recorded
of such a partisan leader, and the locaUty of his opera
tions is not given ; he wore upon his coat, embroidered
in letters of silver, the blasphemous inscription, "I am
Captain Warner, commander of a troop of robbers, an
enemy to God, without pity, and without mercy," (They
robbed without scruple,) "Peter, the king of Cyprus
and Jerusalem, was stopped by such a troop on the
highway and stripped of his money and baggage," ^
1 Eot, Pat,, 21 Edw, III,, m, 32,
'¦^ Henry, Hist. Eng,, VIII., 386,

In 1351 Lucy de Newchurch, who desired to quit the
world for a secluded life, after due inquiry into her con
duct, purity of life, and possession of the necessary
virtues by the Bishop of Worcester, obtained leave so
to do, and was shut up in a hermitage on Brandon hiU ;
she had a piece of ground, walled in, and a croft near
by. This hiU was, at that period, an isolated spot, the
nearest inhabited dwelling being most probably down in
Woodwell lane,
46, In 1356 Edward, wishing to consiUt the mer
chants of England on certain affairs which much con
cerned the interests of the realm, directed letters, on the

Details of Eoof of the Hall of Sirycer's House,
8th June, at Westminster, to about 180 persons of this
description, requiring their attendance on the Sunday
foUowing June 24th, Amongst the recipients of these
letters in Bristol were the foUowing : — Walter de Framp
ton (the man who rebuilt the church of St, John the
Baptist), John de Wycombe, Eobert Cheddre, Eobert
Beauflower, Edmund Blanket, Thomas Blanket, John
de Cobyndon, and Eichard le Spycer,
[The beautifuUy carved door of Spycer's house, with
paneUed side posts and spandreUs, of the Decorated
period, may stiU be seen on the Welsh Back ; within
are some interesting remains which consist of an open
oak roof, the arches springing from grotesque corbel

A,D. 1360.

QUEEN PHILIPPA' S DOWER.

175

heads in the waU, "In the rear of the house there are
the remains of the screen forming the entrance to the
haU, now entirely bare, deserted, and decayed, the
dimensions of which are 32ft, by 21ft, The roof,
which longitudinaUy is divided into ten bays, is plain,
but good in character, and consists constructionaUy of
principal and common rafters, collar, and purlins, the
angles of which are chamfered, and moulded waU-plate,
Under the coUar, which is high up between the rafters,
is a main arch, with chamfered edges, resting at the
foot on a foUated capital in each alternate truss, the
intermediate one abutting direct on the wall. There
are two Unes of arched wind-braces, the centres of which
alternate one over the other. The wind-braces are tra-
ceried, and the general effect is exceedingly good,"^
The work dates from about the middle of the 14th
century. There is also a piscina in a wall on the
ground floor, and in the inner court are several early
doorways and masked corbels ; the four-leaved motUd-
ing (of which an iUustration is given on page 149) is
seen in many portions of the woodwork, Spycer also
founded the chapel of St, George, adjoining the GuUd
haU,] What the king wanted from these men is not stated,
probably money or ships, or both, for the French
war (the battle of Poictiers was fought on Sunday,
the 18th of the foUowing September), or it may have
been to consult them upon the removal of the staple
from Bruges to Calais, which was then contemplated
by him. But one thing seems tolerably clear that
these Bristol burgesses obtained some months after
this visit the charter given on page 172, which enabled
them "to make anew a place of conflnement for prisoners
within the town aforesaid, in order to imprison in the
same such evU doers and disturbers of the peace, if any
should be found in the same place wandering about by
night, in the same manner as in the city of London.
Also for the better keeping of the assize of bread, they
are empowered in future to inflict such a punishment
on bakers who break that assize in the same place ; viz.,
to draw such bakers who offend against that assize
through the streets of the town aforesaid, and other
wise to punish them as is practised in like manner with
regard to such bakers in the city of London." The
¦witness to this charter is "our most dear son Lionel
[not 9 years old], guardian of England: dated Eeading,
24th AprU, the 2 Ist of our reign of England, but of our
reign of France the 8th," The charter, which is in beauti
ful preservation in the Archives of Bristol, has an iUumin-
ated initial letter (engraved on this page) which contains
in the upper half the constable with his staff driving
1 F. T, DoUman, Ancient Domestic Architecture,

two persons into a sort of huge wooden dog kennel. In
the lower half an unhappy baker, bound upon a sledge
with his unjust scales suspended over his head, is being
dra^wn through the streets by two horses, driven by a
man with a triple-lashed whip. The "like manner," or
custom of London was, for the flrst offence, "let him be
drawn on a hurdle from the GuUdhaU to his own house,
through the great streets where there may be most
people assembled, and through the great streets that
are most cUrty, with the faulty loaf hanging from his
neck." For the second offence "he is to be drawn from
the GuUdhaU to the pillory, to stand therein one hour ;"
for the third default, " he shall be drawn, his oven
pulled down, and he forswear the trade in the city for

Initial Letter from old Bristol Charter,
47. Queen PhUippa was dowered, in 1328, with the
town of Bristol and its castle, after the usual practice.
The castle and tower of London for the king, the castle of
Bristol for the queen. In 1360 she granted to Edmund
Flambard the constableship of Bristol, which he re
signed ; she then granted it to Eobert de Foulehurst,
whose appointment the king confirmed.^ This queen
was greatly and deservedly beloved in Bristol, There
are heads representing her in St, PhiUp's, St, Michael's,
and there was another in Clifton church ; that she had
a share in the building of the crypt of St, Nicholas is
likely from the fact that the boss on the key rib of the
first groining on the west side of the south aisle contains
a flne mask of her face, in the same head-dress as that
of her effigy on her tomb in Westminster abbey. On
^ Liber Albus, 232. 2 Evans, 87.

176

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1361.

the south tierceron key is also one of Edward III, This
proves that the PerpendiciUar style of architecture was
commenced in England rather earlier than is usuaUy
supposed, Philippa died in 1370,
In 1358 the society of Thomas a Becket, which
merged, we think, in after years into the society of the
Merchant Adventurers, was founded. This was the
second maritime trading company of England, the
Staple Merchant Company, founded in 1319, being the
first. In 1361 the state of Ireland was so dangerous and
alarming that the king summoned a councU to advise
with him as to its defence ; one of the writs is directed
to the abbot of St, Augustine, As the writs were only
directed to those who had lands in Ireland, we infer
that the monastery in Bristol had still some interest
in Dublin, under the charter of Henry II. , 1172, The
king's son, Lionel, Earl of Ulster, with aU the magnates
of the realm who had lands in Ireland, and a large
army were to go over. If they were weak of body, any
of them, they were to send sufficient persons in their
stead, and in order to expedite the affair they were to
attend in person or by proxy at Westminster in the three
weeks of Easter next. The writ was dated March 15th,
Lord Maurice de Berkeley became Lord of Bristol on
the death of his father. This is he who was wounded
through both thighs, as before related, at the battle of
Poictiers, In 1362 the French language was ordered to be
discontinued and English to be used in aU law pro
ceedings. This j^ear complaint was made of the high
price of wines and other victuals in Bristol and other
towns, to the great damage of the people, and the
commons pray that the statutes and ordinances regu
lating the prices may be put in force. The staple
of wool was this year established in Bristol, and the
mayor was made mayor of the staple and held a staple
court ; Edmund Blanket was the appropriate name of
the mayor.
In 1366 Sir John de Gournay, Lord of Knowle,
granted the ground for an aqueduct from Pile hiU to
Temple gate, from a fountain caUed Eaven's weU, at a
place caUed Hales, and in 1368 the above-named Lord
Maurice de Berkeley died, and was succeeded by his
son, the fourth Lord Thomas, who married Margaret,
daughter of Warren de Lisle,
48, Upon the death of Queen Philippa the king took
the town and castle into his own hands, and farmed it
out to Walter Derby and Henry Derneford, both Bristol
burgesses, for £100 a year, uj)on these conditions: —
The}' were to hold from Michaelmas to Michaelmas the
"houses, shops, cottages, selds, tofts, gardens, miUs,

ponds, tine of the castle, landgables, rents, toUs, pleas
of courts, fair of market, customs, and aU other rights
in the same manner as the mayor and commonalty
held the same town from the grant of PhUippa, late
queen of England, The garden below the castle (King's
Orchard) and the garden towards Berton only excepted.
Saving aU royal liberties and prerogatives. Saving also
to our constable of the said castle the grinding of corn
for his own table, and that of his family and of the
garrison, at the miUs of the said town free of expense,
Eent to be paid in equal instalments at Easter and
Michaelmas, The ponds of the miUs to be repaired by
the farmers, who may dig stone for the purpose on the
king's land, with the approval of the steward. The
farmers also to pay £20 a year wages to the constable
of the castle, 2d. a day for the wages of the porter, and
id. a day for the wages of two day watchmen, and for
the same watchmen halfpenny a night, said wages to be
paid weekly or quarterly at the option of the constable ;
also to pay to the abbot of Tewkesbury £14 10s. for the
year's tithe of the town ; to the prior of St. James', of
Bristol, 60s. out of the rent of the town miU; to the
water bailiff of the town 26s., and 8i. a year for his robe;
to the keeper of the Kingswood forest l^d. every day; to
pay all other accustomed rents, alms and burdens; to
keep intact the payment to the king of the said £100,
and to keep all buildings, miUs, pools, &c., in good
repair. The mayor and commonalty are ordered to
transfer aU their rights, as previous farmers, to Derby
and Derneford, so that they maj^ make their own ad
vantage, &c. This farm altogether amounts to only
£158 lis., which shows how the town had suffered from
the great plague and its subsequent results," ^
49, In 1372 Walter Derby aud John Stokes were
members for Bristol. These were the last bm-gesses
returned to Parliament for the town by the sheriffs of
Gloucestershire. The king sent another naval expedi
tion to the coast of France. Some of the returns of
the fleet of 1357, and the charges incident to its equip
ment, have been preserved, from which we gather that
the ships ranged in size from 40 to 100 tons, and that
very few of them were of so great a burden as 200 tons.
These had a master and constable, whose daily pay was
&d. each ; the mariners had Sd. and the pages l^d. In
some instances (for going into action we suppose) these
had extra rewards given, the archers had Qd. and the
men-at-arms Is, per day, Philip Scorlewe was master
of the George, of Bristol, 90 tons; she carried 16 men-
at-arms, 16 archers, 76 mariners and 1 page, besides
the constable and master. At another period she car
ried 23 archers and 56 mariners. Larger ships had, in
^ Seyer, II,, 149-50-1.

A,D. 1373.

BRISTOL MADE A COUNTY BY CHARTER.

177

addition, a captain to command the fighting men,
Bristol ships named are as foUow: —
Ship, Master, Money paid, 0\vners.
Trinity , John Davy

The

Money paid.

Katerine , John Piers

TheCogge John ,
James Godbizete or
Godbiete The Cog
Saint mari
Margaret ,
Elyanore ,
The Cogg
Thomas
Grace dieu

Money paid,
£ s,
•^2ojJol^nDodyng,John| j Da-vy and John Bord \
{ John Piers, John 1
6 0 \ WygenandNicholas } 6 13
( Phelps  )
Thomas Kuappe , 10 0 Thomas Knappe , 11 4
Walter Frampton ) no a ) Walter Frampton I ,» ^
and Elias Spelly , ^^ " j and EUas Spelly , ( ^' -^^

John Castell and
John Seley , ,
John SpeUy , ,
John Godefroy ,
Walter Herford ,
Eichard Andrew ,
Walter Cogan

10

»1

John Castell and
John Seley , , ,

3 0 John SpeUy , . ,
6 0 JohnSloo, , , ,
( Eoger Gournay,
3 0 < Hugh Frauncys and
( John Hardewych .
I Eobert Barbour and
I Simon Pichmaker ,
13 6 Walter Derby , .

12 0

10 10
5 5
24 0
4 11
20 0
40 0

From the above account it seems that many of these
merchant saUors actuaUy commanded and saUed their
own ships. Knappe, Frampton, Derby and SpeUy
were elevated to the mayoralty subsequently, each of
them several times ; and the same names repeatedly
occur in the Usts of baiUffs and sheriffs of the town,
Frampton was twice returned to Parliament, Derby
twice, and SpeUy four times; Sloo was bailiff in 1366,
This shows the honourable estimation in which the
maritime profession was stUl held. Although Athel-
stane's law, which made such men nobles, had become
inoperative, they continued to be regarded by their co-
burgesses and the sheriffs as noblemen and worthy of
the highest civic honours. That the system of im
pressing the ships for a naval expedition was not
always and to aU shipowners satisfactory is evident
from other items of these accounts, and this, we ap
prehend, ¦wiU explain the great disparity often shown
in the number of ships furnished by such large sea
ports as Bristol and London when compared with those
suppUed by the smaUer towns. The merchants had the
earliest news, and when the press came their ships were
missing, despatched upon some mercantUe venture that
was more likely to return a better profit and more
prompt payment. Hence we read, ' ' For the hire of
two sailors saUing from ship to ship carrying James
Lyons, the king's sergeant-at-arms, and John Wete-
wang, clerk, to arrest aU the ships in Kirkeley Eoad,
because the said ships were ready to remove from the
said port, for fear of arrest, ¦with the first wind that
should blow in their course, 2s, Also for a boat from
London to Gravesend for Walter Leycestre, and Elyas
[Vol, L]

Eichards, going by Thames to examine the ship ar
rested, 3s. id  Paid to Eichard Swyft sent
with a letter of Privy Seal to arrest the ships at Graves-
end, and to coUect a fieet in the Thames, IQd."
From the above specimens it is clear that the returns
of ships furnished to take part in the king's foreign
wars, are no criteria of the shipping belonging to ports
that were in a position to get an early inkUng of the
coming event. At the first presage of the coming storm
the anchor was weighed and the ship despatched. There
are two other items that specially relate to Bristol ; James
Treverbien had carried 1,000 marks in gold from London
to Plymouth for the king : he seems to have gone fur
ther, as there is a charge " for the hire of three horses
for the same James from Mousehole to Bristol, 24s,
And for the hire of three horses from Bristol to Chepstow
and from thence to Haverford by the sea coast, and from
thence returning to Bristol, 30s," ^
50. The franchise of Bristol, it will be remembered,
at this period, was extended to two separate counties,
divided geographicaUy by the winding river Avon. All
the land on the northern side of that river which is
now known as the Floating harbour, was in Gloucester
shire ; that which lay on the southern side was in Somerset.
This occasioned great inconvenience to the burgesses,
who were compeUed to attend the county courts and
transact legal business, over which their town's magis
trate had no jurisdiction, either at Gloucester or at
Hchester. The mayor and commonalty therefore, in 1373, peti
tioned the king for a remedy, they pleaded the deep and
dangerous roads through which they had to travel to
reach these towns, and the desirability of having the
boundaries of the town unchangeably fiLxed.
John of Gaunt had lost a great part of the English
army and almost aU his horses in France, so that Edward
needing money was graciously pleased to listen to their
plea, and for a consideration of 600 marks, equivalent,
Seyer says, to £4,000, but according to HaUam's reckon
ing more like double that amount of present value, he
granted to them a charter whereby the town was sepa
rated from the counties of Gloucestershire and Somerset,
and was made a county of itself, having the usual
county officers. The mayor was made the king's es
cheator, the office of sheriff was created, that of coroner
was continued, as also were those of the two baUiffs,
In the appointment of sheriff three names were to be
presented to the king, who was to select one of them.
This officer was to hold county courts monthly, to which
the legal business of the burgesses was to be transferred,
and ample civU and criminal jurisdiction was given to
1 Seyer, II. , 154-5, N

178

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1373,

the mayor and sheriff. The mayor was no longer to be
sworn in before the king's constable of the castle, but
before his predecessor in office and the commonalty in
the GuUdhaU. The sheriff to make his oath by writ
dedimus potestatem before the mayor. The gaol to be in
the keeping of the burgesses, Maj'or and sheriff to
have cognizance of aU pleas excepting those in the
Tolzey court, ¦n'hich were still to be held before the
king's steward, as before. No justices of the adjoining
counties were to interfere, except in cases of error, of
subsidies, and those belonging of right to the Tolzey
court. The mayor to have power to recognise deeds,
and, with the sheriff, to levy fines, estreats to be
deUvered by them under their seals on the morrow of
Michaelmas day into the exchequer of the king. The
mayor and sheriff to receive probate of wUls, and
after public proclamation of the same in fuU court in
the GuUdhaU, to put them in execution by their
officers. All writs concerning property in Bristol to be
directed to the officers of the town. The town to send
two men to ParUament as knights of the county, and
as burgesses of the town and borough. The mayor,
sheriff and commonalty to elect forty of the better and
more honest men of the town as a council, who shaU
have power to le^vy rates and taxes, two treasurers to be
appointed who shall be held accountable. Disobedient
and contentious persons who create disturbances about
the elections to be punished by the mayor and sheriff
according to the law and custom of the kingdom and
the enormity of the offence. All former privileges
enjoyed by the burgesses, "from time to the contrary
of which there is no memory," are to be continued, &o.
The above notable charter was signed at Woodstock
on the 8th of August, 1 373. It was foUowed, on the
Ist of September, by an appointment, under letters patent
from the king, of ten commissioners, who were to per
ambulate the township and settle its boundaries, so that
the perpetual divisions between the town, its suburbs,
and precincts should be firmly settled "without ambi
guity." Six of them were to form a quorum, and were
to certify under their seals and those of four lawful
knights present at the perambulation, and rej)ort to the
king's chancery. The commissioners named are the
Bishops of Bath and WeUs, and Worcester; the Abbots of
Glastonbui-y and Cirencester ; Edmund Clivedon, Eichard
de Acton, Theobald Gorges, Henry Percehay, Walter
Clopton and John Sergeaunt, The six lay justices met
at Temple gate on September 30th, 1373, to examine
the evidences, having, as jurors, twelve knights or other
good lawful men from each of the three counties, ¦viz.,
Gloucestershire, Somerset and Bristol. The twelve
Bristol jurors were as f oUow : —

Bailiff.

Sheriff.

Mayor.

M.P.

Eobert Cheddre* ...

1352

13G1-3

Walter Frampton*

1358-66-75
1362-79
Walter Derby...
1352-7-62
1364-8-77-81-5
1372-3
pjlias Spelley 
1361-3
1370-79-83-91
1376-85-6
Eichard Brandon ...
1362
William Coomb
1377
1379
1353
John Jackson, Senr.
William Woodforde
1364
William Somerwell
1361-7
1377
i.S88
1365-84
John Vyell 
1369-70
1372-3
13S9
Henry Vyell 
1359-71
1376
John Somerwell ...
1386
1394
We give the above list of names from the mayors'
calendar, premising two things, firstly, that Eicart
herein gives the year of occupation of the mayor, and
hence is a year later than the list given by Pryce and
others, who date from the appointment ; and, secondly,
that whilst we give all of the same christian and sur
name who held office within a reasonable period of the
date 1373, we have little doubt but that in some of the
cases they represent two generations. The names of the
jurors for Gloucestershire were Ealph WaUys,* John
Crooke,* John de Weston, Junr., John Kent de Wike,
Eobert Atthy or Athay, John Westburne, Laurence
Campe, John Wickenwick, WiUiam Atteaute, Eobert
TeUare, Thomas Overnon, and Thomas Attheath, The
twelve from Somerset were John Becket,* Walter
Laurence,* William Sambrooke, Simon Draycott, John
Babington, Eichard CaUveton, Eichard Oldmixon,
Eichard Sheyne de Acton or Ashton, Eichard English,
Thomas AttemuUe, Eichard Neale, and John Arthur.
WiUiam Canynges being mayor and king's escheator
during the above year his name does not appear, it
would have been undignified.
Those marked with *, together with the six justices,
attested and sealed the copy of the perambulation,
which is as foUows : —
" Beginning the said perambulation at the end of the common
wall of the same town of Bristol, which wall extends itself from
a certain tower of the same town called Tower-harratz, into the
water of Avon on the eastern part of the same town, which water
is in the same place the division between the said county of Glouc'
on the north part and the said county of Bristol on the south part :
and so going upwards from the same end of the said wall by the
end of the same water of Avon strait eastward to a stone lately
fixed at the end of the ditch of a certain croft called tlie Hales ;
which ditch is between the said county of Bristol and county of
Somerset on the south part of the same county of Bristol : and
from the said end of the same ditch on a line along the same ditch
on the north side of the same ditch westward to a great stone
fixed at the western corner of the same ditch near the king's high
way which leads from Temple-gate towards Bath : aud from the
same stone along the same road along the ditch of the same road
southward on the eastern part of the same road to another stone
A,D, 1373,

BRISTOL MADE A COUNTY BY CHARTER.

179

fixed on the eastern part of a certain bridge called Pill-hill-
and from that stone to a spring in the way near the same bridge :
and from the same spring strait westward to another stone fixed
near the hedge of Aldeburiham between the king's highway,
which leads from the town of Bristol towards Pensford, aud the
same hedge : and so going down towards the north along the same
road towards Bristol to a stone fixed at the northern angle of a
certain meadow called Waremead : and from that angle strait
westward along a certain ditch to a great stone fixed in a corner
of the same ditch in the same meadow : and from the same stone
northward and by another ditch to another great stone fixed in
another corner of the same meadow : and so strait along the
same ditch westward to another great stone fixed near the same
meadow in the angle of the ditch of a certain croft, which
formerly belonged to the fraternity of Satinors : and from that
stone along another ditch northwards to another great stone fixed
under a ditch near the head of a certain lane called the Red-lane :
and from the same stone westward strait as far as another great
stone fixed under the ditch of Ergle-croft : and thence along the
same ditch southward as far as another great stone fixed in the
corner of the said ditch : and from that stone on a line along the
ditch of the same croft of Ergle-croft westward as far as another
great stone fixed in the western part of the path which leads from
KnoUe towards Eedcliffe church : and from the same stone along
the same path northward as far as a great stone fixed near the wall
in the eastern corner of Eedcliffe church-yard : And from thence
southward along the middle of a certain lane, which leads towards
the meadow of Langmeade as far as another stone fixed in the
same meadow at the comer of a certain croft belonging to the
master of the hospital of St. John Baptist of Bristol, called
Langcrofl: and from thence in the same meadow strait along a
ditch northward as far as another great stone fixed in another
corner of the same meadow of Langmead : and from the same
stone strait westward along a certain gutter and a certain trench,
which extends along a certain croft called Loheing on the south
side of the same trench as far as another great stone fixed iu the
corner of a certain little croft : and from thence along a certain
ditch on the eastern side of the same ditch northward to another
great stone fixed at the head of the same ditch in the king's high
way which leads from Bristol towards Bedminster : and from the
same stone strait westward along a certain ditch on the southern
side of the same king's highway as far as the middle of Brightnee-
bridge : and from thence strait northward along a certain ditch on
the western side of the same ditch as far as a stone fixed in a
meadow caUed Katharine-meade, at the corner of a certain croft
caUed Cardiff's croft : and from thence along a ditch of the same
croft, which extends eastward, as far as another great stone fixed
in the same meadow in a certain corner of the same meadow ; and
from thence along a certain other ditch, which extends toward
Trenelly-mill, as far as another great stone fixed in the northern
angle of the same meadow of Katharine-mead : and from thence
along a certain ditch strait westward as far as the thread of the
water of Bishop' s-worth-hrooJc at the western head of the same
ditch : and so across the same water northward to a stone fixed
on the northern side of the same water at the southern head of
the ditch of a certain close belonging to the abbot of St. Austin's
of Bristol : and from thence on a line eastward on the northern
side of the pool of Trene-mill as far as a great stone fixed on the
mUl-bay of the same mill and from the same stone strait on the
northern side of the same mill to another stone fixed on the water
of Avon near the same mill ; and from the same stone strait
northward into the said water of Avon, which is there on the
western side of the same county of Bristol : and so along, the
margin of the same water of Avon westward and on the southern
side of the same water of Avon as far as Grocherne Pill: and

from thence westward along the margin of the water of the Severn
as far as Portshead-ford : and from thence along the margin of the
same water of the Severn westward on the southern side of the
same water as far as a certain rock called Clevedon' s Hoe: and
from thence strait westward iu the water of the Severn aforesaid
as far as the northern corner of a certain island in the same called
the Steep-Holme ; which island is the division between the said
county of Somerset on the southern part, and the said county of
Bristol on the eastern part, and the said county of Gloucester on
the northern part : and so from the aforesaid island of Steep-
holme strait northward in the same water of the Severn, as far as
the southern corner of a certain other island caUed the Flat-
holme : and from thence strait eastward in the same water as far
as the southern corner of a certain little island called the Duny :
and from thence in like manner strait eastward in the same
water to Avonroad, which is on the northern side of the water of
Avon aforesaid : and from thence along the margin of the same
water of Avon on the northern side of the same water eastward as
far as a certain great stone fixed on the same water of Avon near
a certain rivulet called WoodwiWs Lake on the eastern side of the
same rivulet : and from thence going up strait northward along
the course of the same rivulet from a great stone to a great stone
fixed near the same rivulet as far as a great stone fixed near the
conduit of the abbot of St. Austin's of Bristol on the western
part of the same conduit : and from thence going up northward
along a certain lane called Woodivill's Lane on the western side of
the same .lane, from a great stone to a great stone fixed for a
boundary in the same lane, as far as a certain stone fixed near a
certain wall called Langcrofl Wall in the same lane, as far as
another stone fixed near the corner of a certain field called
Bartholomew's Close : and from thence along the ditch of the same
field northward on the western side of the same ditch as far as a
stone fixed in the corner of a certain close caUed Foheing Grove :
and from thence strait eastward along a certain long ditch from
stone to stone as far as a stone fixed in the north corner of a
certain close called Gantolce's Glose : and from thence along the
ditch of the same close strait eastward on the northern side of the
same ditch as far as a stone fixed at the eastern corner of a certain
croft belonging to the houses of the religious of Magdalen and
Bartholomew of Bristol : and from thence strait southward along
a ditch of the same croft as far as another stone fixed in another
corner of the same croft : and from thence strait along another
hedge eastward on the north side of the same hedge as far as the
king's highroad which leads from Bristol to Henbury : and so
along the same highroad strait northward on the western side of
the same highroad strait as far as a certain cross called BeweU's
Gross ; and from thence still northward as far as a stone fixed near
BeweU's WeU on the eastern side of the same well : and from that
stone strait eastward across the king's same highroad as far as
another stone fixed on the eastern side of the king's same highroad
near the same highway : and from thence returning strait towards
the south on the eastern side of the king's same highroad as far as
another stone fixed near the said cross on the eastern side of the
said cross : and from thence strait southward on the eastern side
of the king's same highroad as far as a great stone fixed in the
king's same highroad at the head of the ditch of a certain croft
called Brampton's Glose : and from the same stone along the same
ditch, eastward on the northern side of the same ditch as far as
another stone fixed in the eastern head of the same ditch : and
from thence southward along another ditch on the eastern side of
the same ditch as far as another stone fixed in the corner of the
same ditch : and from thence strait westward along a certain
other ditch as far as another stone fixed at the head of a certain
lane called the Mill-Lane: and from thence going down southward
along another ditch as far as a stone fixed in a corner of the same

180

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1373,

ditch near a certain close called Prior's Groft : and from thence
along another ditch eastward as far as another stone fixed at the
end of the same ditch in a certain highroad called Maudlin-Lane :
and so across that highroad along another ditch eastward on the
north side of the same ditch as far as a stone fixed in the corner
of the same ditch : and from thence strait southward along
another ditch as far as a stone flxed in the corner of the same
ditch : and from the same stone strait westward along another
ditch on the southern side of the same ditch as far as another
stone fixed in a corner near the ditch of a certain close caUed
Prior's close : and from thence going down along the same ditch
southward as far as a stone fixed in a corner of the same ditch
close adjoining to Prior's Orchard : and from thence along a long
ditch of a close belonging to the prior of St. James eastward from
a large stone fixed in the east comer of a certain little close caUed
Doucer-Groft : and so from the same stone going do^wn southward
along the ditch of the same close as far as a stone fixed in the
king's highroad which leads from Bristol to Thornbury at the
south corner of the same ditch : and from thence along the same
road northward on the western side of the same highroad as far as
a stone fixed in the same road opposite to a certain path called
Apsherd : and from the same stone across the same road east
ward as far as another stone fixed upon a certain little hillock
near the Apsherd : and so from thence eastward along a certain
ditch on the northern side of the same ditch, as far as a stone
fixed iu the corner of the same ditch : and so going do-wn along
the middle of a certain ditch southward as far as a stone fixed at
the southern end of the same ditch : and from thence strait east
ward through the middle of the ditch of a certain close caUed
Mere-Furlong as far as a great stone fixed at the corner of the
same ditch : and from thence going down southward through the
middle of another ditch of the same close, as far as a certain stone
fixed in an angle near the ditch of a certain close oaUed Beane-
flower-Groft : and from thence strait eastward along the ditch of
the same close as far as a stone fixed in another corner of the
same close : and from thence southward along another ditch of
the same close on the eastern part of the same ditch, as far as a
stone fixed in the eastern corner of the same close : and from
thence along another ditch eastward as far as a certain stone fixed
in the angle of a certain croft called Longesden's Land : and from
thence northward along the middle of another ditch of the same
croft, as far as the north corner of the same ditch : and so from
great stone to great stone, as they are placed for bounds, along a
certain long ditch eastward as far as a great stone fixed in the
corner of a certain croft called Goch's Groft: and from thence
strait northward along another ditch as far as a great stone fixed in
a corner of the same croft : aud so along another ditch of the
same croft eastward as far as another stone fixed in another corner
of the same croft : and from thence strait southward along another
ditch of the same croft as far as another stone fixed in another
corner of the same croft near a certain close called the Piked-
Groft: and thence strait eastward along the ditch of the same
close of Piked-croft as far as a stone in a comer of the same croft
near the road which leads from Bristol to Stoke : and from the
same stone along another ditch of the same close southward as far
as a stone fixed in another corner of the same close : aud from the
same stone strait westward along another ditch of the same close
on the southern side of the same ditch as far as another great
stone fixed on the opposite side of the road aforesaid which leads
to Stoke in a corner of a certain little close called Wrington's
Croft ; and from the same stone along a ditch of the same close-
strait southward as far as a stone fixed in another corner of the
same close in the road which leads from Bristol to Lehenhridqe:
and from the same stone along the ditch of the same close strait
westward as far as a stone fixed in the northern side of the road

which leads from Bristol to the conduit of the same to-wn called
Key -pipe-conduit: and from thence strait westward along a certain
long ditch from stone to stone on the southern side of the same
ditch as far as a stone flxed near a certain spring caUed Begger-
well, on the northern side of the same spring : and from the same
stone strait southward on the eastern side of the ditch of a certain
garden called Ditche's Orchard, as far as a certain stone fixed on
the water of the Froom on the northern side of the same water :
and so on a line along the same water on the northern side of the
same water westward as far as a stone flxed on the same water
opposite to the great ditch of the town of Bristol : and from
thence strait eastward across the same water of Frome as far as a
stone fixed on the south side of the same water in the aforesaid
great ditch of the same to-wn : and from that stone strait along
the same ditch as far as a great stone fixed outside the gate of the
same town called Lawford's Gate near the same gate : and from
that stone strait eastward from stone to stone in the same great
ditch as far as a stone fixed in the eastern comer of the same
ditch : and from that stone strait westward from stone to stone
along the same ditch as far as another stone fixed at the western
end of the same ditch : and from that stone across northward as
far as a stone fixed in a corner under the same ditch : and from
thence going down westward on the southern side of St, Philip's
church-yard as far as a stone fixed in the corner of the ditch of
King's Orchard: and so along the same ditch northward on the
western side of a certain lane called St. Philip's Lane as far as a
stone fixed on the ditch of the castle of Bristol near the gate of
the same castle called Nether-gate: and from the same stone
always along the ditch of the same castle on the northern side of
the same ditch as far as the gate of the same town called Newgate :
and from the same gate westward on the western side of the ditch
called the Moat-ditch of the same castle as far as a stone fixed in
the corner of the same ditch : and from the same stone strait
southward on the western part of the same ditch of the castle
aforesaid as far as the thread of the said water of the Avon : and
so along the thread of the said water of the Avon strait eastward
as far as the aforesaid end of the common wall of the same town
of Bristol, which extends from the same thread of water in that
place westward as far as the aforesaid tower called Tower-Harratz,
at which end of the wall aforesaid the foregoing perambulation
was begun. Which bounds according to the signs, metes and
divisions the said justices place, set and adjudge to endure
for ever between the aforesaid counties, and as before mentioned :
and it is commanded to each of the aforesaid sheriffs that they
cause public proclamation to be made in all places of their baili
wick, where they shaU see it to be most expedient, that aU and
singular persons of their said bailiwick shall inviolably keep and
observe for ever the aforesaid metes and divisions set, appointed
and adjudged by the aforesaid justices in their said perambula
tion. In witness of aU which things as well as the said justices
as Eobert Chedre and Walter Frampton of the said county of
Bristol, Ealph Wales and John Crooke of the said county of
Gloucester, and John Beckett and Walter Lawrence of the county
of Somerset, [being some] of the aforesaid jurors present at making
that perambulation, have hereto set their seals,"
51, Bristol High Cross is said to have been erected
by the burgesses in gratitude to Edward for the grant
of this noble charter,
"Several ancient stone crosses are mentioned by
WUUam Wyrcestre as existing in Bristol before the
Eeformation, One caUed ' StaUage, or Market Cross,
stood in the midst of the market staUs, near Temple
chui'ch, belonging to the Knights Templars, for the

A,D, 1373.

THE HIGH CROSS.

181

supply of the tenants of their peculiar district,' A
second cross stood ' yn Baldwyne strete been IIII crosse
wayes metyng, one waye goyng ys a grete -wyde way
goyng to Bafft strete, the second waye goyng
northward by a hygh grese caUed a steyr of
XXXII steppys ynto Seynt CoUas strete, the
other tweyn metyng wayes at the seyd Cros
of Bald-wyne streete.' A third cross stood
in Old Market street, near Lawford's gate ;
a fourth in the Castle ditch ; a fifth on the
bridge near St. James' churchyard ; and a
sixth, called by way of distinction the High
Cross, stood where the four principal streets
of the to-wn met in the centre. Here it was
placed in the reign of Edward III. as a memo
rial to future ages of the charter granted
by that monarch to the burgesses of Bristol.
Some MS, calendars mention a High Cross
standing on this spot in 1247, where also
the market, it is said, was held,
" The High Cross," (see the iUustration),
"whose absence from Bristol is a subject of
regret, was erected at a time when the
Decorated style of EngUsh architecture was
in fuU practice, and when it was executed
by British artists in aU its beautiful and
elaborate detaU. Niches were constructed
for the reception of statues, and those of
Kings John, Henry III,, Edward III,, and
Edward IV,, were placed in them ; the three
former ha-ving been benefactors to the to-wn
when the cross was first erected, and the
latter subsequent to his visit to Bristol in
1461, These effigies, together -with the
entire cross, were enriched with gold and
colours in profusion, in 1490, and again in
1495 ; and they so remained, both as to orna
mentation and position, until the year 1633,
when, in the bad taste of the times, the High
Cross was raised to a greater elevation, and
enlarged so as to receive
four more figures, in as
many niches prepared for
the purpose. These
figures were representa
tions of Henry VI,,
Elizabeth, James I,, and
Charles I." •¦• From exa
mination of the structure at Stourhead it would seem-
that the oxidization of the original iron cramp ties had
caused the joints to heave and separate, and lead ties
> Pryce, Hist, Bris., 72,

Eiglh Cross, as altered in 1633.

were substituted. The stone is a coarse-grained ooUte,
very liable to decay under climatic influences, hence the
necessity of paint, not as a thing desirable, but simply
preservative. The height to which the cross
was raised in 1633 was 39 ft, 6 in,, and the
most objectionable addition was a tier, or
frieze, of boys bearing shields, which marred
the graceful outline, and some of the cusp
terminations which were of the cherub-head
character. In 1697 the structure was again painted,
the colours being vermiUon and blue, pricked
out with gold, and so lavish was the adorn
ment that it was said no cross in England
could rival it for beauty, a statement that
the present age would perhaps hesitate to
accept. From a pen and ink sketch in our
possession, dated 1703, it would seem that
the city stocks were then fixed at its base,
looking do-wn High street, wherein, in con
juction with Wine street, the principal market
was held.
In 1733 Mr, Vaughan, silversmith, who
was deputy chamberlain, and had the ear of
the Council, swore that his life and house were
in danger every high wind (he lived in the
half-timbered house at the corner of High
and Wine streets) ; the statement, although
not generaUy credited, was accepted by the
magistrates, and they ordered the cross to
be taken down and placed in the ceUars of
the Guildhall, There can be no doubt that,
in the enormous increase of traffic and of
wheeled vehicles in the city, the structure had
become an obstruction to business. After a
lapse of time, by the exertions of Alderman
Price, and other gentlemen, it was rescued
from oblivion, and, with the consent of the
Dean and Chapter, was re-erected in CoUege
green. But in 1763, when the green had
become the fashionable
promenade for the Ma
caronies (as the beaux
and the beUes with pre
posterous hooped dresses
were termed), who were
in the habit of walkins-

five or six abreast, it
was found to inconvenience their perambulations. Then
Mr, Champion, of Bristol china fame, always busy pro
jecting something new, raised a subscription for widen
ing and beautifying the walks, removing the cross, and

182

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1374.

re-erecting it in some less inconvenient situation. The
money raised was expended upon the walks, and the
demolished cross was deposited in a corner of the
cathedral, where it lay until it was given away in Sep
tember, 1768, by the Very Eeverend Cutts Barton, Dean
of Bristol, to Henry Hoare, Esq,, who removed it to his
seat, Stourhead, Wiltshire, in the beautiful grounds of
which delightful retreat it seems at last to have found a
resting place. It is now in arvery dUapidated condition,
62, In 1374, a moiety of the profits of the fair held
in St, James'
churchyard was
granted to the
prior, for permis
sion for the people
who had built up
to and around the
priory to hear
mass, i.e., we pre
sume, to have a
portion of the
church set apart
for their use.
They were to build
the belfry at their
own expense, the
prior finding the
stone and earth
for mortar, the
beUs to be at the
joint expense of
both parties.
In 1376, the
election of the
mayor, sheriffs
and bailiffs was
fixed to be on Holy
Eood day, Sep
tember 14th, On
Michaelmas day
they were to take
the oath before
the whole Com-

S'dver Street and Entrance to St. James' Fair.

monalty in the GuUdhaU, and in the afternoon aU the
Council were to attend the mayor to divine service in
St. Michael's church.
In the same year, also, the Mayor and Commonalty
of Bath presented a petition to the King and ParUa
ment at Westminster, praying that the fines imposed on
Bristol cloth merchants who attended the cloth fair at
Bath, of half a mark for seUing a whole piece of cloth,
&c., by the Bristol Commonalty, who have set up a

cloth fair at the same time, may be redressed, and
that every man may have free liberty to come and to
seU in Bath,
In the same ParUament the representatives of Wilts,
Somerset, Gloucestershire, Dorset and Bristol complain
that the best wooUen yarn made in those counties is
exported to Normandy and Lombardy, the refuse being
left to the injury of the home trade and the loss to the
king on his customs ; and that the men are so profitably
employed in preparing for a foreign market that they
wUl not work at
haymaking and
harvest time in
the fields, and in
consequence be
come weak in
body. They there
fore pray that no
wooUen yarn may
be exported, but
that it shaU aU be
made into cloth
and then sold.
The king com
plied -with the re-
quest of these
protectionists. Perhaps the
most graphic pic
ture which has
ever been por
trayed of the
manners and cus
toms of any age
is that which is
given us of this
reign by the
courtly Chaucer
in his immortal
Canterbury Tales,
in which thirty
distinct represen
tatives of all
classes of society, from the noble to the ploughman, are
drawn to the life. We see the
" Verray perfit gentil Knight arrayed in gipon and habergeon ;
the Squier with lockes cruU, singing or floyting aUe the day ; the
Yeoman, in cote and hode of green, and in his honde a mighty
bowe; the Nonne Prioress, hire mouthe ful smaU, her broche
with Amor vincit omnia. Another Nonne had she that was hire
chapellaine, and Preestes three. The Monk, with manie a daintee
hors in stable, bridle gingling like a chapell beUe, his sleeves
adorned -with costly ermine, and his hood fastened -with a pin of

A,D, 1374,

BRISTOL MAYORS AND INCIDENTS OF THE TIME.

183

gold -WToight into a true lovers knot, &c. The Friar, wanton and
merry, -with his tippet fuU of knives and pins to give to worthy
wives ; he was the best beggar in all his house, who farmed his
district, and never left even a poor widow without extracting a
fee. The Merchant in motley (gray cloth), bragging of his win
nings, who would have 'the sea kept at any price,' who under
stood exchange and chevisance (financing). The Gierke that was
of Oxenforde, lean as his horse, -with 'twenty bookes at his
beedes bed,' 'and gladly wolde he lerne and gladly teche ' the
Serjeant-at-law, who 'seemed besier than he was,' The Franklin,
who wore an ' anelace and gipciere all of silk, hang at his girdel
white as morwe-milk, it snewed in his hous of mete and drinke,'
"An 'Haberdasher' and a 'Carpenter,' a 'Webbe,' a 'Deyer,'
and a ' Tapiser,' were ' alle y clothed in a Ii verie of a solempne, and
grete fraternitie ; their knives ornamented not with brass but silver,
so also their purses and girdles, each man a fair burgess fitted to
sit on the dais of his haU of Gild, and shapely enough for an alder
man, -with cattle and rent sufficient for the position ; their wives
longing to be called Madame, and have their robes and mantles
borne royally. The Cook, to boil the chickens and the marrow
bones, &c. The Shipman, who rode upon ' a rouncie ' as he could,
' -with go-wne of falding to the knee, a dagger hanging by a lace
had hee,' brown of hue from sunburn, fond of wine, not nice of
conscience if so be he got the upper hand in a fight ; ' with many
a tempest had his berde be shake '; one who ' knew all the havens
from Gotland to Finisterre, and aU the crekes in Bretayne and

*' With Powles ^vyndowes corven on his schoos.''
Chaucer f Miller's Tale).
Speyne ; his barge ycleped was the Magdelaine,' The doctor of
physick, who ' knew the cause of every maladie, ' were it of cold,
or hote, or moiste, or drie, 'a vary parfite practisour,' whose
' studie was but Utel on the Bibel,' who ' kept that he wan in the
pestilence,' &c. The good wife of Bath, a cloth maker, the first
of her craft in standing in her parish, -with fine ' scarlet hosen, ful
strait tyed, and shoon ful moist and newe,' who had been thrice
on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, also ' to Eome, Boloine, St, James iu
Galioe, and at Coloine.' The good ' Gierke who Christes gospel
treweley wolde preche,' poor, and ha-ving a large scattered parish,
who was not hindered by storm or thunder from visiting his sick
people, who sought no preferment or lazy work as a chantry priest,
but dwelt at home, kept well his fold, not disputatious, but ' to
drawen folk to heven with fairenesse, by good ensample, was his
besiuesse, ' ' Christes lore and his Apostles twelve he taught, but
first he folwed it himselve,' With him was his brother, the
Ploughman, a true labourer and a good, that loved God -with all
his heart, and then his neighbour, whether he gained or lost, who
would ' thresh, dike and delve for Christes sake, for any poure
wight, withouten hire, if it lay in his might,' The stout old
MiUer, who at -wrestling could bear away the ram, who could
break in any door with his head, or burst the bars with a heave,

a roystering, obscene jangler, he had ' a thombe of golde,' in
dealing with the grist of the poor. The gentle Manciple, wise
in buying of victuals. The Eeeve, a 'slender, cholerick man, lean,
long-legid, close shorn and shaven,' who had managed his Lords
business so well that he could live in a better house and lend
money to his Master, The Sumpnour, ' with fire-red cherubinnes
chekes,' from whose face the children fled away in terror, who
loved garlick onions and leeks, aud wine strong and red as blood,
of which when he had drunk he would speak only Latin, in ' termes
two or three that he had learned out of some decree, ' The ' gentil
Pardonere,' whose ' wallett lay beforere him on his lappe, bretful
of perdon, come from Eome all hotte,' who ' with fained flattering
and japes he made the parsonne and the peple his apes,' The
Host, a seemly man, fit to be a Marshall in a Hall ; no fairer
burges in Cheap than he, bold of speech, wise and weU taught, an
early riser and a sound adviser,"
These word-pictures portray correctly the costume,
manners, sentiments, tempers, actions and speech of the
characters and of the age.
The late Samuel Tovey, an artist of no mean repu
tation, and a -writer whose diligent researches were re
corded in a pleasant flowing style, contributed to the
Bristol Mercury a series of sketches of our mayors, &c,,
under the title of Loccd Jottings. We have compared
these sketches with the source from which they were
derived, — the books of the Corporation, — and, flnding
them substantially correct, coloured here and there with
a light free hand, but on the whole a fair holding up
of the mirror to the times, abstract the following par
ticulars : —
Walter de Frampton, who was Mayor in 1357-65-74, and
M.P. in 1362, did bj' his Will demise unto Isable, his wife, fifteen
Tenements in Bristol for term of her life, upon condition that if
she marry or live unchaste, then the Mayor and Bailiffs of Bristol
should enter upon the said lands, and the same should sell, and
that the money thereof coming should be divided into four equal
parts, whereof one quarter part should be distributed amongst
the poor, blind, lame people of this town ; another part should be
employed to the marriage of poor maidens ; another part should
be spent in repairing and constructing the highways and bridges
about Bristol. The portion of the said fifteen Tenements after
the decease of his said wife to the Mayor and Bailiffs of Bristol,
to the intent that the same should be sold, and the money thereof
proceeding should be distributed to the use aforesaid. He ap
pointed that fifteen other Tenements in Bristol should presently
after his decease be sold by the Mayor and Bailiffs aforesaid, or
his Executors, and that the money thereof arising should be
divided and distributed to the use aforesaid ; and gave thirty
other Tenements to his sonne and other his kindred, and ordereth
that if they should decease without issue of their bodies, then the
Mayor and Bailiffs of Bristol should sell the same and employ the
money to the uses aforesaid, and gave twenty-two shillings a week
to the poor for four years after his decease. The residue of all
his goods he ordereth to be sold, and the money be distributed to
the uses aforesaid, as appeareth in the Great Book of Orphans.
He also built the Parish Churoh of St. John the Baptist in
Bristol, His tomb is in the church, on the north side of the altar.
His effigy has a robe over a coat of mail, the latter visible from
the elbows. His hands are raised in supplication — prayerful in
death ! He founded a chantry in this church, of which Eichard,
son of John Coke, was chantry priest.

184

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1377,

Contemporaneous~-with Walter de Frampton was Richard le
Spycer, founder of St, George's chapel, adjoining the old GuUd
haU, Mayor in 1353, 1354 and 1371 ; also representative of the
to-wn in Parliament, By his Will, bearing date 1377, he be
queathed unto Cicely, his wife, for term of her life, the Tenement
lying upon the Back of Avon, within the suburbs of the Town
of Bristol, wherein he then dwelleth, with three tenements
or shops thereunto adjoining, and five tenements or shops lying
in Baldwin street, and four tenements or shops, with the garden,
situate in Back street, and four others also lying in Back street,
upon conditions expressed in his will ; aud if the said Cicely did
not perform the conditions, then the Mayor and Commonalty
should enter upon the said land, and enjoy it and dispose it to
the gift of the town, which houses and tenements are now con
verted to the city's use, and part of them is called Spycer's hall
(now the Back hall), and made a place for the keeping and weigh
ing of strangers' goods, which yieldeth a yearly profit to the said
Mayor and Commonalty, ^
Another merchant prince, Walter Derby, rich -with ancestral
merchandise, was Mayor five times, and also M.P, for the town in
two Parliaments. But if this were all that is kno-wn concerning
him he would have remained in official oblivion, and not had his
name revived. He gave £40 towards the re-building of St,
Werburgh's church. This sum is to be estimated according to
the currency of the period. He died in 1385, and was buried
in the chapel of St, Anne, in the parish of St. Werburgh.
He gave towards the building of the same church (the tower
thereof being then in buUding) the sum of forty pounds. He
gave to the Mayor and Commonalty seventeen tenements in
reversion of his wife, who had term of her life therein, and ap
pointed that the said tenements should be sold, and the money
should be distributed to Godly uses, at the discretion of the Mayor
and Commonalty, He gave tokens of his love and bounty to most
parish churches aud Fraternities in Bristol and to the religious
people of the same. He remembered the poor, and every Alms
house, and every poor, blind and lame person in Bristol, and like
wise every salt-bearer and labourer frequenting the Key, He
forgot not the religious houses and brethren in the outskirts, and
amongst said persons by particular sums did bequeath the sum of
[writing illegible] or thereabout. He was very liberal to his
servants, who were many in number, and to some of his special
servants he gave ships. He also, in 1376, and during life, at the
yearly cost of £10, brought the water into the Key, AU Saints'
and St, John's pipes.
The first mention of the distinguished name of
Canynges in our civic annals is in 1361, when WiUiam
Canynges served the office of baUifl: in conjunction with
Walter Derby, Six times was he elected mayor, viz.,
in 1372-73-75-81-85 and 89, He represented the city
in ParUament in 1364-83-84, Barrett says, his father
was Eobert Canynges, of Touker street; but Chatterton
is his only authority. He was a wooUen cloth manu
facturer of great opulence, whose name is associated, in
1376, with that of the first merchants of his day in a
deed of conveyance of a tenement in EedcUff street,
from William Sutton to Adam Stable, which document
is preserved in the chui-ch of St, Thomas, In Eicart's
Calendar, under date 1376, we read, "This yeare WiUiam
1 This hall was of subsequent date, it will be seen, to the hall
in Spycer's house, described at 174^5,

Canynges builded ye body of Eedcliff Church from ye
cross isles downwards and so ye church was finished
as it is now," The worthy calendary commenced the
mayor's calendar, in which the above appears, after he
became town clerk, which was in 1479, and as aU the
authentic records of the calendaries had perished in a
disastrous fire in 1466, Eicart most probably wrote the
above from his remembrance of the contents of those
documents. A reference to our Ecclesiastical History
wUl, however, satisfactorUy show that a large portion
of the building was erected during the lifetime of this
WiUiam Canynges, and it is most likely that during the
time of his filling the civic chair he was actively employed
in carrying towards completion the noble structure,
53, Edward III. died on the 21st of June, 1377,
having reigned 49 years and nearly three quarters. One
of the most iUustrious of our kings, possessing great
mental and personal qualifications, yet he scrupled not
in his ambition to sacrifice the lives, property and hajjpi-
ness of his people, in order to attain his end and win the
crown of France, His mUitary talents are evinced by
his successes, but his wars were neither just nor profit
able. CompeUed by his necessities to have frequent
resort to his Commons for aid, and to receive their peti
tions, the people won from him in return a most valuable
addition to the Constitution ; viz., that these petitions
(more properly speaking, advices) should become statutes
upon their being assented to by the Crown and entered
upon the EoUs of Parliament. PersonaUy brave, and
rash to an extreme, Edward loved to surround himself
with aU the pomp of chivalry, and when the fight was
over to treat his prisoners with a courtesy and munifi
cence that was indeed royal. He could let the bravest
of his enemies, Du Guesclin, fix his own ransom, and yet
ravage the fairest parts of France, burn its cities and
turn the land into a desert. The Black Prince could
wait at table upon his kingly captive, but butcher 3,000
of the citizens of Limoges in cold blood, Edward hesi
tated not to hang WUliam de Thorpe, the chief justice
of his king's bench, in 1351, for taking bribes to pervert
justice ; but in the same year he himself had no scruple
in robbing his people of 5s, 2d, in every pound weight
of the silver coinage, reducing the weight of the sUver
penny from 22|- grains to 18 grains, and he was so
pettishly jealous that he hanged an unfortunate inn
keeper who, in a garrulous moment, boasted that he
would make his son heir to the Crown (the name of his
inn), 54, Eichard II., the son of the famous Black Prince,
succeeded his grandfather, being at his accession but
eleven years of age ; he was crowned July 6th, 1377, in
Westminster abbey. On the 8th of February, 1378, he

A.D, 1378,

ACCESSION OF RICHARD II.

185

confirmed the recent charters given by his grandfather,
but, the older letters patent not being therein mentioned,
another charter was obtained from him, dated the 28th
of the same month, which, though brief, confirms to the
burgesses aU their previous rights, liberties, &c. For
this the Mayor and Commonalty "lent" the king 500
marks. This is, we beUeve, the first instance of a pro
vincial town lending money to the king ; individuals
had often been caUed upon to do so, but we know of
no earlier instance in which the commonalty at large
became the creditors of royalty. It was, with the
exception of London, the largest sum furnished by
any to-wn. It was foUowed by a further loan, in
1379, of 100 marks by the mayor, but whether this
was a town's loan or a private transaction is not men
tioned. In 1378 the Parliament resumed its work of reform,
they appointed a standing committee to control the
expenditure, and obtained an account of the manner in
which the subsidies had been expended. The French
war had been most disastrous, an English fleet had
been beaten by the Spaniards, another was lost in a fear-
fiU storm, "In 1379 the king directs a writ to Bishop
Hatfield, on complaint of WiUiam and John Canynges,
merchants of Bristol, ordering John Heiselden, Senior,
Andrew Browntoft, &c., to appear in the court of West
minster, to answer for having seized and carried into
Hartlepool a ship of Canynges' saUing towards Calais
and Flanders,"^
Parliament, busy in its attempt to reduce labour to
its wonted state of serfdom, now introduced a poll-tax,
by which the poorest labourer was made to contribute
as much as the richest merchant or the lordly baron.
From HuU to Somerset, from the Severn to the Nore,
this gross injustice roused the whole people ; short poli
tical diatribes, and quaint rhymes in vernacular English,
rang a tocsin through the land. The Essex men, under
a leader who assumed the cognomen of Jack Straw,
crossed the Thames and roused the men of Kent,
Canterbury threw open its gates, and took John BaU
out of prison, 100,000 men rallied around Wat Tyler,
who, in his fatherly indignation, had smitten down one
of the coUectors who had grossly assaidted his young
maiden daughter. The whole of central England was
in arms. The rude rhythmical missives of Jack the
MUler, Jack Carter, and Jack Trueman, rung out a
demand for righteous rule and simple justice, and ex
posed the immorality of the court and the ruling classes,
with angry resentment at the oppressive perversion of
the law. The Kentish men marched on London, killing
every lawyer who feU into their hands ; the people
1 Surtees' Hist, of Durham, IIL, 101,
[Vol, L]

everywhere joined them with acclamations. The gates
of London were thrown open to them, the Lawyers'
Inn (the Temple) was fired, so was the Savoy Palace,
but " seekers of truth and justice, and not thieves
and robbers," as they avowed themselves, they flung a
plunderer who had taken a silver cup from the Savoy
Palace into the flames as an example. They carried
the tower, and in rough horse-play told the knights
they were their equals, and would be good comrades.
The king's ministers were seized, and those who had
been most conspicuous in imposing the hated poU-tax
were beheaded. The boy -king, with a noble fearlessness,
met them in conference at Mile end, and asked, "What
will ye?" "To be free for ever," was the unanimous
reply ; " we and our lands, and that we be never named
or held for serfs." " I grant it," said the king, and he
pledged himself to issue charters granting the same and
a full amnesty. Vast numbers of the peasants dis
persed at once to their homes, but Wat Tyler and
30,000 men remained in London waiting the fulfilment
of the pledge. An accidental encounter between this
body and the king's the next morning resulted in the
death of the popular leader by the hand of the Lord
Mayor of London ; Eichard heroically sprang to the
front, promised to be the leader of his people, calmed
the tumult, and dismissed them to their homes with
the promised letters of freedom.
Had Eichard been as resolute as he was undoubtedly
courageous, he might now have made himself the idol
of his people and won for himself a longer and a
happier reign, but he was only a lad, surrounded by
flatterers, ill advised, and fond of vain parade and
ostentation. The tumults had brought to the front
some true peasant leaders, others, as was to be ex
pected, were boorish ruffians, whose outrageous license
disgusted the men whose cause they professed to serve.
In Kent and the eastern counties the revolt continuing,
the king, at the head of 40,000 men, 6,000 of whom
were knights, marched against the disorganised mob,
which hastily fled before him. He, by his ruthless
executions, struck terror into the hearts of the men
who had looked to him as their deliverer from bondage.
The Parliament declared the king's letters of freedom
were null and void, not having been sanctioned by them
selves ; their serfs were their goods and could not be
alienated without their own consent, which they de
clared they would all die in one day rather than give.
The revolt ended in the apparent subjugation of the
people, but a stubborn, passive, unwUling obedience
showed that everywhere there yet smouldered embers
that might under rigour break out again into flame.
The social strife continued, but in a modifled form, the
N 2

186

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1382,

Statutes of Labourers had aroused a hatred between the
poor and the rich, but were utterly ineffective in re
ducing wages, or restricting labour within parochial
areas. The Parliament then forbad that "the chUd of
the agricultural labourer should become an apprentice
in a town, that their chUdren should not be placed at
school, or advanced in the world by entering the church,
and the universities closed their gates against all children
of viUans," This alone is sufficient to show that thrift
was raising the labouring class into a higher, but as yet
unacknowledged, position. The high price of effective
labour and the scarcity of hands, personal service being
practicaUy abolished, now drove the landed proprietor

at5o6-r^OLnBa;2;?P30x^)?i^WQ3m;ebigp

Fac-slriiile of Wycliffe's Bible.
to throw his smaU farms into larger
holdings, reduce the number of his
tenants, and lay down his tiUage lands
with grass for sheep farming. This created a mass of
pauperism which, as the area of employment dimin
ished, increased enormously untU the days of the
Tudors, The very turbulence of change infected aU classes at
this crisis. The church was torn by internal dissensions,
and by the enormous inequaUty in the stipend of the
poor parson and the lordly revenue of the prelate ; the
monks had become landholders, the friars impudent
mendicants and the secular clergy were at bitter strife
with both. The whole sacerdotal order was powerless
to repress or even to reprove immoraUty, their own
shortcomings being the theme of caustic satire and
popular song. Few but weak credulous women, or
the dying, sought their ministrations ; the former they
victimised in their persons, the latter in their estates.

Piers Ploughman rung the changes on their greed, vice,
pride and worldliness ; the sceptical Chaucer gibbeted
them in his immortal poems ; whilst John WycUffe
preached boldly a personal responsibility to God, which
cut away the very roots of a mediating priesthood, and,
by a stiU bolder denial of the doctrine of transubstantia-
tion, severed the connection of himself and his foUowers
with the Papacy, In a few years every second man, it
was said, was a LoUard (idle babbler), the nickname
given to Wycliffe's foUowers by the church. The death
of this great ecclesiastical reformer was accelerated by
his efforts to give to the people a translation of the
Bible ; but the seed of religious truth sown by him feU
not upon the wayside only but into good
ground, to reappear in vigorous life ere many
years had passed,
France had now become mistress of the
seas, had ventured to land a force in the
Frith of Forth, and had closed the whole
continent against British commerce, whilst
John of Gaunt was frittering away the Eng
lish force in pursuit of a visionary crown in
Castile, The strife between the ministry of
the king, headed by the Earl of Suffolk, and
the Duke of Gloucester, the king's uncle,
with the whole baronage in arms, cost the
former nobleman his life ; but the violence
brought back sympathy to the royal cause,
and enabled the king, at twenty-two years
of age, to emancipate himself from the
wardship of his uncles and to declare his
intention to manage the affairs of the king
dom himself,
55. Eichard II. had married, in 1382, Anne, daughter
of the Emperor Charles VI. , and early in the year 1387,
we learn from Froissart, from whose work we abstract
the greater part of this and the following paragraph,
he came to Bristol with a briUiant retinue, "being
followed by the queen and aU the ladies and damsels
of her court." When Eichard arrived at Bristol, which
was a handsome and strong town, he fixed his resi
dence in the castle. Those in Wales and at a dis
tance thought he had done so to favour the Duke
of Ireland (Eobert de Vere, the king's favourite), who
had made it to be reported he intended going thence
to Ireland, and to assist him with money to increase
his foUowers, for that had been agreed on by the Par
liament. This agreement expressed that the duke, on
setting out for Ireland, where he was to remain three
years, should have the command of 500 men-at-arms
and 1,500 archers paid by England, which should be
punctually remitted to him. But the duke had no in-

A.D. 1387,

DEATH OF TRESILIAN.

187

clination to go there ; for as the king was so young
he managed him as he pleased, and should he leave
him he feared the king's affection would be cooled.
Besides, he was so enamoured of one of the queen's
damsels (the Landgravine) he could not leave her. In
order to marry this lady he sought a divorce, at the hands
of Pope Urban, from his wife, who was a daughter of
the Earl of Bedford, and grand-daughter of Edward and
PhiUppa, His own mother discountenanced his conduct
and gave the duchess a home and a handsome establish
ment. The duke was most assiduous in his attentions
to the king and queen whUst they were in Bristol as
weU as to aU the knights and esquires, whom he sought
to get upon his side ; he visited aU the gentlemen in
Bristol and the neighbourhood, went frequently into
Wales, where he complained to aU who would listen to
him that the king's uncles, from their ambition to obtain
the government, had driven from the councU the most
noble and wisest members, such as the Archbishop of
York, the Bishops of Durham and London, Sir Michael
de la Pole, Sir John Salisbmy, Sir Eobert Tresilian,
Sir John Beauchamp and himself ; that they had put to
death, without any justice whatever, that valiant knight.
Sir Simon Burley, and if they continued as they had
begun they would soon destroy all England, ^
He thus induced many of the gentry to visit the
king at Bristol to enquire into the truth of these state
ments. The king confirmed all that De Vere had
stated, begged them to show their affection for him by
putting aU confidence in the duke, added that his uncles
were too ambitious, and that he feared their aim was to
deprive him of his crown. The Welsh and Bristol men
promised obedience, and expressed their readiness to
march whithersoever the king ordered them. The duke
offered to raise 12,000 or 15,000 men, and as the king's
lieutenant to march by way of Oxford to London. To
this the king assented, nominated him his lieut.-general,
giving him power to raise men and to act for the
advantage of the realm. Eichard then issued his
summons to many great barons, knights and esquires
in Wales, and in the country round Bristol and on the
Severn side. Some excused themselves, giving satis
factory reasons ; others came and placed themselves
under the obedience of the king.
56, While this army was coUecting, the king and
the duke sent Sir Eobert Tresilian to London, on his
own offer of the adventure, to spy out the proceedings of
the Dukes of Gloucester and Lancaster and the Council,
' The Archbishop of York, the Duke of Ireland, Pole, Tre
silian and Sir Nicholas Brember had been arraigned of high treason
by the Dukes of Gloucester and Lancaster, and, not appearing,
had been condemned by the Parliament in their absence.

Tresilian left Bristol disguised as a poor tradesman,
mounted on a wretched hack ; he reached London,
and lodged at a mean inn. Whilst picking up as well
as he could all the news, he heard there was to be a
meeting of the dukes and their council at Westminster.
Thither he went and continued his espionage at an ale
house opposite the Palace gate, choosing a chamber that
looked into the Palace yard, in order to observe aU who
came to this Parliament, of whom he recognised the
greater part, he himself remaining unknown. He was
there so frequently that at last one of the esquires of
the Duke of Gloucester saw and knew him, having been
often in his company, for Sir Eobert had been chamber
lain to the king and one of his Privy Council. Per
ceiving himself recognised, Tresilian withdrew from the
window ; but the esquire entered, and, accosting the
landlady, said, " Dame, tell me on your troth who is he
drinking above; is he alone, or in company?" "On
my troth, sir," she replied, " I cannot teU you his name,
but he has been here some time," At these words the
esquire went upstairs to know the truth, and, having
saluted Sir Eobert, found he was right, though he dis
sembled, by saying, "God preserve you. Master! I
hope you will not take my coming amiss, for I thought
you had been one of my farmers from Essex as you are
so very like him." The esquire hastened from the inn
to the Duke of Gloucester, who sent him back with four
bailiffs to apprehend the detected councillor ; and when
he was brought before him accosted him with, " Tre
silian, what has brought you hither? How fares my
Sovereign? Where does he now reside?" Tresilian,
finding he was discovered, replied, " On my faith, my
lord, the king sent me hither to learn the news ; he is
at Bristol, and on the banks of the Severn, where he
hunts and amuses himself." "And where is your
master, the Duke of Ireland?" "My lord, he is with
the king our lord." The duke mused awhile, and then
said, "Tresilian, your actions are neither honest nor fair.
You and others of your faction have done what has
greatly displeased my brother and myself, and have ill-
counseUed the king, whom you have made to quarrel
with his chief nobility. In addition, you have excited
the principal towns against us. The day of retribution
is therefore come when you shaU receive payment ; look
to your affairs, for I will neither eat nor drink untU you
are no more." Sir Eobert most abjectly sought to
obtain pardon, but in vain. The duke had received
information of what was going on at Bristol, and all
excuses were fruitless. Sir Eobert was beheaded, and
then hung by the arm upon a gibbet. When the news
of Tresilian' s death reached the king at Bristol, he
ordered the Duke of Ireland to march with all the force

188

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1396.

he could coUect, vid Oxford, for London, bearing only
the king's arms on their banners, it being, he said, his
personal quarrel.
The Eegents summoned a council, and it was deter
mined to meet the Duke of Ireland at Oxford with
an army, which, when he knew, he fled disgracefully
into HoUand, The dukes thereupon despatched the
Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Arundel, to the
king at Bristol, praying the king to return to London
and to come to terms with his nobles. The prelate set
out in grand array and fixed his lodgings in the town.
The king lived very privately now, for aU his intimates
were either dead or banished. The archbishop was two
nights and a day in Bristol before Eichard would give
him an audience. Being at length admitted, Arundel
humbled himself before the king, and by his remon
strances and pleadings succeeded in inducing the king
to accompany him to London. Eichard left his queen
in Bristol, but took a sufficient retinue with him. '

57. In 1378, Paul Odbec, a merchant of Bruges,
freighted a ship with wines from Spain and Portugal to
go to Butal (the outer, from abutan without) Kay, in
the port of Bristol, Jacob de Eath being master. The
ship was lost in Hung road.- She was afterwards re
covered and taken to Caerleon, -v\here some of the wine
was saved and conveyed to Bristol, and the ship was
sold to EUas SpeUy, of Bristol, for £30.
This year Walter Warwyke assigned to the parish
his house in C(.irn street as a site for tlie tower of St.
Werburgh, towards which, as is elsewhere mentioned,
Walter Derby gave £40 by his will.
In 1386 the citizens lent the king £200 to provide
against the threatened French invasion, more than
^ Condensed from Johnes' Froissart, IIL, 474-81-97.
' Hungroad is in the river Avon, a little above Crockern PiU.
The low cliff of sandstone rock on the Somerset side stUl contains
the mooring rings and chains by which the ships were secured.
This 3hii>, however, we think was lost in Kingroad.  Ed.

double that of any other town, except York, and of
course London.
That there were fraudulent and dishonest weavers
in the West Country is evident, complaint being made
to Parliament in 1389 that in Somerset, Dorset, Bristol
and Gloucestershire, where much broadcloth was made,
it was sold tied up and roUed, the outside being of good
quality, whilst the inside was so inferior that the mer
chants who exported it were in danger of death, and
were often imprisoned and put to fine and ransom, and
their cloth burned or forfeited, to the great scandal of
the kingdom ; wherefore the merchants pray that no
cloth be sold tied up and rolled, but open, so that pur
chasers may examine it. To this the king assented,
and enacted the same on pain of forfeiture. It was in
this council that the king asserted his regal authority
against his uncles.
In 1394 the men of Chepstow objected to the Bristol
men claiming custom of wines discharged in their port,
which, it is said, "ought to be free." The king answers,
"As it hath been, so let it be," The king led a large
army into Waterford this year (passing over from Mil
ford), in which e.xjiedition he was successful; and on his
return the burgesses of Bristol obtained from him, in
1396, a charter which exempted them from the jurisdic
tion of king's steward, marshal and market clerk of the
king's household. The right of these officers to sit in
the Tolzey court had been speciaUy retained by Edward
III, in the great county charter of 1373 ; but their exten
sive powers in purveyance, &c., had been so arbitrarUy
exercised as to become a great grievance. No doubt
this concession was weU paid for, as it involved a con
siderable sacrifice on the king's part when in residence.
One of the witnesses to this charter was Henry of
Bolingbroke, who was afterwards Henry IV,
In 1396 the king, then a widower, married IsabeUa,
daughter of the King of France, a child of eight years
of age. Her portion barely paid the expenses of his
journey to fetch her, which cost 300,000 marks.
In 1398, John VyeU gave to the guUd of the Frater
nity of Canynges 40s. ; he also bequeathed to the church
of St. Stephen a ring, in which was set a stone, part of
the identical pillar to which Christ was bound when he
was scourged, to be kept among the relics for ever,
[We need scarcely add that this bequest has long since
disappeared.] On October 15th, John Thorp and John
Sherp, burgesses, obtained a charter from the king for
a guild of the Society of Merchant Tailors, consisting
of brethren and sisters, who had a chapel dedicated to
St. John the Baptist in the south aisle of the nave of
St. Ewen's church.
When he took the reins of power into his own

A.D. 1398.

THE KING VISITS BRISTOL.

189

hands, Eichard, at the first, governed the land with
considerate -wisdom ; but his lavish expenditure, his
ostentatious display in dress, and his vaciUations in
policy, weaned from him the love of all classes of his
subjects. The nobles disliked his peace with France;
the landholders his refusal to carry out the repressive
labour laws ; the merchants -writhed under his illegal
exactions ; the Church hated him for his protection
of the LoUards, The death of his uncle, the Duke of
Gloucester, was laid to his charge ; his interference
with the courts of justice, and his evident attempt to
become an absolute monarch, deterred the people from
becoming loyaUy attached to his throne; whilst the
banishment, -without sufficient reason, of his cousin
Henry of Lancaster, surnamed BoUngbroke, and the
king's violation of his solemn promise not to interfere
with his rights during his exile, raised against himself
a talented leader of royal blood, one fired with ambition,
who needed but to set up his standard as a rallying point
for the malcontents, who formed the large majority of
the whole kingdom,
58, Utterly absorbed in his pleasures, Eichard was
obUvious of the storm that was gathering from all
quarters over his head. In the summer of 1398 he
arrived in Bristol with a large army, which he was
taking over to Ireland in order to quell an insurrection
there, thus denuding his kingdom of the very force
that might have proved the bulwark of his throne
and the salvation of his life. Whilst in Bristol he
caused a theatre to be built for a wager of battle be
tween two Scots — one, the appeUant, being an esquire,
the defendant a knight ; the appeUant was overcome
and hanged. Having reason to suspect the loyalty of
the Earl of Northumberland, he sent a message com
manding his attendance at Bristol, which the earl de
clined to comply with. The infatuated king despised
this signiflcant warning, and sailed for Ireland at the
end of May, taking with him most of the great men
upon whose attachment he could depend, and landed at
Waterford on the 1st of June, Henry of Bolingbroke,
whose father having died during his exile, was now
Duke of Lancaster, and whose paternal property Eichard
had unjustly taken, seized his opportunity, and with a
few adherents, the exiled Archbishop of Canterbury
being one of them, landed at Eavenspur, He was
speedUy joined by the Earls of Northumberland and
Westmoreland ; and, in a few days, finding himself at
the head of a large army, he marched towards Bristol,
where the king's few friends whom he had left in
England had fled for shelter in its castle, Froissart,
describing the state of the country at this time, says : —
' ' During the time that King Eichard was holding his court at

Bristol, and in that neighbourhood there was a general insurrec
tion of the people of England, The courts of justice were closed,
at which many of the prelates, barons, and prudent part of the
people who only wanted for peace and to pay what was lawful,
were much dejected, A stop was put to all traffic, for merchants
dare not travel for fear of being robbed, and having no court to
fly to for redress. The farmers' houses were pillaged of grain,
and their beeves, jpigs and sheep carried away, without the owner
daring to say a word. These enormities increased so much that
there was nothing but complaints heard. The common people
said, ' Times are sadly changed for the worse since the days of
King Edward of happy memory, , , , But now we have a
good-for-nothing king who only attends to his idle pleasures, and
cares not how public affairs are managed, so that his inclinations
are gratified.' "'
59. No wonder that
in such a state of the
country Bolingbroke's
force increased rapidly
as he marched south
wards; before he
reached Worcester
shire he had 60,000
men ranged under his
banner. The Duke of
York, uncle both to
the king and to Boling-
broke, gathered an
army on the king's
behalf, but could not
trust his men, who
openly declared that
' ' they would not shoot
an arrow against Bo
lingbroke or his
friends," York, find
ing all was lost, met
Lancaster in Berkeley
castle, and the fate of
Eichard was sealed.
The united armies, to
the number of 100,000
men, marched towards
Bristol, the town was
immediately delivered
into their hands and the
castle was besieged.
The governor for the
king was Sir WiUiam Courtenay, who, refusing to recog
nise Lancaster's claim, consented, after four days' siege,
to yield the fortress to the Duke of York, Lord WiUiam
Scrope, Earl of Wiltshire and Treasurer of England, Sir
John Bushy and Sir Henry Green, three members of the
1 Froissart, IV,, 638,

The High Cross in 1697.

190

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1404,

King's Privy CouncU, were amongst the prisoners. They
were arraigned before the victors on the following day,
Scrope was charged -with having sold Calais to the king
of France for a large sum of money. The gravamen of
his offence lay, however, in the fact that he had received
from the king a large portion of the Duke of Lancaster's
patrimony. Bushy was Speaker of the House, an
avowed foe of the archbishop, whom he had persuaded
the king to banish, and of the Earl of Arundel whom
he had pursued to the block. Both the archbishop and
the young Earl of Arundel were amongst the Uttle band
that came from the continent with Lancaster. There
seems to be no doubt that the three unfortunate gentle
men had been evil counseUors to their more unfortunate
king, that they were grasping, covetous, ambitious and
dissolute in their lives, and had exercised a most baneful
influence over the weak-minded monarch. They were
condemned to death, and "at the outcry of the populace"
beheaded at the High Cross, Lancaster's unexampled
success made him boastful and presumptuous, as will be
seen by the following letter which he " sent with the
heads of Scrope, Bushy and Green in a white basket to
London, and which was read before all the commonalty
of London : — ' I, Henry, Duke of Hereford and Earl
of Derby, commend myself to aU the people of London,
high and low. My good friends, I send you this my
salutation, and I acquaint you that I have come over to
take my rightful inheritance, I beg of you to know if
you wUl be on my side or not, and I care not which, for
I have people enough to flght aU the world for one day,
thank God, But take in good part the present I send
you,' " 1
60, The doctrines of Wycliffe found favour with
a considerable portion of the community in Bristol,
Knyghton, who was averse to the new opinions, men
tions one Sir John Purveye, or Purney (Sir was merely
a title of courtesy for a priest), a grave, sober man,
plain in dress, who laboured indefatigably in Bristol,
publicly teaching that the celebration of the mass is a
human tradition, and not an evangelical ; also that
Christ suffered in the opening of his side, and of his
heart, &o, Knyghton describes Purveye as an invin
cible disciple and a powerful agent for his master
Wycliffe, with whom he had been a boarder, and with
whose principles he had become intoxicated, and, being
his inseparable companion, he accompanied him even to
the borders of death. He openly re-riled the mendi
cants, terming them false preachers and false brothers,
and proclaimed themselves (the followers of Wycliffe)
to be true preachers and gospeUers because they had
the gospel translated into the English tongue.
1 Taylor's Book about Bristol, 273.

Candour compels us to add that Purveye's faith faUed
him under a cruel test, he recanted at Paul's cross, Lon
don, Archbishop Arundel rewarded his perversion -with
a benefice, and said of him afterwards, "For lo! I gave
John Purveye a beneflce, a mile out of this Castle (Salt-
wood), and I heard more complaints about his covetous-
ness for tithes, and other misdoings, than I did of aU
the men that were advanced within my diocese,"
6 1 , Eichard on landing at Milford Haven in August
with the remains of his Irish army, flnding himself
deserted by York and his array, disbanded his forces
and retired to Conway, He soon afterwards consented
to a conference with Lancaster, was thrown into prison,
resigned his crown on the 29th September, 1399, and
was murdered the foUowing year in Pontefract castle.
The reader will observe the remarkable resemblance
between the termination of this king's reign and that
of his ancestor Edward II. seventy years before. In
each case Bristol was the spot where unfortunate royalty
made its last and unsuccessful resistance,
62, Of Elias Spelly we have already recorded several
items of interest. He was three times returned to Par
liament by the sheriffs of Bristol, and was four times
mayor. He gave, in 1383, when he was mayor, lands
yielding £5 8s, 8d. yearly, and Agnes his wife gave
£1 13s, 4d, in land and twenty marks in money to St.
Leonard's church for obits and chantries,
Thomas Knappe was mayor for the first time in
1386, when he also represented the town in Parliament ;
he was mayor for the fifth and last time in 1403, By
will, dated 1404, he gave to the Mayor and Commonalty
for the use and common profit of the town, the sum of
two hundred marks ; he gave also towards the re
building of St, Nicholas' church the sum of twenty
pounds, and desired to be buried in the church of St,
John the Evangelist upon the Back of Bristol, The
site of this desecrated church is indicated in Hoefnagle's
Map of Bristol, 1575, It stood apparently in the north
side of the churchyard at the corner of Crow lane,
John Canynges is chiefly memorable as the wealthy
father of a more distinguished son, William Canynges.
The flrst time his name occurs in connection with his
native place is in 1380, 3 Eichard IL, when on the
6th of July, in that year, in conjunction with Eobert
Candever, they, as bailiffs of Bristol, witness a release
of land belonging to the parish of St, Thomas, Again
in 1398, 21 of the same reign, on the 13th of May, he
also witnessed the conveyance of a tenement in Eedcliff
street from Francis Peel to WiUiam Payes and another
party, not mentioned by name, as appears by the original
deed deposited among numerous others in the custody
of the authorities of St, Thomas' parish. In 1382 he

A.d, 1405,

BRISTOL MAYORS, ETC.

191

was sheriff ; in 1392, and again in 1398, he was mayor ;
having also, in 1384, been elected member of Parliament
for Bristol, His wiU is dated March 13th, 1405, and
in it he is styled, as was the flrst WiUiam Canynges in
a similar document, ' ' a burgess and merchant of Bris
tol," He bequeaths "his body to be buried in the
chapel of St, Thomas the Martyr, in his tomb below
the chapel of the Blessed Virgin Mary," which was
evidently the famUy place of sepulture, although his
brother Simon was interred elsewhere. He leaves in
structions that all his goods and chattels shaU be
distributed in three portions under the dUection of his
executors, with the exception of his clothing ; the
whole of which, " and aU other ornaments, and aU other
arms belonging to his body," are otherwise disposed of
as the reader may see by referring to his wUl, a copy of
which is here given. One portion of his goods he leaves
to his -wife Joan Wotton ; another part to be distributed
between his children in equal shares ; and a third part
to his executors, which they were to employ for his sake
in whatever manner they preferred ; which means in
fact they -jrere to use it for the purpose of paying priests
for his obit, and to pray for the release of his soul out
of purgatory. His large estates and lands in Bristol,
which his -wife enjoyed during her lifetime, devolved,
on her death, to his third son, the second William Can
ynges, by which addition to his fortune, the latter
became a very wealthy man. His trustees, Joan his
wife. Sir Henry Garleston, and John Frere, entered
into recognizances before the mayor at the GuUdhaU,
for the due fulfilment of their trust,
" The Will or John Canynges,
" Datum 13th March 1405. Johannes Canynges Bergensis
Bristol and Mercator, Corpus sepeliendum in Capell^ Sancti
Thomee Martyris in tumb^ me^ infra capellam B, Mariee Virginis
in orient! parte volo quod omnia bona et catalla mea distribuantur
in tres partes per visum Executorum meum exceptis omnibus ves-
tibus et omnibus aliis ornameutis et omnibus meis armis corpori
meo pertinentibus Lego unam partem Johanna uxori me^ alteram
distribuendam inter liberos meos inter me et Johannam uxorem
meam legitime procreatos tam inter masculos quam inter femellas
per equales partes, Et tertiam partem lego executoribus meis
quod facient ordinem et dispendent pro anim^ me^ quali mode
vellent et si aliquis liberorum infra setatem obierit volo quod
dicta bona equaliter distribuenter inter tune viventes. Do et lego
Johannse uxori meae omnia tenementa subscripta videlicet quatuor
shopas situatas in Touker strete inter terram Thomje Barough ex
parte un^ et terras meas ex altera et extendit se a vice anterius ad
terras meas usque ad terram Wilelmi Baker ex parte una posterius
et duas aulas cum pertinentiis in eodem suburbio in vice prsedicto
situatas juxta terram Johannis Bremer et parte altera anterius et
extendunt se usque ad cursum aquae Abon^ posterius et octo
shopas cum pertinentiis in suburbio Bristol prradicto situatas
juxta les Eakkys cum tentoriis ibidem et tres shopas cum perti
nentiis iu suburbio eodem in vioo Sancti Thomae Martyris situatas
inter terram Thomae Stokes Militis ex parte un^ et terram
Wilelmi Payes ex parte altera et unum gardinum cum duobus

tenementis eidem gardino adjaoentibus quae gardina jacet in eodem
suburbio juxta Le Hounden-lane et unum aliud gardinum cum
pertinentiis qu83 gardina jacet in suburbio praedicto in Eedclyve
strete inter terram Hugonis Haper ex parte un^ et terram Alicise
Clyvedon ex parte altera et 13 solidi et 4 denarii redittls assizae
exeuntis ex tenementis situatis in suburbio Bristol in Thomas
strete inter meas tres shopas ex parte una et tenementum in quo ,
Hugo Stonenton die hujus scripti habitat ex parte altera quo
tenementa die confectionis hujus testamenti praedictus WiUelmus
Payes tenet habendum et tenendum praedictae JohannsB uxori me«
ad terminum -vitae suss sine calumpnia vasti de capitalibus Dominii
et feodi et aliarum consuetudinum et post mortem praedictaB
Johannae Volo quod omnia praediota tenementa cum pertinentiis
suis remaneant Johanni filio meo et heredibus de corpore sui
legitime procreatis quod se dictus Johannes sine h'.-eredibus se
obierit quod tunc praedicta tenementa Johanni legati permaneant
haeredibus de corpore mei Johanni Canynges testatoris et Johanno
uxoris meae procreatis Etsi Ego pr^dictus Johannis Canynges
testator et praediota Johanna obieremus sine hujus modi haeredibus
quod tunc omnia eadem tenementa cum suis pertinentiis remaneant
rectis hasredibus Johannae uxoris me^ Item lego prasfats Johanno
uxori meae omnia tenementa mea subscripta cum suis pertinentiis
videlicet unam aulam cum una shopa adjacente cum pertinentiis
iu suburbio Bristol in Touker strete inter terram Thomae Beau-
pign6 ex parte una et terras meas ex parte altera et extendit se a
vice praedicto anterius usque ad le Lawdiche posterius et sex
shopas cum pertinentiis in eodem suburbio situatas in Touker strete
inter terras meas ex una parte et tonus prioris et Conventiis de
Wytham ex parte altera et quatuor tenementa cum pertinentiis in
dicto suburbio in Touker strete praedicta situata inter tenementum
Jacobi CoUis ex parte una et terras meas ex parte altera et se ex
tendunt in vico praedicto anterius usque ad le Lawdiche posterius
et unum gardinum quod jacet in Pile strete habenda et tenenda
eidem Johannae ad terminum vit« suae sine calumpnia vasti, &c.
Item post mortem dictae Johanna uxoris me^ remaneant Thomae
filio meo et haeredibus de suo corpore &c et si idem Johannis
obierit sine haeredibus tunc tenementa praediota remaneant Thomae
fllio meo et haeredibus suis et si dictus Thomas obierit sine haere
dibus tunc praedicta tenementa Thorn* legata remaneant haeredibus
de corpore meo et Johannae uxoris meae legitimis procreatis Ita
quod si ego Johannes Canynges testator et Johanna uxor mea
obieremus sine haeredibus &c quod tunc Volo quod prsdicta tene
menta remaneant rectis haeredibus Johannae uxoris meae Item Volo
quod si Thomas aut heredes sui alienaverint praedicta tenementa
personae sen aliquabus personis in feodo simplici &c, tunc per illos
alientio flat vacua et nuUius vigoris et tunc statim omnia tene
menta pr^diota remaneant haeredibus mei Johannis Canynges
testatoris Etsi Ego Johannes Canynges et Johanna uxor mea sine
haeredibus obieremus tunc tenementa &c. remaneant rectis here
dibus Johannae uxoris meae. Item lego omnia mea tenementa
subscripta Johannae uxoris meae videlicit unum tenementum cum
suis pertinentiis in suburbio Bristol vocato Small strete inter
tenementa Walteri Seymor ex parte una et tenementa Johannis
Porhard ex parte altera et extendit se usque ad Gildam aulam
Bristol posterius et sex shopas cum suis pertinentiis in suburbio
Bristol versus Le Casteldych et unam aulam et quatuor shopas
cum pertinentiis in suburbio Bristol in Castel strete inter tene
menta Johannis Brewton ex parte una et terras Prioris et Conventiis
de Monkenferleigh ex parte altera et duas shopas cum pertinentiis
in villa Bristol in Wynche strete inter tenementa David Vaughan
et terras prioris et Conventis de Monkenferleigh ex parte altera
et unum gardinum quod jacet super montem Sancti Michaelis inter
terras Thom* Broke militis ex una parte et terras Johannis Hurell
ex parte altera et unum gardinum quod jacet super Brendon hille
quae Johanna uxor Johannis Knight "Crokker" die hujus scripti

192

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1378,

tenet infra libertatis Bristoliae et unam shopam cum pertinentiis
in suburbio Bristol in Lewenes Mede inter shopam Martini Bou
cher ex parte una et shopam Hugonis Garleston ex parte altera et
unam vacuam placeam in Villa Bristol in Wynche strete quod
Johannis Tavernor tenet et unam alteram placeam jacentem in
suburbio Bristol iu Baldwyns sti ete inter tenementa quondam
Wilielmi Woodford ex parte una et tenementa ThomaB Gloucester
ex parte altera et unam acram et dimldiam terrae cum pertinentiis
jacentem inter terram nuper Alani Wrington ex parte una et
terram Johannis Ffoliott ex parte altera habenda et tenenda
praedictae Johannae ad terminum vitae sine calumpnia vasti &c.
Ita quod post mortem Johannae uxoris mea3 remaneant Wilelmo
fllio meo et heredibus suis &c. tenenda ut supra et per defectum
hujus modi remaneant heredibus femalibus de corpore meo &c.
Etsi per defectum hujus modi, Volo quod praedicta tenementa
cum pertinentiis praefato Wilelmo legata venduntur per majorem
villae Bristol qui pro tempore fuerit et per Ballivos ejusdem Ac
etiam per quatuor probos et legates homines de Parochia Sancti
Thomae Martyris Bristol per electionem dicti maj oris etBallivorum
et capiat dictus major pro labore suo in venditione praedicta 20
solidi sterling et quilibet duorum Ballivorum 10 solidi sterling et
de pecunia de venditione tenementorum predictorum proveniente
distribuantur in pios usfts perdictum majorem et Ballivos Bristol
et ex assensft quatuor dictorum et per majorem partem eorum pro
auima mea et pro animabus eorum quibus teneor Item lego Johannae
uxori meae omnia tenementa subscripta videlicet unum tenemen
tum cum pertinentiis in suburbio Bristol in Temple strete inter tene
menta Thomae Broke Militis ex parte una et tenementum Eicardi
Innyng ex parte altera et extendit se a vico predicto anterius
usque ad le Lawdyche posterius et uuum tenementum cum perti
nentiis situatum in suburbio Bristol iu Eedeclyf strete inter
tenementa Johannis Hardyug ex parte una et tenementum Henrici
Greene ex parte altera et extendit se a vico predicto anterius usque
ad cursum aquae AbouiE posterius et reversionem unius teuementi
cum pertinentiis quos .Johannes Lane de Netherwere et Alicia
uxor ejus de me tenent ad terminum vitae suorum iu Netherwere
predicta in comitata Somersetensi una cum 10 solidi redditus quod
redere tenentur annuatim pro tenemento predicto habend, et
tenend, praediota Johannae ad terminum vit« sine calumpnia vasti
&o, Ita quod post mortem praedictae Johannae remaneant proli in
utero predictae Johanna uxoris meae die confectionis hujus testa

menti tenend, ut supra Etsi pr^dictus proles sine hsredibus &c,
obierit quod tunc Volo quod praediota tenementa una cum 10 solidi
redditus predicto proli legatum remaneant rectis heredibus
Johannae uxoris meae Item lego Johannae uxori me* custodiam
Wilhelmi fllii mei et Agnetis flliae meae una cum bonis et catallis
eisdem legalis quousque ad plenam aetatem pervenerint inveniendo
securitatem coram ilajore Villae Bristol et Ballivos ejusdem villae
prontmos et consuetude. Item lego Margaretae Beaupignd custo
diam Thomae filii mei et Johannae uxoris meae ac Margaretae flliae
meae una cum bonis et catallis eisdem per me legatis quousque ad
plenam aetatem pervenerint inveniendo securitatem coram Majore
et Ballivis &,c. Item lego Johanni Sudbury custodiam Johannis
fllii mei una cum bonis et catallis inveniendo securitatem coram
Majore et Ballivis &c, Et ad hoc testamentum bene et fldeliter
exequendum et ad implendum ordino facio &c, Johannem uxorem
meam et Dominum Henricum Garleston ac Johannem Frere execu-
tores meos In cujus rei testimonium sigillum meum apposui apud
Bristol anno et die supersoriptis."
There was a Castle street prior to that which is now
known by that name, which was also in the suburbs,
i.e., outside the waUs, It is now known as Peter street,
63, Eichard IL, by inspeximus, on February 8th,
1 378, in the first year of his reign, confirmed the
charter of 21 Edward IIL, which gave power to rebuild
a prison and to punish fraudulent bakers ; also that of
47 Edward III., -u'hich was an inspexi^nus of the charter
making Bristol into a county, and of the letters patent
for the perambulation ; but most unaccountably the
charter of 5 Edward IIL, which gave the custody of
orphans to the mayors, pardoned aU laches through non-
usage, and confirmed to the burgesses the view of
frankpledge, was not produced, at least it is not men
tioned. Just twenty days after the above confirmation
was given, February 28th, we find the king granting
another inspeximus for the sole purpose of rectifying the
omission.

CHAPTER VIII,

^

Tp r^onsES OB li^i^e^asTE^ jniD yo:^^. ^^

I. Henry IV. seizes the Throne. Despencer taken and brought to Bristol. 2. Thomas, Lord
de Berkeley takes the field against Owen Glendower. 3. Bristol exempted from the jurisdiction of the Court
of Admiralty. 4. Act for improving the navigation of the Avon to Bath. 5. Incidents of the period,
Bristol Mayors, etc. 6. Accession of Henry V. Bristol ships. Agincourt. 7. Accession of Henry VI.
Queen Catherine dowered with Bristol. 8. Norton's house made into a Mint. 9. Bristol fortified with
chambered guns. 10. War Taxes : the Comptrollers ordered to London, ii. Bristol's contribution to the
Channel fleet. 12. The King and Queen at Bristol. 13. The Mariner's Guild in Virgin lane. 14. Curious
bits illustrative of life in Bristol in the 15th Century. 15. Keeping the Sepulchre. 16. Singular bequest.
17. Cost of building a house in the i^th Century. 18. The Calendars' Library burned, ig. Canynges'
favour with the King. 20. The Crafts' Guilds. Customs on woollen goods. Bristol ships. 21. Private
war between the members of the Berkeley family. 22. Bristol Mayors. Incidents of the period.
23. Edward IV. seizes on the Throne: Retributive justice. 24. Execution of Sir Baldwin Fulford.
25. Letter patent, making Bristol a Court of Admiralty. 26. Incidents of the period. The King's marriage.
Lord Herbert's brother killed at Bristol. 27. State of the Kingdom. Battle of Nibley Green. 28. Reversion
of the Berkeley manors. 29. Queen Margaret and Prince Edward at Bristol. The battle of Tewkesbury.
30. Edward visits Bristol : Quaint story told of him. 31. The Earl's Court in Bristol, held
by the Duke of Clarence : His death. 32. Norton's accusation of the Mayor. 33. William Wyrcestre.
34. Bristol Coins of Henry VI. and Edward IV. 35. Bristol Mayors : Eminent men, etc. Incidents.
36. Richard III. usurps the Throne.

JT was during the Mayoralty of John
Canynges, on the 29th of Sept., 1399,
that Eichard II, was deposed, having
reigned 22 years 14 weeks and 2 days,
and the same time king Henry IV,
was crowned," ^ This is not correct,
inasmuch as Henry was crowned on
the 13th of October, and one of his
first acts was to imprison the two heirs
to the throne in the castle at Windsor,
1 Old Bristol MS,
[Vol. L]

Before the year was ended a plot was formed against
him by some of his quondam friends amongst the nobles,
but Henry, forewarned by the Duke of Eutland, marched
against them, Eetreating along the banks of the
Thames, the insurgents reached Cirencester, where the
chiefs, most imprudently leaving their soldiers encamped
in the fields, took up their lodgings, with but few at
tendants, in two inns. The mayor of the town coUected
the townsmen, closed the gates, and forced the inns ;
from one of them he took the Duke of Surrey and the
Earl of Salisbury, whom he immediately ordered to be

194

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1405.

beheaded, the inmates of the other made a longer
resistance, but one calendar states that the Earls of
Kent and Oxford, -with Sir Thomas Blount and Sir
Ealph Homly, were also taken and beheaded. The
Duke of Exeter and Thomas Despencer, who had lately
been made Earl of Gloucester, escaped. For the above
service the king granted to the townsmen of Cirencester
two tuns of wine to be delivered from the port of Bristol
at their pleasure, Despencer took refuge in his castle
at Cardiff, but feeling his retreat unsafe, he embarked
on board ship, with his servants and treasure, and en
deavoured to escape to the continent. The captain of
the ship, however, when at sea refused to carry him
anywhere but to Bristol, Despencer threatened him
with death, when 20 armed men, who had been secreted
in the hold, rushed upon deck and overpowered the earl
and his attendants. One need scarcely wonder at this
apparent treachery. These Lords of Glamorganshire
were a tyrannical race, rapacious, lawless, and licen
tious, "They," says an old historian, "would take
what they pleased, a flne beast, a horse, or a flne
woman, and carry their prey off to their colossal castle
of Caerphilly, so that when anything of the kind was
lost, or not known where it might be found, the common
expression was, 'it has gone to CaerphUly,' which was
tantamount to saying 'it has gone to the de-vil,'"^ De
spencer being thus captured, was deUvered into the
custody of the Mayor of Bristol,
Henry, it is said, wished to have an inter-yiew with
his prisoner before he was put to death, but on the
second day after his arrival a great tumult arose, the
populace clamoured for his death as a traitor to the
king and the realm, and demanded that he should be
immediately brought out and executed. The mayor,
WUliam Froome, remonstrated in vain, the mob dragged
their victim forth and beheaded him at the High Cross,
" His head was sent to London and set upon a pole on
the bridge, his body was buried at Tewkesbury in the
choir, under a lamp that burned before the host.""
The king granted, by writ, a certain gown of motley
velvet of damask, furred, which the prisoner wore, to
the earl's captor, WUliam Flaxman. Despencer was
beheaded in January, 1400; and seven months after his
death, his wife, Constantia, was deUvered of a daughter
at Cardiff castle,
Henry married, in 1403, his second wife, Joanna of
Navarre, and settled upon her "the town of Bristol and
the suburbs thereof, with the waUs, gates, ditches, lands
and tenements, rents and services, and particularly the
flesh shambles : which grant seems to contain also the
produce of tolls, pleas of courts, markets, fairs, &c, ;
^ Taylor's Cook about Bristol, 273. " Ibid, 34.

that is, everything afterward granted to the Mayor and
Commonalty."^ 2, The year 1402 was one of Ul omen, the Welsh
under Owen Glendower rose, striving to regain their
national independence, and Thomas, Lord de Berkeley, in
March, was, with the Earl of Warwick, ordered by the
king to raise and train men in the counties of Gloucester
shire, Somerset, and Bristol. In June of the same year
he marched with them to defend the borders of Wales,
The invasion of that kingdom became an annual event; ia
1403-4 Berkeley was again sent against Glendower, his
commission authorised him to take up six barges from
the above-named counties, with sufficient mariners, and
go to sea with them at the king's wages, with aU dili
gence, which he did. In 1405 he was again ordered to
muster and arm aU the able men in the two counties to
withstand the incursions of the Welsh. Berkeley was
unable to prevent the landing of 12,000 troops at MU-
ford Haven, which the French king had sent in a fleet
of 140 saU, to the assistance of Glendower, but he took
14 ships and burned other 15 of them,^
The Berkeleys sometimes fltted out ships, and shared
in the commerce of the port. In 1409-10 the king
wrote to Lord Thomas, that whereas he had, by letters
patent, in the eighth year of his reign, granted for ten
years, liberty to the merchants of Genoa to trade with
their carracks into England, there to bring and seU
their wares, and to carry back to Flanders and other
parts cloth and wool, paying the customs and doing no
damage, he now learned that divers of Lord Berkeley's
men and servants, in a ship of his saUing towards Bor
deaux, had violently set upon one of the carracks, the
St, Mary and St. Bridget, laden with wines and other
merchandise. He therefore required this lord either to
make immediate restitution, or to come and answer
before his Pri-yy CouncU forthwith,
Eestitution in part, it seems, was made by Lord
Berkeley, Sir John Greyndour, who had been Sheriff
of Gloucester in 1405, and others of Bristol, That the
king was not very angry is evident from the fact that
the same year he employed Berkeley to borrow money
for him in Bristol upon the security of the uncoUected
flfteenth that had been granted by Parliament,
The year 1405 was the most critical period in the
king's reign, and although Henry triumphed over his
foes, he emerged from the struggle a broken down man.
He issued writs for summoning a ParUament in Bristol,
because "many persons belonging to the Forest of
Dean sought to prevent corn and other provisions being
brought to Bristol, hoping thereby to distress the king
and his government," Whereupon Henry issued a
' Seyer, II. , 173. ^ Condensed from Smyth,

A,D. 1405,

JURISDICTION OF THE COURT OF ADMIRALTY.

195

proclamation to his beloved and faithful John Greyn
dour, knight, John Joce, and Henry Moton as fol
lows : — "Whereas we are given to understand, that
certain of our subjects of the forest of Dene and others
of the county of Gloucester are daily hindering persons,
who wish to carry com, flesh, fish or other victuals to
our town of Bristol, where we have ordered our Par
Uament to be holden, to the prejudice and great damage
of the inhabitants of the said town, and of our other
subjects, who will come there on account of the Parlia
ment : We, being -wiUing to provide against such evils,
charge you to cause proclamation to be made in our
name as weU within the forest, as in other flt places in
the said county, that aU our subjects shaU permit all
manner of persons to carry corn, flesh, &c,, to the said
to-wn: and to arrest aU those whom they should flnd
acting to the contrary, and to commit them to pri
son," &c,i
3, For many years the merchants of Bristol and
other to-wns in the west had been greatly troubled by
the vexatious proceedings of the Court of Admiralty,
which sat in London or at Southwark, and which pro
perly had jurisdiction only of offences committed on the
high seas or in countries beyond the sea. The admirals
and their officers had gone beyond their original juris
diction, and had encroached upon that of the common
law courts, claiming cognizance of aU causes between
mariners and merchants, and even of persons dwelling
inland, who were neither mariners nor merchants. They
summoned men from aU parts of the kingdom to appear
before them in London, tried common causes by the
civU law, and imprisoned and extorted hea-yy fines
from the unfortunates who were cast. These proceed
ings had caused many petitions to be presented to
Eichard II,, and also to Henry, praying for redress.
One such is in the Little Red Book, in Norman French,
dated 17 Eich. IL, 1393-4. The substance is as fol
lows: —"Your poor subjects the burgesses of Bristuyt,
Briggewater, Excestre, Bamestaple and WeUes humbly
pray ; that whereas many pleas were lately depending
in the Court of Admiralty in the south and west parts
of England, which did not belong to the jurisdiction of
the said court, such as of house breaking, goods carried
away, batteries and other trespasses and contracts of aU
sorts ; by reason of which many of the king's subjects
have received great harm in their goods and their
estate : and although the Lords and Commons in the
last Parliament ordered that the Court of Admiralty
shoiUd be restrained, and that such causes should be
determined by the common law, yet stUl that court takes
cognizance of them, and many have been pending un-
» Seyer, II, , 175,

determined for three years and more, owing to the divers
delays of the civU law and the subtU imagination of the
plaintiffs ; insomuch that many persons of the aforesaid
to-wns have been utterly ruined by their great expences
in law, and have left their -wives and children beggars,
and are gone to Uve in Wales and other parts out of
England. They therefore pray that such matters may
be withdrawn from the Admiralty, and. that plaintiffs
may have their action at common law, on account of the
great delays of the civil law, and the great costs and
expences belonging to it, which the poor subjects above
mentioned cannot endure, Eesp', The king refers the
matter to the ChanceUor, who is to grant prohibitions,"-'
This seems to have been ineffective, but the burgesses
persevered in their petitions to Henry, who, in consider
ation of the many services done to himself and former
kings by the merchants of Bristol, their ships, and voy
ages, and in consideration of £200 freely given to him in
his necessities for the benefit of the kingdom, and because
the merchants and burgesses had been grievously vexed
by the officers of the Admiralty, therefore the king
granted them exemption from their jurisdiction, ^ One
woiUd have deemed this sufficient, but usurped usages
die hard, A case is cited by Prynne (Anim' 4 Inst',
78), in 1427-8, of John Button against Bartholomew
Pit, in the court of C P', for a ship supposed by the Ubel
in the Court of Admiralty to be taken upon the high
sea, although the said ship was actuaUy lying, when
seized, in the harbour of Bristol, and not upon the main
sea, contrary to the form and effect of the said statutes.
This was a palpable fiction of Admiralty law, which
described every case as happening upon the high sea,
in order that the Admiralty Court in London might
retain their usurpation. In 1461 the Mayor and Ee-
corder were by commission constituted judges of the
Court of Admiralty within the to-wn and county of
Bristol, its liberties and precincts,
4, The Parliament of 1404, held in Coventry, was
nicknamed the "unlearned," because aU lawyers were
rigorously excluded. This Parliament attempted to
lighten the taxes on the people by the resumption of
aU royal grants, and to prevent the alienation in future
of the royal patrimony, so that the sovereign might be
enabled to live upon his hereditary private revenue;
they further sought to appropriate the wealth of the
clergy, asserting that one-third of the land of England
had by craft come into the possession of ecclesiastics.
The royal income was only 48,000 marks, whilst the
church possessed 500,000 marks, and 18,000 ploughs of
land; this the ParUament proposed to utiUse for the
king, earls, knights, squires, and hospitals.
1 Seyer, II,, 177, ^ Little Eed Book,

196

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1412,

In 1409 the commons of Somerset, Wilts, and Bristol
petitioned Parliament for power to remove aU obstruc
tions in the river Avon between Bristol and Bath, They
stated that before the time of Eichard II, the river was
navigable throughout that portion, and that wine, wax
(the wax chandler ranked high amongst the wealthy
traders of Bristol, and the trade in wax was very exten
sive, owing to the number of candles used for pious pur
poses in the chantry chapels and in churches), salt, wool,
skins and cloth, used to be conveyed in vessels between
the two cities, A writ was directed to the Mayor of
Bristol, John Droyse, and Eichard TikehuU, sheriff of
Somerset, for that purpose.
The Parliament which sat in
1407 greatly abridged the
royal prerogative ; it ordained
fifteen councillors for the
king's guidance, his Chan
ceUor was not to act contrary
to the law, traitors in his court
were to be punished, and the
king's revenue was to be for
his household only. Petitions
were to be received twice a
week, and all grants of money
were to be declared by the
mouth of the Speaker of the
House of Commons. This
precedent has become an in
valuable condition of the Brit
ish Constitution.
5, The infamy of burning
preachers and professors of
the gospel wUl ever be an in
delible stain upon this king's
character. In February, 1401,
Sir WiUiam Sawtrey, minister
of St. Osyth, a LoUard, was ""' '^'"'""'^ ^'""' '" ^'- ^^'"'i'-'^-J"^' street.
burnt for heresy, and in 1410 John Badby was burned at
Smithfield in the presence of the Prince of Wales, whose
sensational appetite and love of low vicious associates
brought upon himself, in 1412, his commitment to the
tower by Chief Justice Gascoigne,
The exercise of undue influence by the Crown in
the return of its own partisans to Parliament was
greatly checked during this reign, and a county sheriff
was imprisoned by the House for making a false return.
The growing boldness of the members, and their restric
tion of the privileges claimed by royalty, were not palat
able to the king ; he complained of the too great liberty
of speech of the young members of the Commons, and
ere his death he ad-vised his son " not to allow his peojile

to remain too long at peace, which, he remarked, was
ever apt to breed commotions {i,e, more Uberty) in Eng
land." A maxim the truth of which the sovereigns of
this and other realms, besides his son, have been not slow
to carry into practice, Thomas Norton was returned
for Bristol to four of these Parliaments,
In 1412 Hugh Luttrel was appointed constable of
Bristol castle, and, in 1413, the unquiet reign of Henry
IV, was ended, the king dying of a flt of apoplexy on
the 20th of March in the Jerusalem chamber at West
minster, John Barstaple founded Trinity hospital on the south
side of the Old Market, com
monly caUed the Dial alms
house, within Lawford's gate,
for ten widowers and ten
widows, a bedmaker and a
ivasherwoman. On the north
side of the Old Market, within
the gate, is another almshouse
for twenty-four women, found
ed by IsabeUa, his wife, who
died in 1404, John Barstable
was mayor thrice. He died
in 1411, and was buried with
his wife near the communion
table of the Dial almshouse.
" He builded the chapel therein
to the honour of God and the Holy
Trinity, pro-^aded twelve chambers
and twelve gardens for six poor
men and six poor women, to be con-
tinuallj' placed therein. He aUowed
competent maintenance for a priest,
to serve in and attend on the said
chapel and premises, -with certain
rents towards their maintenance,
which rents are since increased, as
by the particulars under written
may appear,
"The rentall of the landes and tenements belonging to the
saide almshouse of the gift of the saide John Barstaple,
' ' Three tenements in St, Maryport-Street, Six tenements on
the Key, Eleven tenements and seven gardens in the 'Aulde
Markett,' Sixteen tenements in Thomas-street, Three tene
ments and seven gardens in 'the Barres.' Two gardens in
A tenement, garden, aud little house in

seven
Marshall-street. 'Broademeade,' "An orchard, a garden, a little house, a close of meadow, and
a ragge of ground iu the (writing indistinct) yard," ^
Thomas Young, mayor in 1411 and 1420, represented
the town in ParUament in 1414. This great merchant
married the widow of John Canynges, the mother of
the celebrated WUUam, He left to his wife by wUl his
mansion in Temple street, and other messuages there
1 Bristol Archives,

A.D, 1414,

QUEEN CATHERINE DOWERED WITH BRISTOL.

197

and in the suburbs of the town. He also left legacies
to the Friars Mendicant of Bristol, In his wiU, dated
14th March, 1426, he directed his body to be buried
before the altar of St, Nicholas, in the church of St.
Thomas, 6, During the mayoralty of John Cleve, Henry V,,
of Monmouth, began his reign on the 20th of March,
141 3, being then twenty-four years of age. He displayed
great worthiness by discarding the loose companions of
his earlier years, and showing favour to the judge who
had in his own person vindicated the majesty of violated
EngUsh law. He was crowned on the 9th of April in
the same year. The cradle, or rather cot, of this king
is in the possession of Eev, G, W, Braikenridge,
Clevedon. In 1414 the king, by the advice of his council, sup
pressed 110 monasteries, or rather took that number
which were held by foreigners, non-resident, into his
own hands, and in the same year he laid claim to France,
In his invasion of that country, in 1415, we are told by
Drayton : —
" Eight goodly ships, so Bristow ready made.
Which to the king they bountifully lent,
With Spanish wines, which they for ballast lade
In happy speed of his brave voyagement ;
Hoping his conquest should enlarge their trade ;
And therewithall a rich, and spacious tent.
And as this fleet the Severn seas doth stem.
Five more from Padstow came along with them. "
This year complaints were made that English ships had
been seized, as they passed the coast of Brittany, by the
Bretons, during a time of truce. One of these is from
John Fisher (sheriff 1406), John Droyse (mayor 1406-9,
1414, and M.P. 1407), and Thomas Fish (baiUff 1419)
and others, their companions of the town of Bristol, who
complain that " John Fisher had a ship, the Christopher,
which attended the king in his voyage to Hareflieu,
and afterwards continued her voyage towards Bordeaux
-with cloth and other goods and merchandise to the value
of 1,200 marks (the ship and goods) ; and that certain
Bretons came on board the ship, took possession of her,
threw the men into prison, where they kept them three
months and more. They therefore pray the king to
grant them permission to seize any of the subjects of
Brittany on either side of the sea, together with any
ships, goods, debts, obligations, and property whatever
belonging to them, and to detain them until fuU resti
tution be made for the ship and merchandise before
mentioned, as weU as for the expenses which have been
incurred, which amounted, by estimation, to the sum of
300 marks." This petition was referred to the King's
council, with a request that the lords of that council
would order what was reasonable.

Henry, by far the greatest king in Christendom,
died August 31st, 1422, As a politician, warrior, and
ruler, he ranks high. Brave and temperate as a king,
impartial, but a martinet, he too frequently gave way
to cruelty and ruinous ambition, Agincourt was the
glory of his reign, it made him the arbiter in European
politics ; he had 30,000 troops when he landed, aud
with a smaller numerical force he defeated the French,
kiUing 10,000 men and taking 14,000 prisoners. The
pay of the English army was — Duke, 1 5s, 4(? ; earl, 6s,
8(?. ; baron, 4s, ; esquire. Is, ; and archer, Qd. per day,
John Claydon, a furrier, was burned for religion,
and Sir John Oldcastle was also burned alive in chains
for the same aUeged cause ; but it is only fair to add
that Oldcastle was deeply implicated in insurrectionary
attempts and had been outlawed for three years before
his capture and cruel death,
7, One of our MS, calendars runs thus: — "John
Spine (Thorn) was mayor when ' the flower and glory
of knighthood died,' This year while the king was in
France his son, king Henry, was born at Windsor upon
St. Nicholas' day. And this year ye king died in France
and was brought to Westminster ye 31st August, 1422,
having reigned 9 years 5 months and 24 days, and the
same day his son, Henry VI, , succeeded his father ; at
ye age of eight months old was crowned in his cradle
and committed to the keeping of his uncle, the Duke of
Gloucester, who was appointed Eegent in England, the
Duke of Bedford Eegent in France," The dower of
Catherine, the queen mother, had been settled upon
her marriage with Henry V,, and one of the items was
an annual rent of £60 out of the ulnage and subsidy of
cloths sold in the town of Bristol, to be paid by the
farmers of such ulnage and subsidy. But inasmuch as
Bristol had been freed from "ulnage ^ of drabs" by the
king in 1389, and the subsidies were intermittent and
uncertain, the king (Henry VI,), in 1433-4, granted
that the said £60 be taken out of the subsidy and ulnage
of cloth sold in Bristol, and the forfeited cloths, the
amount to be received annuaUy from those who derived
the proflt,
8. In 1422 the mansion of the Nortons (St, Peter's
hospital) was occupied as a mint for coining,^ Portions
of this ancient and most substantial building remain.
The old house is the eastern portion only of the present
buUding, its upper story is probably of an intermediate
date between that of its foundation and the erection,
^ Ulnage is from idna, the bones of the forearm (an ell), said
to be the standard measure fixed. by Henry I., in 1100, from the
length of his own arm. "Ulnage of drabs " means the measuring
of cloth (drapery) by the king's officers, which were by them
measured and sealed, — Ed,
" Evans, 100 ; but he gives no authority.

198

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1431,

early in the I7th century, of the three beautiful western
gables, with their picturesque caryatides and arabesque
fronts, for a view of which, and further description,
we refer to our Ecclesiastical Histoet, 135-6,
In the first year of the reign of this king the bur
gesses of Tenby were, by agreement with the port
and city of Bristol, made free for twelve years from aU
kunagio, numagio, portagio, parmagio, and picagio. The
words ring like a refrain from an old song, but they
simply mean that Tenby, for that period, was freed from
aU Bristol town dues. The king was crowned in 1429,
being then a chUd of eight years of age, and the regents
took the opportunity of borrowing £50,000 for the de-

Juyn's Chapel ai his house neo/r Bishojnvorth.
fence of the kingdom, of which Bristol lent £333 6s, 8d,,
which was thus apportioned: — The town £220, and the
port of the town £113 6s, 8d, (out of the subsidy of 3s,
on every cask of wine, and Is. in the pound on pro
perty), ^
9, The cities of Bristol, Gloucester and Worcester,
complained that the Welshmen of the Marches and
other privileged places where the king's writs did not
run, seized their dregs and ^oats in order to compel the
hiring of the Welsh trows to carry their goods, and that
they were forced to pay whatever rates the Welshmen
1 EoUs of Par,, V,, 418,

asked. The EoUs of Parliament in the ensuing year
stated that divers Welsh gaUeys were lying in wait in the
Severn to seize on the boats of the before-named cities.
"Bristol, being a most important city, was not left to
the mere strength of its waUs and towers, but had the
means of keeping at a distance enemies assembled to
assaU it. There was 20 cwt, of gunpowder in store,
and the sum of £40 was ordered to be laid out there for
the purchase of certain guns and other stuffe for the
defence of the town ; a dozen brazen guns were ordered
to be made shotting peUettes as grete as a Parys balle
or lesse and every gonne had iiij chambers." ^ So that
we learn that artiUery of that description is by no means
a modern invention. These are amongst the many in
stances in which Bristol is termed a city before the time
of Henry VIII,
In 1431 Sir John de WeUis was Lord Mayor of
London ; he gave the sword with scabbard embroidered
with pearls, to the town of Bristol, on the hUt of which
may stiU be read this inscription : —
' ' John Wellis, of London, Grocer, Maior,
Gave to Bristol this sword feire, ''
He was a Bristol man, most probably a descendant of
the Eichard de WeUs whom we have mentioned,
WUliam Wyrcestre, our industrious topographer,
whose parents were whitawers, skinners and glovers,
who also bore the maternal name Botoner, was entered
this year as a student at Hart's haU, Oxford. In 1434
Sir Thomas MarshaU, a calendar, buUt a house adjoin
ing AU Saints for a residence for the -vicars of that
church.- In 1439 Sir John Juyn (not Inyng as in
variably speUed hitherto), died and was buried in Eed
cliff church. He was a knight, recorder of Bristol,
a judge of the King's Bench and chief baron of the
Exchequer, whose country seat was between Filwood
and Bishopworth, Some few fragments of his chapel
stUl exist. One of his granddaughters married Lord
Paulet, of Hinton St. George,
John Sharpe, mayor in 1432 and 1439, was chosen
four times M,P, In 1446 he was elected with Thomas
Young, son of the great merchant, and they had " two
shillings for their expenses, and no more ! "
1 0 , After more than twenty -five years' war in France,
affairs there were, at this period, looking very gloomy
for the English army. Whereupon a writ was sent to
the chief ports, one being directed to the officers of the
Customs in Bristol, which ordered them to enforce the
provisions of an Act passed in the last ParUament,
and made it felony for any captain who had received
payment for his soldiers from the king, to keep back
1 Eoberts' Soc, Hist,, 102.
'' See Ecclesiastical History, 92.

A.D. 1433.

BRISTOL'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE CHANNEL FLEET.

199

any part of their wages, or that any man, who had
received pay and passed muster, shoiUd desert the army.
These misdemeanours are stated " to have been the chief
cause of the long continuance of the war, and of the
losses, hurts, and disgraces that have befaUen us be
yond the sea,"
The death of Anne of Burgundy, -wife of the Duke of
Bedford, Eegent of France, dissolved the tie that had
bound England and Burgundy together in the war
against Charles of France, Young Henry, after his
coronation in England, had been sent over to be crowned
in Paris, then held by the English, as king of France,
but, owing to the want of money, the ceremony had to
be delayed eighteen months ; meanwhUe the coolness we
have aUuded to ha-ving arisen between the dukes, a
bitter quarrel soon after drove Burgundy into aUiance
-with Charles, While tidings of victories came from
over the sea, EngUshmen had borne the hea-vy burdens
without much repining, but now, as the prospect of con
quest vanished, and frequent defeats were reluctantly
admitted, the people became peevish and discontented.
This state of affairs wiU account, we think, for the un
usual step taken by the Government in 1431-2. Letters
under Privy seal were sent by them "to aU coUectors
of the customs and subsidies, and to the comptroUers
of the seaports in England, Bristol included, ordering
them to appear personaUy before the treasurer and
barons of the Exchequer at Westminster on the mor
row of St. Michael coming, and to bring with them the
books, roUs, taUies, moneys, and accounts, and to pay
no money whatever untU that day."^ We have seen
by charter that the moneys coUected were payable on
that day, but this inqiusitorial examination was evidently
something special, and doubtless meant more money, an
increase of taxation,
11. A curious rhyming pamphlet, written about
1433, became very popular. Its burden has grown
into a national axiom, it asserted in terse, vigorous
language that if England kept the seas, especiaUy the
narrow seas, she could compel aU the world to be at
peace with her, and to court her friendship. The
Commons had evidently caught the spirit of the writer
when, in 1441-2, they determined to maintain a Channel
fleet that should keep the sea from Candlemas to Mar
tinmas. It was to consist of eight large ships with
forstages (four stages or decks), having one with ano
ther, 150 mariners; each of these was to have one
barge and one balynger (tender), each barge to have 80
men, and each balynger 40 men ; every ship to have a
master and a quarter-master. Four large spynaces with
25 men each were to act as frigates for the fleet. The
' Bree's Cursory Sketch, 319,

pay for each man was to be 2s, per month, and that of
the master and quarter-master 40 pence per month over
and above the said pay. The ships were to be fur
nished by the seaports. From Bristol, our historians
state, two of the eight large ships were hired, viz,. The
Nicholas of the Tower and The Katherine of Burtons, The
Nicholas of the Toioer was, in 1450, under the command
of the Duke of Exeter, and was the ship that captured
WiUiam de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk, who, accused of
high treason, had been banished the kingdom for five
years by the king, who wished to save him from convic
tion by his- peers and from the punishment of a traitor.
Endeavouring to escape his weU merited fate, Suffolk
took ship hastily at Ipswich, hurrying to get over into
France, UnhappUy for him his vessel was overhauled
by The Nicholas of the Toiver, the captain of which seized
him, and carried him to Dover, where his head was
struck off on the gunwale of a cock-boat, and his
mangled remains were left unburied upon the beach.
The late Mr, John Gough Nichols contended that our
historians were in error in the supposition that The
Nicholas of the Toiver was a Bristol ship built by Burton,
and named after' his tower on the Broad quay. He
considers it to have had no connection with Bristol,
and to have been named after the Tower of London.^
Bree supposes that the Katherine of Burtons belonged
to WiUiam Canynges, He thinks the foUowing relates
to her when she was lying in Dartmouth harbour : — "Be
there made letters under the Privy Seal to — Cannings
of Bristol, that thereas a barge called The I£atherine of
Bristol is charged with wheat and other victuals to the
king's city of Bayonne for the advictuaUing of it, that
he take into the same vessel to Bayonne, — Beday,
esquire, whom the king sendeth now to Bordeaux, Bay
onne, Aix, and other places there with his letters," But
there are discrepancies ; The Katherine de Burtons and
The Katherine of Bristol may have been two different
ships, that they were so we think is certain, Canynges'
vessel lying at Dartmouth is called a barge, not a large
ship, in fact her burden, as shown in the list of his
shipping, was only 140 tons. From WiUiam Wyrcestre's
list, however, we learn that Canynges possessed a
large ship with a name sufficiently near to give plausi
bility to the tradition ; The Katherine de Boston of 220
tons, is erroneously painted on the board on his tomb
as one of 22 tons only; be it remembered, however,
that there was an eminent merchant named Burton in
Bristol who, between 1417 and 1427, was five times
returned to Parliament by the burgesses, who was
baiUff in 1416, sheriff in 1418, and mayor in 1423 and
1429; whose son John was mayor in 1448-50, and
1 Gentleman's Mag,, 519, 1851,

200

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1446,

whose daughter married Canynges' half-brother Thomas
Young ; there may, therefore, have been a partnership
in this ship, and it possibly was the one meant.
Favourites had been the bane of the Plantagenets,
those of the Lancaster branch were rather more wary ;
nevertheless, every man has his accessible weak side,
and kings are especially open to the flatteries and fawn-
ings of sharp-witted courtiers. In 1444-5 Henry VI, 's
chief favourite was Henry Beauchamp, whom he had
created Duke of Warwick. He gave him the castle of
Bristol with aU its appurtenances, and had him crowned
king of the Isles of Wight, Guernsey, and Jersey,
nominating him also flrst Earl of all England. This
pseudo king, however, did not live long to enjoy his
honours, dying at his castle of Hanley, in Worcester
shire, on June 11th, 1446, at the age of twenty -two.
He was buried in the
choir of Tewkesbury
abbey, ^
12, In 1446 Hen
ry came to Bristol
and stayed at a house
in Eedcliff pit, near
to the church. Seyer
supposes it to have
been the Hospital of
St. John the Baptist,
which stood near to
EedcUff gate. Why
he and the queen
lodged in an inferior
religious house,
rather than in one oidjiercimnis' Bull,
of the more prominent Orders, which could offer su
perior accommodation for the numerous courtiers and
attendants, is not known, or, indeed, why the king did
not occupy the palace in the castle. During his stay he
granted to Nicholas HUl, the mayor, and the Common
alty of Bristol a Letter Patent, dated March 15th, 1446.
It wUl be remembered that Queen Joanna who, in 1403,
had received the town of Bristol as her dower from her
husband Henry IV., grandfather of the present Icing,
had re-granted it to the Mayor and Commonalty for her
life. On her death, in 1437, it fell into the hands of
the king, who granted it to the authorities of the town
for 20 years, for which they stood charged to the king
for a j'early paj'ment of £102 15s, Qd. This term did
not expire untU 1457, consequently it had, at the period
of this visit of Henry VI. and Queen Margaret, in
1446, ten or eleven years yet to run; the roj'al mar
riage had exhausted the king's coft'ers, and money was
1 Lei, Itin., 6, 86-91.

always acceptable to royalty, so with commendable fore
sight the Mayor and Commonalty obtained from Henry
an additional lease of sixty years, to commence at the end
of the unexpired term, Seyer says it was a large amount
of money that induced the king and his advisers to
grant so long a lease. By it "the town and suburbs,
waUs, gates, ditches, together with aU lands within it,
containing houses, shops, particularly the flesh shambles
(the south side of Bridge street), gardens, pools, miUs,
mill-streams, rents, tolls, pleas of courts, profits of fairs,
and markets, fines, amercements, &c. , together with the
reversion of aU lands, tenements, &c., and reserved
rents ; from this grant the castle is excepted, the king
kept it in his own hands, but he granted to the farmers
the water course that runs through castle ditch towards
the mUl under the castle, and the inside bank of the
same for the space of
four feet in breadth
(a path to the mUl),
&c. The payments
were to be to the
Queen Margaret of
Anjou, £102 15s, Qd.;
the Abbot of Tewkes
bury, in lieu of tithes,
£14 lOs. Od.; the
Prior of St, James,
out of the rent of the
town mill (at the cor
ner of EUbroad street
and Lower Castle
street), £3 ; to the
from Millerd's Map. constable of the cas-
tle, his officers, the porter, watchman, and the forester
of Kingswood, £39 14s. Od ; total, £160." ^
13. The Mariners' guild was estabUshed in 1445-6
in Virgin (Maiden) lane. The last relics of the building
were pulled down in 1880, in order to erect on its site
St. Stephen's chambers, at the corner of Marsh street
and Baldwin street. The whole of the ground floor was
occupied as a kitchen, it contained four good arches,
which sprung from corbel-heads about two feet from the
floor. The rest of the building fell, through decay, in 1 8 1 2
or 1813, a result not surprising, as recent excavations
proved that there was absolutely no foundation but the
hardened diluvium of the Frome. The remains of the
chapel dedicated to St, Clement were, until recently, a
smithy (now destroyed to lengthen Baldwin street), and
on the opposite side of the lane stood the first or Old
Merchants' hall. The guild was a religious one, estab
lished for the soul's health and good of the king, the
> Seyer, II, , 186; Evans, 102,

A,D, 1442.

LIFE IN BRISTOL IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.

201

mayor and commonalty; and, for the prosperity of the
mariners who were exposed to manifold dangers and
distresses, there should be a Fraternity erected to the
worship of God, our Lady, St. Clement, St, George, and
aU the saints in heaven, for a priest and twelve poor
mariners to pray daUy as above. To support this the
master of every ship, barge, &c,, on his arrival in port
from a voyage, was obUged to pay fourpence per ton on
aU goods imported within two days, to two wardens chosen
from the craft of mariners, admitted by the mayor, and
sworn by the articles and orders of the Fraternity, on pain
of 6s, 8d. if a master, 3s, 4(?, if a seaman. Is, 8d. if a
servant. One half of the tax Avas to go to the mayor, the
other moiety to the Fraternity for the support of the priest
and the poor; the like penalty to seamen or servants who
omit or refuse to pay the Ad. per ton, the master, if in de-
faiflt, to pay 40s, Every master and mariner was bound
to attend in procession on Corpus Christi day, under the
Uke penalties, A mariner con-victed of having stolen goods
on board, or bringing any such in his ship, the mate that
received such mariner was to forfeit 20s, Every master
and mariner to attend the mayor in harness (in his
armour) during the watches of St, John's, St, Peter's
and St, Paul's feasts, under like penalties. The twelve
poor mariners to have served seven years at least, to be
chosen by vote, those who had been masters to receive
I2d. per week, others 8d. per week, and to flnd them
selves. Any warden neglecting to pay the said aUow
ance six weeks to forfeit 20s ; half the flne to go to the
town and half to the Fraternity. Every Bristol mariner
to contribute, whether he saUed in a Bristol ship or in
one belonging to any other port,^
Marsh street (old SkadpuUe street) intersected these
properties and became the favourite residence for many
years of master mariners. The connection which of old
intimately existed between the Merchants' haU aiid the
Fraternity is stUl continued in a modifled form by the
Merchant Venturers and their admirable almshouse ad
joining their present buUding. The wages of a free
mason or a master carpenter were 4.d. per day, without
meat or drink 5^d.
14. In an old veUum roU of the mayors of Bristol,
which begins, in 1375-6, with the mayoralty of William
Canynges, and ends, 1503, with the mayoralty of Hugh
Johnes, the caligraphy of which is certainly not later
than the reign of Elizabeth, there is this note against
the year 1442-3: — "Clement Bagod, Maior, Nicholas
HiU, Sheriff,' Eichard Hatter, and Eichard Haddon,
BaiUffs, This year Eedcliff church steeple throwne
downe with thunder and lyghtning," Evans mentions
its repairs under the year 1446, thus, "In a storm, the
' Barrett, 180; Evans, 102,
[Vol, L]

steeple of EedcUff Church was blown down, WiUiam
Canynges and others repaired the church by new cover
ing and glazing it, at their o-wn expense," i.e, they, in
1446, flnished the repairs rendered necessary by the
storm of 1443,
The king was in Bristol in 1447-8 "and," says Eicart,
"was most worshipfuUy received"; and in 1449-50 he
was again in Bristol, " and this year the BaUiffs of
Bristol brouight into the common coffers one hundred
marks sterUng to the use of the Chambers against
their wUl for they were ' cohartyd ' thereto by the
councU, which money it was said was stolen from a
vicar of AUiaUowen," ^ The prior of the Calendars
at that time was Sir John GyUarde, who died in
1451. He erected a curious wainscot ceiling over
the north aisle of AU Saints church, and expended

Cannon, circa 11,20 to lk60 ; Henry n. armed Bristol with guns,
£217 upon the public library over (against) the same
aisle which was under the government of the prior and
the mayor.
It seems highly improbable that the above insinua
tion of theft, or constrained payment, can be correct, in
the face of such a generous gift on the part of the prior,
unless, indeed, there had been a quarrel between him
and the then vicar. Sir WiUiam Eodberd, the connection
between the Calendars and the vicars of AU Saints
being most close and intimate, besides which we have
not been able, after examination of the church records,
to flnd any notice of such a wrongful act. On the other
hand Eicart himself was a Calendar, and he certainly,
from his position, must have had some ground for the
statement, which is in itself sufficiently indeflnite, and
may be solved thus : the said money, probably a legacy,
was intended for the church, but through some iUegality
(mortmain most likely) the civic authorities claimed it,
and this was construed by the Calendar to-n'n clerk into
a robbery of the church and of his friend the vicar.
That they were not afraid of the luxury of law we
gather from some curious entries in their most valuable
book which is stiU carefuUy preserved in the church :—
1 Eicart, 40, o 2

202

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1438,

John Whytside and Eoger Abingdon in these days defended
the plea against John Southfolk y take between the church and
him for the house that John Pers gave to the church in AVine
street, God have mercy on their souls,
1438, Expenses touching the plea of John Southfolk, his
shop, and the Goldsmith, his house iu Wine street : — s. d.
Imp, To John Pavey and to VyeU  3 3
In wine and ale to the said Pavey  2
To Vyell to enquire for certain names  1
In wine to the said men  2
To the Bayley Erond ...  2 0
To Bolton  2 0
To a copy of the deed  4
To Pavey, Vyell, and Chocke at the day of assize... 10 0
To Chocke on St, Lucy his day for another assize... ."j 4
To Pavey and Vyell, the same day of assize  3 4
For the copy of the writ   2
To Sergeant and entering of plaint  4
To Selwood the man of law  1 8
For writing two obligations  4
£1 7 2
The churchwardens were successful, and spent in the
fulness of their joy 2d, on themselves and 2d, on their
men of law for wine, and in the exuberance of their
success they gave a quart of wine to the "Bayleys,"
By this we think our readers wiU have most pro
bably accjuiesced in our conclusion, that, in 1450, the
Mayor and Council simply ordered the baUiffs to enforce
the law against the church.
Ere we leave the subject, we wiU give a few other
interesting quotations from this valuable churoh record.
The practice of hanging up pictures and "popinjays "
in the churches at certain festivals was very common.
We flnd repeatecUy in the expenses such items as the
foUowing : —
A stained (painted) cloth of the Holy Trinity, with two curtains
of augels.
A cloth with popinjays of Scripture.
1430, To making one long Death in our Lady's Chapel, 9s,
This must have been a work of some merit as weU as
size if we compare it with the wage paid to the raker
{i.e., the man who kept the rushes and sedges that
covered the floor in neat order), who received id. per
annum for his .services. "Long Death" had to be
mended, in 1447, at a cost of 2fl. Judas was represented
both by painting and effigy, at a ccst of from Is. to 3s. Qd.
The price of the angels ranged from 5s. to 10s. each. In
1408 the charge for making one Judas was 13r/., in 1430
it was 2s. id. In 1431 the treacherous disciple had
three representations in the churoh, one over against
the sepulchre cost Is., one in the Lady chapel that cost
in making 2s., and one painted near the high altar at
the cost of 3s. Qd. The entry in 1464 .shows that he was
only used on three nights before Easter. Another sin

gular custom, and one that must have been most unplea
sant to the neighbourhood, was that of jangUng harsh,
unmusical, discordant beUs throughout the above interim,
making night hideous. That this was done with hearty
goodwiU at AU Saints, is shown by the frequent entries
for mending the Judas beU, 2d., for a new clapper for
the Judas beU, Qd., &c.
In 1464 the entry is for new clappers for aU the
Judas beUs, Judas candles were also burned. We
have already mentioned the status of the wax chandler,
but that the church knew how to get a good article at a
cheap rate is evident from the foUowing: — "To John
waxmaker for making the Paschal tapers of his o-wn
wax, and for the waste thereof, 2s, Qd. ; for torches
weighing 50 lb,, price per lb., 3d., 12s. Qd." " To John
Mayhowe for the making of 53 lb, of your own wax
that was of your square lights, and round lights, 2s. 2d."
Also, "22 lb, of new wax to perform your square lights
and round, and the ' founts ' tapers, at 1 Od. per lb., 1 8s.
4d." These Judas entries are earUer in Bristol by nearly
a century than any noted in Brand, or in Notes and
Queries. The foUowing entries are also interesting : —
1437, For making clay balls to hold the candles at Christmas
1442, For setting in of two eyes for our Lady in the pillar...
1445. For making one holy water " stick of iron " ' 
1448. For ringing against the king 

1450.

Id.
id.
M, 8d, 3d,
id.

1476, For a board and setting above the Trinity his head ...
1478. For mending the checquered board that is beared the
church bread upon  ... 2d.
1478, For besoms to stroke the church with  \d.
(This is a yearly item, recurring regularly for a long period.)
1478. For mendynz off espolker  \d.
(Mending the sepulchre for the Easter representation.) From time im
memorial it has
been the practice
in Bristol and else
where at Al-Hal-
lowtide to bring
men's good deeds,
and also their pec-
cadUloes, to remem
brance before the
public. It is not
improbable that the
election of Town
CounciUors on this
day has arisen from
this most ancient custom. We find from this book,
which dates from 1407, that it was the custom for the
priests to ring and call together the "hole paryshe to
' The term candlesiici- arose from the candle holder having
originaUy no socket but a spike on which to stick the candle. — Ed.

Coitamr Henry V.

¦en 11,20. Longsleeve

and Bnhlrick Kith hells.

A.D, 1472,

KEEPING THE SEPULCHRE.

203

ye general mynde, and if any man absented himself he
was fined 4d., but if he was a Council man the fine was
Is, id. in his case," The costs of the gathering are given
every year ; at first the moderate sum of 2s, sufficed ;
afterwards the amount grew higher, reaching occasion
ally 14s. In 1472 the biU for the feast was as foUows: —
s. d.
Imp, For lofe brede, cakys, and otr spyceries  3 2
" For a deson Ale  1 0
" For bekyng ye seyd cakys  2
" For redde Wynne — swete -wynne  4 4
" For Six Priestys and ye Gierke  1 10
" For ryngynge of ye belle  1 4
11 10
When the people were gathered, the priests opened and
read from the parish book, "These ben ye names of ye
good doers and the evU doers ;" for particulars of which
we refer our readers to our Ecclesiastical Histoey, 95.
15. It was the custom at Easter to represent the
holy sepulchre and tableaux of the betrayal and cruci-
fiixion of our Lord, the figures being often life-size.
We have an item, in 1395, for various painted cloths
"to hange ye sepolker within ye Lentyn tyme of ye
passyon of Cryste with Uij knyghts and M'' Magdalen,"
The charge for keeping watch by the sepulchre at night
at All Saints was, in 1407, two pence. At that time it
appears to have been a temporary structure, but in
1422, among the good doers, we find the record of
"WiUiam Eaynes and Thomas Chester (Cook), let
make in their days the sepulkor and brought clearly
to the church 7d. God ha mercy on their souUs,"
The 7d. was the balance over the yearly expenditiu-e
which included the building of a permanent tomb, as
wUl appear from the bUl : —

"payment pok makvng of the sbpulkok,
Imp, for 3 Easterlygge bordys . . .
Item to 1 Kerver ... 
" to 1 Mason 
" Eye Peynter 
" the procutorys of St, Nickolas
' ' Iren gayr 
" 1 ffronteU and 1 ffrange
' ' Lyme, nayles, aud rekhokys
' ' in bred and ayle 
On the opposite page the account is continued :
Imp, To Byford for ye huyr of hs crane 
Item to Huckeford mason for ale 
" " for his grust 
WiUm Huckeforde and Willm Tempyll for ale
CoUe mason for ale 
" " for his grust 
Huckf ord mason 

1
10
1 309

47

0

s.

d.

2

1

2

3
2
2
... 40
0
£2 1 0
Then foUows an item to Agnes ffyler for one quart of
wine 2d., which appears to have been to drink good luck
to their exhibition. Their receipts this year were for
showing the sepulchre on Good Friday and Easter day
20s,, and for the extra exhibition of the cross and the
crown 20s., being double the amount taken in pre-vious
years. In the year 1472 the show was on Shyre Thurs
day, Easter eve and Easter day, AU the lights were
put out on Easter eve, the wax was blessed, fire was
obtained from flint and steel, this was haUowed, and
then the whole church was lighted up with wax
candles, kindled from the tapers that had been also
blessed ; the charge for keeping the sepulchre, and the
lights, and for two night's watching, was Sd, "For
bred, ale, and coUys (coals) for ye said keepers, 2d,"
Shyre or Sheere Thursday is our Maundy Thursday, it
is so named in
an old homUy,
"For that in
Old Father's
days the people
would that day
shore theyr
hedes, and
clyppe theyr
berdes, andpool
theyr heydes,
and so make
theym honest
ayenst Ester-
day," The or
thography of
this remarkable book is at times rather startling ; for
instance we have one item " for iiij Q-wysthyns aUe
stuffe iiijs,", i,e, " for four cushions, 4s,"
16, Eogers, in his calendar of Al-HaUowen, has made
a mistake which we are anxious to rectify, more especiaUy
as his arguments, occupying six pages of his book, have
stained the memory of the pious dead, and have led
many a reader to a most impotent conclusion. In two
separate deeds of Cecilia de la Warr, which are without
date, but both of which, from theu- internal evidence as
weU as from the names of the witnesses, must have been
written a little before 1370, she gives a house and land
to Thomas de Novo Burgo, to him and to his heirs for
ever at a yearly rent of 24s,, and to the lord of the fees
5id, landgable, with permission to give, seU, or exchange
the same to any "except religious men, and Jews,"
The first deed was executed when she was unmarried,
her husband is a signatory to the second, which contains
the same apparently strange condition, Eogers supposes
her to have been inveterately rancorous against all
Costume, circa lUlO-30,
These long Beccas are on the two Monuments supposed
to be tlwse of Canynges and his Almoner.
204

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1472,

ecclesiastics, and because she inserted this clause, assumes
her to be an infldel in principle, and to have been the
wife or leman of an archdeacon. But the documents
show plainly enough that her husband was a layman,
HoweU, the son of Worgan the Archdeacon of Llandaff,
We have seen that, after the deadly plague of 1358,
numbers of laymen who had lost their wives took holy
orders. Worgan was probably one of these, John de
la Warr, the father of Cecilia, was the founder of the
chapel of St, Anne, in the wood of Brislington, and either
he or his father was mayor of Bristol in 1286, Our
readers wUl have gathered aU-eady from these pages
that there was bitter animosity and deadly hatred be
tween the secular clergy and the reUgious men, as the
preaching or mendicant Friars were caUed, These were
the men whom Cecilia classed with the Jews and towards
-vdiom she showed her antipathy. It is highly probable
that both she and her husband were foUowers of Wyc
liffe, who about this time, with his eloquent friend
and disciple Purney (or Purvey), preached so success
fuUy in the to-wn that it was said ' ' of every two persons
you met one would be a Wickliffite." At all events
both she and her husband were in perfect sympathy
with the reformer, and have been sadly maligned. The
fact that WiUiam de Novo Burgo, who died in 1414,
with his name Anglicised into WUUam Newbury, be
queathed out of this very property to Thomas MarshaU,
clerk, and to Thomas Halway, churchwarden, a rent of
assize of 12s, per annum for the said church, helps to
the conclusion that they aU belonged to the party which
supported the church, but hated the Friars,
Newbury added to his bec[uest "his beautiful mazer
cup [a cup of bird's eye maplewood, flnely wrought and
usually mounted in silver], -with a silver cover, then in
the custody of the aforesaid prior of the Calendars";
together with 20s. a year to the said church for an obit
to be said yearly on the 9th day of May, The house on
which this rent was settled was in Baldwin street, "In
ye which dweUyd John Albyrton, Merchant, and thereto
longeth, twelve evydences undyr auctentick selys,"
17, Eogers also gives in his book (from a copy) an
agreement for buUding a house in High street, for the
sum of £6 13s, id. This sum is so smaU, that we, in
common with others, had thought that there must have
been some mistake made by the copyist. But by one
of those fortuitous circumstances which occasionaUy
occur, we were enabled to purchase in Birmingham, a
few years since, the identical agreement, which at some
time had been stolen from the church. It is now in
the possession of Mr, WiUiam TerreU, and modernised,
reads as foUows: —
By indre between Alice Chester, widow, formerly wife of

Henry Chester, draper, of the one part, and Stephen Morgan,
carpenter, of the other part, the said Stephen Morgan covenanteth
to make well, workmanly, and surely, of good timber and boards,
a new house iu High street, Bristol, -with floors, windows, doors
and partitions, and all other things of timber work belonging to
the said house, with  [joists apparently], laths and lattices,
situated between a tenement called the Bull inn (afterwards
named the Angel) on the one part, and a tenement in which John
a Cork, cornisor (corn chandler), then dwelt, on the other part,
containing in length 19ft. lOin, of assize, and in width 10ft, 4in,
And that he would make in said house a shop, a hall above the
same, with an oryell window, a chamber above the hall with an
oryell, and another chamber above that, by Lady day next, for
which Alice Chester covenants to pay £6 13«, id. sterling, viz,,
at Christmas then next £3, at flooring of the said house 33s, id,,
and at the end of the said work 40s,, the said Stephen Morgan to
have the old timber.
This is dated 17th Novr,, 12th Edward IV,, 1472.
In February of the same year (the year began in
March), there arose a dispute between AUce Chester
and John VyeU, the owner of the house in which John a
Cork dwelt, and a jury of sworn viewers, viz., Eawlyns
WyUyms and Eanie Spuryour, masons, Stephen Canon
and Thomas Skydmore, carpenters, found that VyeU's
waU overhung the widow's land by 4^ inches, which
ought to be amended. This is authenticated by the
seal of the Mayor of Bristol, and bears date 24th
February, 1472, the very time when Alice was prepar
ing to build. The property came into the possession of
the church, and there are some ten deeds relating to it,
which have enabled us to trace its history for more
than a century, as weU as to fijx its site.
The first of these throws incidentaUy some light
upon a subject that has been much discussed, viz,,
whether the corner of High street, then frequently
caUed Goldsmith's street, was occupied by a church
dedicated to St, Andi-ew, being a fourth church at the
angles surrounding the High Cross. It is dated Novem
ber 28th, nth Henry VIII,, 1520, and purports to be a
supplement to Alice Chester's wiU, made in 1477, add
ing the names of her family deceased since that date,
and giving for them, for herself and husband, and for
the testator, an additional obit in the month of March,
annuaUy, for which the above-named house was to yield
its rental in part payment. It runs thus: "Indre, of
Eichard Hervey, gent,, son and heir of Homfray
Hervey, executor of the wUl of John Thomas, late vicar
of the parish of AU Saints, and formerly rector of the
parish church of the Holy Apostles, SS, Peter, Paul,
and Andrew," from which we gather that St. Andrew
was one of the dedications of the church now known as
St, Peter's. Thomas was rector of St, Peter in 1499.
He was cousin and heir to John Chester, merchant, son
of Henry and Alice, and by his wUl he gives the afore
said house, then in the occupation of John Eyppe,

A.D, 1466.

THE CALENDARS' LIBRARY BURNED.

205

grocer, together with a garden in the Old Market, to
John Ffooke, vicar of All Saints, and 17 others, to
found an obit for ever in the church of All Saints, on
the vigU of St. Valentine, for masses for the souls yearly
of the aforesaid Chesters, Herveys, and John Thomas.
said John Ffooke to pay every Such anniversary to the
vicar or his deputy, for labour and wax tapers I2d,,
for an offering at high mass Id,, to each of the six
chaplains singing in their surpUces, id,, to the co-
brother for his labour and ringing of the beUs I2d,,
to the common cryer for proclaiming the obit 4d,, bread
to the value of 20d, to be given to the poor prisoners in
Newgate, and to the poor in the almshouse in AU
Saints lane id,, to the lepers in Brightbow 4d,, and 4d.
to the poor in Long row. Also the said Ffooke and
his co-feoffees are to found a like obit on the 4th day of
March yearly. Honest men are to be added as the
trustees die off, and if the almshouses, &c,, are destoyed
or faU off, the gifts are to revert to the poor. of the
town. At the Eeformation this property came into the
possession of the Crown. Queen Elizabeth, in the 1 7th
year of her reign, in consideration of the sum of
£397 5s. Od., paid for her use by Sir John Parrott,
knight, granted the house to Herbert and Palmer ; two
months afterwards they conveyed it to Dodington and
Harvey, who the next year, on November 19th, 1576,
conveyed it to Thomas Colston, in consideration of £40
paid by him to them, the said house being then tenanted
by Clement Barnes, soap maker,
18, By this deed we may gather some idea of the
great value of Sir John GyUarde' s gift, circa 1450, to the
Library of the Calendars, and of the exceeding precious-
ness of MSS. in the days that preceded printing, the said
gift being sufficient to have buUt thirty -two such houses
as the one above described, which was situated in one of
the best streets in the to-wn. Taking HaUam's estimate of
value (the multiple 16) it would be equivalent to £3,472
sterUng, When this celebrated library was founded we
know not, GyUarde's gift seems to have been an addition
to a foundation already in existence. The large room
for a pubUc library, under the government of the Prior
of the Calendaries and the Mayor of Bristol, is said to
have been buUt at this time over the north or Jesus
aisle. The word "over" here must be read as "over
against," as it is expressly stated in the parish book,
under date 1466, that this year the library was burnt
through the carelessness of a drunken poynt maker. ^
This fire happened only two years after John,
Bishop of Worcester, had re-built the library (see
Ecclesiastical History, 91-2). The loss of rent is
^ Points, i.e., tags, tassels and metal ornaments worii on the dress.

entered as a debit for two subsequent years, and
all the items for the repairs of the house, conse
quent upon this disastrous fire, are duly entered, and
by deed it is shown that John, the ChanceUor of
Keynsham, gave 100 marks to re-buUd the house,
but there is not one penny of extra buUding outlay
upon the church itself, which indeed woiUd have
been burned to the ground, if, as our historians suppose,
the room had been above the roof of Jesus aisle, and
consequently a portion of the sacred building, A deed
of John, Bishop of Worcester, 1464, confirms this view,
in which it is said, "the Prior shaU reside in the said
house, and shaU take custody of a certain Ubrary newly
erected, at the Bishop's expense, in the said house," &c.
See Ecclesiastical History, 91,
In 1451 it is expressly stated that GyUarde, as
executor of Eichard Haddon, effected sundry repairs
in the library, and mention is made of a door in the
Calendars' house that opened into it. The loss sustained
by the citizens of Bristol through this calamitous fire has
been irrepara
ble ; it is said
that there were
in the buUding
not fewer than
800 MS, vol
umes. The re
cords of the
town were kept
then by the
Calendars, as
weU as those of
their own most
ancient frater
nity, so that aU
materials for
elucidating the
early history of
Bristol have
now to be gath
ered piecemeal
from extrane
ous sources.
Many of the
Cook and Kitchen, circa lh30. books WOrO
handsomely iUuminated ; some of them were chained
to piUars, or enclosed in grydlys (gratings) in the church.
For further particulars see Ecclesiastical History, 97,
19, In 1455 there was trouble between the citizens
and some Irishmen, Henry May and others ha-dng
abused their privUeges were disfranchised until they
bought them again, and on their knees asked favour and

206

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1449,

forgiveness of the Mayor and his brethren,^ We pre
sume from this that the DubUn Charter of Henry II,
was stUl effective, and that burgesses of each town were
mutuaUy free of the other.
In 1449, WiUiam Canynges being at that time
Mayor, the king addressed two letters in. his favour,
one to the Master General at Prussia, the other to the
magistrates at Dantzic, in which he is styled ' ' the
king's beloved and eminent merchant of Bristol," For
further particiUars of Canynges see Ecclesiastical His
tory, 213-219,
20, The Crafts' guilds had now the upper hand in
the town, and had become of considerable importance,
as the mayor, WiUiam Canynges, and the Common
Council ordered that the mayor on St, John's night,
and the sheriff on St, Peter's, should dispense wine to
the several crafts at their different halls. The quantity
given to each trade wUl show approximately the status
of each : —

Galls.

Galls.

1. Weavers

10
15.
Barbers .... ..
 4
2. Tuckers 
10
16.
Waxmakers ..
 4
3. Tailors ... .
10
17,
Tanners 
 4
4. Cornesers (corn dealers)
8
IS.
Whitawers . .
 4
5, Butchers
6
19.
Masons 
 3
6. Dyers 
5
20.
Tylers 
 3
7, Bakers 
5
21.
Carpenters . .
3
8, Brewers 
5
22.
Hoopers
 3
9, Shermen
5
23,
Wiredrawers
 3
10. Skinners
4
24,
Cardmakers ..
 3
11. Smiths 
4
25,
Bowers
 3
12. Farriers 
4
26,
Fletchers (arro
wmakers) 2
13. Cuttelers
4

14. Lockyers rm_ -  L
• ___ _m _ J
4
120
The proportion aUotted to those connected with the
wooUen cloth trade, amounting to 43 gallons, or over
one-third, proves it to have been, in 1449, the staple
trade of the town. In 1454 the ParUament ordered
that the payment from the king's subsidies and customs
in the port of Bristol should be £300 (of which the
farmers of the ulnage were to raise £60) ; the ulnage of
the county of Somerset was only £80, and that of WUt
shire £40. This was, we believe, the most flourishing
time in Bristol for the woollen trade, as we flnd in 1485
and 1495, although the town was farmed at the higher
rentals of £400 and £600, the ulnage feU to £27 13s. 4d.
Commerce was steadily progressing ; much money was
laid out for repairing the Back, the slips, and the quays,
which were made again flt for the unloading and dis
charging of goods. "
When the Duke of York, as protector of the realm,
found it necessary for the protection of trade to send
out a fleet, he borrowed the money for its equipment
' Evans, 104. Seyer, II. , 187, who gives the date 1445.
2 Seyer, IL, 187.
from the chief seaport towns. In this instance we see
that Bristol again ranked next to London, the loan
being £150, London found £300; but HuU, York,
Yarmouth, Norwich, Ipswich, Colchester and Maiden
only raised £100 each, Lynn £50, Boston £30, and
Newcastle £20, Bristol was to be repaid out of the
flrst money raised by subsidy in that port on aU ex
ports and imports, save and except " merchandise of
the staple,"
21, In 1451 the whole kingdom was in a ferment.
The English had lost aU their possessions in France
except Calais, the Duke of York, on his return from
Ireland with an army, was marching towards London,
The condition of society may be seen in the fact that
in a famUy quarrel between different members of a great
baronial family they openly waged war upon each other,
the castle of Berkeley was taken and re-taken several
times during the twenty years that intervened between
this period and the famous battle of Nibley Green, In
the course of this private war, " James, Lord Berkeley,
and his four sons, being surprised in his castle of Berkeley
and taken prisoners by their three adversaries, as if in
time of war, on the 4th of November, 1451, were by an
armed band of men carried to the Grey Friars in Bristol,
whither John Stanley, then mayor, was sent for, and
there before him Lord Berkeley was constrained to
acknowledge three statutes, whereof one of £10,000
defeizanced," ^ &c,
22, The civil war of the Eed and White Eoses being
renewed in 1455, Henry's energetic and brave queen was
on the alert to win the great towns to the side of her
husband, and she came to Bristol with a large retinue
of the nobiUty, where she was most honourably received
and hospitably entertained,
John Stanley, mayor in 1443 and 1451, is distin
guished from having had his name on a brass piUar,
which has long since disappeared. The annals relate : —
"A post of brasse yet standing on the Key of Bristoll, neere
to the conduit, was sett upp in the time of the mayor, John
Stanley's yeere, as appeares by his name and others yet there to
be read," WiUiam Coder, mayor 1452, 1457 and 1464, gave
£2 per annum to St, Leonard's church and a chalice,
weighing 23 oz, ; also 20 oz, silver to make the oil vat and
£40 to buy the best suit of blue velvet with branches
of gold. 23, " The sins of the father shall be visited upon
the children to the third and fourth generation." His
tory offers, perhaps, nowhere such a striking exemplifi
cation of the Divine word as is sho-wn in the famUy of
Edward III., the rebeUious son, who, at the instigation
> Seyer, II., ISS,
a,d, 1461,

EXECUTION OF SIR BALDWIN FULFORD.

207

of his faithless mother, had consented to the deposition
and murder of his father, Edward II, The ties of
consanguinity were powerless against ambition, and the
cro-wn was dyed with the blood of his descendants dur
ing five generations,
Edward III, had five sons who lived to maturity and
left issue, viz,: — 1. Edward the Black Prince, who,
dying during his father's lifetime, left one son, Eichard
II, ; he afterwards was deposed and murdered by his
cousin, Henry IV, 2, Lionel, whose son Edmund, Earl
of March, was imprisoned by Henry IV, ; he died with
out issue, 3, John of Gaunt, father of Henry IV, Of
the sons of Henry IV,, Thomas, Duke of Clarence, was
kUled in battle, 1421 ; Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester,
was murdered at Bury St, Edmunds ; his grandson,
Henry VI,, was murdered in the Tower ; and his great-
grandson Edward, Prince of Wales, was murdered at
Tewkesbury, 1471. 4, Edmund, father of Eichard, Duke
of York, who, with his second son Eutland, was slain at
the battle of Wakefield, when fighting against Henry VI,
This Eichard left three sons, Edward IV,, who deposed
Henry VI,, and caused him to be murdered in the
Tower ; Clarence, murdered by his brother ; and Eichard
III,, who, to win the crown, murdered both his nephews,
Edward V, and Eichard, Duke of York, the sons of
Edward IV, Eichard himself lost both his crown and
his Ufe at the battle of Bosworth field, 5, Thomas,
Duke of Gloucester, murdered at Calais by order of his
nephew, Eichard II.
Edward seized the throne in March, 1461, at the age
of nineteen years, and was crowned under the title of
Edward IV,, on the 28th of June, at Westminster, In
an old MS. calendar, now before us, are the foUowing
entries : — " 1460, Wm, Canynges 4th time mayor. This
year Edward, Earl of March, oldest son of ye Duke of
York, with the Earls of Warwick and Salisbury, came
to London with a strong power, and was proclaimed
king, by the consent of the Commons, by the name of
Edward 4th, King Henry, understanding the Earl of
March was coming, fied with the queen into the north,
and so king Henry was deposed the 4th March, 1460,
when he had reigned 38 years 6 months and 16 days,
1461, Eex Edwardus Quartus, Philip Mede mayor the
second time ; Wm, Spencer sheriff, Eobert Sturmey and
Hen, Brown baUiffs. This year the king came again to
Bristol, where he beheaded Sir John Bawdin Fulford
and Hesant, and the same day he departed back again."
During the harvest months the young king came
into the Marches, and reached Bristol in September,
where he was most royaUy received,
24, The king witnessed the execution of Fulford
and his associates from the east window of St, Ewen's

church (now destroyed ; the offices of the Western Baily
Press stand upon the site). In the church book is an
entry, "Item, for wasshyng of ye churche pavnon
ageynst king Edward ye IV, is comyng iiij, ol,"
This event has been immortalised by Chatterton's
beautiful ballad, Tlie Beath of Syr Charles Bawdin, which
has so much poetical merit that we give a quotation,
referring our readers who desire to read the whole of
the stanzas to the work itself,
" The featherd songster chaunticleer
Han wounde hys bugle home.
And tolde the earlie villager
The commynge of the morne :
Kynge Edwarde sawe the ruddie streakes
Of lyghte eclypse the greie ;
And herde the raven's crokynge throte
Proclayme the fated dale,
' Thou'rt ryght,' quod hee, ' for, by the Godde
That syttes enthron'd on hyghe !
Charles Bawdin, and hys fellowes twaine,
To-daie shall surelie die.'
Thenne wythe a jugge of nappy ale
Hys Knyghtes dydd onne hymm waite ;
' Goe tell the traytour, thatt to-daie
Hee leaves thys mortall state.'
Syr Canterlone thenne bendedd lowe,
Wythe harte brymm-fuUe of woe ;
Hee journey'd to the castle-gate,
And to Syr Charles dydd goe.
Butt whenne hee came, hys children twaine,
And eke hys lovynge wyfe,
Wythe brinie tears dydd wett the floore,
For goode Syr Charleses lyfe."
etc, etc, etc.
Sir Bawdin had, in 1460, given bond to Henry VI.
that he would either take the life of the Duke of York
(Edward IV.) or lose his own head. Stow says, " after
he had spent the king 1,000 marks he returned again."
Edward seized and imprisoned him and his two accom
plices. Bright and Hesant. The family of Fulford was
of note and antiquity in Devon. In 1467 an act was
passed for the restitution in blood and estate of Thomas
Fulford, knight, eldest son of Sir Baldewyn Fulford, late
of Fulford, in the county of Devon, knight. The pre
amble, after stating the attainder, continues: — "And
also the said Baldwyn, the 1st year of your noble reign
at Bristowe, in the shire of Bristowe, before Henry,
Earl of Essex, WiUiam Hastings, of Hastings, knt,,
Eichard Chock, WiUiam Canynges, the mayor of the
said town of Bristowe, and Thomas Young, by force of
your letters patent to them, and others direct to hear
and determine aU treasons, &c,, done within the said
town of Bristowe before the 6th day of Sept., the first

208

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1464.

year of your said reign, was attaint of divers treasons
by him done against your highness, &c." From this we
learn that the unfortunate knight was tried under Can
ynges' mayoralty, but was executed under that of PhiUp
Mede, 25, It was the policy of Edward to ignore aU grants
of the Lancastrian Une of kings on the ground of their
being usurpers. Hence Canynges, and other of the
chief merchants of Bristol, who had been adherents of
the Eed Eose of Lancaster, but now wished to curry
favour with the victor, trembled for their charter privi
leges and sought to get a confirmation of them from the
king. Their greatest fear seems to have been that the
exemption from the jurisdiction of the Court of Admi
ralty, which was a grant from Henry IV,, and for which
they could not plead ancient and established usage,
would be taken away from them. Hence, in haste, they
procured a repetition of this charter, in which there is

Beds-tcnd, circa ll,',n.
no mention of Henry's name, but which is conferred as
a new grant, on the 22nd of Oct., 1 Edward IV, Less
than two months after, they are again in London, solicit
ing and obtaining a confirmation of the charter of 19
Eichard II,, which included all their earlier privUeges ;
this the king signed on Dec, 1 4th, in the first year of
his reign. Henry VI., late king of England as he is
caUed (although still alive in the North of England),
had granted a lease of the town and all property for a
term of sixty years, which term would only expire in
1517, The burgesses now surrendered this lease to be
cancelled, and the king re-granted it, not for a given
term, but for ever ; he added, moreover, a grant of every
profit that could possibly arise to the king from the
possession of the town (exclu,sive of the castle), except
ing only the escheats of lands, and this at the same rate
of payment as before, viz., £160. These were great
and valuable privileges, being, in fact, a renunciation of

the ancient rights and authorities of the lord, and a
complete dissolution of the feudal system so far as
relates to Bristol, They plainly show that the king
considered some of the burgesses as warm friends of
the White Eose, and there were certainly among them
men whose money and ser-vices had greatly advanced
his cause, Philip Mede was a decided Yorkist, he was
mayor at that time, a man of honourable family and
great spirit, living probably in Eedcliff parish, and
possessing an estate at Failand, He went in person to
soUcit this charter from the king,
26, But there were many in Bristol who clung to
the Eed Eose and avowed their fealty to Henry, who
was stUl at large ; so that, in 1463, Edward felt it neces
sary to write to
the ChanceUor
ordering a "com
mission of Oyer
and Terminer to
be made and
directed to John
Shipward, ma}'-
or of Bristol, and
Nicholas Chook,
one of the king's
justices, Thomas
Young, serjeant-
at-law, and
others, for the
punishment of
certain persons
who had stirred
up commotions
and insurrec
tions in the town
of Bristol and
its neighbour
hood," In 1464 the miserable ex-king, who had been lying
perdu in Westmoreland and Lancashire, was taken at
Waddington hall as he sat at dinner and conveyed to
London by his captor, Sir James Harrington, where he
was imprisoned in the Tower. The year previous to
this Edward had married Elizabeth Woodville, the
charming young widow of Sir John Grey, of Groby,
It was purely a love match, and poUtieaUy a most un
wise one, inasmuch as it brought a whole brood of poor
relations belonging to the inferior nobility about the
king — men who engrossed the royal favour, and whose
avarice and ambition were insatiable, Edward had, as
a matter of prudence, concealed for awhUe his marriage ;
but in 1464, at Michaelmas, he publicly avowed his

Interior and Furniture, Circ^( 1U50,

A.D, 1470,

BATTLE OF NIBLEY GREEN.

209

espousals, and on the 16th March next foUowing he
granted to his dearest consort. Queen Elizabeth, the
usual dower from Bristol of £102 15s, Qd. for her life,
payment to be made from the past Michaelmas out of
the farm of the town of Bristol. Besides the above
sum, £60 per annum was granted out of the farm of
the manor and hundred of Barton, Bristol, with their
appurtenances in the county of Gloucester, In 1467
WUliam Canynges was mayor for the fifth time, Thomas
Eowley being one of the bailiffs.
1469. In this year was fought "the battle of Bam-
berry, where much Welshe people were distressed. And
there were beheded the Lord Herbert, the Lord Eyvers
and his son, and many others ; and Sir Eichard Her
bert, a gentil knight and a manly, was there slayne.
And one of the Lord Herbert's bretheren was slayne at
Bristowe the same yere, at St, James's tyde," ^ Henry
Vaughan was one of the bailiffs, and, from subsequent
events, we judge that this death caused a blood-feud be
tween the two Welsh families of Herbert and Vaughan,
which ended in the recriminatory murder, in 1527, of
WiUiam Vaughan (sheriff 1516) by WiUiam Herbert,
Earl of Pembroke, The battle of Banbury was lost
through the defection of Lord Stafford, Earl of Devon,
He was apprehended in Brent Marsh, and by Edward's
orders was taken to Bridgwater and there beheaded,
27, Edward had at this period, what with the in
trigues of Warwick, the king-maker, and of his own
brother Clarence, fuU occupation for all his talents and
power, so that the private feuds of the great lords could
not be checked by him or private war between them
be prevented. High-spirited nobles, reigning almost
supreme in theu* o-wn domain, accustomed to military
ser-yice, and able, under the conditions of feudal tenure,
to bring large bodies of retainers into the field, had
their private animosities aggravated by their predilec
tions for the rival houses of Lancaster or York ; hence
arose the famous battle of Nibley Green, Kington, a
Bristol poet, has graphicaUy portrayed this internecine
fight in his book Niiley Green, and Seyer devotes several
pages to a narration of the circumstances : we prefer to
give our readers a condensed epitome from an able
paper read before the Bristol and Gloucestershire Arch-
eeological Society on the 5th February, 1879, by J. H,
Cooke, Esq,, F,S.A,, than whom no man is more fitted
to deal with the subject : —
Thomas, the tenth Lord Berkeley, died in 1417, leaving by
his -wife, sole daughter and heiress of Lord Lisle, an only child,
Elizabeth, who was married to Eichard Beauchamp, Earl of War
wick, All the inheritance of the Lisles descended to her, but the
castle and barony of Berkeley devolved, under a fine levied with
the king's license, upon the male heir of the Berkeleys, James,
1 Evans, 110,
[Vol, L]

nephew of the late lord, who had been brought up as the heir at
Berkeley castle.
The Earl and Countess of Warwick claimed, however, the
Berkeley inheritance, and from the Earl's great power and influ
ence, aided by the fact that at the death of Thomas, the tenth
lord, they were at Berkeley, whilst James was in Dorsetshire,
they were enabled to obtain from the king a grant of the custody
of all the late lord's castles, manors and lands as long as they
should be in the king's hands. They also seized upon the title
deeds and evidences, James, who had married a Stafford, ob
tained a verdict of a jury for the ancient barony and castle of
Berkeley, consisting of 12 manors, the advowsons of Wotton aud
Slimbridge, and 22 marks rent in Frampton-on-Severu ; but the
jury found that all the other lands of the late lord descended to
his daughter, Lady AVarwick,
The earl and countess thereupon sued their livery and paid
their relief for the said lands ; but they still held on to the castle
and estates, and by their influence prevented James from being
allowed to sue his livery and pay his flne for the castle and lands.
It was only by a bribe of 1,000 marks paid to the king's brother
that he was enabled to sue and pay, but even then he could not
obtain possession until Henry V, commanded Warwick to give
them up.
On the king's death Warwick entered and took forcible pos
session of the outlying manors, several times besieged the castle,
and the town of Berkeley was half destroyed in the frequent
fights. At length a compromise was effected, which lasted till the
death of Warwick in 1439, He left three daughters, co-heiresses.
Margaret married to
" ... that great Alcides of the field.
Valiant Lord Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury."
Eleanor married to Edmund Beaufort, Earl of Dorset, and Eliza
beth, to George Neville, Lord Latimer. The Lady Margaret was
Talbot's second wife, the Earls of Shrewsbury being descended
from his first wife, a NeviUe. The co-heiresses brought immense
influence to bear against Lord James, and Talbot's great name and
military services were all powerful with the weak king, Henry
VI., and his strong-minded wife, queen Margaret. Talbot had
also great influence in Gloucestershire, where he possessed several
manors. Lord James strove to hold his own by the strong hand. He
made, in 1440, one David Woodburne, who had been sent to
Wotton to serve a subpcena upon him, eat the summons, wax,
parchment and all, and gave him a sound beating into the bargain.
He was for his violence committed to the tower but, upon entering
into a bond of £1,000 to keep the peace, was released after a few
days' conflnement.
In 1448 an award was made at Cirencester, based upon the
former compromise, but Lord Berkeley appears to have been no
party to it, for he garrisoned his castle and prepared to resist its
execution. Both parties again had recourse to arms, many were
the skirmishes, the incursions into each other's territories, and the
gatherings of rents in kind at the point of the sword.
Lord James attacked and pillaged Wotton Manor house,
where Lady Shrewsbury was then residing. In return her son,
Lord Lisle, surprised and broke into Berkeley castle, seized Lord
Berkeley and his four sons, whom he kept prisoners eleven weeks,
and compelled them to sign various deeds and bonds before John
Stanley, the mayor of Bristol, During this contest the towns and
villages" were nearly destroyed, and large tracts of land were laid
waste and left uncultivated. The ladies on both sides actively
assisted their husbands. Berkeley had married for his second
wife Isabel, a daughter of Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, a
direct descendant of Edward I, She wrote to him from London,
that their enemies "have asked surety of peace of me, and are
P

210

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1407,

Thornbury Church and Castle.

striving to get me into the tower,'' She said she should get bail
and go at them again ; begged him not to treat without her, to
send her money or she must come home on her feet, &c. Her lord
pledged his gilt mass book, silver chalice, altar cloths and vest
ments, to Nicholas Poyntz, for 22 marks, to send her,
Shrewsbury was in France warring with desperate valour
against the French, led by the Maid of Orleans, but Lady Shrews
bury was more than a match for Lord Berkeley and his wife ; she
somehow caught Lady Berkeley tripping and had her thrown into
prison in Gloucester castle, . where she died in a few days, her
proud spirit crushed with trouble and anxiety. The next year
Shrewsbury and his son. Lord Lisle, were killed at the siege of
Castillon, near Bordeaux ; James, the second son of Lord Berkeley,
was also slain, and his fourth son was taken prisoner, A peace
was now patched up for a while between the contending parties,
and Berkeley married, at the age of sixty-three, Joan Talbot, a
daughter of the late Lord Shrewsbury, Six years afterwards he
died, and was succeeded by his eldest son William, 12th Earl of
Berkeley, William was at this time thirty-seven years of age ; cautious
and crafty, self-wiUed, haughty and implacable. So much was he
feared that for years before his father's death no tenant would
accept a lease unless William had joined his father in signing it.
The family quarrel was between him and the old Countess of
Shrewsbury; he even accused her of plotting his assassination.
Five years passed, when the countess died, leaving all her property,
with the disputed manors and claims of Berkeley, to her grandson,
Thomas Talbot, Lord Lisle, grandson of the great Talbot, then
recently married to a daughter of WiUiam Herbert, Earl of Pem
broke, He was just twenty years of age, and he took up the in
herited feud with the energy and impatience of youth, and the
craft that was so conspicuous in his race. Bribing Holt, the
keeper of Berkeley castle, he had nearly obtained possession when
the plot was revealed by the repentant porter. Holt fled to
Lord Lisle, at Wotton, who was so enraged at the failure of the
plot that he penned an angry challenge to " William, called Lord

Berkeley, desiring him to come forth ' with all your carts of gunnes,
bowes, with other ordinance' and to bring the uttermost of his
power " to meet him and do battle. The same day Lord Berkeley
returned a cutting satirical answer addressed to "Thomas Talbot,
otherwise called Lord Lisle, not long continued in that name, but
a new found thing brought out of strange countries " (the title of
viscount was new in England), promising to meet him "with not
a tenth of the power he could make," and thro-wing the onus of
the meeting upon him as the challenger in an unjust cause,
Berkeley was a more calculating man than his impulsive
young cousin. He had a good garrison at Berkeley, but he would
leave nothing to chance. There was hard riding of messengers
that day to the Forest of Dean and to Thornbury, where his
brother Sir Maurice lived, who stole from his young wife and
tender son (the hope, at that time, of the posterities of both of
them), and met him with --¦ fair band of men whom he raised on
the spur of the emergency. On into Bristol where Philip Mede,
Maurice's father-in-law, and John Shipward, the mayor, zealous
Yorkists, led out of Lawford's gate a band of citizens ready for a
fray, with the favourers of the Eed Eose, By nightfall there were
not fewer than 1,000 men of the Berkeley faction iu Michel wood,
and the country people readily supplied them with provisions.
At sunrise the next morning the fiery young Lord Lisle was seen
moving at the head of his men down Nibley hill and on to the open
green, A rough forest road ran from thence towards Berkeley,
through Fowleshard aud Michelwood, Berkeley kept his men
in hand, within the wood, until his foes drew near, when he
launched upon them a shower of arrows with deadly effect. Then
rushing from the wood they fell upon Lisle's handful of men
whilst in disorder ; the flght was sharp, short, decisive. Lisle
was shot, visor up, through the face by Black Will, a forest man,
who finished his work with a stroke of his dagger. His fall com
pleted the rout of his party, who rushed pell mell up the steep
lane, crowding it like sheep to fall an easy prey to their pursuers,
Berkeley led his victorious men straight on to Wotton Manor
house, which they sacked ; Lady Lisle, sixteen days afterwards.

A,D, 1470,

REVERSION OF THE BERKELEY MANORS.

211

gave premature birth to a dead son, and the male line of the
younger branch of the Talbot family became extinct, a terrible
and complete retribution for the death of Berkeley's mother
in Gloucester castle. Very Uttle notice appears to have been
taken of this serious breach of the peace by the king or the
authorities, Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, the king-maker, was
changing sides and espousing Henry of Lancaster's cause. Edward
doubtless felt that Berkeley by this blow had done him good
service, for seven days after the battle the king sent him a com
mission to search out and apprehend disaffected persons throughout
the county. A few months after Edward was himself a fugitive
beyond the sea, and Henry was by Warwick replaced on his
tottering throne. Yet another change ! Warwick fell, in 1471,
at the battle of Baruet, On April 17th Edward resumed his
sceptre, Henry was once again incarcerated in the tower, where
he was murdered on May 22nd, Queen Margaret and her son
were taken captives at the battle of Tewkesbury on May 4th ; the
young prince was foully slain and Berkeley's fortunes were once
again in the ascendant. He obtained possession of the disputed
manors, and allowed Lady Lisle £100 a year, without prejudice to
the rights of their respective heirs. The feud was not, however,
ended ; other claimants arose who were more dangerous, inas
much as they were of the queen's family. Compromises, flatteries
and bribes, were the weapons Berkeley now wielded, ' ' Great
gifts are little gods," said he, and, careless as to the interests of
his own family (he had no children), and ambitious of titles and
honours, he enUsted the king on his side by giving the reversion
of the moiety of the vast estates of the Duke of Norfolk (to which,
in right of his mother, he was entitled) to the Duke of York, the
king's second son, who had married Norfolk's daughter, a child of
six years of age, and who had died the day after her marriage.
For this concession the king made him a Viscount and discharged
him from bonds and obligations amounting to £34,000, which, as
we have seen, had been signed under duress by his father. Lord
James, in Bristol,
28, In 1483 the king died. His son, Edward V., and the
above named child, the Duke of York, were murdered in the
Tower by their uncle, Eichard III,, and the moiety of the Norfolk
estates reverted to Berkeley. In 1484 he conveyed to Eichard III, ,
by deed of gift, thirty-five manors— part of the Norfolk inherit
ance — and was created Earl of Nottingham, At Bosworth he
took no part personally, but he is said to have assisted one side
-with men, the other with money. Fortune again smiled upon
him ; on Eichard's death, the thirty-five manors again reverted to
him. By Henry VII, he was created Earl Marishall, and great
Marishall of England, and by deed of the same date, he gave two
castles and twenty-eight manors to Sir WiUiam Stanley, the Lord
Chamberlain, Other gifts and grants of land won him more
court favour and patronage. His brother and heir, resenting
these alienations of the family property, quarrelled with him, and
entailed Berkeley castle and the whole of the remaining family
estates upon the king, reserving only a life interest for himself,
for which he was created Marquis of Berkeley, On his death, in
1491, the king took possession, and spent ten days at the castle
with his queen, Elizabeth of York, Maurice, his brother and
rightful heir, resided still at Thornbury, where he had a fair
estate ; on his succeeding to the title he recovered some of the
manors (wrongly alienated), inherited Tetbury and much property
from the Braose family. Held in high esteem, his son, in the
French war, iu 1512, took with him 411 men, his own tenants
and servants, well armed and trained.
By the death of Edward VI, without issue, in 1553, the
castle and lordship of Berkeley returned again to the family in
the person of Henry, the 17th Lord of Berkeley, who, being a

minor, was a ward of Queen Mary, She, being partial to Henry's
mother, wished to have made him an entirely new grant by dedi
et concessi, but Lady Berkeley, proud of her ancestral title, chose
rather to hold under the old title. This involved the family in
fresh lawsuits and interminable troubles. Lord Dudley, Duke
of Northumberland, the heir of the Greys and the Lisles, was
attainted for high treason in the case of Lady Jane Grey, and his
property became vested in the crown. In 1558 Queen Mary
instituted a suit iu the exchequer against Henry, Lord Berkeley,
and after her death Queen Elizabeth, by her treasurer, prosecuted
the suit, A small sacrifice, well bestowed, stayed the process for
a while. But in 1572, Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk,
brother to Lady Berkeley, suffered for high treason, and Leicester,
then the queen's favourite, feeling hurt that proposals of marriage
between his nephew and the daughter of the house of Berkeley
had been declined, the suit was revived, Leicester holding a
written promise from the queen of the estates if they were
recovered. In 1573 a verdict was given in the queen's favour, by
which the manors of Symonds hall and Wotton, with the mesne
proflts since the flrst of Queen Mary, came into her hands, and
she immediately gave them to Leicester, and his brother, War
wick, Leicester went to Wotton and took possession ; he also
tried to get possession of EoUs court, Slimbridge, but Arnold
Lygon, who held it by lease from Lord Berkeley, defended it with
such spirit that the assailants were forced to retire.
In 1580 suits were commenced by the crown, which were
successful. Sages and Arlingham, Cam, Hinton and Slimbridge,
passed by adverse verdicts into the hands of the queen, and were
transferred to her favourites. On the death of Leicester and
Warwick the property came into the hands of the Countess of
Warwick, daughter of the Earl of Bedford,
Berkeley, much impoverished, petitioned for a remission of
the mesne profits, and Lady Berkeley prayed for it on her knees.
Queen Elizabeth had a spice of Tudor brutality in her that
cropped out occasionally, "No, No," she exclaimed, "No, my
Lady Berkeley, we know you will never love us for the death of
your brother," To meet his expenses, Berkeley sold much of the
Norfolk inheritance, and raised £37,000 between 1565 and 1602
(a sum equal to about £450,000 at the present time).
After the death of Lady Warwick and Queen Elizabeth, an
agreement was come to by both families, by which all the property
that had at any previous time belonged to Lord Berkeley or his
ancestors was to return into his possession, with the exception of
written leases, rents and annuities granted by the late possessors.
Lord Berkeley paying Lord Lisle the sum of £7,320 in discharge
of all other claims. To raise this sum he had to cut dovm the
timber in Michelwood, and to get a "benevolence" from aU his
tenants, an ancient feudal obligation which Smyth says they very
wiUingly paid. The close of this extraordinary contest found
the heir male, the 17th Baron by descent, more firmly than ever
established in his ancestral castle and ancient barony. To this
great and long continued lawsuit the family owe their freedom
from loss of life or estate in the wars of the Eoses ; their internal
troubles in all human probability saved them from violent death
in battle or under the headsman's axe. But the whole story is
fraught with interest to the student of the history of the 15th
century. With regard to the part taken by Bristol men in the
above-named battle of Nibley Green, it is evident that
there was no good wiU between the Talbots and the
Bristol Yorkists, "In 1458, when Philip Mede was
mayor, a tumult was made by one Thomas Talbot, esq,,
who abused and beat the king's searcher, John Welsh,

212

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1474.

Talbot resisted the mayor and got away out of town at
Temple gate, otherwise he had been imprisoned." ^
On the 2nd of May, 1470, Lady Lisle, after the battle
of Nibley Green (which was fought on the 20th of
March), procured an enquiry to be made before the
mayor of Bristol, John Keynsham, as to the part that
Philip Mede and John Shipward
had taken in the fray. Twenty
persons were examined, but the
accused were acquitted, "as is
shown," says Smyth, "by the
mayor's testimonial, under seal,
in that city," Nevertheless the
tradition lingered long in the
neighbourhood of Nibley and
Wotton, and there is no manner
of doubt whatever as to the fact,
that if they were not present
themselves, they sent men to aid
the Berkeleys, Leland thinks that
the Berkeleys favoured the Lan
castrians, but all the circumstances
of the case point in an opposite
direction, 29, In AprU, 1471, Queen Mar
garet and her son. Prince Edward,
landed at Weymouth, where she
received the dismal tidings of Warwick's death ; she re
tired to Bath, whUst her friends raised an army in the
west. Stow says that from thence she came to Bristol,
to meet the Duke of Somerset, Lord John Somerset,
and other chiefs who were devoted to her cause. Had
the town been whoUy
favourable to her, she
would, it is almost
certain, have made it
her base of opera
tions; instead of
doing so, however,
she resolved to retire
into Wales, She
coined gold angels,
groats of several
kinds, and silver pen
nies and halfpence
in the town, so that
Bristol must have had a strong posse of Lancastrians,
There seems to have been a shifting of officials this
year, Henry Alister, the sheriff, was replaced by John
Shipward when the Yorkists again had the ascendancy.
"At Bristow, a good and strong- waUed town, they
' Evans, 105.

Knight and horse in complete armour, circa IhSO.

Costumed, circa l/iOO.

were greatly refreshed and rele-yyd by such as were the
king's rebells in that towne of money, men and artUerye,
And so far were they emboldened therewithe that they
toke corage the Thursday aftar to take the field. For
whiche intent they had sent fore riders to a towne ix
myle from Bristow callyd Sudbury, and a myle towards
the kynge they appointed a
grounde for their field at a place
caUed Sudbury hUl," ^
Edward, hearing that Mar
garet was at Bristol, marched
directly for the town, but, en
camping on the hiU above Sod
bury, learned that she had passed
with her forces towards Gloucester,
Being disappointed in her hopes
of crossing the Severn at the city,
she pushed on to Tewkesbury ;
but ere she could reach it Edward
overtook her, and the fatal battle
was fought that for ever extin
guished the hopes of the Lancas
trian party, John Vere, Earl of
Oxford, escaped to the Continent,
but returned next year and ob
tained possession of St, Michael's
Mount, which he held five months,
surrendering at last on condition that the lives of him
self and his garrison should be spared. He was, in
1473, imprisoned in Newgate, Bristol, Stow says: —
"He was afterwards sent to ' Gwines,' where he was
kept until the death of Edward ; his wife, sister to the
great Earl of Warwick,
subsisting during those
ten years upon charity
or what she coiUd earn
by her needle,"
30, In 1474 Edward
came to Bristol and lod
ged in the abbey of St,
Augustine. He made
the burgesses pay dear
ly for their fickleness,
levying large sums from
them by way of benevo
lences, A quaint story Costumes, circa 1U7S.
is told by Sir Eichard Baker iUustrative of the king's
method of wheedUng money out of his subjects: — "Hav
ing, amongst others, caUed before him an old rich widow
(possibly of Mede or Shipward, who had died within
two years past), he merrily asked what she woiUd wil-
1 Hall,

A,D, 1474.

EDWARD VISITS BRISTOL.

213

lingly give towards his great charges ? ' By my troth,'
quoth she, ' for thy lovely countenance thou shalt have
even twenty pounds.' • The king, looking scarce for half
that sum, thanked and lovingly kissed her, which so
wrought with the old widow that she swore he should
have twenty pounds more, and paid it wiUingly." " It
was probably on this occasion," says Evans, "that the
king obtained of Wm. Canynges the sum of 3,000 marks
for his peace, to be had in 2,470 tons of shipping." ^
But this date is, we think, an error, Canynges died in
1474, having been a priest seven years. It seems more
probable that this sum was a composition paid by
Canynges when he was mayor, in 1466, for the whole
town, and that it was not a personal amercement, the
more so because the value was taken out in the hire
of ships. It is, however, possible that, although
Canynges became a priest, he stUl retained his pro
perty, and Edward might on this visit have exercised
such an infiuence over him as to obtain the above ton
nage in ships for his fleet which he was then coUecting
for the invasion of France : this theory is at least plau
sible. Commerce had little sympathy with dynasties;"
aU it asked was a strong hand to administer the law
and to be let alone. In the strife between the Eoses it
was difficidt work for any prominent man to steer clear.
Henry VI, 's patent to Canynges shows his feeling
towards the merchant, but does not assure us that
Canynges' procU-vities were strongly Lancastrian. From
the foUo-wing answer to a writ issued in 1463, and
addressed to Thomas Young, the recorder of Bristol,
it is clear that before the battle of St, Albans, in 1455,
when the Earl of Wiltshire deserted the king, Canynges
was on the side of the Duke of York, The document
in the councU chamber of Bristol recaUs the fact that
in the reign of Henry VI,, "that was of dede and not
of ryghte," there had been sent 11 barrels of ammuni
tion, weighing xx. cwt,, by John Judde, master of
Henry's ordnance, to one Harry May, merchant of
Bristol, which WiUiam Canynges, being mayor, and
knowing that May was intimate with the Earl of Wilt
shire, seized, with the approbation of the common
councU, on behalf of the Duke of York, and put in
the " tresoure chambyre of the saide towne," The
duke then sent two commissioners to the mayor and
common councU, desiring them to take upon themselves
the ride and governance of the king's castle in Bristol
against the Duke of Somerset and the Earl of Wilt
shire. The mayor did so, and spent in the castle 4 cwt.
of the said ammunition. This order of the Duke of
York was confirmed when he became Edward IV, The
balance of the ammunition was expended by the king's
1 Evans, 112,

order in the naval array fitted out by the town at the
said king's order against Jasper, Earl of Pembroke,
which expedition cost the town 500 marks, (This was
in 1460-1,) A second expedition was fitted out by Canynges, as
is shown by his instructions to Thomas MaunceU "to
arrest aU shippis, bargys, balingers and pycardys, for a
newe army to be made with the said p'ties of Walls,
and to purveye for xxiiijti barrels of gounnepoudyr
and other stuffe for the seid armye ageinst his comyng
into theis marches" {circa September, 1461), The
residue was deUvered to Philip Harneys, master of
Edward's ordnance, by the hands of Thomas Hore,
chamberlain of Bristol, AU this is rehearsed in the
return to the writ, in order to show what had become
of the ammunition which, under it, had been demanded
on behalf of the king. We also give here an account
of the expenditure of the money aUuded to on page
201 as having been taken from All Saints : —
"These ben the deliu'aunces of Nicholas Hille, Eichard Hatt',
PhUip Meed, and Thomas Eogers, kepers of the keyes of Barstaples
cofre, with Inne the Chapell of Saint George, in the Yeldhalle, bi
comaundemts of Eichard Forster, Maire, and the co'ne councell of
the same. Anno xxv'° henrici sexti, John Burton, Maire, and ye
co'ne councell. Anno xxvij" h. sexti, and William Canynges,
Maire, and the co'ne counceU, Anno xxviij" h, vi", of the money
sumtyme of the Vicarie of AUehalwyn,
In pmis to cure soueraine lord kyng )
the time of Eichard anno xxv'° henr > xxli.
ex Dono ¦{ sexti in money  )
It' for au hors to cure saide soueraine |
L lorde 
It' sonde to London to the Eecorder and John
Sherp the young' to be disposed in the
parliament for the welfare of the towne the
tyme of John Burton, Anno xxvi j° 
It' for the mat' of Tynby and other necessaries
sende to the saide Eecorder and John Sherp
to London 
It' for repa'cion of the Wallis of BristoU deliu'ded
to Nicholas hiUe and to John Stanlegh bi
comaundment of William Canynges, Maire,
And all the co'ne counceU Anno xxviij"
henrici sexti  Sm to' 

vjK, xiijs. iiij(^.

xxK.

vU.

xvli,
— C Marcs,''

Amongst Canynges' bequests was one for an alms
house for fourteen persons, which was erected upon the
ground through which the New Cut flows, and which
the house, re-erected, now faces.
Thomas Young, the Eecorder of Bristol, who died
seized of the manors of North WraxaU and Easton-in-
Gordano, was the half-brother of WiUiam Canynges,
He was an active, talented man, and played a con
spicuous part in his generation ; representing the town
in Parliament from 1435 to 1455, with the exception
of the ParUament of 1453, He is referred to in the

214

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1478,

double capacity of Eecorder and M,P. in the Paston
letters. He was a Yorkist, and, in 1449, was com
mitted to the Tower of London for proposing that
Edward, Duke of York, should be appointed Eegent of
the kingdom; he became king's serjeant in 3 Edward
IV,, and chief justice of the Common Pleas in 7 Edward
IV, Lucas says "he wa^ one of the judges who in
Taltarmus' case struck such a blow at the landed nobUity,
by subjecting their estates tail to the operation of com
mon recoveries," ^ He had a mansion in Wine street.
His brother George bequeathed to his wife, Joan, a
house caUed the White Lamb, between the houses of
Thomas Young and that of Lord Cobham, His son
John, a gTocer, Lord Mayor of London, was, in 1466,
knighted in the field for bravery,
31, On March Uth, 1478, the Duke of Clarence,
attainted of treason by ParUament, perished in the
Tower, He held, in right of his wife, a certain great
court of the honour of Gloucester, in Bristol, caUed the
Earl's court (Whitsun court), in his demesne, as of fee,
which court was held time out of mind monthly within
the precincts of the priory of St, James, or in the
churchyard under a large tree, at which court the
tenants of the said duke and his wife (a Beauchamp)
owed suit and service. It seems to have been a moiety
of the honour held of the king in cap, by knight's
service, and worth 100s, per annum. By the duke's
attainder this property came to the Crown; the other
moiety held by the Staffords escaped. To this was
attached the oflice of the bailiwick of the liberty ; this
also, on the attainder of the Duke of Buckingham,
ultimately came to the Crown.
32, Thomas Norton accused the mayor, WiUiam
Spencer, of treasonable correspondence with the Earl
of Eichmond (afterwards Henry VIL). The mayor met
the accusation boldly, yielding himself prisoner ; he
was put in Newgate for 1 3 days, when he was honour
ably cleared by the king, who commended him highly,
and Norton was severely reprimanded by Edward for his
malicious accusation. Less happUy fared another towns
man, Eobert Marks, who, incited by one Symbarbe,
accused an eminent merchant, Eobert Strange, owner
of twelve ships and an ex-mayor of the town, of coining
money and sending the gold over the sea to the Earl of
Eichmond, The king committed Strange to the Tower,
where he. remained about eight weeks; but being able
to clear his character, his accuser, Marks, was hanged,
drawn and quartered at Bristol, and Strange was re
leased with honour.
We have now entered upon the domain of recorded
local history by Eobert Eicart, the calendar, who was
' Lucas, 291,

the to-wn clerk, and who employed his leisure in gather
ing up the scattered fragments of historical events, re
cording the customs and laws of the town, and making
his Ust of its chief magistrates. We have no record of
either his birth or his death. He appears to have been
a brother of the guild of the Calendars, and to have
been vestry clerk in the church of AU Saints, the parish
book, from which we have so freely culled, being in his
handwriting for twelve years. He was then chosen as
town clerk, which office he filled for 27 years. There is
gTcat doubt as to his having been a chantry priest ; he
was, we think, a lay brother of the Calendaries. He
probably died in 1503, Thomas Hardings being ap
pointed town clerk in that year. Eogers says he left
by will a sum of money to be paid annuaUy in equal
proportions to the church of AU Saints and to the
Fraternity, but we have been unable to find any such
record in the church books.

IVUliam Wyrcestre,
33, Another townsman, WiUiam Wyrcestre, busied
himself likewise with the topography of the town,
measuring by his steps its streets, bridges and buUd
ings, and in quaint mediseval Latin recording his most
valuable measurements for the use of posterity. The
foUowing extracts with reference to him are from Dal
laway's Antiquities of Bristotv : —
"William AVyrcestre was the son of a person of the same name,
who was a worthy burgess of Bristol, and engaged in trade. He
was born at a house in a street called St, James's Bee, in 1415,
His mother was Elizabeth Botoner, of an opulent family settled at
Coventry ; by two rich individuals of which, the sumptuous church
of the Holy Trinity in that city was erected, upon the authority

A,D, 1464,

BRISTOL COINS OF HENRY VI. AND EDWARD IV.

215

of Dugdale, who describes their arms, — 'Argent on a cheveron,
gules, three bezants, between three lions' heads erased and crowned,
or,' After having passed four years as a student of Hart hall, in
Oxford, he became a retainer to Sir John Fostolf, of Caistre Castle,
in Norfolk, and, in process of time, his secretary, physician, and
finally his executor. In the 'Paston' letters, published by Sir
John Fenn, in 1787, vols. 1, 3, and 4, there are several from him,
respecting his employments, and the affairs of his executorship,
and of the siege of Caistre Castle by John Mowbray, Duke of
Norfolk. He then assumed the designation of W. Botoner, called
Wyrcestre, preferring his mother's name to that of his father,
"In the decline of life he established himself in Bristol, having
a house and garden near St, Philip's church-yard gate, and various
other property, 'triagardinaW, W,' There he cultivated medicinal
herbs and practised physic. His chief amusement in his old age
was most minutely to survey his native town by paces and measure
ment, and committing the result of such investigation, daily, to
his note-book. This circumstance will account for the desultory
manner in which the MS, we are now examining is compiled and
¦written. There is evidence collected from his notes, that he died
about the year 1484,"
34, Henry VI,, in 1422, gave authority to the master
of his mint to coin money at Bristol, but there are no
specimens known of any of his moneys earlier than the
period of his restoration, in 1470, before which time
Edward IV, had issued money from the Bristol mint,
Edward's first gold coins minted at Bristol were made
in 1465. They were nobles and half-nobles (sometimes
termed rials and half-rials, another form of the word
royal). The gold was nearly pure, there being only one
part of aUoy to 192. The Noble weighed 120 grains
troy, and was current for 10s. ; on the olverse is a figure
of the king, crowned, in armour, standing in a ship,
-with a sword in his right hand, and in his left a shield,
bearing the quartered arms of England and France ;
there is a square flag in the stern bearing the letter E,

/- » I IT 'j ** 1 w,, '^SS-

K-ff

Bristol Gold Noble, imS, Edward IV.
on the side of the ship is a fuU blown rose, and under
neath it on the waves is the letter B (for Bristol), Le
gend, EDWAED, DI, GEA,' BEX, ANGL,' Z, PEANC, DNS, 'iB,
Reverse, a tressure of eight curves, with a beaded
interior, and -with trefoils in the outward angles, , con
taining a large sun of sixteen rays. Four ornaments
are around in the direction of a cross with fleurs-de-lys
over them. These ornaments alternate with four Uons
under crowns. In the centre of the coin is a smaU rose,

over the middle of the sun. Legend, ihc avt teansiens
PEE MEDIVM ILLOEVM IBAT, (Luke iv,, 30), A mint mark
of a sun before ihc. There are beaded inner circles
within the legends on both sides. There are two of
these coins in the British Museum both with the sun
mint mark; but Mr, WiUiam Brice possesses a fine
example, identical with the above description, except
in having a crown instead of the sun for a mint mark.
The Halp-noble is similar in type to the noble, also
having B under the rose on the obverse. The legends
read, obverse, ed-ward. di. gea, eex, angl,' z, feanc.
Reverse, domine ne in fveoee tvo aegvas me (Psalm
vi,, 1), with small trefoils between the words, Mr,
Brice has one of these coins with a sun for a mint
mark before domine. The full weight of the half-noble
was 60 grains, it was current for 5s, There is no speci
men in the British Museum of this coin. It is interest
ing to observe that the type of the obverse is clearly
intended to copimemorate the naval supremacy of Eng
land, or in the words of the old couplet, —
" Four things our noble, sheweth unto me —
King, ship, and sword, and power of the sea,"
The reverse, type of the rose and sun, is the well-known
badge of Edward IV,, adopted by him after the extra
ordinary appearance of the sun at the battle of Morti
mer's Cross,
Of the heavy or first silver coinage of this king only
a Hale-geoat or twopenny piece is known. It weighed
29 grains, and bore, obverse, full-face bust, crowned,
within a tressure of arches and beaded inner circle. A
fleur-de-lys on the king's breast, and a peUeton each side
of the crown. Legend, edwaed di gea eex angl z. pe.
Reverse, a cross with three peUets in each angle ; the

Bristol Light Groat, llSk. Edward IV.
following legends in two circles : villa bristow and
posui' DEUM, ADIVTOEE, MEUM, Mint mark a cross. In
1464 the weight of the sUver coins was reduced from the
proportion of 15 grains to the penny to the rate of 12
grains to the penny. This second coinage is, therefore,
termed the " light " coinage. The light groats, of which
there are many varieties, should weigh 48 grains. The
type is, obverse, a bust of the king, fuU-faced, crowned,
within a tressure of nine arches and a beaded circle.
The letter B (for Bristol) on the king's breast. Some

216

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1477,

groats have quatrefoils on each side of his neck, others
have trefoils, and some have neither. Legend, obverse,
EDWAED Dl GEA EEX ANGL. Z. EEANC Or FEANCI, Mint
mark a sun, crown, annulet, or rose. Reverse, a large
cross with three peUets in each angle ; legend, in two
circles, Posui deum audivtoee meum villa beistow, on
some beestoll or beistoll. Mint mark a sun, crown
or rose in front of Posui, Mr, Brice has a groat
which has a crown mint mark on both sides, and reads
Beestoll. The Ught half-groats should weigh 24
grains. Obverse, bust, &c,, as on the groats, B on
king's breast. Some specimens have quatrefoils at the
sides of the neck. Legends and mint marks similar to
above. On the reverse the mint mark before Posui is
often a pierced cross. The Light Penny is ex
tremely rare, one in the British Museum, weighing
12.6 grains, has obverse bust, fuU-faced, crowned, within
a beaded inner circle ; a trefoU to right of king's neck.
Legend, edwaed de gea. ex. angl. ; mint mark, a crown.
Reverse, cross and pellets, and inner circle. Legend,
VILLA beistoll, Light HALFPENNY, also extremely
rare, weighing 6,5 grains, bears obverse similar to the
penny ; a trefoil on each side of the neck. Legend,
ed(waed di) gea, eex. Reverse, similar to the penny.
Legend, villa beisto ; mint mark, a crown.
During the brief restoration of Henry VL, from
the 9th of October, 1470, to the I4th of April, 1471,
several coins were minted at Bristol, The gold money
consisted of angels, at that time current for 6s. 8d. each.
The full legal weight was 80 grains, and they were of

'^,-

I'.ristul Gold Kohle, lU7n.

the same fineness of gold as Edward's nobles. This
piece acquired the name of angel from the rej)resenta-
tion of the Archangel Michael on the obverse. A fine
specimen is in the British Museum weighing 80 grains,
bearing on olverse the Archangel Michael spearing
the dragon. Legend, heneicus dei gea. eex. angl.'
z. feanc. Reverse, a ship with a large cross for the
mast, the letter H (for Henry), and a fleur-de-lys at the
side of the cross ; a shield bearing the quartered arms
of England and France is affixed to the side of the
ship ; the letter B (for Bristol) is on the waves below
the shield. Legend, pee ceyse tya salva nos xpo

EEDET fper crucam tuam salva nos Christe redemptorj. Mint
mark a pierced cross before the word per. There are
beaded inner circles on both sides, and smaU trefoils
between the words of the legends ; also trefoils beneath
the H and fleur-de-lys on the reverse. Another rare and
fine Bristol angel sold in 1864 for £10, It was similar
to the above, but the legend on the obverse was heneicv,
and it ended with dns, ; and on the reverse the last word
was spelt eede-'toe. It weighed 79|- grains.
The silver coins of Henry struck at this time are
several varieties of light groats, weighing 48 grains.
These have on the obverse king's bust, full-faced, crowned,
&c,, as in Edward's groats, the letter B is placed on the
king's breast. Legend, heneio (various) de gea, eex.
Asa. (various). Reverse, as Edward's, on one coin it is
spelt beistow. These groats are very rare.^

Carriage of the 15th Century.
This reign was prolific in events destined to exercise
a powerful influence throughout all future ages, Wil
liam Caxton brought the art of printing into England,
and, in 1471, printed the first book in the English lan
guage. In 1482 the first book was printed on English
made paper by one of Caxton' s whilom apprentices,
Wynkyn de Worde, its title is Bartholomaus de Proprie-
tatibus Reritm. The English version was made by John
Trevisa, vicar of Berkeley, There is an old vellum
copy of this book of the date, circa 1395-1410, in the City
Library, which may possibly have been Trevisa's copy.
35, John Shipward served the offices of bailiff in
1408 and 1415, sheriff in 1429 and 1441, and mayor in
1444 and 1455, In 1453 a John Shipward sat in the
Parliament, at Eeading, as member for Bristol, John
Barry being his colleague, and in 1459-60 in those held
at Coventry and Westminster, In 1463, one of the name
was again mayor, and in 1465 John Shipward, jun.,
served as bailiff; in 1469 and 1477 the name occurs
again as mayor. Mr, DaUaway suppUes a pedigree
which is manifestly incorrect ; a far more likely one is
suggested by a more recent writer, who was assisted by
1 Condons from Henfrey, 351-3,

a,d. 1470.

BRISTOL MAYORS: EMINENT MEN, ETC.

217

the veteran antiquary Tyson, and Mr. J. B, Kington
gives, based on the wills, the suggested pedigree : —
PEDIGEEE OF SHIPWAED,
Dallaway, Suggested,
John Shipward=Katherine John Shipward=Gwynet
BaiUff, 1413 | Bailiff, 1408 |
I I
John SHiPWARD=Gwinett John SHiPWAED=Katherine

Mayor 1453, WiU
proved 1473, foun-
derof St, Stephen's
Tower

I
John Shipward=
Mayor 1477,
completed the

Mayor 1469, Will
executed 1473,
proved 1477,
Built St, Ste
phen's Tower

I

John Shipward ? Norton =Agnes=E, Westcote
Mayor 1477 |
Isabel Norton

1,1 I
John Shipward Agnes=Edmund Westcote Joan=Thos, Norton
Isabel= John Norton.
Those who are curious in this matter wiU find a
satisfactory solution in Mr, Kington's book, 281-5,
The Shipwards were, no doubt, men of consideration ;
their large dwelUng-house, near to St. Stephen's churoh,
is mentioned by WiUiam Wyrcestre, who makes it several
times the landmark of his measurements. The mayor,
in 1469, is "One Shipward a Merchant of Bristow who
made the right highe and costly tower of S, Stephenes in
Brightstow." ^ The date is generaUy referred to as 1470,
and we have evidence that his wiU, drawn in 1473, was
proved in 1477. WiUiam Wyrcestre, who compiled his
Itinerary between 1460 and 1480, gives a list of ships
belonging to Bristol, and mentions "the new chyrche
Toure of Seynt Stevyns;"^ and Barrett says in the
great west window now destroyed were the efiigies of a
man and woman in painted glass with this inscription,
" Orate pro animabus Johannis Shipward et Catharines
uxoris ejus, qui Johannes istam fenestram fecit et fuit
speeialis benefactor hujus ecclesia." ^
PhUip Mede, in conjunction with John Shipward,
was a member of the unduly summoned Parliament
that, holden at Coventry, in 1459, attainted the Duke
of York and his friends and decreed the forfeiture of
their estates. They were both members also of the
Yorkist ParUament, which, at Westminster, in 1466,
decreed that the acts of the Coventry Session should be
"reversed and nuUed, eassed, irrite, repeled, revoked,
voide, and of noo force, ne effect," * Between these
sessions, however, two other burgesses, Thomas Eussell
and John Sharp, jun,, were returned (1460), who, not
being sufficiently Yorkist for the aspirant to the Crown,
were displaced. Philip Mede served the ofiice of
mayor in 1461, the year in which Sir Baldwin Ful-
1 Lei. Itin,, 7, 89, « WiU, Wyrces,, 107,
» Barrett, 510, * Eot. Par,, V,, 374,
[Vol. I.]

ford was executed ; in the commission for that knight's
trial WiUiam Canynges, mayor, was included, as
was also Thomas Young, the recorder.^ Both state
ments are correct. The mayors were elected on the
15th September and sworn into office on the 29th, and
the practice of the Calendars was to state their year of
office as the year of election ; consequently Canynges
was mayor up to the 29th September, and during the
trial and execution, Philip Mede was the mayor elect,
although recorded in the annals as serving in the same
year, his mayoralty onlj' commenced at the last-named
date (September 29th). He was mayor a second time
in 1468; and in 1470 was, it is said, engaged in the
battle of Nibley Green, He was buried in the church
of St. Mary Eedcliff. (See Ecclesiastical Histoey, 208,)
In the Great Book of Wills, amongst those of a
number of the burgesses, we find that of Philip Mede,
It was proved in March, 1476, and a copy of it is given
in Kington's Nibley Green, 277, The first will contained
in the Great Booh is that of John Woodroue, and is
dated the Monday next after the Feast of St, Laurence,
in the 6th year of the reign of Eichard II,, i.e., the 9th
February, 1383, The wills are written in Latin until
about the year 1500, after which, with few exceptions,
they are written in English : the last wiU is dated 1663.
WilUam Spencer, one of the executors of WiUiam
Canynges, was three times mayor, viz., 1465, 1473 and
1478-9 (a double date is given for this last year, as
Eicart, from whom we henceforth copy our list of
mayors, begins his with the election of the mayor, viz.,
in September), He was also twice Member of Parlia
ment, viz,, in 1466-67. He gave to the mayor and
commonalty of Bristol " four score and six pounds eight
shiUings and eight pence; twenty pounds to be freely
lent to the mayor for the time being, and to have the
continuance from mayor to mayor for ever ; the re
mainder he appointed should be lent to the bailiffs,
they to have and enjoy the same during their time of
being in office, paying therefrom the sum of two shil
lings a week to the priest of St, George's chapel, who
should distribute the same unto the poor people of the
almshouse in Lewin's Mead, which WiUiam Spencer did
buUd with the money and goods of WiUiam Canynges.
Moreover, he gave four pounds annually to three priests
sufficiently instructed in sacred things to preach the
Word of God in the church or churchyard of St, Mary
Eedcliff before the mayor and commons and other
devout persons there assembling at the Feasts of Pen
tecost ; certain moneys to each of the priests there for
preaching ; to the mayor for the said preacher's dinner
at his table; to the clerk and sexton for ringing the
« Eot, Par,, VI. , 231, 3.37, p 2

218

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1476.

beU and placing the forms for the mayor and common
councU." '^ The preaching of the three sermons at Whit
suntide was to commemorate the day on which Canynges
sung his first mass.
Eobert Strange was mayor for the second time when
Edward IV, died, on the 8th of April, "and," says
Eicart, ignoring the young king, Edward V,, " on Sun
day, the 7th day of July then next ensuing, Eichard,
Duke of Gloucester, brother to the said King Edward,
was made king and crowned at Westminster,"
On St, Woolfrank's day, being the 15th of October,
there was a terrific storm of wind and rain in the west
of England, To add to the
superstitious terrors of the peo
ple, there was an eclipse of the
moon which appeared of divers
colours — a streak of blue in
the middle, of green above,
and on the top a little Ught,
The spring tide, with the wind
blowing a tempest from the
south-west, drove the shipping
from the anchorage in King
road, Several were lost, nota
bly the Katharine ; a ship of
Bilboa was driven ashore on
the Hollow backs, another from
Brittany cut away her masts,
and many boats and cogs were
lost. The flood tide drowned
the saltmarsh ; corn, cattle and
houses were carried away, and
upwards of 200 people were
dro-wned. Great damage was
done in the merchants' houses
and ceUars in Bristol, especially
to the wool and salt. "And this
year the two sons of King Edward were put to silence
in the Tower of London," Thus cautiously does Eicart
enter their most atrocious murder; moreover, it is an
interpolation ; such a deed could not with safety be
recorded until there was security given by the death of
the perpetrator. Strange was mayor in 1474-82-89,
and died in 1491, There was a handsome monument in
the churchyard of St, John to the memory of himself and
wife, which "told aU about him;" but the inscription
told too much, and was nefariously expunged to cover
an embezzlement. He was the reputed founder of St,
John's almshouse, mentioned in the parish accounts for
the year 1500 ; but his title as founder, or having any
thing to do with the almshouse, has been disputed,
• Tovey's Local Jotting.^,

Upon holding a commission in 1640 to inquire into the
trust of the charity, it appeared that the revenue had
been embezzled, that several leaves had been cut out of
the parish books, and the inscription on his tomb in the
churchyard entirely obliterated. The answer not only
decidedly negatives any endowment by the said Eobert
Strange, but also declares its disbelief that such alms
house was ever built by him ; nevertheless, cutting out
the leaves from the parish book and defacing the in
scription on the monument had a suspiciously ugly
appearance. The national convulsion subsequently ter
minated the inquiry,^ Strange, according to William
Wyrcestre, had even a greater
number of ships than Canynges,
he having twelve,^
John Bagod al' Bagott, mayor
in 1476, gave tenements for the
use of the city, out of which
was paid yearly to the prisoners
in Newgate 3s, 4d, ; he dwelt
in a high tower in Lewin's
Mead, William Wodington,
mayor 1480, gave to the gild
ing of the figures of our Lady,
St, Leonard, and St, GUes, £6.
Thomas Eowley, sheriff in
1475, Ues buried in St. John's
church. He was not a priest
but a merchant of repute.
Chatterton must have had ac
cess to the archives of the city,
we think, as weU as to the
books in the old City Library
and the parish documents of
St, Mary Eedcliff, He seems
to have been misled by an entry
Cha2Jel to Three Kings of Cologne, Fosters Alwslumses. in the Mayor's Calendar, which
mentions Thomas Eowley' s chantry priest. This, as far
as we can gather, is the molecule from which the
genius of Chatterton evolved the ' ' Gode prisete Thomas
Eowlie," to whom Norton Malreward gave birth, the
Convent of St, Kenna education, Canynges a canonry,
and Westbury a grave,
John Foster (particulars of whose interesting wUl
wiU be given in a future chapter on the charities of
Bristol) was sheriff in 1474, mayor in 1481, and member
of Parliament in 1489. A MS. says: — "John Foster,
merchant, buUded the chapel in the north-west end of
Steep street (top of Christmas steps), in the parish of
St, Michael, in the city of Bristol, in the honour of God,
to the three kings of Cologne, and annexed thereto an
' Tovey's Local Jottings, ' WiU, Wyrces,, 184,

A.D. 1482,

INCIDENTS.

219

almshouse, containing fourteen chambers, with fourteen
gardens, for one priest, eight poor men, and five poor
women, and by his wiU did appoint his executors to seU
his lands lying in the county of Gloucester, and the
money thereof shoiUd be employed and disposed to and
for the maintenance of the chapel, almshouse, priest,
poor men and women, and made John EsterfeUde, mer
chant and alderman of Bristol, and twice mayor of the
same, and one John Walshe, of Olveston, in the county
of Gloucester, Esquire, his executors ; and for that the
said John Walshe, and without the assent of the said
John EsterfeUde, contrary to the wiU of John Foster,
sold the said lands and converted the money to his own
use, and in recompence thereof, did, by his wUl, give
and devise to the said John EsterfeUde and his heirs
twenty-three messuages and a garden and two parcels
of land, being" [writing iUegible] "to the use and per
formance of the last wUl and testament of the said John
Foster, . . . The aforesaid John EsterfeUde, in
tending that the said chapel and almshouse, and that
the said priest, poor men and women should be for ever
provided for and maintained, the rents of the said tene
ments given by the said John Walshe not being of the
value of the lands by him sold, did add thereunto three
messuages and a piece of land in Bristol, four cottages
lying in St, Thomas street, aU being of the yearly value
of twenty-seven pounds, and also two parts of a mes
suage in Corn street, of the clear value of forty-two
shiUings, Ukewise purchased a parcel of land, where
upon the almshouse standeth, which was the fee of the
abbot of Tewkesbury, and over and beside did repair
the same tenements and lands to their cost,"
John Esterfeld represented the town in 1485 and
1487. He was bailiff in 1482, mayor in 1488 and 1495.
He was twice married, leaving issue two sons, Henry
and John; when mayor, in 1488, he, together with the
sheriff and bailiffs, was summoned to London, to bring
before the king two men of Waterford who were charged
with bringing counterfeit money into England, He was
buried in St, Peter's church beneath a large flat stone,
in which was inserted a brass, representing himself and
his two wives, with a Latin inscription: — "Beneath
this marble is entombed the iUustrious John Esterfeld,
merchant, and twice mayor of this town, and alderman
also, together with the remains of Alicia, a learned
woman, and of Matilda, his wives," The brass has long
since disappeared, but the noble manner in which Ester
feld fulfilled the -uishes of his deceased friend, Foster,
wiU be an enduring and well deserved monument.
We briefiy note here a few other eminent men of
this age, aU of whom were, in some degree, connected
with Bristol: — John Daubeny, Walter Newbury and

WiUiam Hunt, abbots of St, Augustine ; Nicholas Can-
tilupe, prior of the Carmelites ; Henry Abyndon, master
of St, Catherine's hospital, a Bachelor of Music at Cam
bridge in 1463 and a member of the king's chapel; Sir
John GyUarde, prior of the Calendaries; John Carpen
ter, Bishop of Worcester, who was intimately connected
with the church and coUege at Westbury-on-Trym ;
Simon OUver, recorder from 1394 to 1430, who dwelt in
a large house in Peter street,^ "The house of the
Chokes was greatly advanced by Choke, Chief Judge of
England, that attained lands to the sum of 500 marks
by the year and kept his chief house at Long Ashton,
by Bristow, having great furniture of silver," ^ His
arms and pedigree are given in WiUiam Wyrcestre, 163.
From the biU for the men of law, given on page 202, it
seems probable that the chief justice. Sir Eichard Choke,
began his practice as a lawyer in Bristol,
Sir Eichard Newton, who took the name of Cradock
in after Ufe, was recorder from 1430 to 1439, when he
was elevated to the judicial bench. His residence was at
Barrs court, and he and his wife lie in Yatton church,
and not, as is generaUy supposed and as the monument
erroneously states, in the Newton chapel in Bristol
cathedral, [The inscription was, by mistake, placed on
the tomb of Eichard Newton, a gi-andson of the judge,
in 1718, by a Mrs. Archer, one of the family,]
John Spine, D.D. (Thorne). " I had concluded him
born at Spine in Berkshire, nigh Newbury, but for
these diswasives : — 1, He lived lately under Eichard
III,, when the clergy began to leave off their local sur
names, and in conformity to the laity, to be called from
their father's. 2. I suspect the name to be Latinized
Spineus, and that in plain English he was caUed Thorn,
an ancient name in this city (Bristol) ; " where Bale
positively says he was born. Pitts, too, assures his
readers that he was " an Englishman by nation, of the
city of Bristol, of the Order of brethren of the Blessed
Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel, Doctor of Theology, and
as. it appears Professor at Oxford ; a man skiUed in
PhUosophy and Theology ; highly educated and a
preacher celebrated in his own time," He appears to
have been held in high estimation by associates of his
own sect, and by his teachers, whose method of study
he so carefully foUowed in every department, that he
^ St, Peter's pump, or rather the casteUette which covered the
well of St, Edith, which was the work of Spencer, mayor of
Bristol in 1474, was, in 1633, re-built in a debased style as com
pared with the original structure. It was removed, in 1765, to
Stourhead park, where it was re-erected over the source of the river
Stour, In form it is hexagonal, set on slight columns ; in each
facet is a sculptured effigy, and slight pinnacles rise from each
corner. The style is debased Gothic, — Ed,
" Lei, Itin., VIL, 84,

220

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1485.

ultimately obtained the chief office among them by
public suffrage. He was the author of a volume of
discourses to the clergy, and also one entitled Annual
Bisputations, and some other works. He died at Oxford
in 1484.1 ' ' John MUverton is said, by CoUinson, to have derived
his name from MUverton, in Somersetshire, ' where
indeed he was born, but filing himself in Bristol he
was there inducted into the sacred rites of the CarmeUte
Order.' He, however, finished his studies at Oxford,
where he was made a Doctor of Divinity and a profes
sor in the university. ' After he had gained for himself
a great name by public lectures and scholastic disputes,
he was in-vited to Paris by John Sorethus, General
Master of the Order, and was appointed head of the
CarmeUtes .in England, Scotland, and Ireland in 1456 ;
so that his jurisdiction was larger than that of King
Edward IV,, under whom he flourished. This office,
with its honour and advantages, he occupied for eleven
or twelve years,' " ^ He died in January, 1486,
36, Eichard III,, as we have noticed, having deposed
Edward V. and murdered him and his brother in the
tower, ascended the throne on July 6th, 1483, On
October 15th the great flood, which we have before
described, stopped the Welsh forces who were marching,
1 FuUer's Worthies, ^ Pryce, 509,

Richard III, and his Queen.
under the Duke of Buckingham, to join the army which,
in Devonshire, Hugh Courtney and the Bishop of Exeter
had arrayed against Eichard, WiUiam Wyrcestre died
this year. At the battle of Bosworth, on August 22nd,
1485, Eichard III, was slain.
The mayor and Common Council, in 1482, granted a
yearly fee of 40s. to Oliver Kyng, the king's secretary,
as long as he continued in the oflice, for the welfare of the
town.

^-^^

CHAPTER IX.

^

Tr^E -f TUDO^ -f E^^. ^

I. Henry VII.'s reception in Bristol. 2. His second visit and its results. 3. Death of the King's
Uncle. The King pays Bristol a third visit, accompanied by the Queen. 4. Loyalty wins a new Charter.
5. Customs; Sports; Persecutions; Taxation. 6. Incidents of the period. 7. The King's Death and
Character. 8. Accession of Henry VIII. Market customs. g. " Young Bristol " grows contentious.
10. Other incidents of the time. 11. Seeds of the Reformation. Tyndale's New Testament. 12. Trade matters.
Robert Thorne. 13. Disputes with Tewkesbury and Gloucester. Thos. White's Gifts. 14, Henry breaks
with the Pope. Cranmer and Latimer preach in Bristol. 15. The new head of the Church and the
Monasteries. 16. Parliament grants to the King the property of the Monasteries. 17. Misery of the Poor.
18. The King makes Bristol a City. ig. Contention with the Knights of St. John. 20. Local matters.
Church Service in English. Ships, etc. 21. Bristol Money of this reign. The King's death. 22. Edward VI.
23. Merchant Adventurers' Guild. 24. Bristol Coinage. 25. Accession of Mary. Bristol Martyrs.
26. Local incidents. 27. Accession of Elizabeth. Secret Court in Tolzey. 28. Act of Uniformity.
29. The Butts in Canons' Marsh. Military Shows. 30. The Queen visits Bristol. 31. Pill Pirates.
First Canoe in England. Shipping Notes. 32. First Fire Brigade. Mayors, etc. 33, Bronze Pillar.
The Armada, etc. 34. Civic Notices. Queen Elizabeth's Hospital. 35. The Queen's "Entertainment."
Soldiers disorderly. 36. Coinage. Death of Elizabeth.

^ENEY VIL, the first of the Tudor line,
began his reign August 22nd, 1485. He
was crowned in October, and married
Elizabeth, of York, eldest daughter of
Edward IV., on the 14th of the foUowing
January. A month after his accession
that dreadful plague, the sweating sick
ness, desolated the whole country. Edward
Westcot, mayor of Bristol, f eU a victim to it fifteen days
after Michaelmas, and Henry Vaughan, who had been
mayor in 1483, again occupied the civic chair.
A fortnight after Whit Monday, in 1486, Henry
came to Bristol, and kept his court at the Great House

on St, Augustine's place. From a narrative of his pro
gress given by Leland we learn that, having dined at
Iron Acton with Sir Eobert Poyntz, he was met three
miles out of Bristol by the mayor, sheriff, baiUffs, and a
great number of the burgesses ; that Tremayle, the re
corder, in their names, right cunningly welcomed him.
The mayor bare no mace, the sheriff no rod, untU they
came to Lawford's gate where their jurisdiction began.
On the Causeway within the gate stood the procession
of the Friars, at the end of the Causeway the procession
of the parochial clergy, and at Newgate "there was
ordained a pageant with great melody and singing;
after which there was a king, who had speech as fol-

222

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1490,

loweth ..." Then follow thirty -five lines of miserable
doggerel, in which Brennus welcomes the king, teUs him
that it was he who built the town, that he had left it
full of wealth, but that in his long absence it had faUen
into decay, and prays that the king by his navy, and
encouragement of the cloth trade, wiU apply a remedy,
for which God wUl reward him. At the High Cross
there was another pageant full of maiden chUdren, richly
beseen, where Prudentia made a complimentary speech.
Then the king passed down through St, John's gate,
where another pageant awaited him of many maiden
children, richly bedight with girdles, beads and ouches
(jewels), there Justitia stopped him with another speech.
From thence through Christmas and Host streets the
royal procession slowly wended its way, a baker's wife
showering down wheat on the king from a window,
crying out "good luck "and "welcome," Then came
the shipwright's pageant, with pretty conceits but no
speech, anon another of an olifaunt (elephant) with a
castle on his back. Yet one more, the resurrection of
our Lord, with a castle, and in the highest tower thereof
certain imagery smiting beUs. Then to St, Austen's
church (the cathedral) where the abbot and monks re
ceived the king in fuU procession.
On the morn when the king had dined he rode on
pilgrimage to St, Anne's, in the beautiful little wood at
Brislington (of the chapel not a vestige remains). And
on the Thursday next, being Corpus Christi day, he
went in procession around the great Green, then caUed
the Sanctuary, whither came aU the processions of the
town (the trades' guilds), and the Bishop of Worcester
preached in the pulpit in the green to the king, mayor
and burgesses, with their wives, and much people of
the country. At evensong the king sent for the mayor
and chief men and demanded of them the cause of their
poverty, which they ascribed to their great losses of ships
and goods within the past five years, Henry comforted
them, advised them to buUd fresh ships, and enter into
merchandise as they had been wont to do, and promised
that he would help them in divers ways, some of which
he showed them. This gave such satisfaction that the
mayor said "they had not heard such comfort from any
king for a hundred years, and thanked God who had
sent them so good a lord," Just five years before the
expedition of John Jay, which had been sent out in
search of the unknown land in the west, had returned
to Bristol ; like several previous attempts, it was unsuc
cessful, and these speculative adventures must be enu
merated amongst the losses of the merchants. In a
future chapter we shall deal with the maritime adven
tures of this period. From one of the old stage morali
ties the foUowing list of ships is given as having been

lost in the Irish channel, probably on their way to or
from St. James' fair : —
" Herken, and I wyll shewe you theyr names eche one :
Fyrst was the Eegent, with the Myghell of Brykylse,
The George, with the Gabryell, aud the Anne of Foye,
The Starre of Salte-Ashe with the Ihesus of Plumoth ;
Also the Hermytage, with the Barbara of Dartmouth,
The Nycolas, and the Mary Bellouse of Brystowe,
With the Elyn of London and James also."
Scratched on a slate (preserved in the CouncU House),
which was found in repairing one of the pinnacles of St.
Mark, is a statement that in this year, 1487, that tower
was finished, and in the foUowing year the king confirmed
the charters of 1461-62, The king's visit brought one
good result to the town ; we gather that there was a
short causeway near to Lawford's gate, on lea-ying which
the procession had UteraUy to wade through the mud.
An Act was passed in the next Parliament which com
peUed every man in the town to pave (or pitch) the
street before his own house; by 1490 the streets were
all newly paved, and in that year the bridge on the
Weir was bnUt of stone,
2, Henry was a shrewd, calculating king; he doubt
less saw the inconsistency of men pleading poverty, and
yet getting up costly pageants, with rich dresses, jewels,
&c. In the freshness of his iUegitimate royalty he had
given the men of Bristol smooth words; but in 1490,
when Simnel, the quondam claimant of the throne, was
a turnspit in the royal kitchen, the court of the Star
Chamber a mere instrument for extortion, and Warwick
a close prisoner in the Tower, Henry came once more to
Bristol, accompanied by the Lord ChanceUor, But
now the case was altered ; occupying his former lodg
ings at the Great House, and finding the tradesmen's
wives stiU more sumptuously arrayed, and no outward
signs of indigence, he exacted £500 as a benevolence
from the town, and made ' ' every man who was worth
£200 pay 20s., because men's wives went so sumptu
ously appareled." ^
In 1492 Clement Wiltshire, the mayor, died suddenly
in the night of St, John's day, and John Hawks sup
plied for the remainder of the year,
3, Jasper Tudor, Duke of Bedford, uncle to the king,
died at Thornbury, in December, 1496 ; he was buried
at Keynsham abbey, WiUiam Eegent, the mayor, with
200 townsmen, aU clad in black, met the funeral pro
cession outside Bristol and accompanied it to the grave.
The king, who with his queen shortly afterwards paid a
third visit to Bristol and lodged at his old quarters,
gave the mayor great thanks for his courtesy. The
Friary of the Carmelites, so frequently patronised by
royalty, stood on the site of Colston haU, in a series of
1 Old MS,

A.D, 1492,

LOYALTY WINS A NEW CHARTER.

223

terraced gardens that reached from the tidal river up
the hiU to the Eed Lodge, and in width from Pipe lane
to Christmas steps. Pleasantly situated on the sunny
side of the hill, with the busy to-wn in sight, but not
inconveniently near, and having its internal accommoda
tions lofty and large, its attractions overcame those of
the abbey, and it became for centuries the lodging-place
of royalty, even when it had passed from the hands of
the friars into those of private people.
College green was a sanctuary which if the criminal
once reached he was free from the clutch of the civil
law, and the Elder Lady chapel of the monastery had
hitherto been a city of refuge even for traitors; but,
in 1495, Henry astutely obtained from Pope Alexander
an authority which, denouncing traitors as enemies to
the Christian faith, broke up the frequently abused
privUege, The
handicraftsmen, P^^^^ ' "'^^ '^^.7r,'7> TTT ,^.
we are told, who
took refuge
there, used to
be employed in
rope-making. 4, Per kin
Warbeck, who
personated Eich
ard the young
Duke of York,
who was mur
dered in the
Tower by Eich
ard III,, had,
since 1492, been

(jwld
HalL in-3
Broad
jlreeL
dti/IalL

From Millerd's Map,

lands by tenure to defend England against Scottish
invasions. He proposed to the Cornishmen that they
should arm themselves, but march in a peaceable
manner to London, and petition the king to abate this
unlawful tax, and to drive from his presence his evil
counseUors. 16,000 men answered the appeal, and
armed themselves with bills and bows, pikes and flails,
and marched as far as Wells ; there they were joined
by Lord Audley, and thence sent orders to the mayor of
Bristol to prepare biUets for 2,000 men; this he refused,
and threatened them at their peril to approach the
town ; the gates were fortified, the ships of force were
brought up from Hungroad and lined the quay from
the Marsh to Eedcliff, and the whole strength of
Bristol was held in readiness. The rebels, finding
such preparations made, desisted from their purpose,
marched into
Kent, were
routed at Black-
heath, and the
ringleaders seized and exe
cuted, Bristol's
good service was
not forgotten by
the king. He
had, by inspexi
mus on Feb
ruary 5th, 1487,
confirmed to the
burgesses their
charters, and
now, as a re-

a great source of annoyance to Henry, His claims had
been acknowledged by the King of Scotland ; and the
Earl of Huntley, by whose assistance Henry had won
his crown, had given the young pretender his daughter
to wife. In support of his protege the king of Scotland
invaded England, and, ravaging the north, returned to
his o-wn land laden with booty, Henry, determined to
be revenged for this insult, asked his Parliament for
means to carry the war into Scotland, They granted
£120,000 on condition that it shoidd be applied to that
purpose alone. But taxes have seldom been as readily
paid as they are by Parliaments heedlessly granted;
Cornwall is a long way from the Scottish border ;
the people there, already overburdened by the king's
cupidity, demurred to any extra payment, Michael
Joseph, a brawny blacksmith and natural leader of
men, came boldly to the front, and Nicholas Flammock,
a country lawyer, advised them that the tax was un
lawful, as the barons of the north country held their

ward, he granted on the 1 7th of December, 1499, another
charter, of which the foUowing are the principal items :
Instead of two aldermen they were to have six, the re
corder being one, the other five to be chosen by the
Common Council, the aldermen to have the same power
as those of London. It gave the mayor and alder
men power to remove any of their number and to
choose others, they are to be justices of the peace, to
cause to be kept' the ordinances relating to workmen,
artificers, servingmen, innkeepers, weights, measures,
sellers of victuals, mendicants, vagabonds, and other
mendicants who caU themselves "travelling men"
(? Wycliffites) : also those against giving livery of
badges of companies to knights, esquires or valets, and
other liveries of cloths, and against using the same
liveries in any way [see the sumptuary laws, and note
the particulars of this king's visit to his friend, the Earl
of Oxford, in any history of England] ; also a statute
against the Lollards, and another concerning chipping.

224

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1499.

counterfeiting, washing or other falsifying of the king's
money, &c. They are also constituted justices for en
quiring into treasons, felonies, &c,, illicit conventicles,
regratings, and forestallings are especially named ; also
those who have used caps and other liveries of a single
suit by confederacy and maintenance contrary to the
statute, &c. They have power to inc[uire into the con
duct of sheriffs, bailiffs, constables, and keepers of the
gaol, are to inspect and proceed on indictments for the
hearing and determining of trespasses, misdemeanours,
and other offences against the statutes, at the king's
suit or that of any other person. The mayor and com
monalty to have aU the fines, without giving an account
to the Exchequer ; no other justice to interfere. They
shall appoint a chamberlain, a burgess of the town, who
is to hold office at their pleasure. He is to make oath,
have a seal [it is stiU in existence], and office and
authority, the same as in London, The chamberlain
may sue and be sued; he shaU receive the revenues,
rents, profits, &c,, and have the custody of aU charters,
bonds and muniments ; he shall pay moneys and give an
annual account in the Guildhall within a month after
the feast of St. Luke. The baUiffs to be elected as
before. They are also to be sheriffs of the county as
weU as baUiffs of the town of Bristol, and so shaU hold
County Courts, as heretofore held by the one sheriff.
They shaU have the same power as other county sheriffs,
and no other may interfere with their jurisdiction.
They are to make their proffers (the king's dues) and
pay the same into the Exchequer, their attorneys may
be admitted to account as their deputies. All writs to be
directed to them, and in case of death during office the
mayor and commonalty may elect another within eight
days.^ The one sheriff system abolished. The mayor
and commonalty shaU have cognizance of aU pleas,
trespasses, covenants, debts, accounts, contracts, plaints,
&c., at the Guildhall, before the mayor and two alder
men of his nomination, which cognizances shaU be
allowed by the king's courts on inspection of the
charter, which shaU be sufficient. The mayor, and two
aldermen nominated by him, to choose forty of the
better and honester men of the town, suburbs or pre
cincts, as often as shaU be necessary, who shall make
reasonable rules for the commonalty, and the said mayor
and two aldermen and the forty men shaU levy taxes
upon every person according to his estate, without im
peachment of the crown. The moneys so coUected to
1 When, in 1421, Nicholas Bagot, the sheriff, had died during
his year of office, the mayor caused the good men of the Common
Council of the town to be summoned, and they selected out of
themselves three persons, whose names were sent up to the king
for choice, John Milton being the man chosen.

remain in the custody of two honest men of the town,
chosen to the office of treasurers by common consent,
who are to be held accountable. The mayor, two alder
men, and the forty men may punish disobedient and
refractory persons. The mayor and aldermen to have
power to levy fines for the crown, and to deUver their
estreats into the king's exchequer. The mayor may
receive probate of wills. He may also, with one alder
man, hold the same court which heretofore was held by
the mayor and sheriff, and may determine pleas, and
execute process, and levy fines, amercements and forfeited
redemptions belonging to the town without giving ac
count thereof to the crown. Further, as on the 24th of
September, in the 1st year of his reign, the king had
appointed Thomas Hoskins water bailiff of the town for
his life, so it is ordered that at his death the maj'or and
commonalty shall be water baiUffs for ever, to which
office they may appoint a deputy on paying annuaUy
four marks into the king's exchequer. The mayor,
recorder, and five aldermen (three being a quorum), shaU
be justices of gaol delivery, having the same power as
other justices of the king, saving always the fines and
forfeitures reserved to the cro-wn. This charter is
witnessed by Arthur, Prince of Wales ; Cardinal Mor
ton, Archbishop of Canterbury ; Henry, Duke of York
(Henry VIII.), 8 years old; E. Fox, Bishop of Durham;
John Vere, Earl of Oxford, Great Chamberlain and
Admiral of England; Thomas Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel;
Eobt. Willoughby de Brooke, Knight, Steward of the
king's household ; Giles Daubenj^," Chamberlain of the
household ; Eeginald Bray and Eichard Guildford,
Knights, ComptroUers, It was signed at KnoUe, in
Kent, on the I7th December, 1499, As a further mark
of favour ' ' The king this year presented his own sword
to the mayor to be borne before him on aU occasions of
state," 1
5, In the Tudor days dinner commenced with
pudding — the custom still lingers in Suffolk and in the
West of England— hence "pudding time," or just the
right time for dinner. Sports and pastimes were cruel in
the extreme, cock-fighting has always been an amuse
ment and an occasion for gambUng, cock-squailing was
its twin sister, and was practised in the West of England
at Whitsuntide as well as at Shrovetide, On Shrove
Tuesday it was dangerous to pass through some parts
of the town on account of the showers of missUes that
were used to fling at the cocks. The birds were tied by
the leg, and any churl who could raise a penny was
entitled to fling a stick at it from a given distance, the
fowl to be his if he kiUed it. Hence the term, "a
cockshy." The crowing of the cock when St. Peter
^ Evans, 126,

A.D, 1503,

INCIDENTS OF THE PERIOD.

225

denied his Master is said to have given rise to this
brutal practice,
" May'st thou be punished for St, Peter's crime
And on Shrove Tuesday perish in thy prime,"
It was a common practice in the West of England for
the vUlage taUor to make the figure of a cock of scarlet
cloth lined with lead, so that it regained an upright
position when knocked down by the infant squailer.
To practice upon a Uving bird was the next step. We
can personaUy testify that the custom was not extinct at
the end of the first quarter of the present century.
The disciples of WycUffe had been so long and
so crueUy persecuted that their number had greatly
diminished. Still many were reduced to ashes in the
latter part of this king's reign, and one of our calendars
informs us that in 1499 " many were apprehended for
heresy in Bristol, whereof some abjured and bore
faggots," i e. they did penance in a church, bearing a
faggot on their shoulders to intimate the kind of death
they had so narrowly escaped. They were also com
peUed to wear an embroidered emblem of a faggot upon
their go-wns, that aU men thereafter might know their
character. This year, on account of the prevalent sick
ness, there was no court kept, nor baUiff, nor constable
of Temple fee for ten weeks.
In 1503 the ParUament granted £30,000 to the king
instead of aids claimed as ancient rights by the crown
on the occasion of the knighting of Prince Arthur, the
king's eldest son, and the marriage of his daughter
Margaret to the king of Scotland, The proportion for
Bristol was £185 8s, lid., being the largest sum paid
by any town, excepting London, which paid £618 3s, 5d.
The county of Gloucester was rated at £1,100, that of
Somerset at £1,129 13s, O^d. The Commissioners for
Bristol were PhUip Eygmeston, Eichard Warham,
Nicholas Brown and John Jay, Brown had been baUiff
in 1488, sheriff 1496, and mayor in 1500. Jay had
only served as sheriff in 1498, The two others were
king's officers.
6. In the year 1503 Foster's chapel and almshouses
were built, and death ran riot amongst the chief officials
of the town in this and subsequent years. Merrick, the
sheriff in 1504, died, and Eobert Thorne, then baiUff,
served for the remainder of his year. In 1505 Thomas
EUiott, sheriff, died, and Thomas Snig, baUiff, succeeded,
John Harris taking his place. In 1507 the mayor,
PhUip Kingston, died, and Eichard Vaughan served for
the remainder of the year,
Eoger Dawes was mayor in 1505, 1515, and 1520,
During his last mayoralty, in 1520, occurs this curious
" memorandum," showing that in times of old, when ale
was the common beverage at breakfast, dinner, and
[Vol, L]

supper, the magistrates, to check adulteration, ordained
as foUows : —
" Whereas it hath been complained that the brewers
of this to-wn have used heretofore to take home again to
their houses from their customers being tapsters within
this town aU such ale as hath been found turned fusty,
dead, and unable to be drunken within three days after
the clearing of the same, which unwholesome ale the
brewers of craft and subtlety have tried to put among
the ale at the next brewing, and so do utter the same
unto the king's people within this town, whereby it is
likely that some persons heretofore hath taken infection
and disease. It is therefore enacted the sixteenth day
of October, in the year above written, that it shaU not
be lawful to any such brewers to take any refused ale,
but that the same so found faulty be forthwith cast into
the street before the door of the same customer or
tapster, by the oversight of the sergeant of the ward
where such default is found,"
" Each brewer in default of the above observance to
be fined iu a penalty of 20s,, and the tapster 3s. 4d, —
half to the sheriffs and the other half to the chamber.
And also that any brewer using ' hops ' in his ale except
in the months of June, July, and August, to forfeit for
every default 40s,, to be disposed of as above." Hops
are commonly supposed to have been introduced first
into England in the reign of Henry VIII,
" Turkeys, carps, hops, piccards and beer
Came into England all in one year,"
It is evident from the above ordinance that the aromatic
bitter was surreptitiously used in Bristol at an earlier
date ; also that the ale of the Tudor era was nothing
more than a mild decoction of malt.
In 1508, during the mayoralty of Eichard Hoby,
who was twice M.P,, -we have the first notice of the
foUowing method of punishment for brewers of bad beer
and for brawling women : —
" That for as muche since ye memory of man there
hath beene a Oookynge Stool yn ye Weare for ye cor
rection of scolds, and ye same beyng corrupt, decayed,
and feeble, to the greate hazard of their lives, yt ys this
dale enactyd and establysshed yt ye aforesayd shall be
alteryd and made of ye newe for ye use of ye dysturbers
of ye peace of ye commonalty,"
No order touching the stool occurs tiU the foUo-wing
year : —
" 25th [month iUegible], 1509, Forasmuche yt hath
this day been proven that Charlote Trym ys a common
scold and dysturber of ye peace of her neybours, yt ys
hereby orderyd that ye sayd Charlote Trym be taken
from hence to ye cooking stool in ye Weare, and there
bee ducked 3 tymes." John CapeU, Maior. Q

226

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1509,

John Hawkes, alias Hawkins, mayor 1471 and M,P,
in 1477, by wiU dated 4th May, 1527, bequeathed a
third part of his estate, valued at £900, to the rectors
and proctors of the church of St, Leonard, adjoining St,
John, Eichard Vaughan, who was mayor in the year 1500
and M,P, in 1509, came to a tragic end in 1527, It is
related that on a hoUday, Mr, Mayor, and the Corporation
were returning from duck-hunting in the pond of Treen-
miUs (Bathurst basin), when Eichard Vaughan was slain
by a Welshman, one WUUam Herbert, who became
subsequently, we believe, Earl of Pembroke. Herbert
escaped through the then great gate of Back street and
so got into the Marsh, The Corporation ordered the
gate to be waUed up, lea-ying only a little postern gate or
door, with a turnstile for a foot passenger ; and for many
years, when they went to take pleasure in the Marsh, they
doubled their guard, A MS, thus relates the incident : —
"1527, This yeare uppon Midsomer-night, there was
made by the Welshmen a great fray in the king's watch,
and at St, James' tide the next foUowing, as the mayor
and his brethren came from wrasling, a ' Welshman '
kUled Eichard Vaughan, mercer, on the bridge, and
they escaped cleare away in a boate with the tide without
any hurte done to them for it," Another MS, says that
the murdered was William Vaughan, one of the sheriffs,
and that the "murther was committed for want of some
respect in compliment," It is most probable that the
affray arose in a quarrel for precedence,
7, " In 1509, on the 22nd of AprU, king Henry died,
having reigned 23 years 8 months and 19 days, and
Henry his son was proclaimed king by the name of
Henry VIII,, on the same day being St, John's day." ^
Henry VII, was a man of business, but sordid, and
selfish to a degree unknown before amongst English
kings. He extorted from his subjects, chiefly by the
aid of informers, a sum of £1,800,000 (equal in value
to about £10,000,000 at the present time). On his
deathbed he ordered his son to make what restitution
he could to those whom he had -wronged, but to this,
his dying father's commandment, Henry VIII, paid no
regard, Henry's legislation had tended to advance
commerce and manufacture and to lessen the infiuence of
the nobUity, By giving power to the landed interest to
break ancient entaUs and to seU portions of their estates,
he added to the strength of the country and created
a class of smaU landowners and middle-class yeomen.
Much improvement in the state of the law, in learning
and the fine arts, took place during his reign. But the
most notable event was the impulse given to navigation
and discovery, by which in a few years the known area
' Mugleworth's MS,

of the world was enlarged to double its size, and in this
mighty development Bristol bore a conspicuous part.
8, At Westminster, on the 10th of May, 1509, Henry
VIII, confirmed the Bristol charters of 1488 and 1499,
The year of the mayoralty began on the 15th of Septem
ber, the regnal year commenced -with the accession of
the king, whUst the ci-yil year, or the Anno Bomini,
began on the 25th of March, Hence the lists of mayors
given by our historians often differ. In fact the mayor
served six months in one civU year and six months in
the foUowing one. To avoid confusion we shaU continue
to quote, when necessary, the year of a mayor's accession
to the civic chair as the year of his office. In 1513 John
EUiott was the chief magistrate, and in 1516 Eichard
Hobby, whilst serving for a second time, died, and was
succeeded by John Jay, during whose mayoralty we have
the following notice : —
" Whereas there was a custom in this to-wir of Bristoll, for the
relief of the prisoners in Newgate, that every country person who
brought anything to be sold in the market should pay to the jailor
for pitching every pot, or sack, one halfpenny ; but, because the
jaUors conveyed it to their ovm profit, Mr, Eichard Hobbington,
sheriff in 1515, with the consent of the mayor, to reform the
disordered custom and abuse, and to ease the country people, did
put down this disordered use ; and the said Mr. Hobbington, at
his own cost, purchased a perpetual stipend to find the prisoners
victuals, wood, and straw,"
Eichard Abyngdon (Hobbington) was twice mayor
(in 1525 and 1536), and he also represented the town
in Parliament in 1529. When mayor in 1525 —
' ' Master Maire, as well -with hys o-wn costs as with the costs
of the Commons of this worshipful to-wne, caused to be taken
do-wne Stalenge Crosse, beynge right olde, corrupt, and feble, and
caused the Crosse there nowe to be made of the newe ; not only
that Crosse, but also he commanded that the heddes of the Crosses
at the Gallowes and Market-place shoulde be made of the newe as
they now bee,"
StaUenge cross stood originaUy in Temple fee, in
the midst of the market there held, and near to Bristol
bridge. Abyngdon re-built it at the junction of Eedcliff,
Thomas and Tucker streets. The cross at the gaUows
was Bewels, and was erected by some pious hand upon
that spot to give unhappy criminals an opportunity of
offering up a valedictory orison ere they took the fatal
leap from the ladder, A stone of this cross is built into
the boundary waU of Highbury chapel, on the site of
which the gaUows once stood. The Market cross was
that erected at the west end of Old Market street. At
Abyngdon's death, on the I7th of July, 1545, "there
was much thunder and lightning, which lasted from
eight o'clock at night until four the next morning,
which was fearful to hear, but when Eichard Abyngdon
deceased the thunder also ceased presently." Super
stitious minds ascribe to occult and supernatural in-

A,D, 1517,

•'YOUNG BRISTOL" GROWS CONTENTIOUS.

227

fluences tempests that occur when public men are
passing away. It would be strange, indeed, if good
men never died during a thunderstorm,
9. In 1517, Sir John Seymour obtained a grant
from the king of the constablewick of the castle of
Bristol for his life, and also for that of his son Edward.
There was great strife in the town, in 1518, between
"Young Bristol," headed by John Dale, late sheriff
(an apothecary), and the older merchants, headed by
the mayor, John Edwards, and the recorder, John
Fitzjames, with regard to certain ancient dues, which
the younger burgesses considered had become obsolete.
Men began to pant for more freedom in trade and to
think it possible that their magistrates had not monopo-
Hsed aU the wisdom of the age. For instance, under
John WUliams, mayor, in 1519 and 1523, it had been
ordained — " That no Baker of the country shaU presume
from henceforth to bring to the Town any bread made
of rye or other corn, but only of wheat, upon pain of
forfeiting the same bread," Dale and his foUowers
argued that "if there had been no consumers the
country bakers would not have brought it to the
market." Ale was the beverage commonly drunk by
the people ; we have seen it was brewed without hops,
or their equivalent. Such an interference with trade,
as is shown by the foUowing ordinance, might have
been more necessary than popular : —
"Item. That from henceforth an Ale-conner be ordained and
appointed by the Mayor and his brethren the Aldermen, which
Ale-conner on Shifting-days in the year, shall boldly go into the
house of the said common Brewer before the shifting of any of
their Ale and there shall note the same, and if he find it good and
wholesome for man's body to so commend it ; and if he find it
contrary and unfit for the King's people, then he to command the
same Brewer not to make any sale or utterance thereof unto the
King's subjects, but that every common brewer do obey the said
Ale-conner in executing his office, and to make no resistance, let,
or impediment against him ujion pain of 6s. 8d,"
"Item. It is commanded and ordained that none of the com
mon Brewers do shift any of their Ale in the winter time betwixt
AUhaUows-tide and Candlemas before the hour of five in the
morning, and in the summer time between Candlemas and AU-
haUows-tide before the hour of four in the morning,"
It is evident that these enactments placed the brewers
entirely at the mercy of the officer, who, if dishonest and
open to bribery, could at his pleasure ruin a sturdy,
honest tradesman. But the chief difference between
Dale and the Corporation was a dispute as to whether
the costs of the members of Parliament should be borne
by the sheriffs or by the borough at large. In the Great
White Book, 48-58, the arrears are on one occasion "by
estymacion £16 16s, Od.", on another they amounted, it
was thought, "to £10 to the knyghtes of the shere."
The matter was carried before the Star Chamber, and

it was settled on October 4th, 1520, that "the sheriffs
shaU bear and pay yearly to the Chamber of Bristol,
towards the charges and expense of the knights of the
shire, and burgesses of the ParUament against such time
as any Parliament shaU be holden, 40s," Some of our
historians supposed this to mean that the yearly sum
paid to each member of Parliament was 20s, We do
not so understand it, but think that it means 20s. was
to be the sheriff's yearly proportion, which, added to
other moneys in the chamberlain's hands, was to form a
reserve fund, to accumulate when (as was often the case)
there was no Parliament, and from which the members,
when in session, were to be paid, John Eowland died,
during his mayoralty, in 1522, and WiUiam Wosley
succeeded to the office, during whose occupation of the
chair we find the foUowing memorandum, from which
we infer that Dale's opposition was personally successful,
the payment commencing with his successors in office : —
"Md, that the first day of ApriU, in the xiij* yere of the
reign of kyng Henry the VIII"', Clement Bays, Eobert Salbrige,
William Shipman, Eobert Avyntry, Eobert EUyott, and Eoger
Cooke, late Shrifs of this Towne of Bristowe, came before the said
Maire, Shrifs, and Comen Counsaill then assembled in the Coun-
saille house of the same towne ; and then and there every of theym
paid -vnto the f ornamed Maire, to thuse of the Chambre of the said
Towne, towardez the chargez and expensis of the knyghtes of the
shere and burgeises of the ParUament, at euery tyme as the Par
liament shall be holden, xxs., according to thact therof made the
iiijUi day of Octobre, in the xj yere of the reign of kyng Henry the
VIII"" forsaid, in the tyme of John WUlyams, Maire then being,
as in the same act more plainly appereth," '¦
The foUowing wages were this year fixed for certain
of the officers of the Corporation : — Keeper of the Quay, .
28s. M, per annum; keeper of the Back, 26s, 8d,; porter
of Newgate, 30s, ; porter of Eedcliff gate, 20s, ; porter
of Temple gate, 26s, 8d,; porter of Frome gate, 13s, 4d.;
porter of Pithay gate, 13s, 4d, WiUiam Grocyn, the
eminent Greek scholar, who died in his 80th year, and
of whom the great Erasmus wrote "pro patrono suo et
prmceptore," was a native of Bristol,
10, In 1521 the Duke of Buckingham visited Bristol
on his way to Thornbury, from whence, through the
envious jealousy of Wolsey and the revenge of a slighted
servant, he was taken under arrest, and being accused
of listening to and crediting a vain prophecy uttered by
a monk of Hinton Charterhouse that he would be king,
he was convicted of high treason and beheaded in London.
His wealth and ostentation cost him his life. Neither
Wolsey nor his master were chary of blood, if by the
shedding thereof they could fiU their coffers, "This
year John Mathews, of the parish of St, Ewen, gave
aU his land, save one tenement in Marsh street, to the
Almshouse at Lawford's gate; and that one tenement
1 Eicart, 49-50.

228

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1522.

he gave to the parish of St. Ewen." ^ This name occurs
several times amongst men of standing after this date.
In 1522, Henry -wrote his famous book, taking part
against Martin Luther, for which the Pope, Adrian VI,,
by BuU, conferred upon him and his successors the title
of ' ' Defender of
the faith," greatly
to the delight of
the king.
The lack of
good roads and of
commercial inter
course, and the
laws against fore
staUing and re-
grating, caused
great differences
in prices in parts
of the kingdom
by no means re
mote from each
other. Thus we
learn that about
this time there
was such a scar
city of corn in
Bristol that wheat
fetched 4s. 8d. per
bushel (equal now
to about 42s.), and
the people made
bread of acorns
and fern roots.
Then the mayor,
John Eowland,
despatched Mr,
Ware and others
into Worcester
shire to buy corn;
by virtue of the
king's letters pa
tent they were
successful, and
in subsequent
years wheat and
malt fetched only
12d, per bushel

The Pithay looMng'vpwards from the Gate.
but, in 1534, it again rose from 8d.
and 9d. per bushel to 2s, and 2s, 4d, In the year 1522,
the king, having declared war with France, raised large
sums by way of loan or benevolence from his subjects,
and by Wolsey's ad-vice every man in the kingdom was
» Evans, 130,

sworn as to the value of his property, which made the
cardinal very unpopular.
11. We have seen the facUity with which the popes
confiscated the property of religious houses when they
saw opportunity; and now, in 1525, Wolsey, who was
aU powerful with
king, emperor
and pope, obtain
ed from his holi
ness a license to
suppress forty
smaU monasteries
and to apply their
revenues to the
establishment of
coUeges which he
had commenced
at Oxford and
Ipswich. Little
did pope or cardi
nal dream of the
perilous example
they were setting
before a scholar
apt to learn in
things that minis
tered to his own
desires. We in
this age may
think that there
was nothing in
congruous in the
two titles "defen
der of the faith"
and "destroyer of
the monasteries";
that, in point of
fact, Henry better
deserved the for
mer title, for his
cleansingthe styes
of convent and
nunnery, than for
his chivalrous at
tempt to break a
spear withLuther.

But it was not thus the Eomish church felt when the
king, soon afterwards, displaced the pope and usurped
the position of head of the church. Freedom of
thought was at a discount in England, But it is a
faUacy to suppose that the Eeformation owed its origin
to the passions and perfidy of Henry VIII. His was,

A,D, 1525,

SEEDS OF THE REFORMATION.

229

it is true, the bold hand that struck the blow which
severed us from the Papacy ; but kings, however arbi
trary, are strong only as their subjects are with them.
The advent of printing and the revival of letters in
England had steadUy been paving the way for a sepa
ration from Eome. The vicious lives of the clergy,
their iU-gotten wealth and arrogant assumption of power,
became trenchant weapons in the hands of men who had
made the Scriptures in the original tongues their study,
and whose great aim it was to restore to the church
the simple earnest life and the pure teaching of
apostolic days.
The avarice of Henry VII, had been unfavourable
to the development of learning, and his notion of liberty
was that it should be doled out for an equivalent in
money ; but there was a choice band of Englishmen,
distinguished for their learning and united by the bonds
of friendship, ripe for the coming fray — SeUing, Grocyn,
Linacre, LUly, More, and Oolet, dean of St, Paul's,
Grocyn became Professor of Greek at Oxford, where
his Uberal lectures caUed forth great opposition. Sir
Thomas More, writing of him to Colet, says : — "He, as
you know, is sole master of my life in your absence."
Erasmus, flying from the plague in Paris to England,
met at Colet's table these accompUshed scholars ; and
at Eltham they liecame acquainted with Prince Henry,
Duke of York, afterwards Henry VIII,, then ten years
of age, and were deUghted with his capacity, acquire
ments and love of learning, Erasmus studied Greek
under Grocyn and Linacre, and, in 1516, printed the
New Testament in Greek, which was sought for as a
priceless treasure by the thoughtful and inteUigent,
These literati were not satisfied with this success ; they
would that all men shoiUd be able to read it in their own
tongue. It might be expedient to conceal the secrets of
kings, but the mysteries of Christ should be pubUshed,
"The husbandman should sing the Scriptures as he
holds the handle of his plough ; the weaver repeat
them as he plies his shuttle ; and the wearied tra-
veUer, halting on his journey, refresh him under some
shady tree by these goodly narratives," The day soon
came when resolute efforts were made to fulfil this
desire, and to give by aid of the printing press to
EngUshmen a version of the Scriptures in their own
language. " About nine miles from Bristol, on the road
which in stage-coach days led from that city to Glou
cester, there is a curve where the wheels of the traveUer
turn northward, crossing ere long a high ground, open
as sheep-walk, and patched with furze and heather.
The slope from the left of that road, as it crosses that
open land, descends into one of the most fertUe sections
of the vale of Gloucester. The landscape is fuU of

EngUsh beauty, undulated and richly wooded, with
spire and turret seen here and there above, or between,
the wooded level, and made bright stiU, as in centuries
past, by many a rising or setting sun. Through the
midst of that valley the broad red waters of the Severn
are seen to flow on towards the estuary of the Wye,
curving from that point into the Bristol Channel, That
noble river, some miles in width, separates the high
lands of Monmouthshire, the country of Caractacus and
his SUures, from the ancient home of other British
tribes on this side its banks. The district is rich in
traces of the past, in the remains of Eoman encamp
ments, Eoman viUas and Norman castles. So abundant
were its religious establishments, that the expression,
' as sure as God is in Gloucestershire,' came to be a
common expression to denote certainty,
' ' On the edge of the vaUey, and about a mile from
the road of which we have spoken, the smaU town of
Sodbury is visible. Near that town, in the time of
Henry VIIL, stood an old haU, which, like many struc
tures of its class in that day, was spacious in its dimen
sions, but irregularly built, decorated with ancient
evergreens, and overshadowed in its approaches by the
more ancient elm, and oak, and yew-tree. The owner
of this mansion was Sir John Walsh, ^ an accomplished
gentleman, who had acquired reputation and royal
favour in the jousts and entertainments of the court.
His lady was one of those true Englishwomen who, to
the accomplishments proper to their sex and the vir
tues of the good superintendent of household matters,
have added the feeling which has given them an interest
in questions concerning the honour of their country and
of religion. Behind the haU, at the end of the yew-
tree walk, was the small church of St, Adeline, where
Sir John and his dependents formed nearly the whole
congregation, "The knight was hospitable. Men of position in
the neighbourhood, especiaUy the more wealthy eccle
siastics, were often found at his table. But among the
inmates of the haU was a priest, who preached in the
little church on Sunday, and acquitted himself as tutor
to the young Walshes during the week. This man,
then about 36 years of age, was a close student, earn
estly religious, very familiar with his Greek Testament,
and much out of mood with the prevaUing ideas and
usages in regard to religion. Judging from what is
' Sir John Walsh was son of John Walsh, of Olveston, by
Elizabeth, "daughter and heir" of Eichard Foster, of Sodbury,
son of Johu Foster, the mayor of Bristol Sir John died 1546,
leaving Maurice, his son and heir, aged 30, Sir John's daughter
Margaret was the wife of Eichard Norton, of St, Peter's, Bristol,
— Ed,

230

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1526,

now known of him, his head and features were such as
bespoke capacity, seriousness and firmness, with enough
of a relish for humour to prompt him at times to subject
a question to the test of ridicule. We speak now of
the fij-st half-dozen years after 1520, during which time
great stir was made both by prince and prelate to put
down heresy and to keep out Lutheranism,
"The ecclesiastics who visited Sir John talked at
table on such matters, and often
in a style neither very intelligent
nor very tolerant. But the tutor
priest never failed to convert such
discour sings into discussions. In
these debates it was his manner
to take his Greek Testament from
his side pocket, and, opening it
on the table, to place his finger
on passage after passage as his
proofs. As will be supposed,
this fencing was not always calm
ly conducted. The blood some
times grew hot on both sides. In
one instance, when the authority
of the law of God in the Scrip
tures was insisted on, a priest
was bold enough to say, ' We
could do better Avithout God's
law than without the pope's law ; '
to which the tutor rejoined, 'I
defy the pope and aU his laws,
and, if God spare my life, ere
many years I wiU cause the boy
who driveth the plough to know
more of Scripture than you do.'
" Of course, the man who so
spoke soon became a ' known '
man. The priests used the con
fessional, and even frequented
the benches of the alehouse, for
the purpose of filling the neigh
bourhood with the rumour of
heresy as harboured at the hall.
The reputed heretic, however,
continued to preach in viUage and town when per
mitted. In Bristol he preached in the open air, upon
the College green, then called St, Austin's green.
But everywhere he was tracked, and the cry of heresy
foUowed, The preacher deplored his inabUity to deal
single-handed with an enemy whose name was legion.
By one expedient only could he hope to become enough
Uke Briareus to meet such odds, and that would be by
translating the New Testament into the spoken lan-

'Ouer this

gate is leqibh ihisln/criplion
^xHemir^ fecund^. elBomW lio
¦bert Hili ' Uerdm^ipij J^eq isDatuop.
AuiW Mon affer \j.p\-im\ FundatoreJ'
 exidefuni^^'^S) nt^o.

guage of his country and by printing it for general
circulation. The EngUsh Testament might do for the
people what the Greek Testament had done for himself.
He decided, accordingly, to leave Sodbury, and to seek
the quiet of another home for the prosecution of his
object. Already he had been summoned before the-
chanceUor of the diocese, and escaped only through the
absence of the witnesses who had been expected to
appear against him," ''¦
In London, at the house of
Humphrey Monmouth, assisted
by the pious and learned John
Frith, Tyndale began the work
of translating the New Testament
from the Greek into EngUsh as
spoken at that day. Forced to
fly to HoUand, he began to print
3,000 copies at Cologne; be
trayed by a confidant, he just
saved the sheets of four score
quarto pages wet from the press,
and carrying them to Worms,
there finished the edition, AVithin
ten years after the Greek Testa
ment had been printed for our
scholars, the English New Testa
ment was in the hands of the
people, and tradesmen, artisans,
students, and even priests and
monks, eagerly sought to obtain
a copy. These were disseminated
at the risk of life, Thomas Gar
rett, a curate of Al - Hallows,
Cheapside, for selling Testaments
at Oxford, had to &y for his life.
Orders were sent to aU the ports
to watch the ships and seize him.
He was taken in the viUage of
Bedminster ; and although Wol
sey prevailed on him by threats
and promises to recant, he suffer
ed a martyr's death a few years
later, Dr, Barnes and five Steel-

The Old Gate in College green, from Millerd's Map.
yard merchants, who had brought copies of the book con
cealed in their bales into the country, had to do penance,
casting faggots into a fire at the east end of St, Paul's ;
and the doctor had to repeat the ceremony in Bristol,
and to wear a faggot worked in his gown, as a token to
all men that he had only just escaped burning, A few
years later he suffered with dignity a death by fire for
his faith, ^ Vaughan's Eevolutions in English History, 109-111.

A.D. 1526.

TRADE MATTERS. ROBERT THORNE.

231

Tyndale's Testament, in the Baptist coUege, Bristol,
is the only one known that is complete from the begin
ning of the text to the end of the volume (a Uthographed
fac simile copy was brought out for private circiUation by
Francis Fry, Esq., F,S.A.). There is a very imperfect
copy of the original in the Ubrary of St, Paul's cathe
dral, A copy of a later amended edition, being that
printed at Geneva in 1557, in which the contents are
for the first time divided into chapters and verses, is in
the City Library.
12. An act had
passed, 19 Henry
VIL, c, 8, by which
mayors and officers of
seaport towns were
forbidden to take
scavage, or shewage
(a toll levied bj
to-wns on merchant
strangers for goods
shewed or offered for
sale within their lib
erties) under a penal
ty of £20, On the
18th March, 1524,
Master PoUard, one
of the justices of
Common Pleas, sat
¦with the mayor in the
GuUdhaU. "by rea
son of a nisi prius,"
sued by one Antony
Bridgegode against
Eobert Elyott (sheriff
in 1522), upon an ac
tion of debt of £20,
"for distraining and
taking of custom
named scavage, or
shewage, of one Mor
ice, butcher," Elyott
seems to have proved
that he had le-vied

iigP?efyrlti)i<lkoff

®iS.p«tet%

Fac simile of a page of Tyndale's New Testament in the Baptist College, Bristol.

for quayage, and not for scavage. We further note
that an attempt was made, in 1528, by the president
and councU of Wales and the Marches, of which the
Princess Mary (there being no Prince of Wales) was
the head, to bring Bristol imder their jurisdiction as of
olden time, when it had been a part of Gloucestershire,
The princess directed her discreet letters unto the mayor,
summoning him in person or by attorney to appear
before her council at Ludlow on the 16th of May, and

to bring with him Sir John Popley, clerk, at the suit
of Galyard de Brassaley, because the said mayor
attached not the same Sir John as by her former letters
she had directed.
By command of the mayor, WiUiam Chester, sheriff
(pointmaker, a man of whose persuasive eloquence we
shaU yet read), and John CoUys went to Ludlow, and
pleaded successfuUy that Bristol was a county of itself
and exempt from their jurisdiction,^ Thomas Brooke,
mayor 1526, gave the
Salmon in Tucker
street, worth £6 a
. year, to the alms
houses in Lewin's
Mead, Until about
1528 trade with the
Canary Islands had
been carried on by
means of ships from
San Lucar, in Spain.
The exports were
chiefly cloth and
soap, but now a di
rect trade to the is
lands was established
by Eobert Thorne,
jun,, "a knight of
CiviU" (SevUle), who
was then resident in
Spain, This and the
ready help he gave
to Cabot must have
rendered him obnox
ious to the Spanish
Dons, who could
iU- brook the inter
ference of foreigners.
It is probable that
this feeling cost Sir
Eobert his life, but
_ whether he feU in a
duel or by the knife
of an assassin is un-
SeviUe, in Spain," is all

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m €\)vi<Si / w^idj tlxaowebtaabouri^Mtrnvf
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known, "He was kiUed at
the MS, states, and this is corroborated by the remark
able expression on his monument in London — "buried
before his time."
We accept unhesitatingly the statement that Thorne
was a knight of Spain, although he did not, in fact
dared not, assume the title in England, if, indeed, " the
knight" ever was in England. No foreign titles were
* Eicart, 51.

232

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1527,

or are aUowed in this country to be borne by English
men without the previously obtained consent of the
sovereign. One of the Ariindels was sent to the Tower
by EUzabeth because he had dared to accept the title of
count from the emperor (as a recognition of his services
in the war against the Turks) without the queen's per
mission, and after his release he was not aUowed to
assume it,
Thorne, we judge, never had the chance of asking
permission from the king, and his relatives dared not
inscribe the title on his monument.
He lived in friendly intimacy with the most scientific seamen
and geographers of his day. When a boy in Bristol he might have
seen the triumphant return of Sebastian Cabot from his grand
discovery — in the fitting out of whose expedition his father had
possibly borne a share, as well as in that under the patent of 1501
with Hugh Elliott ; certain it is that Thorne was on the most
friendly terms with his great townsman, who held then the post
of pilot-major in Spain, Americus Vesputius, Columbus, jun,,
and Peter Martyr, were also his familiar friends,
Cabot was at this time projecting a new expedition to the
Indies by a south-westerly course. Baffled for a time by the in
trigues of Portugal, and the scarcity of funds, he finally sailed, in
1526, on his famous expedition to the Eio de la Plata. ^
To fit out this expedition, and to advance the interests of
science, Eobert Thorne and his partner advanced 1,400 ducats, or
more than one-seventh part of the whole cost.'-" "A small caravel
added to the squadron by an individual " belonged also to Thorne,
as he tells us that ' ' two English friends of mine (George Barlow
being one), who were learned in cosmography," were sent by him
to bring him a relation of the countries, and to acquire expertness
in the art of navigation. =
But it was not merely by a liberal devotion of his wealth to
the cause of scientific discovery that Thorne maintained his posi
tion amongst the great cosmographers of the age. His letters to
Henry VIII,, and to Dr. Ley, the English ambassador to Spain,
bespeak him as their peer iu ability, clearness of foresight, calmness
of judgment and scientific acquirements. *
To the doctor he sends accounts of the conflicting claims to
discoveries in Spain and Portugal ; discriminates between those
which are real and those which are assumed ; shows the extent
and position of the former ; draws with his own hand charts to be
used by the mariners, and points out the kind and value of the
commerce. Nor is this all ; he pencils out his own ideas upon the
chart, gives a north-west and westerly coast-line to America from
Hudson's Bay, as the probable shape of that end of the continent,
and presents both latitude and longitude, with directions how to
find them. He suggests routes which shall verify his theory —
that the new-found land (America), then thought to be insular, is
really continental, and contends that had it not been for the
cowardice of the mariners, the expedition in which his father was
a partner many years before, might have gone by the N,W, to
California and Peru, This theory has been verified by McClure,
McClintock and CoUinson in this nineteenth century.
Neither can Eobert Thorne, good Catholic as he undoubtedly is,
allow the right which the Pope claimed to dispose of at his will all
the nations upon the earth. In the dispute between Spain and
Portugal his Holiness had drawn a longitudinal line, and so
> Peter Martyr, Dec, VII,, cap. vi, ' Hakluyt, 215,
' Peter Martyr, Herrera, Dec, IV., lib, iii,, cap, i,
* Hakluyt, 212-220,

divided the heathen world between the two nations. "Christ
said," says Thorne, " 'Quis me constltuit judkem inter vos,' but the
Pope did not refuse, but making himself as Lord and Judge over
all, not only granted that all lands that should be discovered from
the Orient to the Occident should be the King's of Portugal, but
also that upon great censures no other Prince should discover but
he,"i Many months before this, Thorne had written direct to Henry
VIII, upon the same subject, and boldly and earnestly did he
press the policy of an exploring expedition from England upon
the king,'' " Spain has discovered the West Indies, Portugal the
East ; it is your duty to explore the north, because the situation
of your realm is nearest and aptest of all others ; because the almost
continued daylight of the northern seas renders navigation less
dangerous there than it is in the regions where ordinary dark
nights prevail ; because your grace's subjects have begun the
work ; and besides by it your grace shall -win perpetual glory,
and your subjects infinite profit without having to travel half as
far as the Spaniards ; for if our men do go by the back of the new
found land discovered by Cabot, they shall reach under the
equinoctial the richest lands and islands of the world. Further,
people would think that he, the king, lacked the noble courage
and spirit of other princes if he were content to live quiet in his
own dominions, &c , &c. " The king was stirred and so determined
on the attempt, and in May, 1527, the Mary of Oiuldford and the
Samson set sail from the Thames, The Sam,ion, with all on board,
was lost in a terrific storm on the coast of Labrador, The Mary,
commanded by Eut, escaped and coasted the land to the south
ward, losing her pilot, the celebrated Verrazani, who, having gone
on shore, was killed by the natives, and roasted and eaten in the
sight of those who remained on board the ship, " The expedition
failed in its object. Thome did not suffer any loss of favour from
the king, for in the year following he obtained from Henry letters
of license to purchase of the brethren and sisters their hospital of
St. Bartholomew.
This religious foundation -nas originally a lazar house for lepers.
Chatterton correctly describes it as being subject to annoyance
from the overflo-wing of the river Frome, on whose bank it stood.
On the left side of its entrance porch still stands the mutilated
statue of the Virgin and Child ; but the statue of the mailed
warrior, which he mentions as guarding the opposite side, has dis
appeared.* Leland, who visited Bristol about 1533, tells us "the
Bartilmews " was in ruins.
Having license from the king, George Croft, the master, and
Sir Thomas West and Lord de la Warr, the patrons gladly sold the
whole estate to Eobert Thorne, jun., Nicholas Thorne and John
Goodryche, who, as executors of the elder Thorne, now began to
carry out the testator's wishes. ' The property, situated in the
town of Bristol, and in the parishes of Clifton, Stapleton, Sod
bury, Horfield and Wickwar, consisted, besides the hospital, of
five messuages, 80 acres of meadow, 200 acres of pasture and 10
of woodland, besides 40s. rent in King's Marsh,
The desire of Robert Thome, Sen,, had been that a free gram
mar school might be erected in Bristol, which should continue
therein for ever, and his executors now sought to convey to the
mayor, burgesses and commonalty of the borough the above estate,
out of which they were to pay forty pounds clear annuaUy to the
support of the school.
Meanwhile, ere matters were settled, Eobert Thorne, jun,,
died, leaving a princely fortune, equal to a quarter of a million at
the present day. His body was brought to England and buried
^ Hakluyt, 217, = Ibid, 212,
" Purchas, iii., 809 ; Eamusi, iii., 417. * Barrett, 428,
= N, Thome's Deed Poll.

A,D, 1527.

ROBERT THORNE.

233

in the church of St, Christopher, where Stow tells us "there was
a monument of pure touch," containing a Latin epitaph rendered
as foUows ; ' —
" Here reposes Robert Thorn an honourable merchant
Who by business gained for himself an honest fortune
The city of Bristol had given him life as a boy
London had buried him iu bis tomb before bis time
He did honoiu to his country by his pursuit of learning, and exalted it by his
virtues. Of his own accord he erected a public school at his own expense.
Whosoever thou art O Reader that approacheth this place ask peace (I iiray) for
his ashes, and humbly move the Deity to ans-wer thy prayer."
Fuller, in his Worthies, quaintly says, "I see it matters not
what the name be, so the nature be good. Thorns came in by man's
curse, and our Saviour says, ' Do men gather grapes of thorns ?'
But this our Thome (God send us many copies of them) was a
blessing to our nation. Wine and oil may be freely said to flow
from him; being bred a merchant tailor he gave more than £4,445
to pious uses, a sum more than sufficient to endow a coUege, I
have observed some at the church door cast in sixpence with such
ostentation that it rebounded from the bottom and rang against
both sides of the basin (so that the same silver was the alms and
the giver's trumpet), whilst others have dropped down five shillings
-without noise. Our Thorne was of the second sort, doing his
charity effectually but with all possible privacy. Nor was this
good Christian abroad worse (in the apostolic phrase) than an
infidel at home in not providing for his family who gave his poor
kindred, besides debts forgiven unto them, £5,142, Grudge not,
reader, to peruse his epitaph, which, though not so good as he
deserved, is better than most in that age, " ''
Prom his will, preserved in the great Will-book in the Council-
house, Bristol, we gather that among the charitable donations were
the following — £300, and more that my Lord Delawar oweth,
toward the making up of St, Bartholomew's school, Bristol ; £300
to buy corn and wood when it is cheap, the same to be sold at the
cost price to the poor when provision and firewood are dear ; £500
to lend free of interest to young men beginning business as clothiers
in Bristol ; £50 to the relief of poor prisoners in London, aud a
like sum for the same purpose in Bristol ; £50 towards the mar
riages of poor maidens in Bristol; £100 to be given in bread to the
four prisons in London, and a like sum to be for the prisons in
Bristol, ' ' the bread to be prudently given any quarter of a year to
any house until the money be expended;" £100 to be expended in
making in the streets of Bristol a place of merchandise, at the
discretion of his executors, on condition that it be made within
three years of his decease ; £200 for the reparation of the high
ways in and around Bristol ; £500 to be distributed in good deeds
of mercy, to the relief of the commons of Bristol, above his be
quests aforesaid ; also £200 ' ' towards the redemption of the fee
farm unAprisay of the said town of Bristol, so that it be redeemed
within these three years ;" and £500 to be distributed among the
25 wards of London, £20 in each ward to poor householders. To
Thomas Moffatt, the master of the Free Grammar School, £25,
and to his son, Eobert Moffatt, £10, He forgives the various
debts of his relatives and friends, the sums specified varying from
£500 down to £4 15s, ; "all these foresaid debts I forgive and be
queath to any of them, and would not that it be asked," To each
of the five almshouses in Bristol he bequeaths £100,
Three thousand pounds had been bequeathed for the support
and maintenance of a son borne to him by a Spanish lady, of
which £1,000 was to come "to my son Vincent Thorne, being in
Spain, which I will that Carolo Cantanio, that hath the keeping
of him at this present in Spain, shall receive out of the goods of
mine that the said Carolo Cantanio and his brother hath to the
use and benefit of my said child till he be of lawful age ; and if
' Stow, 193, 2 FuUer's Worthies, 36,
[Vol, I,]

the said Vincent, my son, die before he come to lawful age, the
said £3,000 to retum to my heirs. Item I also bequeath to
Anayaria (sic), mother of the said Vincent, £50, with condition
that she renounce aU that pretence of inheritance of the bequest
of her said son," He mentions two chests of Geant velvet, in
which are 33 pieces black, appertaining to George Cantanio, more
two belles of pearles worked with a spectacles in the which is 200
pearles that are also the said George's, ^
The above are the principal bequests ; besides which he makes
his brother Nicholas his residuary legatee, willing further, how
ever, that there shall be "in the powers of my executors one
thousand pounds, to be distributed and ordered as they shall see
best for ray soul." The will was subscribed and sealed on the 23rd
of May, 1552, and was proved in London on the 10th of October,
in the same year, °
Eobert Thorne, jun. , never sought municipal or parliamentary
honours ; it was a happy thing for Bristol that the elder Thome's
wishes were carried into effect by his large-hearted and educated
son. The age was growing barren of writers in the Latin tongue ;
the study of Greek, introduced into England and Oxford in the
elder Thome's day by Grocyn, a Bristol man, was even now
powerfully assailed iu both universities by the Trojans. ^ Thome's
object was to resuscitate classical literature by cultivating a taste
for and educating the children of his fellow citizens up to an ap
preciative enjoyment of its beauties. Hence his foundation of
what we now term a first grade classical school iu which should be
given ' ' for learning and knowledge of the Latin tongue, and other
good learning, to teach grammar and understanding of the tongues,
and other good literatures to all children and others that would
repair to the said school, &c, , freely without anything to be taken
other than fourpence only for the first admission of every
scholar,"* With a mind well cultivated and enlarged by intimate converse
with the highest intellects of the age, Thome's classical tastes gave
an impress to the Free Grammar School, which amidst varied
changes it has ever borne, but never more honourably or bene
ficially to Bristol than at the present time.
Henry VJII. will ever need and but seldom obtain a champion ;
it is only just to say that he has been falsely accused of robbing
the hospital of St. Bartholomew to give it to the Thornes. The
king never benefited by the transfer. The sale of the property
was gladly made by the owners eight j'cars before the monasteries
were dissolved ; it was paid for by the elder Thome's bequest,
made sixteen years before that date, Eobert Thorne, jun., also
died three years before that period, leaving bequests to the school
master and to his son, so that the school was at work from 1530 it
not before. Let us add that the Thornes were firm adherents of
the Romish faith ; Eobert, j un, , kept a priest, and left legacies to
the four orders of Friars established in Bristol, so that the accusa
tion that they sought to pave a golden way into heaven with
property which they had stolen from their own church is a slander
on their memory.
It has been assumed by Manchee and others that the £1,000
left at the discretion of the younger Thome's executors, to be used
by them for the good of his soul, was appropriated to the Grammar
School. But whatever Thorne, jun., did for the school during his
life time (and it was probably considerable), there is no proof of
the institution benefiting by his death beyond the sum of £300
before mentioned,
"This yere M, Maire and Cominaltie of this Towne of Bristowe
haue received of Emanuel Lucar, Executor of the testament and
1 Great Book of Wills, = Ibid,
" HaUam's Middle Ages, III,, 595.
* Manchee's Charities, 31,
Q 2

234

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1530,

From Millerd's Map.
last wiU of Eobert Thorne, late of London, merchauntailor,
decessid, occccZ«, sterling to thentent to socour yong men which ar
full mynded to make cloth within the same Towne, according to
the said testament and last wUl, Thordynance wherof appereth
in the Boke of Ordenaunces in the tyme of the said Maire the xxij
day of January, Anno r, r, H, VIII, xxv*"; whiche ccoccZi, were
divided accordingly, and seuerall obligaoions thereof made and
delyuerede vnto GUbert Cogan, Chambrelayn of the same Towne,
for the due execution of the Testament and will abouementioned,""
A window of the parish church of Walthamstow had (perhaps
StiU has) this inscription :— "Christen people, praye for the soule
of Eobert Thorne, citizen of London, wyth whose goodys thys
syde of thys churche was newe edyfied and fynished in the yeare
of our Lord 1535," Inasmuch as this took place three years after
Thome's death, the probabiUty is that the work was done for the
good of his soul by his executors, Withypoul, Lucar and Hubber-
thorne, of whom one at least, Withypoul, was a relation, '-^
13, When Thomas White, of Coventry, was mayor,
in 1530, he held a conference at Newport with Sir
WiUiam Kingston and other burgesses of Tewkesbury,
who had some claim evidently by their charter for
exemption from certain dues on goods at Bristol, The
matter was compromised by a reduction of one-half on
the customs of quayage and murage for the inhabitants
1 Mayor's Calendar, 53,
¦ Condensed from J, F. NichoUs' Free Grammar School
Bristol and the Thornes its Founders,

of Tewkesbury, and a copy of their charter was enroUed in the Great
Wliite Book.
This being a year of great scarcity in Bristol, the mayor imported
corn from other counties. The sheriffs of Gloucester city stopped
some and sold it, by order of WiUiam Hassard, their mayor. For
this act they were sued in the Star chamber, and were condemned to
restore the same quantity of corn and to pay £6 13«. 4d,, being the
amount of costs. ^ Stage plays were at this period performed at the
cost of the magistrates ; they had grown out of the miracle plays
of the clergy. In this year, the drapery work in timber and the
painted cloths, were made and ordained within the compter of the
common audience of the said mayor.
Item, pd for bordde nailys, cawfoote nailys, and hache nailys for the
worke at the tolsill  vijd
Item, pd for ix bewdeley borddes for the crestes, after iij the bordde ijs, ii^d.
Item, pd for taoke nailys, and racke hookys, to fastyn the steyned
clothes at the tolsill  mid.
Item, pd to .Wm, Kelke for v yardes for to be steyned for the tolsill ^ os, od.
Item, pd for ij newe payre of gymmewys for both ye newe dorrys at
ye tolsill  xxd.
Item, pd for a lache and a cache w' a vise  iiijd.
Item, pd for another lache w* a rynge apon it  vd, '
This is the first mention of theatrical representations in Bristol,
other than the Passion and Mystery plays of the Friars. There
being no theatre, the Guildhall was allowed for their use for many
years, "Between Michaelmas, 1577, and the same season 1578,
the Earl of Leicester's players here performed before the mayor and
aldermen, the play being 'Myngs,' Shortly after we find Lord
Berkeley's, Lord Charles Howard's and Lord Sheffield's, and the Earl
of Sussex's, or the Lord Chamberlain's respective companies here
acting before the same civic dignitaries, the plays being
severally ' What mischief worketh in the mind of
Man,' 'The Queen of Ethiopia,' 'The Court of Com
fort,' and the 'Eed Knight,'-* The last of these com
panies is that to which Shakespeare became attached
about the year 1587," and during the interval between
this date and 1603, when he is believed to have retired
from the stage, it seems more than probable that he
may have performed with his company at the GuUdhaU
in Bristol, It is certain that in pursuance of their
license to act in any 'town haU,' &c,, throughout the
kingdom, the Lord Chamberlain's servants did occasion
aUy visit Bristol, and the following extract from the

of

* Mayor's Calendar, 52,
2 Kelke, who was a mercer, was sheriff in 1529,
" Mayor's Calendar, 53,
* Early Treatises on the Stage, Shakesp, Soc, xiii., a,
= In 1596 the order in which the servants of the Lord Cham
berlain are named is as follows :— Pope, Burbage, Hemings,
Philips, Shalccspeare ; in May, 1603, Fletcher, Shakespeare, Bur
bage, Phillips, Hemings, Coudell, Sly, Armyn and Cowley, Pope
had previously retired, and, as he died in 1603, Shakespeare (to
try and account for his position) may have bought his share,
Fletcher died in 1608, leaving Shakespeare in all likelihood at the
head of the company. Revels at Court, Shakesp, Soc, xxxii.

A,D. 1532.

STAGE PLAYS.

235

city records wUl show that they were able to draw a
crowded audience : —
1576. August, — Item pd, for two ryngs of jren to be set
vpon the howces of thonside of the Yeldhall
dore to rere the dore from the grownd and for
mending the cramp of jren wch shuthyth the
barr wch cramp was stretched wth the press of
people at the play of my Lord Chambleyu's
surts in the Yeldhall before Mr, Mayer and
thaldermeu  vjd*
"It has also been recently ascertained by HaUiweU
that Shakespeare's company of actors visited Bristol in
the summer of 1597.^ In 1593 the once famous actor
and friend of Shakespeare, Edward AUeyne, played
with the company of Lord Strange at Bristol, ^ no doubt
at the GuUdhaU. George Peele, the dramatist, seems
also to have been here about this time, and in his
' Merrie and Conceited Jests ' he boasts of a discredi
table trick which he played the credulous mayor and
citizens. It appears that this dissipated poet found
himself without means to redeem his horse from the inn
stable by the payment of his host's biU, It happened
that some players had just arrived in town, and were
staying at the same inn with Peele, The latter there
upon goes to the mayor, and, describing himself to be
a ' schoUer and a gentleman,' asserts that he has a
play named 'The Kiiight of the Eodes,' which he was
¦wiUing to perform at. Bristol if the mayor and corpora
tion would attend. The mayor, though unable to grace
the performance by his presence, grants the use of the
GuUdhaU, and gives the poet ' an angel ' towards
expenses, Peele thereupon hires the players and pro
claims the play; but when the audience was gathered
and expecting the performance, he having pocketed the
money (40s,) received at the doors, puts on one of the
player's sUk robes, and, ' after the trumpet had sounded
thrice,' comes before the company, recites the prologue,
and promises to send the actors, but instead he roguishly
deserts both the imsuspecting players and the specta
tors, and regaining his horse departs towards London,
The prologue was this : —
' A trifling joy, a jest of no account, pardie
The knighte, perhaps you thinke to be I,
Thinke on so stiU ; for why you know that thought is free.
Sit stiU awhile. He send the actors to yee,' " *
The earUest mention of the GuUdhaU is in 1313,
when it became the scene of the furious outbreak which
we have fully described at 155. "In the old GuUdhaU
1 Western Daily Press, October 28th, 1867 ; also Early Trea
tises on the Stage, x,, where the same extract is less accurately
given. = The Athenseum, November 12th, 1870
" AUeyne's Memoirs, Shakesp, Soc, 26.
* Taylor's Book about Bristol, 287-89,

was the chapel of St, George, founded by Eichard
Spicer, a famous merchant and burgess of the town,
about the time of King Edward III, or Eichard II,,
and belonging to the chapel was a most dignified fra
ternity of merchants and mariners of Bristol,^ The
' handsome Gothic east window ' of St. George's chapel
was, upon the demoUtion of the edifice, re-erected on the
beautiful ground of the Grove, Brislington, ^ A new
frontage was erected to the GuUdhaU preparatory to
Oueen EUzabeth's -visit in 1576; this was taken down
in 1813, " The ground now occupied by Queen square was in
former days caUed The Marsh — a name stUl preserved
in the locality by the nomenclature of Marsh street and
Canons' Marsh. In character with the coarse tastes of
our ancestors, the place served not only as a public
promenade and for mUitary exercises and athletic sports,
but for bear-baiting and other popular diversions of
the Uke barbarous kind. Erasmus, who visited England
in the days of Henry VIIL, speaks of ' many herds '
of bears regularly trained for the arena : the rich nobles
had their bearwards, and the royal establishment its
master of the king's bears. In Uke manner that com
panies of dramatic actors traveUed from town to town
under the badge of the respective nobles whose players
they were caUed, so there is e-vidence to indicate that
the unfortunate bears of these rich nobles were also
itinerant and forced to fight their battles in various
places. Thus, in iUustration of the custom, we find
under the year 1532, in reference to the Marsh at
Bristol, the foUowing payments recorded : —

Duke of Suffolk's bearward 
Lord Westmoreland 
Duke of Eichmond 
Paid Wrestlers for -wrestling in the Marsh St,
James' day 

d, 44 0

6 8

"In the next year (1533) there is a simUar account
for baiting bears in the Marsh, Holyrood day, 5s,
" Also, wrestling expenses : —

2 gallons claret...
2 " white...
2Pears ...
Wrestlers Horse to carry the wine and for him that carried
it.

4 0

0 4

" An entry of rather earlier date shows how our fore
fathers realised the comfortable maxim since enforced
by Dr, Watts, that ' Eeligion never was designed
To make our pleasures less ' ;
1 Will, Wyrces,, 253.
2 Bristol Times, January Ist, 1855,

236

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1533.

the beautiful association of hard drinking, bear-baiting,
minstrelsy and devotional services is exhibited in the
extract we now supply : — s. d,
20 0

1519, Sept, — Drinking at Trinity chapel...
" on St, Nicholas day
Wrestling at St, James' tide
The bearwards 
The minstrels 
For a sermon at St. Austin's

On these occasions elevated seats were erected for the
use of the aldermen and other civic dignitaries,^"
" By his deed bearing date the 14th January, in the
thirty-second year of King Henry the Eighth, Thomas
White did infeoff Eobert EUiot, mayor of BristoU,
and other his feoffees and their heirs of and in divers
lands, tenements, and hereditaments lying in Hinton
and elsewhere, within the county of Gloucester, and in
the town of BristoU, upon condition that they shall
appoint the Chamberlain of Bristol for the time, yearly
and for ever, to receive the rents and profits, and there-
withaU to satisfy and pay yearly to the poor of Mr,
Foster's almshouse, caUed the Three Kings, £2 more ;
to the poor of Mr. Spicer's almshouse, Lewin's mead,
£2 Is, ; to the poor of St, Thomas' almshouse, £2 7s, ;
to the poor in Mr, Strange's almshouse, caUed St, John's,
£2 7s, ; towards the maintenance of AUhaUow's pipe,
£1 ; towards the maintenance of St, John's pipe, £1 ;
for the freedom of goods bought of burgesses of Bristol,
and carried up the Severn by water from the key of
Bristol, £11. In 1541 he gave the manor of Dirham
to free the gates of the city of Bristol from toU, In
1555 he founded St. John's coUege, Oxford, and
aUowed two feUowships in it to Bristol, each £30 a
year, for two qualified boys from the Grammar school.
He devised by his wiU, dated the 10th September,
1560, that the said chamberlain should pay the said
annuities. To help poor people on the last day of each
month, in every year, for ever, viz,, to each almshouse
four shUlings apiece, and thirty shiUings and eight-
pence in bread to the poor prisoners in Newgate, yearly,
for ever. He was very charitable to the poor in general,
and beside gave [writing Ulegible] to be distributed
amongst them within a year after his decease; to his
wife to pay £20 per annum during her life, among poor
people, to be distributed the day of his obitt." *
14, Cardinal Wolsey, in 1530, died broken-hearted
accused of high treason, and Henry rapidly broke with
the pope. In 1533 aU appeals to Eome were prohibited
by statute, the king's marriage with Catherine was
' State Papers, Henry VIIL, II., 101,
2 Taylor's Book about Bristol, 289, 320-22.
" Tovey's Local Jottings,

declared void, and the archbishop had pronounced the
divorce. In 1534 Parliament threw off the pope's
supremacy, abolished Peter's pence, and declared the
king to be the head of the church. CromweU was
made ChanceUor of the Exchequer, and heartily sup
ported the Eeformation.
" 'King Henry and his traine came unto his manor
of Thornebury the 18th dale of August, 1534, where
he continued ten dales. And forasmuch as his grace
determined to come to Bristow, had it not been for the
plague then reigning here ; therefore Mr. Thomas White,
Mr, Nicholas Thorne and the Chamberlin of Bristow,
by consent of Mr. Cooke, maior, and the common
councell of the towne, the 20th of August resorted to
Thornebury, and there in the name of the said maior
and cominaltie presented to the king tenne fat oxen and
forty sheepe towards his hospitaUitie ; and unto Queene
Anne one cup with a cover of silver guUded, waying
28 ounces, with a hundred markes of gowld in the
same, as a gift from this his maiestie's towne and his
[her] chamber of Bristow,' " ¦"•
Eoger Cook was elevated to the civic chair on two
subsequent occasions, viz,, 1541 and 1551. He was a
tanner, and at the expiration of his last mayoralty was
sent to represent the city in Parliament,
In 1533 Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canter
bury, came to Bristol, and tarried here 1 9 days, reform
ing many things that were amiss ; he preached at the
abbey of St, Augustine and many other places. That
preacher whose terse sayings, homely wit, and fearless
boldness in denouncing sin have shed a halo round his
martyr name — good Hugh Latimer — was bearing testi
mony for his Master in Bristol also this year. He
seems to have thrown the whole to-wn into confusion, as
wUl be seen from the foUowing extracts : —
Eichard Bro-wne to  , Eight Worshipful Master, — It may
like you to be advertised that the second Sunday this Lent, at
Bristol, there preached Mr, Latimer, and it is reported he hath
done much hurt among the people, &o. It is reported he is to
preach again on the Wednesday in Easter week, unless by your
commandment to the dean he be denied. The fellow dwelleth
in the diocese of Bath and Wells [West Kington, Wiltshire, was
his benefice]. The good Catholic people of the said town do abhor
all such his preaching.
For an abstract of a letter written to the chanceUor
by John HUsey (S,T,P, of Cambs.) against Latimer, we
refer to Seyer, II,, 217 ; and those who are curious wiU
find some scurrilous polemics at 1 9 of our Ecclesiastical
History. "Thomas Jeffreys, Maior, — Md, that this yere, the
xv"" day of May, a Scott named George Wysard sett
furth his lecture in S, Nicholas church of Bristowe the
1 Seyer, II,, 214,

A,D, 1536, THE NEW HEAD OF THE CHURCH AND THE MONASTERIES.

237

moost blasphemous heresy that euer was herd, openly
declaryng that Christ nother hath nor coulde merite for
hym ne yett for vs, Wich heresy brought many of the
comons of this to-wne into a greate errour, and dyuers
of theym were persuaded by that heraticaU lecture to
heresy. Wherupon the said stiffnecked Scott was ac
cused by M. John Kerne, deane of this diocese of
Worcestre, and soone after he was send to the moost.
reuerend Father in God the Archbisshop of Canterbury,
before whom and others, that is to singnyfie, the bishops
of Bathe, Norwhiche and Chechester, with others as
doctors, &c. And he bifore theym was examyned, con-
uicted and condemned in and -vpon the detestable heresy
aboue mentioned. Wherupon he was inioyned to here
a fagott in St. Nicholas church forsaid and [about] the
parisshe of the same, the xiij*'' day of July Anno pre
dicto ; and in Christeschurch and parisshe therof, the
xx"" day of July abouesaid. Which iniunction was
duely executed in forme forsaid," ^
That Eicart's continuator should err in his views as
to Wishart's preaching and character is not singular ;
but that so sound a Protestant and Churchman as Seyer
should form so incorrect a judgment of the gifted young
Scotch lecturer and write disparagingly of him is to us
matter of considerable surprise, Wishart's doctrine
was simply that of justification by faith in Christ ; his
affirmation "that the death of Christ would be of no
efficacy for himself or for his hearers " meant that
without their acceptance of Him, and a change of heart
and life, there was no salvation : it is the simple Gospel
as we understand it this day.
This truth Wishart, who preached it constantly and
Uved it most consistently, sealed by his death in the fire
as a martyr at St, Andrew's. Wishart is "the young
faithful man " of the scurrilous letters quoted by Seyer,
which plainly show that some of the Protestants were
neither good nor gentlemen.
Tyndale was, in 1536, a prisoner in a damp ceU
at VUvorde, awaiting his fate. His touching letter
offers a striking paraUel to the request of St, Paul, the
prisoner, to Timothy : — " The cloak that I left at Troas
-with Carpus bring with thee and the books, but espe
ciaUy the parchments," So here the shivering English
martyr, awaiting death, writes, "for Jesus' sake, for a
warmer cap, and something to patch my leggings, and
a wooUen shirt, but above aU send my Hebrew Bible,
Grammar and Dictionary," Both men were students
up to the day of their martyrdom.
15, Henry, the new head of the church, evinced no
disposition to grant Uberty of conscience to his people.
He held to the powers, prerogatives and immense reve-
* Mayor's Calendar, 55,

nues of which he had deprived the pope, and claimed
and exercised an equal jurisdiction with his holiness in
spiritual as weU as in temporal matters. He deprived
the married clergy of their orders and benefices, and
by proclamation threatened death without mercy to any
who denied the doctrine of transubstantiation, or dis
puted any of the doctrines of the church. On a weU-
known proverbial principle the king sent commissioners
to hunt out the sins of his clergy. We dare not poUute
these pages with a recital of the crimes of which the
occupants of religious houses, both male and female,
were accused. "The cities of the plain" seem to have
been taken by them for their prototype. In 1536, on
the reception of the report of the commissioners, aU the
small houses of the monks, canons and nuns that had
not more than twelve resident members, or a revenue of
more than £200 a year, were dissolved, and their in
mates were removed into larger houses, whUst their
property, both in lands and goods, was by Parliament
granted to the king. The number of these houses was
376, their annual revenue was computed to be £32,000,
and their jewels, plate, corn, cattle and furniture was
estimated at £100,000, Both of these sums were
greatly below their real value,
Henry was an apt scholar in the Papal school of
confiscations. He knew weU that every inmate that he
had thus forced upon the greater monasteries was an
enemy who would fan the embers of disaffection which
his claim to the supremacy and his open defiance of the
pope had kindled ; but he had clear-headed, sagacious
men at his side, whose experience of the dissolute lives
of the smaUer reUgious houses was conclusive as to the
utter failure of the monastic system. They argued that
the king had but to let in the light, and the revealed
impurity would be ample justification for a repetition
on a larger scale of his most successful experiment.
He therefore ordered a fresh visitation, in 1537, of aU
the religious houses in the kingdom. Dire consterna
tion now prevailed! The king's word was mighty in
casting out devils ! Vast but vain attempts at moral
whitewashings were made. But avarice had sharpened
the royal eyesight, and greedy courtiers, who hoped for
a share of the spoU, were everywhere ready with their
fatal testimony. Many of the monks, in order to obtain
better terms, surrendered then- houses and possessions
at once to the king, without waiting the arrival of the
commissioners ,
For three years the visitors were employed in settling
the surrenders of the property and the pensions to be
paid, in making surveys of the estates, seizing the relics,
jewels and plate, seUing the furniture, dismantling and
too often destroying the grand old churches and glorious

238

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1537.

Gothic abbeys, and disposing of the beUs, lead and other
materials. The year 1538 witnessed the last offering of
the mass in Bristol on Michaelmas day at St, Michael's
church, ^
16, The Parliament of 1540 passed a biU, with but
little opposition, which granted to the king aU the lands,
goods and houses of the abbeys, priories, nunneries,
chantries, hospitals and religious houses that had been
or that should thereafter be suppressed, 645 convents,
90 coUeges, 2,374 chantries and free chapels, and 110
hospitals were thus annexed to the Crown, The yearly
rental of the lands was estimated at £160,000, and
this, Bishop Burnet says, was not one-tenth of their
real value, whilst no computation can be made of the
prodigious wealth in jewels, plate, ornaments and vest
ments of the churches and shrines of the saints. It
was a bold stroke, not without peril, and was effected
by the determined courage of the king and the superior
ability of his viceregent — Thomas CromweU, Earl of
Essex. From documents of the Augmentation office, now in
Eecord office, we gather the foUowing : —
Henry Brayne had requested to purchase (8th July, 37 Henry
VIII, ), among others, farms iu Bristol, late of the priory of Bath,
others there late of the monastery of Keynsham, of the priory of
Hinton, of the priory of Witham, of the monastery of Olyve, of
the priory of Mynchynbarrow, and of the priory of Cannington ;
also the site, lands and possessions of the late priory of St. Mary
Magdalen, farms in Bristol lately belonging to Tewkesbury abbey,
to Laycock abbey, to Malmesbury abbey and Bradenstock priory ;
also farms in Bristol, Iron Acton and Codrington, late of the said
priory of St, Mary Magdalen,
The mayor and commonalty (30th June, 36 Henry VIII,) re
quest to purchase the manor of Temple Fee, parcel of the late
preceptory of Temple Combe, late of the priory of St. John of
Jerusalem. Eent in Bristol, late of the priory of Witham. Farms
in the "city" and town of Bristol, and in hundred of Barton,
lately purchased of Sir John Dudley, kt.
Further, the mayor and commonalty requested to purchase
lands of the house of St, Mark, of Billes-wike, alias Gaunts, except
it appears the manor of Paulet-Gaunts, in lieu of which "lands to
the yerley valewe of xxxvU. (were) appoynted to the towne of
Bristowe," Also farm of St, Michael's mount, Bristol, late of the
priory of St, Mary Magdalen, and the scites of the houses of the
Friars Minories and Friars Carmelites,
Maurice Denys (13th ,July, 35 Henry VIII,) requested to pur
chase farm of the scite of the priory of the Austin Friars (at
Temple Gate), ^
John Smythe [founder of the Long Ashton family, mayor of
Bristol in 1547 and 1554, who was buried in St, Werburgh's
church], on the 27th April (35 Henry VIII, ), requested to purchase
rents in Small street in the parishes of "St, Warborowe " and St,
Leonard, in Com street in the parish of All Saints, and in Brode-
strete in the parish of " St. Tuyns," all in the city of Bristol, late of
the priory of Bath, Eents in Corn street, with waste lands in the
parish of St, Warburgh, late of the monastery of Nethe, By the
description of " Merchant of Bristol," Smythe further requested
* Mayor's Calendar, 54,
'' Inventory of Particulars for Grants, 9th Eeport, 175-6,

to purchase the farm of the manor of Aysheton-Meriett in Long-
aysheton, the rectory of Longaysheton, late of the priory of Bath,
and some other lands in Essex, *
Grants from the cro-wn foUowed these requests in
nearly every case.
Eichard Abyngdon and John Shipward were mem
bers of the long Parliament which sat from 1529 to
1536, and which dissolved the smaUer monasteries.
Nicholas Thorne and Eoger Cook were the members
who assisted at the complete sweep of the Augean styes
that had so long been a disgrace to the very name of
religion. These Monasteries and Eeligious Orders were
indeed begun with exceUent motives, by godly men
who were faithful to the light which they possessed,
but our Ecclesiastical History wiU show how rapidly
they degenerated and how low they sank.
17. The one good thing that had clung to them was
their care of the indigent and helpless poor, who were
now driven to extremity by the aboUtion of the monas
teries and the inclosure of waste lands. These were
serious deprivations to men who in precarious times
depended on the hospitable charity of religious houses,
and loud .were the murmurs of discontent. Insurrec
tions were rife throughout the country, nor was Bristol
exempt. Apprehending rebeUion, the town and castle
waUs were repaired and fortified -with ordnance, the
gates were repaired, and watch and ward kept night
and day, and other provision was made for resistance.
In 1534 the site and demesnes of St. Mark's (the
Gaunts) were surrendered and purchased by the mayor
and commonalty of Bristol for £1,000 from the king;
£600 was paid down, of which £523 10s. 8d. was con
tributed in the shape of plate by the churchwardens and
vestrymen of the parishes. In 1537-8 the four orders
of friaries and aU the nunneries in Bristol had been de
Uvered into the king's hand. In 1540 the abbot and
convent of St, Augustine had also surrendered their
monastery. Abbot GuUUam, on surrendering the monas
tery, had a pension of £80 per annum, and the monks
who continued their vows £7 or £8 each; the junior ex-
monk became a prebendary, Eobert Circester, prior of
St, James', was aUowed £13 6s. 8d. per annum. The
Magdalen house was bought by Henry Brayne and
John Marsh, The site of the Black Friars' monastery
was granted to WiUiam Chester, The monastic plate
seized before 1540 was forwarded to London in that
year ; other portions were sent to the Mint in Bristol
in 1545 ; that of AU Saints church, weighing 423^oz.
altogether, was used in part for the same purpose in
1549, and the remaining part in 1552.^
^ Inventory of Particulars for Grants, 10th Eeport, 273,
« Evans, 138, 139, 140 and 142,

A.D. 1542.

THE KING MAKES BRISTOL A CITY.

239

18, Hitherto Bristol had been a part of the diocese
of Worcester, but in 1542 it was made a see, and Paul
Bush became its first bishop, Henry thus fulfilled the
promise which he made to Nicholas Thorne and Eoger
Cook when they visited him at Thornbury and made
him so handsome a present of oxen, sheep and money.
The plague was at that time raging in Bristol, and the
king did not dare venture his young blooming queen and
court within its waUs ; but never lacking in courage —
one might justly say foolhardiness — he came incog, with
Thorne and Cook and -viewed the city, promising Thorne,
at whose
house he
was en
tertained, thatthough "this is
now but
the to-wne
of Bris
towe, I
wUlmake
it a city."
The stu
dent who
shrewdly
reads be
tween the
Unes -wiU
now see
why these
two bur-
ges s e s
had been
sent to
the next
ensuing
Parlia-

King Band Inn, on the site of the Priory of St. Mary Magdalen.

ment, and helped the king wiUingly to destroy the
monasteries. The "scurrilous letters" show that they
were staunch Catholics ; they sacrificed not their reli
gion, but the abuses that had marred its usefulness and
beauty, in order to make their much loved town a
cathedral city.
19. Matters were not very satisfactory at this time
between the civU and the religious authorities. Just
previously to the visit of Thorne and Cook to Thorn
bury, in 1534, there had been a sharp controversy be
tween the mayor and commonalty of Bristol and the
lord prior of St. John of Jerusalem relating to the
pri-vUege of sanctuary in Temple street. This the prior

claimed, and also to have a law-day, the right to hold a
court to return a brevium and execution in the same
street; also that his tenants, not being burgesses, had
the right to vend their wares in open shops in his fee,^
This, it is easy to see, would seriously infringe the
chartered monopoly claimed for Bristol men, conse
quently it was opposed by the mayor. The lord chief
justice and chief baron decided in favour of the bur
gesses on two points, viz,, that the right of sanctuary
should be void, and that the mayor's officers should
serve processes in that fee without disturbance from the
the lord
prior. The other
matters in dis
pute were
referredfor future
consider-a t i o n .
Henrydid con-
s i d e r
them in
his own
fashion, and there
is very
little doubt but
that the
timelyvisit to
Thorn-
b u r y
helpedhim to
form his
most sweeping conclusion, as we learn that "this year
(1543) Temple fee was broken,"^ and in 1544 the king
sold to the corporation of Bristol the patronage of
Temple church and part of the lands,
Leland visited Bristol about this time, and he thus
describes the castle : — " There be two courts. In the
outer court, in the north-west part of it, is a great
dungeon-tower, made, as it is said, of stone brought
out of Caen, in Normandy, by the red Earl of Glouces
ter, A pretty church and much lodging in the area;
on the south side of it a great gate, a stone bridge, and
three bulwarks in lara ripa ad ostium Frome. There be
* Evans, 135, ' Old MS,

240

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1546,

many towers yet standing in both the courts, but .aU
tendeth to ruin. The castle and most part of the town
by north standeth upon a ground metely eminent, be
twixt the rivers Avon and Frome."
20, The foUowing has a true, independent ring
about it : —
It was ordained that if any of the common council of the said
city do at any time hereafter sue to the king's majesty, or to any
of his most honourable council, for any office that is of the city's
grant or gift, that then he shall be dismissed as well from the
house as from the liberties of the city.
In 1537 Prince Edward was born, and there was a
joyous procession in Bristol in honour of the event,
WiUiam Chester was mayor in 1537 and 1552 ; he
was also M,P, for the city in 1555. He founded the
almshouse on St, James' back, caUed the Gift house,
and gave four tenements the profit thereof to the poor.
He died on the 1st January, 1572, and was buried in
St. James' church, in the ancient sepulchre of his sires.
During the season of Lent in 1540 a ship of Brit
tany of the burden of 40 tons came to Bristol with fish
from Newfoundland, &c,, and having discharged her
cargo, shipped lime, coal, lead and cloth. Being leaky,
the Ume ignited the cargo, and she was burned to the
keel, 1543. " Henricus Whyte, Maior. — This yere xiiij.
days before Myghelmas the said Harry Whyte, mayor,
dyed. And John Eepe was chosen to supplye his rome,
"And this yere in the tyme of the said John Eepe
beyng mayor, the xvij"' day of Septembre, the Erie of
Surrey, the Duke of Norfolk's son and heire apparant,
came to Bristowe, and was receved by the mayor and
thaldremen of the saide citie vpon the Brige of Bris
towe, and so they gave hym a bankett,
" WUlelmus Jay, Maior. — In this yere the new Tolsel
was buylte, and in that same yere was the stipe strete
goieng vp to Saincte MichaeUs was brought lower and
in good fassion. Also in this yere was Eedclif strete,
Saincte Thomas strete, new pight [pitched]. In this
yere there was an order taken aboute the admaraltie,
that aU straungers that take ankerage of vs beyond the
see, they shoulde paie like ankerage here."^
1542-3. "This yeare on ye 2nd of July, ye day of
ye vissitation of our Ladye, the Letany was begun to
be sung in English, in a general procession from Christ
church to St, Mary Eedcliffe," ^
In July, 1544, the king saUed for France with an
army of 80,000 men, Bristol furnished eight ships for
the expedition (one MS, says twelve). They were under
the command of Matthew, Earl of Lennox. Henry
visited his Bristol fleet, and never a king knew better
* Mayor's Calendar, 56, 57, ' Old MS,

how to win his people by honeyed words than did he,
"What are the names of yon ships?" Being told
the barque Thorne, of 600 tons ; the Pratt, 600 tons ;
Gourney, 400 tons ; Young, 400 tons ; Winter, 300 tons ;
SJiipman, 250 -tons; Elephant, 120 tons; Bragon, 120
tons, he said, " I wish I had many such Thornes,
Pratts, Gourneys, and the Uke in my land,"
Nicholas Thorne was mayor that year ; John Gourney
was sheriff ; Pratt (or Spratt in one MS,) had been
sheriff in 1540; WiUiam Young was sheriff in 1539,
and mayor in 1555 ; Winter afterwards received a
title ; Shipman had been mayor in 1533. The plague
at this time was sore in Bristol throughout the whole
year, so that Nicholas Thorne, then mayor, held his
Court of Admiralty in Clevedon, " The stews were put
down, and Aston was burnt," The previous year the
gifted but unfortunate Earl of Surrey had been met on
the bridge on his visiting Bristol by the mayor, John
Eepe, on the 1 7th of September, and was by the city hand
somely entertained, A long period of domestic peace
had wrought a perceptible change in the traffic of the
kingdom. Men were not needed now to keep watch
and ward as of old on aU strangers, so in return for
the contributions liberally made by the vestries and by
private individuals (such as Thomas White), which had
enabled the corporation to purchase much of the land
of the suppressed monasteries, the five gates — Newgate,
Eedcliff, Temple, Frome and Pithay — were made free
to aU strangers coming or going, and the Quay and
Back were also made free for aU merchandise except
salt fish. A ship on the Quay was set on fire by the
bursting of a Chamber gun (? a breechloader), which
kiUed three men,
21, In 1546 the king caused the mint for coining
gold and silver to be set up in the castle. Sir W, Shar-
ington being master there. One of the MSS, mentions
a mint that was set up in the city by the king, in 1540,
for the conversion of the confiscated plate into money.
The above would therefore appear to be simply a re
moval to a new site. There was also a printing press
set up in the same place, ' ' which is used daily to the
honour of God." There are no known specimens of its
work extant as far as we can discover, the earliest
printed book bearing the impress of Bristol that has
come within our knowledge being The Solemn League
and Covenant, 1642, now in the City Library. This year
Toby Mathew, son of a mercer of Bristol bridge, was
born. He was a great benefactor to the Library, and
died Archbishop of York.
" In an old leger book in the custody of Mr, Hackluit,
written about 1526 by Mr. N, Thorne the elder, a prin
cipal merchant of Bristol, it was noted that before that

A,D, 1547,

BRISTOL MONEY OF THIS REIGN.

241

year one T, Tison, an Englishman, had ' found the way
to the West Indies and resided there, and to him the
said Mr. N. Thorne, then a merchant in Bristol, sent
armour and other merchandise,' whereby it appears
there was an estabUshed trade there very early, and
from the city of Bristol."
" Nicholas Thorne, by his will dated 4th August, 1546, did give
and bequeath towards the reparation of the Bridge, Back and
Key, and the banks on the Marsh, £20. Towards making a yard
for corn for provision of the Commons, £30. Towards the making
of the Dock at the Key, for the better repairing of their ships
there, i£25. To the poor householders in Bristol, one hundred
marks. Towards repairing of the Free School and making a
Library there, £30 ; and [illegible] investments towards retaining
learned Council to ensure the lands of the Bartholomews, To
the Mayor and Commonalty towards the maintenance of the Free
School, £20, To the Chamber of Bristol, £4, for the use of cloth-
making and helping of young men, whereof £2 of the money of
one Mr, Thomas Howell towards the reparation of Highways and
maintaining the Conduits of water, the Pithay Well and St,
Peter's,"! He left his geographical and nautical instruments to
the Grammar school. He died August 19th, 1546, aged
50 years, and was buried in St. Werburgh's church,
now demolished.
The portraits of the brothers Eobert and Nicholas
Thome may stiU be seen in the office of the Charity
Trustees, and copies are also hung in the smaU com
mittee-room of the CouncU-house, Eobert would seem
from his likeness to have much resembled his bluff
contemporary, Henry VIII,, whUe Nicholas has a
hungry ascetic look. With that turn for pedantic pun
ning on names which characterised the period, Nicholas
has had placed over his head, in a corner of the canvas,
the words Kx spinis uvas colligimus — " We gather grapes
of thorns." The quaint conceit is repeated, but not
so epigrammaticaUy, in the portrait of Eobert, who is
made to say, in the same learned tongue, "I am caUed
a thorn ; the glory be given to God who giveth the
good things which the Thorne dispenses to the poor."
Further particulars of these good citizens wUl be given
in our article on the Grammar school.
On the 28th of January, 1547, "Bluff King Hal
died, having reigned 37 years 10 months and 1 day,
when Prince Edward was proclaimed at the High Cross
by the name of Edward ye Sixth."
" The earUest Bristol money of this king [Henry
Vni,] belongs to his thirty-fourth year, 1542-3, Sir
WiUiam Sharington, Knt., appears to have been chief
officer of this mint from 1543 to 1548, under Henry
VIII, and Edward VI,, and his initials are found upon
nearly all the Bristol coins of Henry VIII.
"A few gold coins of Henry VIII,, made in 1543,
' Bristol Archives.
[Vol. I.]

V

are only to be recognised as struck at Bristol by their
mint-mark, which is a monogram of Sharing
ton's initials, W, S,, thus:
" The sovereigns of this coinage have on the obverse, within
an ornamented inner circle, a full-length figure of the king sitting
on his throne, in royal robes, crowned, with the sceptre in his
right hand and the orb in his left ; at his feet a rose ; legend,
HENBIC', 8 . Dl , oka', ANGLIE FRANCIE ET HIB'e BEX, Or HKNKIC'
8 DEi' gra' agl' fban' z hie' EEX, Mint-mark, in front of
HENBIC, the above-mentioned monogram of W, S, Reverse, a
shield bearing the arms of France and England quarterly, cro-wned,
and supported by a crowned lion and the red dragon ; hb in
monogram beneath the shield, for Henricus Rex ; a beaded inuer
circle around all ; legend, ms (or ihesvs) avtem transens per
MEDlVM illob' (or ILLOBV') IBAT, The same mint-mark in front
ot IHESVS, There are cinquefoils between the words of the in
scriptions on the British Museum coin. Full weight, 200 grains.
Current, when issued, for 20s.
" There are some gold crowns and half-crowns, made
at Bristol by Sir WiUiam Sharington, in the thirty-sixth
year of Henry VIIL, 1544, The fuU weight of the
crown (current for 5s,) was 48 grains, and of the half-
crown (current for 2s, 6d.) was 24 grains. The gold
was 22 carats fine, or II parts fine to I of alloy. The
above-mentioned sovereigns were also of this standard,
" The crown bears, obverse, a large double rose crowned, be
tween the letters H E (for Henricus Rex), also crowned ; legend,
HENBio', 8 , BOSA , SINE , SPINE frosa sine spina). Mint-mark, a
quatrefoil. Reverse, the shield of arms crowned, also between
the same letters, H E, crowned ; legend, d', g', anglie , fba', z ,
hib', BEX, Mint-mark, W, S, in monogram. There is a beaded
inner circle on each side of this coin. There are quatrefoils be
tween many of the words in the legends. Engraved in Snelling's
Gold Coinage, plate ii,. No, 20, and in Ruding's, plate vi.. No. 5.
Another specimen in the British Museum has, obverse, mint-mark,
a cinquefoil, and legend, henriovs 8, etc.
"The half-crown has, obverse, shield of arms crowned, between
the letters h e not crowned ; legend, henric' 8 , r>', o', ang , PR ,
z , hib', rex. No mint-mark on this side. Reverse, a large rose
crowned, also between the letters h r not crowned ; legend,
BVTILAKS bosa SINE SPINA (or spi'). Mint-mark, the monogram
of W, S, Beaded inner circles on both sides. Engraved iu Snel
ling's Gold Coinage, pi. ii.. No. 19, and in Ruding's, plate vi..
No. 3, "Several Bristol pieces are extant of Henry VIII,'s
third sUver coinage, made in his thirty-fourth year,
which weighed at the rate of 10 grains to the penny.
The sUver is very base, one-sixth of it being aUoy,

Bristol Shilling of Henry VIII.

242

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1548,

"The British Museum possesses a very rare shilling of his
thirty-fourth year, weighing 120-4 grains, and made of this base
silver. It was formerly in Mr, J. D. Cuff's collection, and bears,
obverse, bust of the king, full-face, crowned, with a mantle over
his shoulders ; legend, henric' 8 d' q' agl' era' z hib eex ; small
quatrefoils between the words. Reverse, a large double rose
crowned ; the letters H b, also cro-wned, at the sides of the rose ;
legend, civitas bristollie. Three crosses after civitas, and two
after bristollie. Mint-mark, before civitas, the monogram of
W, S, A beaded inner circle on each side of the coin,
"A base groat of the third or fourth coinage, in the British
Museum, weighing 33 '9 grains, has, obverse, crowned bust, nearly
full-face, with mantle over the shoulders ; legend, henbic', 8 , d ,
G , AGL , ERA , z , hib', BEX, No mint-mark. Reverse, shield of
arms surmounted by a cross fleuree ; legend, civitas bristolie.
Mint-mark, W, S, in monogram. Beaded inner circle each side,
SmaU trefoils between the words of the legends.
" A penny of the third coinage, in the British Museum, is
engraved in HawUns, fig. 406, It bears, obverse, full-face bust
crowned, in mantle ; legend, he' 8 d', g', eosa sine spina ; no
mint-mark, but a cross after bosa. Reverse, similar in type to the
groat ; legend, civitas bristolie ; two pellets before and a fleur-
de-lys after civitas ; a beaded inner circle on each side of the
coin, "The fourth silver coinage of this king, made in his
thirty-sixth year (1545), was stiU more base than the
preceding, consisting of half silver to half aUoy, The
weight was the same, viz,, 10 grains to the penny,
"The groats of the fourth coinage have, obverse, mantled bust
crowned, nearly full face, within a beaded inner circle ; legend,
iiENEic' 8 • d' g' agl' pka' z hib' EEX ; mint-mark, a rose or a
small cross. Reverse, shield within inner circle, surmounted by
cross fleuree ; legend, civitas beistolie ; a rose after ci-wtas on
one, "The half -groats of the fourth issue bear, obverse, mantled
bust crowned, nearly full face, within inner circle ; legend,
henbic' 8 d' g' ang' fb' z hib' be (or eex) ; no mint-mark on
obverse. Reverse, type as the groats ; legend, civitas bristolie ;
mint-mark, the monogram of W. S. in front of civitas. Some
have trefoils in the forks of the cross ; one has a fleur-de-lys after
civitas, another has a pierced cross after that word ; one piece
has a fleur-de-lys after civitas, aud another before bristolie.
See engravings : Ilaioldns, fig, 404 ; Ruding, pi, viii.. No. 15.
"The fifth coinage, in Henry's thirty-seventh year
(1546), was debased to two-thirds aUoy, Four ounces
only of sUver were mixed with eight ounces of aUoy,
The weight was the same as before,
"The Bristol groats have, obverse, mantled bust cro-wned,
nearly full face, but slightly turned to the right ; inner circle ;
legend, henric' 8 , d', g', ang', fba' z hib' eex. ; no mint-mark
ou obverse, except a rose on one. Reverse, type as on the pre
ceding coinages ; legend, civitas bristolie ; mint-mark, in front
of civitas, the monogram of W, S., or on one coin E. Some have
small trefoils or annulets in the forks of the cross, and a rose and
a trefoU after civitas ; another has a cinquefoil and a pierced
cross after crviTAS, See Ruding, pi, viii,. No, 11, for one of these
groats, "1
22, Edward VI, began his reign at the age of ten
years; he was crowned on the 25th of February, and
on the 1 2th of July he granted a charter of confirmation
* Henfrey, 353-5,

to the citizens of Bristol. The reformation begun by
his father, was countenanced by the protector, Somerset,
and the Council, and the young king was trained as a
Protestant, Injunctions were issued forbidding prayers
for the dead or to saints, or public prayers in a foreign
language, or the use of rosaries, ashes and processions ;
dirges for the dead and the sacrifice of the mass were
abolished. AU the chantries which had not been seized
by the late king were given to the sovereign by Act of
Parliament, As there were so few men able and quali
fied to preach the new doctrines, books of homilies were
issued which were ordered to be read in the churches.
In 1547, "an order of CouncU was passed for re
moving aU images out of the churches ; it was also
ordered that the service should be read in EngUsh, and
the holy communion celebrated in the native tongue," ^
At Bedminster church there were 320 communicants,
drawn thither, it is said, by the popularity of the sports
on the Sunday afternoon.
So great a change as that effected by the aboUtion
of the monasteries, and the sale and enclosure in smaU
fields of the lands held by the monks, could scarcely
have been expected to be made without tumult and riot.
Numbers of people had long preferred to live upon the
alms, bread, beans and broth of the monks, to earning
an honest livelihood by labour. They now found that
they must work or starve ; beg or steal they dared not,
Henry made a short shrift with thieves ; he hanged, it
is said, 72,000 of them for an example. But besides
the loafers there were many industrious poor men who
had won a precarious living off the waste and common
lands, which, being now enclosed, they were reduced to
the deepest penury. There were also the conscientious
Eoman Catholics who were naturaUy aggrieved at the
deprivation of their religious usages, and a host of
malcontent ecclesiastics, whose occupation being gone,
turned their time and talents to fostering sedition.
One Bond, who had murdered his master on Durd
ham down, was hanged on the spot (top of GaUow's
Acre lane, now Pembroke road) where he had com
mitted the crime.
In May, 1548-9, there was a great rising in this
city, and WUliam Pykes, mayor in that year, was on the
alert. He had the castle and the city waUs repaired
and mounted with cannon, most of the gates were newly
made, a new Tolzey, or place of justice, was buUt at the
High Cross, guards of soldiers kept watch and ward
both by day and night, and Sir WiUiam Herbert, a man
of repute in arms, was constable of the castle. But the
disaffected knew better than to attack stone waUs, their
grievance lay chiefly afield, they set to with a -wiU,
^ Old MS,

A,D, 1550,

INCIDENTS OF THE PERIOD,

243

leveUed the new hedges, and filled in the ditches of the
enclosures lately made, and which had put altogether a
different face upon the country and its industry. The
mayor marshaUed his men, and, fuUy armed, went with
them into the Marsh to meet the malcontents, WiUiam
Chester, an ex-mayor, by his kindliness of manner and
wisdom of speech, induced the rioters to submit, and,
relying upon his word, they ceased the strife and were
pardoned. Well was it for them that they submitted, for
presently into the city came the Lord Grey de Wilton
with a band of men, and Captain Spinosa also with 300
soldiers ; these were on the march to Scotland, but find
ing no work for them in Bristol they turned westward
to Honiton, where they defeated the disaffected, who
throughout the west country had risen upon the same
pretexts, but who had proved by their conduct that
plunder, rather than piety, was their ruUng motive,
WiUiam Pykes bequeathed by wiU, in 1550, £50
for repairing the highways, £20 for St, Thomas' pipe,
and land of the annual value of £6 13s, 4d, for the poor
in Burton's almshouse.
Bishop Bush, of Bristol, this year surrendered the
manor of Abbot's Leigh to the king, who granted the
reversion of it after the death of the bishop to the
Nortons, from whom it passed to the Trenchards,
Sebastian Cabot, of Bristol, was this year made grand
pUot of England and governor for life of the Eussian
Company. Mr, Hippesley was lord high steward of
Bristol, During the year 1549, when WUUam Jay,
apothecary, was mayor, the foUowing precaution was
taken in baUasting ships ; it was ordered ' ' that no
person or persons whatsoever do henceforth cast any
sand out of any lighter or boat into any ship or vessel
within the port of Hungroad, except there be a sail put
between the ship and the boat, so that none faU into
the water, upon pain to forfeit, for every default didy
proved, four ducats, half to go to the chamber and half
to the presenter,"
On May 24th, 1551, the king granted the charter
for the September fair, the profits of which, excepting
20s. to the Corporation, were to go to the poor. Change
was the order of the day ; the base money coined by the
late king was pubUcly cried down on July 12th — the
12d, to 9d,, the groat (4d.) to 2d., and the next month
the 12d, was further reduced in value to 6d,, the 2d, to
Id., and the Id. to ^d., so that every man who owned
these coins lost within two months half their value.
Altars were destroyed in churches and tables substi
tuted in their stead. That terrible disease born of
uncleanliness, the sweating sickness, once more pre
vaUed in the city ; it lasted from Easter to Michaelmas
and swept hundreds of victims off every week. The

poor could get no bread ; wheat was 4s, 8d. per bushel,
until the new mayor caused the bakers to furnish bread
to the needy at a lower price. The price, in Bristol, of
sweet wine was 12d., and claret was 8d. per gaUon,
The BrideweU was buUt this year, and by letters patent
the king incorporated the Society of Merchant Ven
turers with four consuls and twenty-four assistants,
Sebastian Cabot being the first governor. The next
year this eminent Bristol citizen promoted a voyage to
the North Sea, and opened up a trade with Eussia
through Archangel, its only seaport. In 1552, John
Walshe, was lord high steward of Bristol. The Corpo
ration buUt a Council-house upon the site of the old
chapel of the fraternity of St, John, which stood on the
south side of the church of St, Ewen, the spot upon
which the present Council-house stands. It had a

The Tuhey.
covered piazza, supported by five stone piUars, fronting
Corn street, in which stood three brass pillars (termed
nails), somewhat similar to those in the old Tolzey
which now stand in front of the Exchange, There
were now three of these covered structures forming the
Tolzey, the most ancient at All Saints, the second at
Christ church, and the third this in front of the- Council-
house, This year corn was so plentiful that wheat was
sold for Id. per bushel, or one-eighth of the price of the
previous year. A multiple of nine wiU give about the
present value for corn. Taverns were restricted in num
ber by Act of Parliament, only six being aUowed in
Bristol, but one MS, states six more were aUowed this
year, making their number twelve. As those towns that
did not possess a cucking or ducking stool were presented
this year, and Bristol was not, it is certain that the city
was stUl in possession of this remarkable instrument
which our sage forefathers employed for imposing
silence on unruly female tongues. It was set up in the
mUlpond in Castle ditch, at the junction of EUbroad
street and Lower Castle street. In form it was a chair

244

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1553.

set upon a long beam, which moved by a swivel on a
post set in the pond. The termagant wife being seated,
bound in the chair, was swung over the water and
dipped at discretion, according to the heinousness of
her offence. The brank in use at this period was an
iron bridle, which was constructed so as to be fitted to
a head of any size ; it had a flat piece of iron that was
placed in the mouth, pressing upon the tongue of the
wearer ; the machine was locked behind the victim's
head. Its weight was no inconvenience, neither did it
prevent the discharge of any domestic duty or maternal
care, save that a kiss to her child would be as difficult
for the woman to achieve as would a tirade to the
husband. These were municipal punishments for scold
ing and brawling women and fraudulent ale-wives.
This year William Gardiner, a Bristol man, servant to
Mr, Paget, merchant, in the madness of religious zeal,
being in Portugal, was so disgusted with the supersti
tious adoration of the sacrament during a marriage at
which he was present that he overthrew the chalice and
trod upon the host, for which, after being wounded in
the melee, he was shortly after burned to death, A
spark from his auto da fe set on fire one of the King of
Portugal's ships that was lying near,
" On July the 6th, 1553, the young king died, having
reigned 6 years 5 months and 4 days, and ye Lady Jane
Grey was proclaimed queen in certain towns ; but ye
Lady Mary, King Henry's eldest daughter, was pro
claimed likewise queen on the 22nd of ye same month,
and was crowned on the 30th day of November fol
lowing," ^
23, As early as the seventh year of Edward IV, the
Merchant Adventurers claimed to be an ancient guild,
at which date they petitioned for the confirmation of
their prerogatives. Their supplication was granted;
and it was commanded that the mayor and town council
should yearly assemble fifteen days after Michaelmas,
in order to choose a person who had been mayor or
sheriff to be master of the FeUowship of Merchants,
together with two wardens and other officers. The
chapel of Spicer's haU, on the Welsh back, was en
gaged for their place of religious worship, and the
"draught chamber" of the same mansion was to serve
for their business meetings. All merchants were to
attend (if in town) upon summons, or to pay one pound
of wax to the master and feUowship. All rules for
selling to strangers "any of the four merchandises"
were to be kept, on pain of 20s. for each default, " one-
half to the feUowship, the other to the chamber," Nor
upon pain aforesaid were they to sell to any stranger
under the ruled price, 1 Old MS,

" The Society of Merchant Venturers, as it now exists,
is undoubtedly the traditional representative of the
ancient Guild of Merchants, whose ordinances, as just
stated, were renewed by Edward IV,, but whose liber
ties ' to buy and seU in the town freely and quietly
from aU toll and customs, &c,,' had been antecedently
confirmed by John, Earl of Moreton, afterwards King
John, The present company was incorporated by
Edward VI,, whose charter recites that men who had
never been apprenticed to merchants having with strange
ships encroached upon the trade of the port, to prevent
the continuance of such irregularities the freemen of
the city using the art or mystery of Merchant Venturers
should be incorporated by the style of the ' Masters,
Wardens and Commonalty of Merchant Venturers of
the City of Bristol,' It was likewise granted that they
should choose a master and two wardens of the mj'stery,
' who would be sworn before the mayor and aldermen,
and have power to make ordinances for the profitable
government of the mystery and the men of the same,
and such only as did touch and concern the said mystery,
but not in prejudice of the royal prerogative, or of the
mayor of Bristol, or any of the royal charters, or of the
Society of Merchants trading to the coast of Holland,
Zealand, Brabant, Flanders, and the parts adjacent;
and that none should practise the art of merchandise in
the city of Bristol except such as were admitted into
the said society or otherwise apprenticed, or had used
the mystery for seven years,' ^ This charter was con
firmed, by Act of Parliament, in the eighth year of
Elizabeth ; and in consideration of the Merchant Ven
turers having aided the queen with twenty-five ships
for the defence of the realm, it was further enacted
that any who should exercise the resource of merchan
dise beyond the seas unless admitted into the society, or
else serving or apprenticed to the mystery for seven
years, the penalty of forfeiture of aU the goods and
merchandises so trafficked in, one moiety to the crown,
the other to be divided between the society and the
civic corporation," This act was repealed five years
after (13 Eliz., c 22) by a fresh enactment which recites
' that no manner of benefit or commodity appeareth to
grow by the said act,' &c.
"The next notice of the Merchant Adventurers ap
pears in the CouncU Book of the Civic Corporation,
31st December, 1605, On that day it was agreed that
there should be a company of Merchant Adventurers of
the city of Bristol, to be governed amongst themselves
by such orders as should be set down by the mayor,
aldermen and common council, and according to the
charters of the city, and by the masters, wardens, and
* Lunell's Port Improvement Question, 53, ^ Ibid, 24,

a,d, 1553,

THE MERCHANT VENTURERS' GUILD.

245

community and corporation of merchants -within the city
of Bristol, "Charles I. (7th Jan., 1638) restored to the society
the charter of Edward VI,, that had been extended, but
afterwards repealed, by Elizabeth. By the restored
charter ' the master, wardens, assistants and common
alty were to meet annuaUy on the 10th of November in
their merchant's hall, and elect one of the commonalty
to be master, two of the assistants to be wardens, and
ten of the more discreet men of the society to be assist
ants for the foUowing year. The master and wardens
were to be sworn before the master and wardens of the
preceding year, or any two of them. Power was given
to the whole society to remove any of the assistants for
misbehaviour and to elect others.' '^ A second charter
was granted by Charles L, and ' in consideration that
the merchants of Bristol have expressed their loyalty
and fidelity to us in these late times of difficulties, when
even the citizens of London and the merchants thereof,
who have enjoyed many more privileges and immunities
for the advancing of a free and complete trade into all
foreign parts, have forgotten their duty unto us, and
many of them have traitorously rebeUed against us,' it
grants to the company of Merchants of Bristol and their
successors that they may have a free trade whithersoever
the Eastland or Eussia companies of London might
trade, &c. This second charter of Charles I. did not
affect the constitution of the society, which is therefore
now estabUshed under the authority of the charter of
1638.2 " The proper characteristic of the company, as quali
fied by their charters of being a guild of commerce and
nothing more, has been practicaUy changed in modern
times. In respect to being a kind of feudal corporation
and monopolists of foreign trade, its once enormous
power has collapsed, and it now Ues, like King Arthur
after his last battle, but as a shattered column. It has,
however, renewed its youth, by becoming ' from its
respectability the almoner of many noble charities,'
and (even an enemy himself being the judge) ' the
society has proved a most faithful steward in this
respect,' ^
" Almost the only part of the charter now observed
with strictness by the merchants is the care they take
to elect none into their society who are not already
freemen of the city. By the regulations now followed
in the yearly election of officers, the master must be
one who has been master, warden, or assistant. The
present master nominates one such candidate, the war
dens and assistants one, and the commonalty one, and
' Lunell's Port Improvement Question, 26. ^ Ibid, 27,
« A Burgess's Letters, 133,

from these three the election is made by a majority of
the whole society present, ^ The ordinary meetings are
held monthly. No salaries are paid to the master or
any of the officers, nor does any pecuniary benefit
accrue to members,
"The right of admission into the society, according to
present demands, is obtained in three ways — by birth,
by apprenticeship, and by purchase. ' Every son of a
Merchant Venturer, born after his father became a
member, is entitled, by birth, after taking up his own
freedom of the city, to be admitted into the Society of
merchants. No necessary quaUfication exists with re
spect to the trade or profession actually exercised by
him. The only refusal to admit, on that ground, was
on the application of a clergyman. This case was dis
missed by the society, and finaUy rejected. Some of the
present members of the society have taken orders since
they entered it, without ceasing to be members,' Those
who claim to be admitted by apprenticeship must have
served a Merchant Venturer for seven years in a mer
cantile capacity.
"The society are proprietors of considerable landed
estates, and possess, among other property, the Hot
weUs at Clifton," " and the manor of Clifton,
24. "No Bristol coins of this king [Edward VL]
are known to me. His first silver coinage, issued in
1547, was of the same low standard as the last coinage
of his father, viz , 4oz. silver to 8oz, alloy. The weight
was at the rate of 10 grains to the penny.
"The Bristol pennies of this base coinage bear, obverse, the
king's bust iu profile to the right, crowned, and within a beaded
inner circle ; legend, ed' 6 , d' g' bosa .«!ine spine (or spina).
One coin reads spipa by mistake. Mint mark, a cross before ED,
One penny has a cross after ROSA ; another, with the cross after
ROSA, has also trefoils after sine and spina. Reverse, shield of
arms within inner circle, surmounted by a cross fleuree ; legend,
ci-viTAS bristolie. One has a fleur-de-lys after civitas ; another
has a cross after the same word. Some specimens have also tre
foils iu the angles of the cross. The penny of this coinage in the
British Museum is not so base as others. For engravings of these
pennies see Snelling's Silver Coinage, pi, IV,, No, 6 ; Ruding,
pi, IX,, No, 16 ; and Haiolcins, fig, 415.
"The halfpennies are very rare, like the pennies, and bear,
obverse, cro-wned profile and inner circle, as on the pennies ; legend,
e' (or ED,) 6, d' g' rosa' sine' spin' (or spina). Mint-mark, a tre
foil before E, One halfpenny has small trefoils after e, d, g, eos,
and a'spin. Reverse, cross fleur(5e, with three pellets in each
angle ; also a beaded inner circle. Legend, civitas eristoli (or
beistolie). Trefoils or roses in the forks of the cross,
"In the PubUc Eecord office, London, are preserved
several original documents relating to the Bristol coin
age of this reign. The earliest one is an indenture
(partiaUy decayed) of all the gold and silver buUion,
* Lunell's Port Ijnprovement Question, 27,
2 Taylor's Book about Bristol, 236-9,

246

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

a,d, 1549,

coined monthly into moneys by Sir WiUiam Sharington,
under-treasurer of the mint at Bristol, from the 1st of
May, 1546, to the last of March, 1547,^ Sharington is
designated in this document ' Sir WiUm, Sharyngton,
knyght, one of the gentillmen of the ks mats" most
honorable p'vey^ chamber, and under-treasr of his
highnes Mynte wthin the Castell of Brystowe,'
' ' No 32 of the same volume of State Papers is Sir W, Sharing
ton's account of the bullion coined according to the foregoing
indenture and of the expenses thereof. It appears that during
the period above stated (1st May, 1546, to 31st March, 1547) there
was coined £962 5.s. value in gold (of 20 carats fine to 4 carats
alloy) and £16,833 4.s. value of silver (of 4oz, fine to 8oz. of alloy).

It is also stated ' harp groats ' of 3oz. fine to 9oz. of alloy were
made at this mint for use in Ireland, The value of them came to
i'3, 657 4s, in the period above mentioned. This account ends
with the signatures of Sir William Sharington, Eoger Wigmore
(comptroller), and Thomas Marshall (paymaster),
"No. 33, vol. L, of these State Papers, is an indenture, dated
6th April, 154V, between Sir William Sharington and Eoger
Wigmore (comptroller and surveyor of the mint of Bristol), of
money delivered to Wigmore for necessaries for the mint there,
" In vol. IL of Edward VI. 's Domestic Slate Papir.t, No. 10 is
an indenture of all gold and silver bullion, coined into moneys in
the office of Sir William Sharington, from the 1st April to 30th
September, 1547, iu the mint of Bristol. No. 1 1 is a duplicate of
the preceding document. No. 12 is the account, also dated 30th
September, 1547, of Sir W. Sharington, of gold and silver bullion
' No. 31, vol. I., Domestic State Papers, Edward VI.
'' King's Majesty's, ° Privy.

coined into moneys from 1st April to 30th September, aud of the
expenses thereof.
"Both documents, Nos, 10 and 12, vol, II., are signed by
Sharington, Wigmore and Marshall ; and they record that, during
the period 1st April to 30th September, 1547, there was coined at
Bristol £204 4.9, in gold of 20 carats fine aud 4 carats alloy. The
gold was coined in July, August and September only. In the
moQths of April to September, inclusive, 1547, the value of the
silver coined -was £6,838 4s,, of 4oz, fine to 8oz, alloy,
' ' No, 3, vol, IV, , of the same papers, is another indenture of
all bullion of gold and silver coined and made into moneys within
the office of Sir William Sharington, in the mint at Bristol, This
document is imperfect, and the date is gone, but it apparently
records the amount of money coined from May, 1547, (?) to March,
1548, inclusive. The total amount of gold coined during this
period was 213 lbs, 10
oz , (troy weight). The
amount of silver, 4oz.
fine to 8oz. alloy, was
16,8331bs. weight, some
being coined in every
month from May to
March, inclusive, ex
cept August and Sep
tember, 'by reason of
coy ning of Irish mony
theis ij moneths. ' These
Irish coins were harp
groats of 3oz. fine and
9oz. alloy, and the
amounts of them made
were, in August, 2,000
lbs. ; in September,
l,6571bs. ; total, 3,657
lbs. weight. The ac
count ends with the sig
natures of E. Wigmore
and Tho. Marshall,
" No, 23 in the same
volume of State Papers
(vol. IV.) is an inden
ture, dated 2nd July,
1548, between Sir Ed
mund Pekham, treas
urer of all the mints,
and Sir William Shar
ington, of the receipt
of certain sums arising from the profits of the mint at Bristol,
to the king's use.
"In January, 1549, Sir WiUiam Sharington, the
chief officer of this mint, was arrested on a charge of
coining base money, clipping, and other frauds. ^ In
order to save his own life he made a confession to the
council, admitting his guilt, and stating that he had
been in league with the Lord Admiral Seymour to
supply the latter with money for his designs upon the
crown. It appears that the admiral was actuaUy Shar
ington's debtor to a considerable amount. After a short
1 Among Edward VI, 's State Papers, VI,, No, 29 (Februa^y,
1549), is a specification of all the plate, money, jewels, &o., be
longing to Sir William Sharington at the time of his arrest in
January.

Specimens of Decorations in the Mint,
now St Peter's Hospital.

A,D, 1549,

BRISTOL COINAGE.

247

time, however, Sharington was pardoned and restored ;
but his confession was the immediate cause of Seymour's
being sent to the Tower, on the 19th January, 1549,
Bishop Burnet says: — 'And now many things broke
out against him (Seymour), and particularly a conspi
racy of his with Sir WiUiam Sharington, vice-treasurer
of the mint at Bristol, who was to have furnished him
with £10,000, and had already coined about £10,000
false money, ¦¦¦ and had clipt a great deal more, to the
value of £40,000 in aU; for which he was attainted by
a process at common law, and that was confirmed in
ParUament.' ^ The 23rd article of high treason, &c,,
against Lord Seymour stated that he had moved the
lord protector and the whole council that he might, by
pubUc authority, have that which by private fraud and
falsehood, and confederating with Sharjngton, he had
obtained — that is, the Mint at Bristol to be his whoUy,
It also appears, by the act for his attainder,^ that he
had de-vised this mint, with aU the treasure in the same
(except £10,000 a month for the wages of his men), to
be at his command, by the means and consent of Sir
WilUam Sharington,* Seymour was executed on the
20th March, 1549, on Tower hiU,
" Horace Walpole, in his Anecdotes of Tainting, says
that there are two or three portraits of Sir WiUiam
Sharington extant, one being among the royal collec
tion of Holbein's drawings,
"It should be borne in mind by the reader that the
base sUver coins of Edward VI,, described above, and
mentioned in the Indentures, cannot be properly termed
' false ' coins, since they were then the legaUy author-
¦ ised currency of England, Money of the same standard
was also made at London, in the Tower mint,
"In 1549 the plate belonging to All Saints' church,
Bristol, was deUvered into the mint for the king's use,
as appears from a receipt printed in WiUiam Barrett's
LKstorg of Bristol (4to, Bristol, 1789), p. 440, as fol
lows : —
"On the 13th of August, 1549, was received by me, Eobert
Eecorde, comptroller of his majesty's mint of Bristol, to his high-
ness's use, of Mr, WilUam Younge and John Pykes, proctors of
All HaUows in Bristol, iu gilt silver 191bs, lljoz,, and in parcel
gilt 151b, 3oz, " EoBEBT Eecobde,
"In the same year Eecorde also accounted for the
receipt of 107oz. of gUt plate and 142oz, of parcel gUt,
belonging to the church of St, Auden or Ewen,'' And
131bs, 8oz, of plate belonging to St, Leonard's church
were delivered to the king's mint for his highness's
use, by virtue of his majesty's letter, two chalices ex-
1 In the State Trials, VII,, 1, the sum is £12,000,
" History of Eeformation, IL, 93, " State Trials, VII,, 7.
* See Euding's Annals of the Coinage for many of these par
ticulars. = Barrett, 478,

cepted (13th August, 1549),^ Even one of these chalices
was afterwards taken away in 1553,
"The Eev, Eogers Ending remarks, in his Annals
of the Coinage, that Burnet does not date the visitation
for the plate in the churches until the year 1553,^
which must be too late if the above receipt be correctly
given, "It further appears from Barrett's History of Bristol,
p, 440, that there being much plate stiU remaining in
AU Saints' church in 1552, it was, on the 6th of August,
delivered to the king's commissioners for the use of his
mint at Bristol, two chalices and six beUs excepted,
which were left till the king's pleasure was further
known, "John Evans, in his Chronological Outline of the
History of Bristol, p, 142, states that in 1549, August
14th, the plate of AU Saints' church weighed 423 Joz.,
but that it was nearly aU taken to the mint for coinage
in 1549-52," 3
Edward VI,, through his mother, was sixth in de
scent from a rich merchant of Bristol, named Markus
WUliam, mayor in 1422.
descent of EDWARD VI. FROM A BRISTOL MERCHANT,
Markus William, merchant of Bristol, M,P, 1421,=
mayor 1422, Arms, Per bend, g, and arg,, three
roses in bend counterchanged, as quartered by the
Duke of Somerset.

Isabel = Sir John Seymour, Knt., died 20th

daughter and heir,

December, 1464, aged 52.

John Seymour, Esq., died in his father's lifetime, =
1463,

Sir John Seymour, Knt, (ait, 14 in 1464),

Sir John Seymour, Knt,, died:
21st December, 1536, oet. 60,
constable of Bristol castle.

Mary, daughter of Sir Henry

Wentworth, K,B.,
besides others

had

I
Sir Edward Seymour =..
K,G,, "the Pro
tector,'' Duke of
Somerset, beh, 22d
June, 1552.

I

Thomas = Queen
LordSey- Kath-
mour of erine, 20th
Sudeley, widow May,
beh, 1549, of Henry 1536,
VIII,

Jane = Henry VIII,
mar.

r

King Edward VI. ,
born 12th October,
1537, died 6th July,
1553,

Sir Edward=Jane, daughter of
Seymour, Mr, Justice
first cou- Walsh, late re
sin of Ed- corder of Bristol,
ward VI, |
A
The Dukes of Somerset and the Marquises of Hertford,
1 BaiTett, 509, ^ History of the Eeformation, II. , 205.
» Henfrey, 355-9,

248

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1555,

^^aHSs

— \>n
uk)^
\ '^^
^S} /
Markus WiUiam's name
is variously given. In the
Seymour pedigree he is
caUed WiUiam MacWU-
liam. WiUiam Wyrcestre,
mentioning the great gar
den and orchard belonging
to him between the Frome
and the Old Market, styles
him " Markyswilliam,"
In the Parliamentary writ
Arms of tiu Seynwur Family. his name is thus givon : 
" Markus WiUiam," Leland says : — "One Mac Williams,
being younger son of a gentUman in Ireland, came to
Bristowe, and there so increased in riches, that he
bought lands to the sum of three or four hundred
markes by the yere, . . ." Isabel, who survived
her husband, and died in 1483, was possessed of houses
in EedcUff, Thomas and Temple streets, and many
others in various parts of Bristol.
25, Mary, the eldest daughter of Henry, succeeded
Edward VI, at the ripe age of 38 years. On the occa
sion of her marriage with Philip of Spain, in 1554,
there were great rejoicings and a grand procession in
Bristol, With the new regime the Eoman Catholic
reUgion was restored, and during her happily brief
reign reUgious intolerance and cruel persecutions were
rampant. NaturaUy sincere and high-minded, kind and
charitable to the poor, a much more womanly woman
than her magnificent sister and successor, Mary was,
nevertheless, ill-fitted to wear a crown. Her piety was
fostered into furious bigotry by angry, revengeful and
interested priests ; iU-health, an unhappy marriage and
domestic troubles made her peevish and Ul-tempered,
Differences of opinion on religious matters were treated
as crimes, and thousands of persons in this kingdom
were, during her reign, deprived of goods, liberty,
health and social status, whilst not fewer than 285
persons, including five bishops, twenty-one clergymen,
fifty-five women, and four children, were burned to
death for conscientious adherence to the truth, as they
understood it from reading the Word of God, Of the
cruelties perpetrated under her authority in Bristol,
Eicart's Continuator in the Calendar is judiciously sUent,
the records have been destroyed, and it is only from
incidental fragments, scattered through various MSS.,
and from the history of the Martyrs, that we can gather
the probable number, names, and the quality of the
sufferers. These are generaUy supposed to have been
only five, and their names are preserved on a com
memorative monumental tablet erected in Highbury
Congregational church, which was built upon the site
of the gaUows, and covers the identical spot where
these martyrs, rather than abjure, sealed the truth
with their blood. In Memory
Of the under-named
Martyrs,
Who during the reign of Queen Mary,
For the avowal of their Christian faith,
AVere burnt to death on the ground
Upon which this Chapel is erected,
William Shapton, Eichabd Sharp,
Suffered Oct, 17th, 1555, May 17, 1557.
Edwaed Sharp, Thomas Hale,
Sept, 8, 1556, May 17, 1557,
Thomas Banion,
August. 17, 1557,
" Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and
after that have no more that they can do,"
We are afraid the number of the sufferers must be
extended, and that two names, one being that of a
woman, must be added to the above list.
In a calendar of the mayors and sheriffs of Bristol,
once the property of Henry Mugleworth, who was the
sword-bearer in the last years of the 1 7th century, there
are these two entries : —
1555, Mayor, Wm, Young, grocer. Sheriffs, Thomas Ship-
man, merchant, and Giles Burton, soapmaker. This year Eose
Pencell and William Shapton, weaver, were burnt for religion on
the 17th of October,
1556, Eobert Sexley, draper, mayor ; George Snigg, merchant,
and John Griffith, bedder, sheriffs. This year were two men, the
one a weaver and the other a cobbler, burnt for religion ; and a
shearman for denying the sacrament of the altar to be the body
and blood of Christ really and substantially. Also this year wheat
was sold for 8d, the bushel, but at the end of the year it rose to
22d. the bushel.
The martyr Ust it seems to us, if the above be
correct, should read thus : —
1555. Age. Occupation. Apprehended. Burnt.
Eose Pencell, or Peniell . , , . Oct. 1 7.
William Shapton  Weaver Oct. 17.
1656.
Edward Sharp  Over 60 Sept. 8.
William Saxton  Young man. Carpenter Aug. 8 Sept. 18.
1567.
Richard Sharp  Weaver { ^^^ed 19 } "^^ '•
Thomas Hale  Shoemaker April 24 May 7.
Thomas Banion  Weaver Aug. 27.
Fox, in his Book of Martyrs, only mentions four of
the above,
William Sarton, a weaver, who was committed to prison by
Dalby, the chancellor of the diocese, and condemned for holding
that the sacrament was a sign of an holy thing, also he denied
that the flesh and blood of Christ is there, after their words of
consecration. He was burned the 18th of September, anno 1556,
aud as he went to the fire he sung psalms. The sheriff, John
Griffith, had prepared green wood to burn him ; but one Master
John Pikes, pitying the man, caused divers to go with him to
Eidland, half a mile off, who brought good store of helme sheaves,
which indeed made good dispatch with little pain, in comparison
A.D. 1555.

BRISTOL MARTYRS.

249

to that he should have suffered with the green wood. In the
mean space, whilest they went for the sheaves, the said Sarton
made many good exhortations to the people, and after died con
stantly and patiently with great joyfulness.
Eichard Sharp, weaver, of Bristow, was brought the 9th day
of March, anno 1556, before Master Dalby, chancellor of the
town or city of Bristow, and after examination concerning the
sacrament of the altar, was perswaded by the said Dalby and
others to recant, and the 29th of the same month was enjoyned
to make his recantation before the parishioners in his parish
church. Which when he had done, he felt in his conscience such
a tormenting hell
that he was not
able quietly to work
in his occupation,
but decayed and
changed both in
colour and liking of
his body. Who
shortly after upon
Sunday came into
parish church, caU
ed Temple, and
after high mass
came to the quire
door and said with a
loud voice: "Neigh
bours, hear me re
cord that yonder
idol (pointing to the
altar) is the greatest
and most abomina
ble that ever was ;
and I am sorry that
ever I denyed my
Lord God," Then
the constables were
commanded to ap
prehend him, but
none stepped forth,
but suffered him to
go out of thechurch,
-After by night, he
was apprehended
and carried to New
gate, and shortly
after was brought
before the chancel
lor, denying the sac
rament of the altar

Highiury Congn

to be the body and blood of Christ, and said it was an idol, and
therefore was condemned to be burned by the said Dalby, He
was burned the 7th day of May, 1557, and died godly, patiently,
and constantly confessing the articles of our faith.
The Thursday in the night before Easter, aimo 1557, came one
Mr. David Harris, alderman (apothecary, mayor, 1551, under
Edward VI, ), and John Stone, to the house of one Thomas Hale,
a shoemaker, and caused him to rise out of his bed, and brought
him forth to his door. To whom the said Thomas Hale said :
"You have sought my blood these two years, and now much
good do you with it," Who, being committed to the watchmen,
was carried to Newgate the 24th of April, the year aforesaid, and
was brought before Mr. Dalby, the chancellor, committed by him
to prison, and after condemned by him to be burnt, for saying the
sacrament of the altar to be an idol. He was burnt the 7th of
[Vol. I.]

May with the foresaid Eichard Sharp, and godly, patiently, and
constantly embraced the fire with his arms. They were bound
back to back,
Thomas Banion, a weaver, at the commandment of the com
missioners, was brought by a constable, the 13th day of August,
anno 1557, before Master Dalby, chancellor of Bristol, who com
mitted him to prison for saying there was nothing but bread in the
sacrament as they used it. Wherefore the 20th day of the said
August he was condemned to be burnt by the said Dalby, for
denying five of these sacraments and affirming two, that is, the
sacrament of the body and blood of Christ and of baptism. He
was burnt the 27th
of the said month
and year, and died
godly, constantly,
and patiently, con
fessing the articles
of our Christian
faith." '
We have here
the record of
four sufferers
and the dates of
their martyrdom,
1556-7. Sup
posing Sarton,
the weaver, ac
cording to Fox,
to be identical
with the young
man by trade a
carpenter (else
where mentioned
by the calendars
but without giv
ing the name),
we have three
others to account
for, William
Shapton is men
tioned by three
authorities (Sey-
•egational Church. er, Evans and
Mugleworth) as suffering on October 17th, 1555; Eose
PenceU, mentioned only by Mugleworth, burned in the
same year; and Edward Sharp, a WiUshke man of
three-score years, who was burned on the 8th of Sep
tember, 1556, whom Pox, it seems to us, has confounded
with Eichard Sharp, who did not suffer untU the 7th of
May, 1557. As we have stated, aU other records of
these frightful atrocities have been apparently destroyed.
Whether the sufferers were five or seven cannot posi
tively be asserted, but " the record is on high,"
Paul Bush, the bishop, a married man, who refused to
» Fox, Acts and Monuments, III,, 749-50, 855,
E 2

250

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1555,

relinquish his wife, had given up the see and retired to
Winterbourne rectory, where he died. John HoUyman,
who succeeded him in the bishopric of Bristol, to his
eternal credit, refused to have anything to do with
these cruelties.
Good Bishop Hooper, who was burned at Gloucester
on the 9th of February, 1555, was a friar of the Car
meUtes in Bristol ere he embraced the new doctrines.
Bishop Latimer was weU known in the city as a most
popular preacher, he is described at his trial as being
clad in "an old threadbare Bristol frieze gown, girded
to his body with a penny leather girdle, at the which
hanged by a long string of leather his testament, his
spectacles without case depending about his neck upon
his breast," He was burned with Bishop Eidley at
Oxford on October 16th, 1555, It is recorded that
many others in Bristol were questioned but escaped.
Two of the reforming preachers, Pacy and Huntington,
made their way to the Continent; returning after the
accession of Elizabeth, Huntington, preaching at the
Cross in CoUege green, charged his hearers, and espe
ciaUy David Harris, the ex-mayor. Sheriff Griffith, and
ChanceUor Dalby, who had aU three been active agents
in the persecutions, with iU-using both those that
escaped and those that suffered, "Know you not who
made the strict search for Mr, Pacy ? Whom, if God
had not hid, as Jeremiah, you had burned stump and
aU [Pacy had a wooden leg]. Yet you had no pity.
And you know who went to Eedland to buy green wood
for the execution of those blessed saints that suffered,
when near at home, at the Back or the Quay, he might
have had dry. Take heed ; a little sorrow wUl not
serve, God may cast you into unquenchable fire, worse
than the soiUtering of green wood," ^ [If this refers to
the occurrence noted at 248, it is only another instance
of the distortion of facts by prejudiced narrators,]
These Marian persecutions were as politicaUy foolish
as they were crueUy wicked. Had the martyr list
closed with the death of the great leaders of the Ee
formation, men who exulted in a death by fire as the
crowning glory of their life's labour, we might under
stand how a spirit of revenge had obUterated in their
persecutors the heavenly quality of mercy. But when
humble artisans and contemplative weavers were, on
the spiteful accusation of some bigoted neighbour,
dragged from their peacefiU homes to the stake and the
fire, intense hatred and disgust were excited at such a
mockery of reUgion, The sublime ennobling effect
produced by the happiness amidst the torturing flames
of these lowly martyrs for conscience sake, gave to their
faith a mighty commanding influence over the beholders,
* Evans, 145.

and truly "their blood became the seed of the Church,"
They never die, " They are here !
With us in the march of time.
Beating at our side !
Let us live their lives sublime.
Though we die not as they died,"
We have given the dark side of David Harris'
character, but in justice to him it should be mentioned
that when mayor, in a time of great scarcity, he "pre
pared for the poor, for he caused every baker to bake
bread for the commons at a price which the mayor and
the bakers agreed upon," He appears to have been
more appreciated as M,P, than as mayor, having been
twice elected representative of the city,
John Smyth was mayor in 1547 and 1554, In the
latter year he was a commissioner to take the surrender
of the Hospital of St. John, without Eedcliff gate.
Part of the confiscated church lands which he pur
chased belong to Ashton Court estate. During his
mayoralty, in 1554, the foUowing notice occurs : "Paid
for a copy of the Corporation of the CoUege, wherein
the town is caUed the City of Bristol, henceforth as
appears by said draft out of Walter GUsson's office,
3s, 4d." Also the foUowing: —
It is ordained that from henceforth no person or persons shall
be elected or chosen Town Clerk, or Steward of the Court of the
Tplzey in this city, unless he or they have been an under-barrister
at some Inn of Court, And it is further ordained that from
henceforth none shall be elected and chosen to be Eecorder of
this city under the degree of a Bencher,
Smyth's monument was at the east end of the north
aisle of St, Werburgh's, it bore the figure of a man
and seven sons, engraven in brass on one side of a
lectern, on the other side of which his wife and two
daughters were depicted, aU in an attitude of suppli
cation. Underneath was the foUowiug inscription in
Latin verse : — " To John Smith and Johanna his wife,
Hugh and Matthew, sons of the same, have erected
this, A pair lie together in this family tomb : a
husband united with his wife. Just as the marriage
couch sustained the two, so does the sepulchre, John
Smith, the husband, a man worthy of being loved,
chose Johanna, equally graced in love. The happy
pair passed many a year together, with a double
token of their love, 1556," When the said church
was re-built in 1760, and shortened to widen the
entrance of SmaU street, the monument was entirely
removed. WUUam Young, grocer, mayor in 1555, gave by
wUl, in 1587, £50 to keep the prisoners at work in
BrideweU.

A.D. 1556.

LOCAL INCIDENTS.

251

During Sexley's mayoralty, in 1556, the foUowing
ordinance was passed : —
It is ordained that the Town Clerk of this city, for the time
being, shall be resident and abiding in this city, and shaU assist
the Mayor and other officers with his best counsel and advice,
and diligently serve and execute his office, and not to depart out
of the said city without the special license of the said Mayor,
propured and had according to the ancient order, and that for one
week or more according to the discretion of the said Mayor, upon
pain to lose and forfeit his office for evermore. And it is also
agreed that the said Town Clerk of Bristol shall have intelligence
of this ordinance and desire between this and June next, to make
provision accordingly.
In 1557, we learn a complaint was laid before the
CouncU that the magistrates of Bristol seldom came to
the sermons at the Cathedral ; so the dean and chapter,
with the cross carried before them in procession, used
to go to their houses, to fetch them to church. Upon
which a letter was written to them to conform them
selves wUUngly to the orders of the Church to frequent
the sermons and go thither of their own accord.^
26. On April 4th, 1555, another brutal execution
took place in Bristol, Four men, John Walters, Eobert
Haddy, GUbert Sheat, and John White, were convicted
of coining money. They were hanged, drawn and
quartered, and their bloody quarters were set up over
the gates of the city. Need we wonder that under
such demoraUsiug iafluences crime increased greatly,
Eobberies with violence were prevalent, men of rank
became robbers, loathsome offences abounded. At
Oxford fifty men were hanged at one assize.
Seyer, quoting from one of the MS, Calendars, says,
"in 1556 the merchants of Bristol, in a great conflict on
the sea, lost ships and goods to the value of £40,000,
or thereabout," This must have been in 1558, we
think, when Calais was taken by the Duke of Guise,
England not being engaged in any foreign war in the
year named. During the latter years of Mary's reign
the rose penny, it is said, feU to nought, the coin was
so fearfuUy debased. Needles and glass were first
made in London during this reign. There was scarcely
a chimney to any ordinary house in the country parts,
the fire was kindled by the waU and the smoke found
its way out through roof, door, or window; the waUs
were plastered with clay, and the internal condition of
the dweUiags had undergone little or no improvement
from that described by Erasmus, The great bulk of
the people slept on straw paUets with a round log of
wood for a pUlow. The dinner hour was eleven in the
morning, the supper between five and six in the evening.
Wheat fluctuated greatly in price ; during a year of
scarcity it was sold for 6s. 8d, per bushel, but imme-
1 Burnet, 559.

diately after harvest it feU to 8d., then it rose by
Ohiistmas to 22d, Horse hire was Gd, per day,
Mary died of dropsy on the I7th of November,
1558, having reigned 5 years 7 months 11 days. She
is not known to have coined any money in Bristol,
27. Elizabeth began her reign on the death of her
sister, she being then twenty-five years of age, a woman
of good natural abiUty, considerable learning, of a taU,
commanding appearance, with red golden hair. She
was, like her father, of an arbitrary disposition, but
had sufficient judgment to yield to the inevitable in
time, and so secure the affection of her people. She
loved her country, and by her choice of wise counsellors
maintained its honour and prosperity both at home and
abroad. No sovereign of Great Britain has left a higher
reputation for talent, prudence and magnanimity than
EUzabeth, yet she was by no means free from the weak
nesses that pertain to human nature or those pecuUar
to her sex.
In the first year of her reign she confirmed the
Bristol charters. The office of mayor was no sinecure,
but was one of great power as weU as honour. During
the mayoralty of Eoger Jones, grocer, the second of
EUzabeth, 1559:—
"It is ordained that from henceforth the mayor of this city,
for the time being, shaU sit one day in the week with the alder
men in the Council Chamber over the Tolzey, secretly, there to
instruct and devise for the good order, rule, and governance of the
said city and common affairs, aud not to hear private suits or com
plaints on that day unless the cause be great and urgent,"
In this latter year we are told that by the cost and
industry of the mayor, Mr. John Pikes, mercer, Bristol
was exempted for ever from the Marches of Wales,
which before had been great trouble and expense to
them. We have before noticed the successful claim of
exemption, in 1 528, from the jurisdiction of the lord presi
dent of the council of the Marches, Seyer thinks that
up to this date Bristol had to bear its share in furnishing
men and money for the defence of the borders from the
Welsh, It may be so ; the conflict of authorities in the
Marches frequently remained in an unsettled state for
many years together. If justice were blind, equity was
lame, and much people suffered under their infirmities ;
but the above is clearly a ratification of the decision
given at Ludlow, Hugh Draper, a merchant of Bristol,
was, in 1560, tried at Westminster, with seven other
men in good position, citizens of London, Winchester,
&c,, " for conjuration and sorcery." They having " con
fessed their wicked actions, and bound themselves by
oath to abstain from the like for the future, were com
mitted to the Fleet prison," By special command of
the queen and councU, they were set in the pillory

252

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. I56I.

before the queen's palace at Westminster haU. Temple
conduit was removed and re-built in the centre of the
street of that name in 1561-2, The fountain head is
shown by a square stone, high up in the road, cut
through PUe hUl, near the three lamps at Totterdown,
28, During the first three years of Elizabeth's reign
polemics had been rife throughout the land. The queen,
in 1558, had forbidden the elevation of the Host in the
Chapel Eoyal, and had liberated all the prisoners who
had been incarcerated for matters of faith. The Bishop's
Bible was pubUshed in 1559, and that of Miles Cover-
dale was re-introduced into England in 1560, The Act
of Uniformity was passed, the queen was declared the
head of the church, Edward VI,'s laws and the Book of
Common Prayer were restored, and the Eoman CathoUcs,
both bishops and priests, were deprived of their sees
and livings, whUst many of the laity who conscientiously
refused to take the oaths of supremacy went into volun
tary exUe. Then Protestant refugees returned from the
Continent in large numbers, and both the queen and
her advisers had to resist the ultra-Protestantism that
would wiUingly have revived the smouldering embers
of persecution. Laws against astrologers were enacted
in 1561. It was this probably that enkindled afresh
the turbulent spirit of the citizens and apprentices, and
may help to account for the above prosecution of Draper
and the foUowing curious entry in our annals : —
1561, This year was much trouble about the christening of a
child, for which the whole city was in an uproar, and all went
armed into the Marsh one among another, not knowing scarce
their foes. The mayor ordered the Marsh gates to be taken off,
to make more room for the commons ; but he and his brethren
stood trembling in the Marsh to see what would become of the
stir, which in the end was pacified by the help of Mr, Chester, a
pointmaker, with his company.
There was a gathering of much people in the Marsh, and the
apprentices did beat great drums and make great brags ; but when
Mr. Chester (him that had been mayor) aud his company did
come, and he inquired of the leaders what they required, they
did not answer a word, having no cause for complaint, and pre
sently dispersed to their homes,
Nicholas Williams, tailor, presided over the councUs
of the city in 1563, when the foUowing memoranda are
set down : —
That the 4th day of February, in the year aforesaid, it was
ordained that every first Tuesday of every month in the year aU
the persons of the common council shall be called and resort
together to understand and take order for such things as shaU be
amiss, that the same may be redressed,
'I Item, The 6th day of June, in the year aforesaid, it was
ordained that for every ship of the burthen of one hundred tons
or upwards that shaU be graven or mended at the slip of the Back
of Avon, the owner shaU pay to the Chamber of this city forty
shillings for every time ; and for every ship under a hundred tons
to forty tons to pay 26s, 8d. ; and under forty tons to pay 20s, for
every such graving. Provided also, and it is ordained that no

person shall have any ship or any other vessel with holm, straw,
or any other thing at the back aforesaid ; but if they heat any
pitch or plank, they shall do so upon the ChesiU, within ten feet
of the low water mark ; and that if any dig any holes or break
any part of the slip they shall fill and repair the same again at
their costs and charges forthwith, "
A cautious repugnance to strangers was stUl a
salient feature of the commercial laws : —
" Also, that any boat having any mast shall be shoaled upon
any of the slips upon pain to forfeit every time 6s. 8d, ; and if any
stranger offend in any the said points after lawful warning, he shall
forfeit the double of the same above written,"
The year 1564-5 was remarkable on several accounts.
On the 7th of October there was an extraordiuary dis
play of the Aurora Borealis, which, being foUowed by
an outbreak of the deadly plague, that lasted a whole
year and carried off 2,500 persons, the people in their
superstitious ignorance concluded the natural pheno
menon had been the cause of the disease. Also, from
December 21st to January 3rd the frost was so intense
that the tidal river froze as far down as Hungroad, and
the people crossed on the ice in perfect safety.
O'Neil having risen in rebeUion in Ireland, 700
soldiers arrived in Bristol about the end of St. James'
fair on their way to that country, being detained here
by contrary winds for six weeks. They grew unruly
and quarreUed with the citizens. Many blows were
iaterchanged around the High Cross, when Captain
GUbert, one of the officers who lodged at the New inn,
behind All Saiats church, rushed out with sword and
target and quieted the tumult. Then Captain EandaU
the next day held a court-martial, and was proceeding
to execute four of the ringleaders — Lawes, Herring,
CarveU and Grant ; the gibbet was erected before the
mayor's door (NorthaU, the pewterer), in High street,
at the end of St. Mary-le-port street, but the mayor and
citizens interceded and saved their lives. The expedi
tion left Bristol on October 8th, but many of the men
died in Ireland of the cold, and others were sick, so
that EandaU had only 300 men, with whom he defeated
800 of O'NeU's army, slaying, it is said, 600 without
the loss of a man, save EandaU himself, who perished
through the wUfulness of his horse, which carried him
into the midst of the enemy.
One Monsieur Laudonniere arrived in Bristol this
year on his return from Florida, where he had taken a
party of French Protestant emigrants to found a colony.
The Spaniards, who claimed the Continent, landed and
attacked them : the settlers surrendered, but were crueUy
hanged, with ignominious labels attached to their bodies.
Laudonniere escaped. This atrocity was revenged a few
years afterwards by the French, who treated the Spanish
prisoners whom they had taken in the Uke manner.

A.D. 1569.

BRISTOL MAYORS, &c.

253

The town clerk, Mr, Eead, erected a windmUl on
Brandon hUl, which it is commonly beUeved was made
free to the Bristol washerwomen by the queen. This
year also the foUowing ordinance was passed : —
" Eighth of Elizabeth, — It is ordained, the two-and-twentieth
of March, in the year 1565, that if any freeman or burgess of the
city shall depart out of the same city to dwell, and being adjudged
by the Common Council of the same city to be of ability to bear
the office of Sheriff or lilayor of the same city, or shall not supply
the same office when he shaU be lawfully required thereunto, shaU
forfeit to the Mayor and Commonalty of the City aforesaid the
sum of two hundred pounds and lose the freedom of the city,"
WUliam PepwaU, grocer, was mayor in 1568 ; it was
ordered that a new straight cut shoiUd be made for the
river Parrett through the lordship of Hamp (? Hanip),
near Bridgwater, in order to prevent the submergence
by the tides of at least 10,000 acres of land. The Com
missioners were Sir Hugh Paulet, Sir George Speke, Sir
Maurice Berkeley, Humphrey Coles and Henry Port-
man, Esqs,, with other good yeomen of the country. The
said lordship belonged to Bristol,^ The plague stiU
Ungered in the purlieus of the city, but was far less
fatal than it had been iu the preceding year ; 188 per
sons only are recorded as having died thereof in eleven
months. Three sheriffs succumbed to the disease.
Eoger Smith, the sheriff, died ; he was succeeded by
WilUam Eich, who, dying, Eichard Carey took his
place; he also died and was succeeded by Eichard
Young. The leaning tower of Temple church has ever been
an object of curiosity, and strangers to the city looked
upon it as one of the Uons of Bristol. This year
Thomas, Duke of Norfolk, came from Bath, having
with him the Earl of Worcester, the Earl of Berkeley,
Lord Eich, and others. In order to test the report of
the vibration of the said tower, he and his friends had
the beUs rung. Little did the duke think of the insta-
bUity of his own greatness, he was already tottering to
his faU ; whUst Ustening to the merry peals a messenger
arrived from the queen summoning him in aU haste to
London. EUzabeth had discovered a project of mar
riage between the duke and Mary, Queen of Scots, and
he exchanged Bristol with its hospitable gaieties for a
stone-waUed ceU in the Tower, and two years later he
laid his head upon the block, Eobert, Earl of Leicester,
was now lord high steward of Bristol ; the Bear and
Eagged Staff in Narrow Wine street was his cognizance.
The plan, of the city, known as Hoefnagles', was this
year, 1569-70, printed in a book entitled Civitates Orbis
Terra/rum. Modem Uthographs wUl have made this
map famUiar to most of our readers. The Earl of
Bedford and his son came to Bristol and were enter-
* Mayor's Calendar, 57-8.

tained at the house of Mr, Higgins (or Wiggins),
SmaU street,
WiUiam Tucker, mayor in 1570-71 —
"It is ordained that as well as the nomination of the three
persons, whereof one shall be chosen to be mayor of this city for
the year then next following, also the choosing and election of
the said mayor shall be on the morrow after the exaltation of the
Holy Cross, and at no other time. At which time and day the
mayor and other officers of the said city have time out of mind
been chosen. Anything in any former ordinance to the contrary
hereof notwithstanding,"
This mayor was one of three aldermen who died in
the same week in September, 1583, He bequeathed
40«, per annum to St, Nicholas parish, at Easter 20«,
and at Christmas 20s., and 6s, 8d, for a sermon next
Sunday after Trinity Sunday for ever. He caused,
during his year of office, a market to be estabUshed in
Thomas street every Thursday, The vestrymen of the
parish buUt the market place along the breadth of the
church and churchyard for the sale of wool, yarn, cattle,
&c. In return for this privilege the feoffees of St,
Thomas granted to the mayor and Corporation the two
houses and land on which the meal market was kept
in Wine street, now the guard-house. John WiUis,
chamberlain in 1569-70, caused all the causeways about
the city (seven miles in length) to be made ; he also
built the BeU tavern in Broad street and obtained the
Back haU as a gift to the city, wherein himself died this
year, '^
Thomas Chester, son of WiUiam the "pacificator,"
was chief civic magistrate in 1569-70, during his
mayoralty this memorandum is entered : —
" That the two and twentieth day of March in the year afore
said it is ordered, that whensoever the office of the High Steward
of this city shall be void, the same office shall be given to one of
the Privy Council commonly attending upon the Queen's person
as heretofore hath been used,"
Two years previously Thomas Chester represented
the city in Parliament, In the same year he purchased
the manor of Almondsbury, and was high sheriff of the
county of Gloucestershire . The summer of 1 5 8 3 was fatal
to aldermen, three dying in one week, Thomas Chester
being one. He died 24th June, and was buried in St,
James' church. He married Anne, daughter of Sir
Samuel Asprey [or Astrey], of Henbury, in the county
of Gloucestershire, In 1582 Thomas Chester, by deed,
gave to the Corporation, lands worth £10 per annum;
to St, John's almshouse, £7 16s, ; to that on St, James'
Back, £4, and to the people in BrideweU, £2, Anthony
Standback, mayor in 1564, gave the Corporation, by
wUl, certain tenements on the quay, the income to
Queen Elizabeth's hospital. 1 Evans, 149,

254

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1571.

29, John Stone, brewer, mayor in 1562-68-71, In
his last year of office he "kept a watch at Midsummer
night and St, Peter's night " : —
The doors of the richer citizens were dressed out with green
stuffe, birch or long fennel, adorned with garlands of gay flowers ;
tables before the doors were set out furnished with sweete breade
and good drinke, whereunto they would cordially invite their
neighbours, and the passers by, and be merry with them, in great
familiarity. Lamps of oyl, which burned all night, were hung out in
clusters ou branches of iron of curious workmanship ; at stated
intervals iu the streets and open places huge bonfires blazed ;
hundreds of torches threw their yellow flare around, whilst the
red cresset lights of the constables, and the thousands of waxen
candles in the windows, turned the night as it were into day.
First marched the train bands with trumpets blaring, drums
rolling, and many whistlers and fifers, whose shrUl tones woke up
the echoes of the darkling night. Ancients with their banners
shaking and fluttering in the wind, demi-launces on their great
horses ; gunners with hand-guns, or half -hakes ; archers in coats
of white fustian, with the city arms stamped on the breast and
back, their bows unstrung, and quivers full of arrows ; pikemen
in bright steel corslets ; the mayor, aldermen and Council in their
robes of office ; grave citizens in unofficial coats of silk, or cloth,
with golden chains around their necks ; then the different trading
companies with their master, officers and pageant, bedeck'd in
colors, armed with all manner of warlike weapons ; these were
succeeded by the mayor's liverymen in say jackets of Watchet
blue, followed by the sheriff's men in lesser numbers and clad in
graver colors, who all combined to make a goodly show, as the
many-colored lights flickered on divers parts of the huge procession,
now clothing a group with a golden hue, deepening the rich scarlets
of the Corporation to a glowing purple, flashing back bright beams
from the polished corslets, and mellowing the distance with the
haze of an artificial twilight.
But the humming stuff was too strong and the
broken heads too many for the scene to be repeated,
and so John Brown, the next mayor, turned these night
watches into a general muster of a war-like character on
Midsummer day, foUowed by another on St, Peter's day.
Then each craft and company marched with drums,
colours and pageant to Canons' Marsh (Queen square),
in grand procession, and practised at the butts with
bow, cross-bow, hand-gun and artUlery, diversifying
their practice with merry bouts of kiss-in-the-ring, and
tripping the toe fantastic with their wives, sweethearts,
and the weU-pleased lookers on. Political feeling now
began to exhibit itself in connection with the election
of members of Parliament, John Popham and Philip
Langley were returned by the sheriffs, contrary, ap
parently to the wish of the burgesses, A seat in the
House of Commons had become an object of ambition,
Popham was high steward of Bristol.
In John Stone's last official year the foUowing ordin
ance was promulgated : —
"30th April, 1571.— Mem, That the day and year above
written it is ordained that the Chamberlain's book of accounts
which he shall yearly render, suche being subscribed with his own

handj shaU remain in a chest with three lockes, whereof the
Maior, for the time beinge, to keep one key, aud one of the Alder
men to keep another key, and the third key to be kept by one
other of the Common Council appointed for that purpose. And
that the Chamberlain shall keep a booke containing the full of his
yearlie accounts for his remembrance, whereunto the auditors, for
the time being, yearly shall set their hands at the time of the
delivery of the saide bookes."
Thomas Warner, soapmaker, and Eandolph HassUl
were sheriffs. The plague was "hot" in Bristol in
1575, and "the sickness that walketh at noon-day" had
no respect for official dignity. To it John Stone feU a
victim ; his monument was in Temple church, it is now
on the outside of the chancel waU and bears this in
scription, " To John Stone, thrice Mayor, who had four
wives; he died 24th of June, 1675, with his effigy and his
four wives ; with the brewer's arms."
Although representing the city in ParUament in
1559-63-67, also chosen to the civic chair in 1560,
WUliam Carr is more known for his large-hearted Uber-
ality and his discriminating benevolence. He gave by
wiU, in 1574, to the Corporation lands, &c,, to the value
of £10 per annum, to the poor of the city in the several
almshouses, and £26 13s. 4d, towards the marriage of
poor maids, and £25 to the highways. He died of the
plague in 1575, and was buried in St, Werburgh's
church. In 1575 Ann Carr, by wUl, gave the Corpora
tion £60 to clothe poor people, and £50 to buy coal and
wood, to be sold to the poor without gain,
John Brown increased the size of barrels and kU-
derkins ; also, he left money for " good uses." In 1595
he gave, by wiU, " out of two tenements on the Weir,
twelve shifts, six for men and six for women, to the
value of 28s, 8d. per annum. One year to the Mer
chants' almshouse in the Marsh and two years to the
poor of St, Nicholas' parish, and so to continue for
ever." 30. In 1574 Thomas Kelke, merchant, was mayor.
Like many another city magnate this good man at his
death, in 1583, left to the corporation £10 in land for
the use of the poor of the city, and £70 for other uses.
During his mayoralty Bristol prepared to receive her
virgin queen. Old guns were furbished up and aU
kinds of artiUery were put into requisition to add to
the din in which English loyalty deUghts to explode.
Stocks of gunpowder were increased and stored away
for the occasion. On the eve of her Majesty's visit one
such hoard exploded at the PeUcan inn (now the Talbot,
Victoria street), and ten men were blown to atoms.
The next day Elizabeth entered the city, and was
most honourably received by the mayor and his brethren,
who met her with the citizens and their companies with
their colours, &c,, the mayor carrying the sword before

A,D. 1574.

THE QUEEN VISITS BRISTOL.

255

her, and so they came to the High Cross, newly painted
and gilded, where, "in a disguised manner stood Faem,
very orderly set forth, and spoke as foUoweth, by an
exceUent boy," but we spare the reader the speech;
when Faem had ended and flung up a great garland,
the scene was renewed at St. John's gate, where
"Salutacion" and " Gratulacion " had each an equaUy
"long ditty," leaving the fourth boy, " Obedient Good
WUl," no chance to speak, the time was so far spent.
They then proceeded to Sir John Young's great house,
in front of which
"three hundred sol
diers shot off their
pieces, at which
warning the great
artUlery went off a
hundred and thirty
cast pieces ; and then
a hundred shot [not
cannon shot, but
musketeers] not pike-
men, were appointed
for her guard, where
she rested at the
great house,"
" On Sunday the
Queen went to the
OoUedge [Cathedral]
to hear a sarmond,
whear thear was a
speetch to be sayd
and an imme to be
songe by a very fien
boye;" but the
schoolmaster, who
should have made the
speech, "envied that
any stranger should
sett forth these
shoes," and either in
the sulks, or more probably in drink,
would not, say it.
Two forts being made close by the water, over at
Wapping, a scaffold was raised for the queen and the
Court at Gibb Taylor, on this or the city side of Prince
street bridge. There were voUeys of powder spent in
attacking the fort, and voUeys of poetry (save the
mark) between Dissencion, Peace, and Warre,— Soldiers
attacked the little fort on Eedcliff hUl and rased it to
the earth, but the main fort held out tUl, by torchlight,
the queen went to her lodging.
" The next day was thear maed a newe aproetch to

Queen Elizabeth at St. John's Gate.
could not, or

the mayn fort for a better order of warre, and to the
ayde of the fort cam dyvers gentlemen from the Court,
Now sarved the tied, and up the water from Kyng roed
came three brave gaUeys, chasing a shyp, that cam with
vittayls to the fort,"
Then John Eobarts, of the Temple, swam, in
his clothes from the fort in its great extremity to the
queen for aid, carrying in his hand a book covered
with green velvet, in which were the speeches she
could not hear, i.e., "the whole substance of this devyce,"
"Then Perswasion
takes up her tale, and
the City answers her :
Perswasion was dis
missed. War brings
fresh batteries into
play, and the fort
succumbed on the
third day, when aU
joined in crying 'God
save the Queen,' "
It speaks weU for
the taste of her Ma
jesty, that "aer theas
things wear brought
to an end, she went
in the gaUees down
to Kyng roed," to
see the lovely scenery
of the Avon. But
her purgatory was
not ended yet, for on
her departure "a
gentil man in the con-
fiens of the toun's
liberties spaek this
speech that foUows :
'ThedolfuUaDue!'"
[the which if any de
sire to read, may be
found with all the rest of the foolery in the "First

part of Churchyardes Chippes Twelve several labours,
1575,"] The official notice of this visit reads thus : —
"This yere on Satterday, beinge the xiiij''' day of August, the
Queene came to this citie, and Mr. Maior and the Common
CounseU ridinge with foote clothes, receaved her highnes within
Laffardes gate. And ther Mr, Maior delyvered the gilt mace
vnto her Maiestie, and she then presentelie delyvered it to him
againe. And so Mr, Maior knelinge whiles Mr, John Popham
esquier, Eecorder of this citie, made an oracon, did after it was
ended stand vp, and delyvered a faire purse wrought with silke
and golde having an hundred poundes in gold ia it, vnto her
highnes. And therevpon Mr, Maior and his bretheren toke theire
horses, and Mr, Maior rode nighe before the Queene betwene two

256

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1576.

sergantes-at-armes. And the residewe of the Common CounseU
rode next afore the nobilitie and trumpeters, and so passed
throughe the towne vnto Mr, John Yonges bowse, where she lay
vntill Satterday then next foUowinge, on which day a litle before
her Maiesties departure hence she made flve knightes — (that is)
the said Sir John Yonge, Sir Eichard Barkeley of Stoke, Mr,
Tracie, Sir Thomas Porter, and Sir William Morgan of Penycoite.
And duringe her abode here (among other thinges devised for
plesure) there weare iiij c, soldiers in one sute of apparell, whereof
iij c, weare harquebussiers and j c, pikemen in corselettes. Also
there was made a greate large forte standinge in Trenemill meade
over againste Gibtaylor, which was assaulted by land and water
iij. dales. And there was also another litle forte called the base
fortt, standinge upon the hill beyond, which was wonue the first
night that the assault was given. And the Queene was there at
euerie assault duringe the saide iij dales, for whose standinge
there was buUded a large scaffolde of tymber in the Marshe.
Whiche martiall experiment being verie costlie and chargeable
(especially in gonnepowder), the Queene and nobilitie liked verie
well of, and gaue Mr, Maior and his brethren greate thankes for
theire doinges," ^
"The charge of the Queenes Ma*'"^ enterteignem' to
the citie of Bristol :

13 8

Gilding and painting the High Cross, and making new
beams  £66
Newly rafting and plastering of Laford's Gate, on both
sides ; Newgate, and both the Froome Gates, on
both sides ; and for setting up of scaffolds and
taking down the same 
Painting and gilding the said gates 
Pitching the streets [sanding, various several charges]
Setting up a scaffold at the High Cross, for the oration
Setting up the Queen's arms and the Town's arms, in
freestone, in the Guildhall wall [the same now
standing— 1824] 
The purse of gold, silver, and silk, wherein the 200
angeletts was presented 
Setting up a gallery in the Marsh, for the Queen's
Majesty to see the triumphs 
Mending the way in Magdalen-lane, where the Earl of
Lincoln lay 
Fees and charge to the Queen's Clerk of the Market,
and to the Yeoman of the Bottles 
Making the Queen's way through Temple-Mead, at her
going away 
Mr, Domynyck Chester, for charge of the two forts,
with other business, as by his accompt 
John Field, for his pains in dressing the Marsh 
Captain Shute, for his travaile, who was captain ot all
the army.. 
Mr, Churchyard, for his travaile both in the forts and
concerning orations 
To eighty-six Pioneers who wrought at the forts 
" The whole of the items number fifty-eight, and the
sum total is £1,053 14s, \ld. The charges included
herein for gunpowder amount to £210 7s. 8d, The
price seems to have been from Is, Id. to Is, 2d. per lb,
" Lord Burghley and the Earl of Oxford joined the
Queen while she was in Bristol," ^
1 Mayor's Calendar, 58-59,
' Evans, 164.

16 6

1

26 13

4

13 18

10

0 8

3

10 14

0

I 12

0

19 4

3

0 6

8

5 0

0

0 14

3

81 8

4

1 0

0

16 13

4

6 13

4

4 5

0

Whether Thomas Kelke,' the mayor, was disap
pointed because the queen did not knight him, as she
did her host. Sir John Young, does not appear, but he
got crusty with the sheriffs and commanded them both
to prison. One of them, WUUam Bird, submitted ; the
other, Edward Porter, defied the mayor with the words,
"The prison is mine. Sir Mayor; with it you have
nothing to do,"
One result of the queen's visit was that David
Harris, the persecuting apothecary, and Eoger Jones,
grocer, who had been mayor during the last year of
Mary's reign, were both of them deprived of their offices
as aldermen, John Chester and John Stone being chosen
in their room. The latter did not long enjoy the
honour, for the next year the plague raged virulently
in the city and he and three other ex-mayors, John
NorthaU (pewterer), John Cutt, and WiUiam Carr,
merchant and soapmaker, together with upwards of
1900 persons, feU victims to it. Bacon says "Praise
is the reflection of virtue," Little dreamt good Mr,
Northbrook, the preacher at EedcUff, that in this cen
tury his faithfulness to God and his kindness to his
perishing feUow men would be had in glad remem
brance, he during the whole of this awful visitation
"did very much good in word and deed by teaching
publicly, and in private from house to house,"
Another result of EUzabeth's visit to Bristol was a
treaty with the king of Spain relating to the trade with
the Low Countries. The trade with Spain was now
perhaps at its highest. In 1576, the Peter, a ship of
220 tons, belonging to Thomas WiUiams, merchant, of
Bristol, was wrecked near Clevedon, and all the men
but three perished. She was laden with oU and wine
(sack), most of which was lost or stolen by wreckers.
Next year ' ' came such sweet and pleasant sack from
Andalusia as was never before known, as pleasant as
bastards," "^ (Sack and bastards were sweet muscadel
wines, much admired in mediseval days), 1578 was
evidently a good wine year.
The queen this year made an attempt to put the
sumptuary laws against excessive apparel into force.
Example, however, is better than precept. A sovereign
who had 3,000 dresses in her own wardrobe could not
reasonably expect to restrain the prodigaUty in fashion
of her subjects,
31, About this time (1676) certain sailors of PUl
stole a barque, and, turning pirates, robbed the Irish
and other ships that were coming with goods to St,
1 Mr. Kelke resided in Small street. In 1824 the house
was occupied by Visgers, for offices, and Overbury, for a ware
house, » Mayor's Calendar, 60.

A,D, 1577.

FIRST FIRE BRIGADE.

257

James' fair. They abandoned the vessel in Wales, but
four of the men foolishly returning to PiU were taken,
tried on the 25th of September, and being condemned
to death "three of them were hanged in chains on the
point over against Gib Taylor [Prince street bridge]
that the tide might run over them,"
To " paddle your own canoe " has become a proverb,
and the healthy pastime is one greatly indiUged in by
Bristol youths, to whom the large calm surface of our
harbour affords a suitable arena for the exhibition of
their skill. Thirty years ago a canoe was a curiosity,
of which there were only very few specimens in the
kingdom. The first canoe ever seen in Great Britain
was exhibited three hundred years since on the river
Avon [now the Floating Harbour] ; it was brought
here, in 1578, by Martin Frobisher, on his return in
the Queen's ship Aid, 200 tons, from a voyage in search
of the north-west passage to Cathay. He brought
back a cargo which he fondly imagined to be gold
ore, and also an Esquimaux with a wife and chUd,
who were clothed in skins, and who fed upon raw flesh.
On October 9th the man at high tide "rowed in a boat
about 14 feet long made of skins, in form like unto a
barge, but sharp at both ends, having but one round
place for him to sit in ; and as he rowed up and down
he kUled a couple of ducks with his dart, and when he
had done he carried away the boat on his back through
the Marsh; the Uke he did at the Weare and other
places. Within one month they aU three died." A
second voyage was rapidly made for more of the valu
able cargo, but alas ! the ore was tested at the Mint in
the Castle, also in London, the result being a speck of
gold about the size of a pin's head, which is stUl pre
served stuck upon the seal of the report.
Somewhere about this date "a gaUant ship, the
Golden Lion, 540 tons, from Andalusia, being badly
moored at Hungroad, fell over and carried down with
her a new hulk of 400 tons burthen, laden with 200
tons of salt, that was moored alongside of her." The
Golden Lion was nearly unladen, having in her but 60
tuns of sack. This appears to have been the greatest
calamity that has ever befaUen the navigation of the
Avon, The two vessels entirely for a while stopped up
the river. Ships, lighters, casks and great engines
were employed by the mayor and commonalty with
very many men, to raise the sunken wreck. It was a
very wet March, Once they got the ship "up a good
height, but the engines and a great cable brake ; after
which time they could not move again, but at low
water tore up aU they could come at, i.e., they had to
break her up where she lay. Some part of her was
seen long after on Shirehampton side; but I hear of
[Vol, I,]

no great hurt against her since." ^ The Mayor's Calendar
states that more than half a year was spent in the at
tempt to remove the obstruction, and that "the river
was in great danger utterly to have perished," The
large ships were generally moored at Hungroad, the
sandstone cliff opposite Shirehampton, until they were
whoUy or partiaUy unladen, the huge rings and mooring
chains may be remarked by any one passing on the
river. John Prewett, tanner, was the mayor that year.
In 1577 there was a remarkable comet visible for
ten days in the west, and in Easter week, 1579, a strong
shock of an earthquake was felt in the city ; another,
termed a mighty earthquake, occurred in 1580. The
old fortification of Menken-bridge was now destroyed
(aU except the tower — shown at 40 — which stood until
1880), and the Bridewell buUt upon the site; "Meg
Lowry, who feigned herself mad, was the first iU-
person there corrected " {i.e., flogged as weU as impri
soned). The ship Swallow was taken by the Turks in
the Bristol Channel,
32. There was a terrible fire near the great tower
on the Quay, which broke out in the house of one
Wolfe, a joiner, several houses were destroyed, and the
smoke from the burning pitch was so dense the sky
could not be seen from the streets.
Terrified by the danger to the wooden houses and
straw-roofed buildings of the city, a by-law was passed
by which
It is ordained and enacted, that after the Feast of Pentecost,
if any fire do appear gleaming out of any house within the said
city of Bristol, or suburbs of the same, that the owners thereof
shall forfeit and pay for every such offence 6s, 8d. to the use of
the Chamber,
Item : It is ordained that after the Feast of St. Bartholomew
no house, roof or pent house within the walls ot the city of
Bristol shall be roofed with reed or thatch, upon pain that the
same shall be pulled down and taken away, by the command of
the Mayor of the City of Bristol, for the time being.
Ten years later it was ordained "that every member
of the Common Council should keep six buckets of
leather in his house, to be in readiness against fire, or
forfeit 20s," Nor were the citizens who eschewed
municipal honours to escape ; so "the mayor and alder
men were to appoint other substantial citizens, who
must do the same or pay 10s," This was our first fire
brigade. The streets were now pitched, and every man
had to pay l^d. per yard for the work done before his
own house,
John Wade, upholsterer, whose country house was
at the Wick, Arlingham, Gloucestershire, was mayor in
1576, He was father to the Major Wade who defended
the city of Gloucester against Charles I,, and grand-
1 MS, Calendar,

258

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1582.

father to Major Nathaniel Wade, of the Eye House
Plot and Monmouth rebeUion notoriety, A scrap of
MS. which was in the possession of the late Mr, Tyson,
says : — " Forasmuch as the aforesaid mayor (Wade)
being an austere man, did incline to LoUardism, which
gave great offence, and to let (hinder) his influence in
the Chamber they revived an Act ' that no person shaU
be mayor more than once,' " A rule that of late years
everyone must admit to have been "more honoured in
the breach than the observance," The next page in
the Calendar shows that this must have been a party
movement directed against a man who was not accept
able to the majority of the house, for when " Thomas
Colston [sheriff of Bristol in 1562], Colonel of the
Train Band, who had married the daughter of WiUiam
ChaUoner, an ancient family in the said city," was
chosen mayor in 1577, his conduct while in the civic
chair so won the esteem of those over whom he pre
sided that the Corporation were desirous of rescinding
the above resolution and again conferring that honour
upon Mr, Colston, to prevent which he paid a sum of
money to the Chamber on the express condition that he
should be exempted from the liabUity of again serving
the office of chief magistrate, and the Corporation were
mean enough in the face of the above entry to take his
money, Colston died in 1597, after a life of honour
and usefulness, and at his own desire was interred by
the side of his first wife, before the little vestry door in
All Saints church. His second wife survived him, and
left by her wiU the munificent sum of £200 for charit
able purposes,
Barrett says : — " On an old stone under the reading-
desk was the foUowing : — Thomas Colston, Mayor, and
Alderman of this city, died November 16th, 1597;"
appended were the foUowing lines : —
" Death is no death, now Thomas Colston lives.
Who fourscore years hath liv^d to his praise ;
A joyful life now Christ doth to him give.
Who wrong'd no wight, each man commends his ways.
Death him commands to bid this world adieu ;
Thrice happy those who die to live anew,"
FareweU now to the home-brewed, which the ale-
wives had brought into sad disrepute ; for it is ordered
by Thomas Stocombe, the mayor, that no one shaU brew
or sell crock-brewed ale under a penalty of 40s,, whilst
aU brewers were to take out a license from him to brew
good ale for the citizens, and to sell it at 3s, 4d. per
dozen, under a penalty of £10. The queen also in this
year (1581) was graciously pleased to grant the city a
new charter by which six additional aldermen were
given to it, making, with the recorder, twelve, or one for
each ward, into which the city was then divided ; but

inexorable death during the next year laid three of them
low, HoUand, the chamberlain, died also, and Nicholas
Thorne, jun,, was chosen as his successor.
PhUip Langley, grocer, who had represented the
city in ParUament in 1571-2, was chosen mayor in
1582, and in March "the Earl of Pembroke was re
ceived honourably into Bristol, with sixty horsemen,
honest burgesses; the mayor, with the aldermen and
common councU, met him in Wine street, and then went
to the Tolzey, and there stayed untU one Mr. Temple
had ended his oration in Latin." ^ On the front of the
pommel of the Sunday sword in the CouncU-house is
the coat of arms of EUzabeth, on the reverse a cross
with the date 1583, and on the exergue —
" This S worde we did repaire
Thomas Aldworth being Mayor."
The Calendar was now adapted to the Julian year by
the use of the double date, thus I58§ indicating that the
year began March 25th, 1582, and ended March 25th,
1583 ; this mode of dating continued untU 1782. There
was another large fire in Bristol this year at the Quay
head. A MS. says [we modernise the speUing] : —
"In 1583, Walter Pykes being mayor, there came to the
Tolzey the Earl of Ormond with the Duke of Desmond's head
pickled in a pipkin, which he exhibited to the mayor and his
brethren, who were much gratified, and returned the duke many
thanks for the entertainment, "
The man who struck it off had a pension of £20 a year,
which he enjoyed a long time, but he was ultimately
hanged at Tyburn.
In the same year occurs the foUowing item : —
"It is ordained and established that from henceforth no
foreigner nor stranger be admitted into the liberties of the staple
of Bristol," In the Mayor's Calendar, 60, it is said, "This year,
before Christmas, were many taken and arraigned in
this country for conspiracies against our gracious queen
whom God defend," They were Eomanist co-plotters
with the Pope, Spain and France. Walter Gleeson
was committed to Newgate because he would neither
serve as sheriff nor pay a fine of £20. He remained
in prison eight days untU he gave surety for the pay
ment. We find this also : —
"Item, It is ordained that from henceforth no person nor
persons whatsoever shall keep or set up any boards or standings
in the High street, upon pain that every such person doing con
trary to the tenour of this ordinance shall forfeit for every such
offence 3s, 4d, to the Chamberlain to the use of the Mayor, Sheriffs,
and commonalty. Provided, nevertheless, that it shall be lawful
for such as sell fish on market days, to place and set up their fish-
boards beneath the Hall door at the sign of the George. "
Walter Pykes married AUce, daughter of Nicholas
Thorne, jun. She outUved her husband, and on the
' Mayor's Calendar,

A.D. 1584.

BRISTOL MAYORS, &c.

259

death of her father came into possession of estates,
which are now held by the Charity Trustees. During
the mayoralty of Thomas Eowland, in 1584, occurs the
foUowing: —
" It is ordered that there shall be forthwith a box set in some
convenient place in the Mayor's and Alderman's Court, in the
Guildhall, and one other box in the Sheriff's Court, and upon
every judgment given in any of the said Courts, or also in the
Staple Court, the party
for whom such judgment
shall be given shall forth
with give 4:d, to the relief
and comfort of the poor
prisoners in Newgate."
The lodge, gar
dens, orchards, &c.,
on Stoney hUl, be
longing to the Friars
Carmelites, now
known as the Eed
Lodge, had been sold
to Thomas Eowland,
merchant, mayor
1584-5, who con
veyed the same in
fee, 7th AprU, 1578,
to Sir John Young,
for the sum of
£26 13s. 4d. Eichard
Cole, mercer, was
mayor and represen
tative of the city, in
ParUament in 1585,
To the latter dignity
he was again chosen
in 1593,
March 17th, 1585,—
The Earl of Pembroke,
Lord Lieutenant of the
trained bands in Bristol,
Somerset and Wilts, came
hither from Wells to a
general muster of the sol
diers, when he insisted
on taking precedence of
the mayor, Eichard Cole,
mercer (who was in Bris
tol the queen's escheator iotjj, and Door
and representative).
Elizabeth being informed of his conduct considered it an iasult
to the crown, and sent for the earl, chid him severely, and com
mitted him to the Tower till he paid a fine for the offence,'
" One Frogmorton, attainted of treason, was drawn,
hanged and quartered.^ Also one Thomas Parry, a
notorious traytor to the queen's majestie, who con-
1 See 209, sec, 26, « Mayor's Calendar, 61,

spired her death, was also hanged and quartered,"
On the 19th September there was darkness at noonday
for the space of an hour in Bristol,
Eichard Cole appears to have been active, far-
sighted, prudent and benevolent. Our annals relate : —
" 1585, Wheat at 7s, per busheU (not I7s, as Evans
says), and aU other grains dear, and for relief the
commons began to make an insurrection, but the mayor
wisely pacified them,
and caused the Pens-
ford bakers to come
into the city with
bread every day in
the week. And the
mayor also having
notice that a barque,
being in Hungroad,
had taken in kinter-
kins of butter for
France, he himseK
went down by water
on board the barque
and seized the butter ;
and notwithstanding
the saUors resisted in
what they durst, and
misused him in re
proachful words, yet
the butter was un
loaded into a barge
and brought up to
the Key, and the
mayor caused it to
be sold at 2id. per
pound. The sailors
who resisted the
mayor were commit
ted by him to ward,
where they lay in
irons untU they had
paid the price set
upon them for theu-
disobedience. The
mayor also procured
i?i the Bed Lodge. corn from Dantzick,
and a great quantity of rice was imported and sold at
4s, per busheU,"
' ' This yeere there was provided by Thomas Aldworth,
alderman, and James CuUimore, of London, haberdasher,
V, shippes laden with corne out of Lyne and Boston, with
wheate, rye, malte, and barley, to the valew of 2,600 U,
worth, and brought to the Cittie of BristoU at the

260

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1586,

chardge of the saied Thomas and James, and did relive
Wales vp Seavorne, and the country about vs, to the
great comfort of aU the people." ^
Aldworth died in 1592, and was buried in All Saints
churoh. He gave by will, proved in Doctors Com
mons, in 1597, lands and tenements to Queen Elizabeth's
Hospital, To the Corporation, reversion of lands for
the poor of this city, and £85 for the poor; £30 for
repairing the roads, £20 to marry poor maids, and 20s,
for two sermons at AU Saints. He also gave a tene
ment in the Barrs, called the Greyhound, let at £1 8s.
per annum ; and two gardens in St, PhUip's parish, each
let at 8s,, in aU per annum £2 4s,
TO BB GIVEN AS FOLLOWS : —
To the prisoners in Newgate in coals  10s.
To do. for three trusses of rye straw  9s,
Do, in bread  3s,
To the Almshouse, Lewin's Mead  10s,
To the Taylor's Almshouse  10s,
To the Churchwards of All Saints for the time being 2s,

£2 4s,

And £4 per annum for ever to the almshouse on St,
James' back. His wife, Alice Cole, gave £12 per
annum to three almshouses in St, James' parish for
ever. In 1604, Alice Cole also gave by wUl £20 per
annum to feoffees, arising out of certain lands, for four
almshouses £4 each and for four sermons ; also £20 per
annum, issuing from the same, to clothe poor boys ; she
also gave £60 to poor decayed householders, and £35 to
be divided between certain ministers.
In 1586 Eichard Dole gave out of a house in the
Shambles (at the corner of the steps that lead from
Bridge street up to St, Mary-le-port church) a sum
towards the repairing of St, Peter's pump for ever.
And in the same year, 1586, April 10th, John Carr gave
by wiU his manor of Congresbury towards founding a
hospital for maintaining and educating poor orphans
and other children, after the manner of Christchurch
Hospital, London.
"This yeere aboute iij, weekes in lent, there was
presented in the house a patente from her ma"" as con-
cerneinge a hospitall to be erected by the name of
Queene Eliz : HospitaU, yssueinge oute of John Carres
landes. Which said HospitaU was the same yeere, by
the gi-eate diUigence and charitable endevour of the
said WiUiam Birde, founded at the Gauntz, and xij.
poore chUdren placed therein for a beginninge of the
sayd good worke, to the which the sayd WilUam Birde
was a bountifuU benefactor and gave therevnto 530/?',
in money for the advancement thereof," ^
Eobert Kitchen was sheriff in the year 1572, In
' Mayor's Calendar, 61-62, = Ibid, 62,

1587 he entertained, at his residence in SmaU street
(now the Water Works offices), the Earls of Leicester and
Warwick, who came at Easter from Bath, The foUow
ing year he was chosen chief magistrate, and during
his mayoralty he attended the funeral of Eobert, Earl
of Leicester, high steward of the city. At the general
thanksgiving to celebrate the destruction of the Spanish
Armada, he attended the Cathedral with the Incor
porated Companies, when the Corporation partook of
the Holy Communion, and, with the charitable and
benevolently disposed, on their return dispersed abroad
and distributed money amongst the poor. Kitchen died
in 1594, leaving a widow, Justyne, and was buried in
the chancel of St, Stephen's, near his first wife, Joan,
who departed 21st January, 1560, He bequeathed a
considerable portion of his property for charitable pur
poses : "to the best benefit and interest of the poor
people within Bristol, and of the town of Kendal, in the
county of Westmoreland." By wUl he gave the Cor
poration £400, to be lent young tradesmen at £25, £10,
and £5 each, interest free, and £7 16s, per annum in
bread to the poor of Christ church, St, Stephen and
Temple; £12 per annum for placing out six poor
children; £2 13s, 4d. per annum towards maintaining a
scholar at Oxford or Cambridge ; £26 per annum to
poor householders of the several parishes in Bristol.
He also gave a handsome salver and ewer of sUver gUt,
which was presented to the chamber by his executors.
The former was stolen during the memorable riots of
1831, and discovered cut into numerous pieces, which
were carefuUy re-united.
Salt, although now an absolute necessity, was a luxury
to the poor at this period ; its value and estimation are
suggested by an ordinance during Kitchen's mayoralty : —
" It is ordained that no person or persons whatsoever presume
to measure any salt within this city, or liberties thereof, but only
the' common measurer of salt, being sworn and appointed there
unto, or otherwise, such person or persons as shall be licensed or
appointed under him by the mayor and aldermen, or the most
part of them, and sworn truly and indifferently to measure salt
between the buyer and the seller, without fraud, cover, or affec
tion, on pain of 40s, for every offence, or twenty days' imprison
ment if he be not able to pay the fine," It was also " ordained
that the office of salt-master shall be given from time to time by
the common consent of the Common Council,"
Concerning salt are two items iUustrating what this
useful commodity had to endure, the swearing and other
official pastimes, before it came into the possession of
the consumer,
"Eichard Chard yt, about 7 months since ye officer of salt
being at Glour, sold him 1217 bushels of Droitvrich salt which by
order ot the justices of the peace for Glousr, was delivered him by
said officer, and that the salt on board the WilUam Drew was at
the key of St, James, there not being any advice to a distrain
thereof.

A,D, 1586.

BRASS PILLARS.

261

" Eichard Chard, dealer in salt in the city of Bristoll, maketh
voluntary oath that about seven months since the officer for the
salt duty in the county of Gloucester sold twelve hundred and
seventeen bushells of Droitwich salt to the informant, which by
order of the last exciseman for the county of Gloucester was de
livered him, and that the salt on board the WilUam Drew at the
key of Bristoll is the same salt delivered him without alteration
or addition, "
The above is written on the outside of a sheet of
paper, endorsed — "A rate for the rebuilding of St,
Werburgh's Church and Tower, 1697,"
In 1730 the salt duty was taken off, upon a gracious
recommendation from the throne, to the great relief of
poor artificers and manufacturers, but not for long ; in
1732 the odious impost was laid on again and mortgaged

"Eobert Kitchen, Alderman, and his wife,
Lieth near this place, closed iu earth and clay ;
Their charities alike in death and life.
Who to the poor gave all their goods away ;
Leaving in trust such men to act the same.
As might in truth perform their good intent.
So that the poor indeed, and eke in name.
To lasting ages in this city meant.
And other places of this city fair.
As Kendall towne and Stockland field both have ;
With Bath, the native place of her first ayre.
The bounty of their gifftes they to them gave."
"In front of the Exchange are erected four piUars
of brass, which, more than a century ago, stood between
the columns which supported the shed or penthouse
caUed the Tolzey, a structure extending the whole

Nos. 2 AND 3. No. 4.
Brass Pillars in front of the Exchange. [Nos. 3 and 3 are almost identical in size and shape.l

for the year, in order to raise £500,000 for the current
expenses, 33, Evans, in 1824, says, "On a beam over the
entrance of the New Market in Broad street (so caUed
from containing butchers' shambles) is the foUowing
carved inscription : — ' This buUding is at the charge of
Eobart Kitchen, late Alderman of BristoU, for the re-
Uefe of the Poor.— E. K. 1598.'
" 1598. The new shambles in Broad street was built
by the executors of Mr, Eobert Kitchen, deceased," ^
Over the vestry door of St, Stephen's church is a '
brass on which is engraved this simple and quaint
epitaph : — Deceased the 5th Sepr,, Anno Domini, 1594,
^ Evans, 160,

length of the north side of AU Saints church, against
which it was raised. At the west end it joined the'
house of the kalendaries, at the base of which was All
Halon conduit. The Tolzey was the place where our
merchant ancestors met for business, and when, in
1771, the pavement in and about it, and also before
the Council-house, on the opposite side of the street,
was altered, the brass piUars were removed to the place
they now occupy, previous to which our merchants paid
for their purchases on them ; hence, I believe, origi
nated the phrase, ' pay down upon the nail,' that is,
upon either of these pillars, which were then caUed

" The first of these pillars of brass (traveUing from
east to west) appears to be somewhat older than the

262

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1587.

rest, and bears on its face a shield charged with a
chevron, but there are no perceptible marks indicating
the colours ; aU traces, also, of an inscription are en
tirely removed. On the pedestal is a small ornamented
band, divided into compartments, containing birds
volant or animals rampant, and beneath it is scroU
work with acorns, StiU lower down, in two bands, is
a leaf ornament, with acorns at intervals. This pUlar
appears to be of a date late in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth, or early in that of James I,
" The second pillar, westward, is inscribed in Latin
on its face, and in Eoman capitals, as near as I can
decipher it,
"'THEY HAVE RELATED THAT WHICH IS UNWORTHY
OF NOTE • WHAT IS WORTHY OF PRAISE THEY
HAVE OMITTED • NO MAN LIVES TO HIMSELF • '
Between this inscription appears a very large Eoman
letter P, extending its entire depth, and under it
appears to be —

" ' HILARLIDATORE D

CLJi DEVS

There have been some other words beneath, but only a
few straggUng letters can now be made out. In a circle
or garter surrounding the above, in the same character,
is — " ' THIS POST IS THE GIFT OF MASTER
ROBERT KITCHIN MERCHANT ¦ SOMETIME
MAIOR AND ALDERMAN OF THIS CITY
WHO DEC • 5 SEPTEMB • 1594 •'
Eound the ujjper edge or rim of the pedestal of this
piUar is inscribed — '"HIS EXECV
TORS WERE FOWER OF HIS SERRYANTS •
lOHN BARKER • MATHEW HAVILAND • ABE
LL KITCHIN • ALDERMEN OF THIS CITY ¦ AN
D JOHN ROWBOROW SHERIFF 1630 •'
Encircling the face of the third pillar is —
" ' PRAIS THE LORD O MY SOYLE AND FORGE
T NOT ALL HIS BENEFITS HE SAVED MV
LIFE FROM DESTRYCTION AND TO HIS
MERCY AND LOVING KINDNESS • PRAISE . , , '
And round the rim, or upper edge, beneath is —
" ' 4- THOMAS HOBSON OF BRISTOL MADE ME ANNO
1625 • NICHOLAS CRISP OF LONDON GAVE ME • TO
THIS HONORABLE CITTY IN REMEBRANCE OF G
ODS MERCY IN ANNO DOMINI • 1625 • N C ¦ '
Inscribed round the face of the fourth piUar is —
"'AD • 1 63 1 • THIS IS THE GIFT OF Mr GEORGE
WHITE OF BRISTOL MERCHAUNT BROTHER
VNTO DOCTOR THOMAS WHITE A FAM
OVS BENEFACTOR TO THIS CITIE • '
' Probably part of a date.

And upon the rim beneath is —
" 'THE CHVRCH OF THE LIVINGE GOD IS THE
PILLAR AND GROVND OF THE TRVETH
SO WAS THE WORKE OF THE PILLARS
FINISHED • '
There appear to have been engraved on the face of this
piUar six lines in verse and a shield, the latter most
probably bearing the arms of WTiite, but the whole is
greatly obUterated, There is no ornament whatever on
the pedestals of the three last-mentioned piUars." ^
Two ships were wrecked at the river's mouth about
this date — one, "the Mayflower, belonging to Mr. Thomas
James and others, caught fire through the negligence
of a servant, and was with difficulty quenched by
scuttUng, In the end she was recovered again, new
repaired, and caUed then the Pleasure, and proved a
good, stout, warlike vessel. The other ship, caUed the
Seabrake, was freighted for Bordeaux, made a good
voyage and came to Kingroad, for joy whereof the com
pany feU a tippling until they were aU drunk, thought
the ship had struck against a rock and was ready to
sink, whereupon they aU forsook the ship, leaving her
riding at anchor. That night and next day such storms
of wind arose that she dragged anchor and was driven
on shore, and so beaten with tempest that she sunk
indeed ; such Was the vehemency of the weather no ship
or boat durst go out to help her,"
In 1587 Edward Whitson, of Newlands, a tanner,
" wanted to ship a cargo of caU skins in the French ship
Esperanm, which then lay in Kingroad ; but Thomas
James, with other Bristol merchants, had obtained from
the queen a patent by which they and only they could
ship calf skins from Bristol, Kingroad was, by 47
Edward IIL, 1373, a part of the port of Bristol, and
Edward Whitson was decidedly in the wrong ; neverthe
less he loaded a wood bush with his skins, and, with
Walter Ely and nine others, weU fitted with bows and
arrows, pikes, targets and privy cotes, suspecting blows
might happen, floated down the Severn from Brock-
were, But Thomas James, with Thomas White and
John Brunsdon, his feUow merchants, and ten others,
were on the look out in the searcher's pinnace, James
having a musket, and the others half-pikes and other
offensive weapons, hoping to meet the said wood bush
and to make seizure and forfeit of the prohibited goods.
The forest men were bold and resisted, arrows were shot
at the pinnace, whereby Thomas White and others were
hurt; hot-headed Thomas James shot at and kUled John
Gethin, the master and owner of "the wood bush, and aU
was dismay. For this the sheriffs arrested James and
seized upon his goods, and also on those of his con-
' Pryce, 291-3.

A.D. 1588.

CIVIC NOTICES.

263

federates. James was indicted for the offence and
arraigned at Southwark, but no evidence appearing
against bim he was released, but it cost him much
besides his trouble.
And now men girded up their loins to meet an im
minent calamity and to repel the most powerful naval
force the world had then seen, the Spanish Armada,
which was destined to invade their land. Bristol fur
nished four weU fitted out men-of-war, with full com
plements of brave men and plenty of ammunition, which
she despatched to Plymouth, there to join Her Majesty's
fleet, these were aU "ship-shape, Bristow fashion," and
were named the Great Unicorn, the Minion, the Handmayde
and the Ayde. AU the canvas which had been brought
for sale at St, James' fair and was laid out in the Back
hall was taken up and sent on to TUbury, to make tents
for her Majesty and her brave soldiers. Then
" Eight sharp and quick the bells aU night rang out from Bristol
town.
And ere the day three hundred horse had met on Clifton down."
The Armada came, but the brave EngUsh tars hung
on the skirts of the huge fleet, seizing every oppor
tunity to attack the Spaniards, whom they UteraUy
worried to their destruction. On the 24th day of
November, 1.588, the whole population turned out and
fiUed the churches to thank God for his great deUver-
ance in answer to a nation's prayer. The mayor, John
Barnes, with Eobert Kitchen, at the head of the Incor
porated Companies attended the Cathedral, and received
the Holy Communion, Mens' hearts were opened by
their escape from perU, and the wealthy everywhere
feasted the poor,
34. WUUam Bird, draper, who was sheriff in 1573,
when Elizabeth visited the city, was mayor in 1589,
and was made an alderman on the 15th October, 1590,
He was a great benefactor to the new Queen's Hospital,
founded by Carr, During his mayoralty the school was
opened, with 28 boys, in the Mansion house, together
with the cloisters of the good men of St. Mark, in
Orchard street, the lease of which was purchased by
him. Including this purchase, his gift ainounted to
£530. He also obtained from the Corporation as a
gift to the school a duty for eight years of 4d. for
every ton of lead, 4d. for every ton of iron, and 2d. for
every piece of raisins that was landed upon the quays.
He had previously given £50, or rather lent it for ever
at 10 per cent, interest, but in order to stimulate others
to the like good work he freely forgave the payment
thereof. At his death his son, regretting that his father had
not remembered the hospital in his wiU, requested his
wife, after his own decease, to present to the governors a

piece of plate as a token of his affection. This she did
in 1599. It is an elegant grace cup with cover, weigh
ing 30 ounces, and is now in the possession of the
Corporation, During his mayoralty a waterman, named Ferris,
for a wager, rowed from London to Bristol by sea in
his wherry. He left London on Midsummer-day and
came up the Avon at half-ebb on August 3rd, against
the tide. He and his boat were carried in triumphant
procession to the Tolzey, and the wherry was put as a
monument of British pluck and perseverance in the
GuUdhaU. Bird died on the 8th October, 1590. He
left his wife 1,000 marks, together with his house and
furniture. He was buried in the church of St, Mark,
In 1590 the mantle of authority feU on John
Hopkins, fishmonger. He was again chosen mayor
in 1 600, and elected M,P, the foUowing year.
At the successful expedition against Cadiz, in 1595,
commanded by Howard, Lord High Admiral, and the
Earl of Essex, one thousand of the nobility and gentry
serving as volunteers,
John Hopkins, fishmonger, sett forth a shippe, and in persone
went captaine to Cades action. At whose returne he was with
much joy mett by the citizens on Durdham downe, aud in the
evening was a gathering of much people in the streetes, and
rejoycings of lamps of divers colours and tallow candells, and a
greate bonfire at the High Crosse, very beautifuU to beholde !
1595. Paide for a draught of wood to make a bonfire at the
High Crosse at the glad tidings of Cades, vjfZ.
John Hopkins gave by deed to the Society of Mer
chants £10, they paying 13s. 4d. per annum to the
Merchants' almshouse.
The revived act that no one shaU be Mayor more
than once was dormant in 1592, on the second election
of Thomas Aldworth, an enterprising merchant, to the
municipal chair. Himself and family are particularly
distinguished by their adventurous spirit in the coloni
sation of Newfoundland, When mayor, in 1582, he
advised Sir Francis Walsingham of the merchants'
intention to provide 1,000 marks and two ships, of 60
and 40 tons, for discoveries on the coast of America,
He also, in 1586, represented the city in Parliament,
He died in 1598, and by wiU left £108 for charitable
purposes, Barrett says that in the chancel of the church of St.
Mark "there is a very grand carved freestone Gothic
arched tomb and monument, with the figure of a man
in an alderman's gown, with a son behind him, with
the foUowing epitaph on a table : — ' Thomas Aldworth,
obiit Februarii 25, anno 1598,' " &c. Both figures are
depicted in the attitude of prayer.
During the mayoralty of Thomas Aldworth it was
ordained :

264

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1593.

That no taverner nor vintner shall suffer any person to spend
his time in drinking, or iu any unlawfuU exercises, in any of
their houses after the Bow-bell ceaseth ringing noine of the clock
at night at St, Nicholas church in the winter, or after the hour of
ten of the clock at night stricken by the clock at St, Nicholas
church in the summer season. Any taverner or vintner doing the
contrary to forfeit ten shillings, &o.
Michael PepwaU was mayor in 1593-4, when the
Corporation stood upon their dignity in the matter of
robes of office. Points, laces, and slashed jerkins, with
barrel-breeches are disaUowed, and
It is ordained that if any alderman shall come to the place of
audience or to the place of justice, at the Tolzey or the Guildhall,
in any other fasljion gown than an alderman's gown of the gravest
sort, he shall forfeit and pay to the Mayor and Commonalty, or
to the Chamberlain, to their use, 6s, 8d. And in like manner
every of the Ccmmon Council which shall come to the assembly
in the Council-house in any other gown than of the gravest
fashion, worn commonly of those that have been sheriffs, shall
forfeit and pay 6s. 8d,
"This yeere [1594] Thomas Aldworth, alderman, did buy to
the use of the commones of this cittie, from Christmas till Mychell-
mas foUowinge, 1,200 Ii. worth of wheate and rye, and did bringe
and caused to be brought into the markett euery markett dale a
quantitie, and thother dales did serve the Commons of the cittie,
to the greate good of the whole comunaltie of the cittie, as by
accompt maye be seene.
" This yeare [1596] all manner of corne was deere, and Mr. John
Whitsuue, of the citty of Bristoll, merchant, did buy of Mr.
Thomas Offeley, of London, merchant, 3000 quarters of Dausk
rye for the prouision of this cittie, which rye ariued here in the
moneth of July, and was presently sould, and there was clearely
gained thereby seauen hundred pounds, a great part whereof was
spent in procuring an Act ot Parliament for Ophants [Orphans]
causes, Mr. George Snigg, Eecorder, and Mr, Alderman Ellis
beinge then Burgeises of the Parliament for this cittie; and the
resedue of the money remained to the Mayor and Commonaltie,"'
In 1594-5 John Corsley, a goldsmith, and one
Saunders, were taken up in Bristol for coining Spanish
money ; but they were not executed.
That fish were plentiful in the Avon at this time is
evident, for we are told that in September, 1592, a
great porpoise was taken in the river between the
bridge and the castle, and another was caught in 1600
between Gib Taylor and Eownham, These had followed
the salmon.
1594. From an old account book in this year we
copy the foUowing items :
Mar, 26th, — Pd, for 104 lbs, of butter out of Gloucestershire,
whereof 16 lbs, at 3^d., the rest at 3d, lb. Salt for same 6d,
Carriage of same from Bristol to London, 4s, Gd. 4 lb, soap, lOc^,
In 1595 the queen granted the ulnage of drabs and
the farm of the subsidy in both Gloucester and Bristol
to Eobert Webbe for the annual rent of £72 6s, 8d.
Alderman John Brown, who had been mayor in 1572,
bequeathed for the poor of St, Nicholas, including
those in the almshouse, £30 6s. Od. per annum,
1 Mayor's Calendar, 62-3,

Francis Knight, mercer, was mayor in 1594, and
again in 1613, He is only noticeable from an ordinance
passed during his mayoralty : —
It is ordained that no artificer or handicraftsman within this
city or liberties thereof shall at any time retain or set on work
any foreigner or stranger to the Uberties of this city which shall
resort here having wife or children in the city or elsewhere, upon
pain that any person who shall so, retain or set on work any such
foreigner or stranger contrary to the merit and meaning of this
present ordinance, shall forfeit and pay to the chamberlain, to the
use of the maj'or and commonalty, 6s. 8d. for every week that
such foreigner be so retained or set to work. And that this ordi
nance shall be endorsed on every ordinance of the company's
within this city. And that this ordinance be also observed by all
innkeepers and victuallers within the city and the liberties there
of, excepting only during the fairs holden within the city.

Guard House

The Guard house passage, in Wine street, demolished
in 1881, was the mansion of WiUiam Yate, who was
'mayor in 1596, His device, a gate (a pun upon his
name, Yate or Gate), with the initial W,, was on one
of the brackets of the bow window over the archway,
and upon the other the initials C, B, and the date 1571,
This doorway has been re-erected at Bishopston.
Hunger, which had for two years past been knocking
sharply at every poor man's door, was now master of
the situation, and the executors of good Master Kitchen
came nobly to the rescue. Long be their names held

A,D, 1597.

QUEEN ELIZABETH'S HOSPITAL.

265

in honourable remembrance, together with those of
Thomas Aldworth and WiUiam Whitson, whose liber-
aUty in previous years had carried comfort into many a
destitute home. The executors, John Barker, Matthew
HavUand, Abel Eitchen and John Eowborough, gave
weekly 100 marks for the relief of the poor in divers
parishes. Kitchen's house is now the office of the
Water Works Company [the monogram repeated on
the frieze of the boardroom is that of T, Kelke, who
formerly resided there]. It seems almost like a pre
vision of its destined use that these four good men as
they sat therein should, amongst other methods for
employing the poor, have devoted 20 marks to the
beautifying of the Quay pipe that brought the pre
cious water into the city. Nor were the corporation
idle. It was ordained
That this year aU the men of habilities within this citty were
enjoyned to give one meale of meate to poor people every day,
¦ viz,, some to eight, some to six, and some to two, according to
their habilitie.
Moreover, the Corporation spent £400 in purchasing
land and buUding a new market for corn, out of the
rents of which £20 yearly was to be spent in appren
ticing poor lads to trades. The Quay conduit and All
Saints conduit were re-buUt and finished by 1601,
"In 1597 John Andrews, Customs' officer, wrote to
Secretary CecU, undertaking to purchase in the counties
of Monmouth and Glamorgan, and deliver in Bristol by
a certain date, 400 barrels of butter, for £3 a barrel of
2161bs, of butter each, to be transported to Ireland,^
This was at the rate of less than 3^d. a pound, a price
at which we find, a year or two before, butter was
usuaUy retaUed, In contrast to this, to take for ex
ample a high modern price, a riot took place on March
23, 1811, in the Bristol market, in consequence of fresh
butter being advanced to 2s, &d. a pound, a price that
it nearly attained to in 1871, In 1811 the average
price of bread was Is, a quartern," ^
WiUiam Whitson was sheriff in 1590, when the
queen granted a charter to Queen Elizabeth's Hospital
(City school), and in 1597 an Act of Parliament was
passed in its favour. This charter has a miniature por
trait of the queen, which conveys a higher idea of her
inteUectually than do most of her portraits.
An old MS. says: — "Eggs were two a penny, and
other wares excessive dear. Wheat was 20s,, and malt
and rye 10s, per bushel,"
In 1601, when WiUiam Vawer, cardmaker, was
mayor. It is ordained that every personne which have bene or shaU
1 Dom, State Papers, EUz,, 1595-7, 359,
'^ Taylor's Book about Bristol, 390,
[Vol, L]

bee Maister of the Companie of Drapers shall bee at liberty to
keep three apprentices the saide occupation, and everie other
householder and widow of the saide Companie shaU be at libertie
to keep two apprentices, any article contained in their ordinances
or orders granted to the saide Companie to the coutrarie notwith
standing, and no person or personnes to keepe above the same
number Umited by the present ordinance, upon paine to forfeit
and paye to the Chamberlaine the sum of 20s, for every month
that suche person or personus shall take or kepe any apprentice
contrary to this ordinance.
That when any office was to be bestowed on any person by the
Mayor, Aldermen and Common Council of this city, that then
the Mayor for the time being shall first give orders to his Sergeants
to summon every person of the Common Council to make his
appearance before the Mayor in the Council-house, so that there
may be a whole House warned, and none be left unsummoned by
the Mayor's directions for any purpose whatsoever, upon paine
that the Mayor for the time beinge, which shaU be in default or
deal partially or indiscretly herein contrary to the intent of this
ordinance, shall forfeit to the Chamberlaine the sum of one hun
dred pounds, to the use of the Maior aud Commonalty of this city.
We have said that in 1590 Gaunt's Hospital, the
beautiful chapel of which had been used as a granary
by the Corporation in times of public scarcity, was con
verted into Queen Elizabeth's Hospital, or school for
poor infants and orphans, born and to be born in the
city of Bristol, or within the manor of Congresbury,
On the 20th of June, 1599, Alderman John Whitson
was appointed by the Council one of a committee of
six "to survey the lands and see what money may be
made by granting estates (out of the lands devised by
Carr) in reversion for years determinable on Uves."
By wiU dated 29th October, 1601, Lady Eamsay,
relict of the Lord Mayor of London in 1557, and a
daughter of WiUiam Dale, sheriff of Bristol in 1519,
gave £1,000 to be laid out in lands for the benefit of
this charity; and in 1602 Whitson purchased lands in
Winterbourne, of the then yearly value of £100 with
the above, and £400 additional, of which £200 was
contributed by Mrs. Ann Coulston. Whitson also
agreed to receive from Eichard Winter the sum of
£50 towards the above payment, and assured to the
Hospital at Lawford's Gate £3 per annum for ever on
account of the gift, but this appears to have fallen
through ; at aU events it is untraceable.
The Eed Lodge and Sir John Young's Great House
were sold, in 1598, to Nicholas Strangeways, of Bradley,
in the county of Gloucester, the stepson of Sir John,
35, In 1602, the inhabitants were taxed to pay for
the queen's entertainment. This entry is inexplicable,
her Majesty had not visited the city since 1574, and one
can scarcely conceive that the expenses had not long ere
this been paid, unless the foUowing may explain it : —
Sir John Stafford, knight, as a reward for his valour,
had been made constable of Bristol castle. On March
6tli this year the mayor and commonalty presented a
s 2

266

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1598,

petition to her Majesty and the Privy Council repre
senting the loose manner in which Sir John held his
office, being non-resident and leaving a mean and un
worthy deputy, who suffered forty-nine families, con
sisting of 240 persons, to inhabit the Castle, who sub
sisted chiefly by begging and stealing; and praying
that Sir John might be made to take order for removing
them into such places where they last dwelt, and that
none should be aUowed to inhabit there but only such
as he would undertake for their sufficiency and good
behaviour; to the end that the city be not further
charged or molested, nor her Majesty's castle pestered
with any such base cottagers or scandalous inmates.
It wiU be remembered that the mayor had no power to
arrest or foUow by his officers any offender who sought
refuge in this Alsatia, Probably the above tax was
intended to get the Queen or her privy counciUors to
"entertain" this jpetition. Sir John died September
28th, 1605, and was buried at Thornbury, where he
resided. The Stafford knot is a conspicuous ornament
in many parts of the castle of Thornbury,
Bristol was the chief port for shipment to Ireland,
hence when troubles arose in the Green Isle it was the
general route for the troops despatched to that country.
In 1589, on a report that the Spaniards intended to
land there, 400 soldiers were sent from this port, who
returned hither two months later. In April, 1595, the
Lord-General Norris passed through with a troop of
horse, and out of an army of 20,000 men sent to put
down the rebeUion of the Earl of Tyrone a very large
proportion were shipped from Bristol,
Contrary winds often detained the troops. In
November, 1596, 750 soldiers were waiting for a fair
wind seven weeks in this city, and then were all dis
charged. In May, 1597, came 800, in July, 1598, 800
more, in February, 1599, 1,000 foot and 100 horsemen,
and in March 1,200 foot and 600 Welshmen, under
Southampton, Eutland and Sir H, Danvers, In January,
1600-1, 400 soldiers were here on their way to Ireland,
in February came 800 more, and on the 17th of August,
1601, Florence Macarta and James Desmond, two great
rebels, were taken prisoners in Ireland, brought to
Bristol, from thence sent to London where they were
committed to the Tower, "Desmond had an English boy
manacled to him by strong irons by the handwrists,"
In 1602 the Earl of Tinmouth passed through Bristol
with 1,012 soldiers for Ireland, The mayor, Eichard
Hunt, grocer, had much trouble in shipping them off,
frays by night with the citizens were common, but the
soldiers mostly had the worst of it. On May 26th,
when they were about to take barge to go down the
river they drew their weapons against the mayor in the

Marsh, whereupon the town bell was rung by the
sergeants-at-mace, the citizens seized their weapons,
the apprentices their clubs, and rushed to the rescue;
the mUitary fared but Ul, many of them were sorely
hurt, one man was kiUed, and the rest took boat as fast
as they could, but not untU the ringleaders were ar
rested and imprisoned. The next day "three of the
soldiers had judgment of execution in the High street
upon a gibbet, whither they were brought with con
stables and halters about their necks ; and when one of
them, being mounted, had prayed and prepared to die,
their pardon was begged and they released," ^ This
was history repeating itself to the letter, for one of the
Calendars, under date 1599, says: " The mayor received
a blow with a stone from a soldier as he endeavoured to
force them aboard, being unruly. The man was con
demned but not executed, because the mayor would not
lay his death to him,"^ Also on Whitsun eve there
came 800 soldiers for Ireland under the command of
Sir Edward Wingfield, these sailed June 30th.
36. "This queen [Elizabeth] did not have a mint at
Bristol, and consequently none of her coins require de
scription here,
"In the third year of her reign, 1560-61, the base
shiUings issued by Edward VI, were decried. Those of
the better sort (made of 6oz, sUver to 6oz, aUoy) were
ordered to pass current for fourpence halfpenny each,
and to be counter-marked with a portcuUis before the
king's face ; whUe the shUlings of baser metal (3oz,
silver to 9oz, aUoy) were to pass for twopence farthing
only, and to be marked with a greyhound.
"I find among the Domestic State Papers of EUza
beth, vol, XVL, No. 10, an original letter from WiUiam
Carr, mayor of Bristol, to the Privy Council, dated
Bristol, 30th January, 1561, In this letter Carr states
that £1,000 in new money had been sent down to Bristol
by the queen, to be distributed to the poor, in exchange
for the base money issued by Edward VI. Two London
goldsmiths, Francis Eton and Eobert WeUs, were sent
down in charge of the money, taking with them a letter
from the Privy CouncU, The exchange of the base
money was declared by the council to be sevenpence in
the pound only. An account of the exact sum spent,
and showing the rates at which the base money was
exchanged, is enclosed in the mayor's letter. I give an
exact copy of this : —
"BristoU, A note of the p'ticlar somes of base monyes ex
changed into new monies by ffraunces Eton and Eobert wells,
begone the xxv"" daie of January A" 1560 and ended the
xxx"! of the same moneth,
" In primis in peces of ij'* q"* — xlvj m' v'' xlvj peces amounting to
iiij" xxxvj", vij' iiij'* ob,
1 Seyer II,, 242, ^ /j,y, 243,

A,D, 1594.

COINAGE.

267

" In pecis of iiij'* ob. — xij m' iiij'^ Ixxij peces. ..ij" xxxiij", xvij',
"In pecis of j* ob, — I uij m' viij" v pecis.., iij" xlij**, x', vij ob.
Some,, . j m' xij". xv^ . . y^nm^.^ Carr mayor,
"The first item in this account (46,546 pieces at
2ld., amounting to £436 7s. 4id.) refers to the base
shiUings of Edward VI. that were countermarked with
a greyhound; the second item (12,472 pieces at 4^d.,
amounting to £233 I7s,) refers to the shiUings of better
sUver which were marked with a portcuUis ; and I sup
pose that the last amount (£342 lOs, T^d. in 54,805
pieces at l^d.) refers to the base groats of Edward VI,'s
first coinage. The total was a Uttle over the sum sent
by the councU, being £1,012 15s.
"This interesting Uttle document has never before
been pubUshed, and is, I beUeve, the only contemporary
account existing relating to the caUing-in of Edward
VI.'s base coins,
"In 1594 the mayor and corporation of Bristol re
ceived a Ucence from Queen Elizabeth to make ' farthing
tokens, which were struck in copper, with a ship on the
one side and C, B. on the other, signifying Civitas Bristol.
These went current (for smaU things) at Bristol and ten
mUes about.' Also, ' on the 12th of May, 1594, a letter
was sent (by the Privy CouncU) to the mayor and alder
men of Bristol, requiring them to caU in aU the private
tokens which had been stamped and uttered by divers
persons within that city, without any manner of authority,
and which they many times refused to accept again.
The mayor, &c,, were required, by authority of that
letter, henceforth to restrain them, and, in the names
signed to that letter, straitly to charge and require them
to change the same for current money, to the value they
were first uttered by them ; and that none should make
the same without Ucence from the mayor, &c., who were
to take especial care that the former abuses were duly
reformed,' ^
"A few of the farthing tokens struck by the mayor and cor
poration of Bristol in Elizabeth's reign, according to the Ucence
above mentioned, are stUl preserved, but they are very rare. An
engraving of one is given on p, 88 of Boyne's Tokens of the Seven
teenth Century, 8vo, 1858, It is lozenge-shaped, and is stamped
on the obverse with the arms of Bristol (a ship issuing from a
castle) on a square shield, surrounded by a beaded circle. On the
reverse, C. B,, in large letters, also within a beaded circle, A
specimen of this token, in copper, is in the British Museum, as
well as another example nearly half its size, but otherwise similar.
The smaUer token has, however, no signs of a shield on the
obverse. The date of both is supposed to be about 1600, [In
1880 one of each kind, together with a copper farthing of Eliza
beth, 1601, were dredged up in the Floating harbour,] This latter
coin bears obverse the inscription Elizabeth dei geatia round a
shield, with E,E, on the field on each side thereof. Reverse, harp
crowned with date, 1601. PosuiT deum adjutorem mbdm. This
rare-coin is engraved in Ruding, Sup. part IL, pi. v., Nos, 6, 7,
' Eev, E, Piuding's Annals of the Coinage,

Bristol Farthing, 150k.

"It is con
sidered by col
lectors tha
these Bristol
farthings ar
the earliest
English tokens,
and the only
ones sanctioned by the state before the 18th century." ^
About the year 1503 blanche poudre (white refined
sugar) was invented by a Venetian, Within a few years
the Bristol merchants were importing it, but it was so
scarce and valuable that a loaf of sugar formed a hand
some present to a judge, lord-lieutenant, or even to a
king. The Bristol channel was infested with pirates, with
whom unscrupulous men trafficked freely whenever a
ship of that character appeared off the coast. In 1548
a reward of 400 crowns was offered for Eichard Cole,
of Minehead, a pirate (quick or dead). Cole escaped
to Ireland, where he petitioned the lord-deputy, and
was aUowed to come in and submit to the king's mercy.
He was employed in reducing the castle of Straughan,
and then in attacking a rebel chieftain named Savage,
Being successful in both instances, he was pardoned.
In 1587 Nicholas Herbert, Esq,, John Thomas Bener
and WUUam Eichards, of Cardiff, were accused as aiders
of pirates, and were examined touching the lading and
victualling of them and buying of their goods, Colin
Dolphin, of evU fame for his exploits as a pirate in the
Bristol channel, was taken by Sir Edward StradUng, of
St, Donyatt's, who hanged him.
In 1593 the mayor of Lyme obtained a warrant from
the lord admu-al to seize a caravel belonging to Thomas
Alworthy and Thomas Ware, of Bristol, which the crew
had seized and carried off and sold. The purchasers
changed her name to the Tobacco Pipe, and sent her out
as a privateer,
Bristol did an export trade in coal at this period,
"On the 19th July, 1569, the ship Grace of God entered
the cobb of Lyme with coal from Bristol, and paid port
dues 3s, 4d. The same year the corporation of that
town paid to Hugh, of Bristol, for playing the organ in
the church (and at my house). Is, 5d.
"Signed, "E, Davis,
"Mayor of Lyme,"
"On March 24th, 1603, Queen EUzabeth died, having
reigned 44 years 4 months and 6 days, and on the same
day in London, and in this city on the 28th of the same
month. King James was proclaimed king by Mr, George
Snigge, Eecorder,"^ 1 Henfrey, 301, » Old MS,

CHAPTER X.

PART I.

I. The Accession of James I. John Whitson, Mayor. Dearth; Plague; State of the Country, etc.
2. Whitson denounces Purveyance; becomes Member of Parliament; his conduct in the House, etc. 3. Great
Flood in Bristol and the West. 4. Census of the City. 5. The Severn Frozen over. ' Great Dearth.
6. Robert Aldworth, Mayor. Visit of the Duke of Brunswick. 7. Dr. Thomas White's Gifts. Great
Drought, etc. 8. James' Queen (Anne) visits Bristol. 9. Bristol Incidents: City Library founded;
Shooting Contest with the Men of Exeter; Dispute as to Precedence in the Council. 10. John Guy, of
Bristol, colonises Newfoundland. Whitson and the House of Commons. 11. The Struggle between James
and the People. 12. Incidents. Corn Market built. Well sunk in Wine Street. Coins of the Reign.
Death of James. 13. Proclamation of Charles I. The Turkish Ambassador present. Differences
between Charles and the People. 14. First Artillery Ground in Bristol. Whitson stabbed: his Death,
Tombs, etc. 15. The King grants an Inspeximus. Loyalty on the wane. Sanitary condition of Bristol.
16. The City purchases the Castle. Conflict between the Crown and the Common Council. 17. Bristol Items.
18. Ship Money demanded. Bristol versus Liverpool. Special Commission. Hardships inflicted on the
Citizens, ig. Sketches of the Mayors. The Plague. Corsairs in the Bristol Channel, etc. 20. Constitu
tionalism in the ascendant. Trimmers. Bristol garrisons Duncannon. Misgovernment in Ireland Charles
raises his standard. 21. Bristol prepares for War. 22. The Lines of Defence around the City.
23. Aldworth refuses admission to the Royalist troops. The Constitutionalists enter the City. 24. Petition
to the King : his answer. 25. Fiennes succeeds Col. Essex as Governor of Bristol. 26. Mrs Carey's
vision. Excesses of the Puritan party. 27. Yeomans and Boucher fail in their attempt to seize the City
Narrative of one who escaped. Cruel death of the Royalist leaders. 28, The Battles of Lansdown and
Roundway. Prince Rupert storms Bristol. 29. Fiennes' defence of his conduct. 30. Bristol under
the Royahst regime. Charles' residence. 31. Bristol Coins of Charles I. Prince Charles in Bristol
as Comumswnev of the West. Moneys extracted by both parties. 32. Cromivell and his Officers.
3i. The Second Siege of Bristol. 34. Various Assaults; the Lines stormed, Prior's Hill Fort captured,
and surrender of Ritpert.

A,D. 1603,

THE ACCESSION OF JAMES I.

269

pAMES I,, when he left Scotland to ascend
the English throne, was thirty-six years
of age. He was proclaimed at the High
Cross in Bristol by Mr. Eecorder Snigge
on the 28th March, 1603. The plague
had once again desolated the city; on the
1 8th of the previous July it broke out in
Pepper aUey, Marsh street, and during
the year it swept off 2,600 persons, whUst
those who died from all other causes combined only
numbered 395. AU the known precautions had been
taken to prevent its entry. No person was aUowed to
enter the gates without a clean bUl of health. The
merchants who attended St. James' fair had to come
provided with a certificate that the house from which
their goods were brought was not infected, or had been
free for at least six weeks; nevertheless the pestilence
entered, and made deadly havoc. The miserable sur
vivors were taxed 2s. in the pound for the expenses of
this visitation.
The mayor this year was John Whitson, a man whose
whole life warrants our placing him amongst the earUest
and best of Bristol's phUanthropists, as weU as one of the
fastest and sturdiest champions of constitutional liberty.
When thirteen years of age he, a poor lad from the Forest
of Dean, carrying his aU in a pocket-handkerchief, came
to Bristol and apprenticed himself to Nicholas Cutts, a
wine-cooper, in Nicholas street; marrying in due course
Bridget, his master's daughter, he succeeded to the
business, which was carried on upon the site of the back
entrance to the Athenseum.
Scrupulously conscientious in his dealings, he lived
up to the "golden rule" and prospered in aU his affairs.
During Parfey's mayoralty Whitson had been commis
sioned to buy a large quantity of corn for the relief of
the city ; ere it could be delivered the market f eU, and
the mayor and aldermen cried off the bargain, offering
Whitson £8 2s, Q)d, for his expenses, and teUing him he
must bear half the loss ; but ere the ships arrived corn
had risen again to 48s. per quarter, and the market stiU
going up Whitson could have made £3,000 profit by
the transaction, whereupon the authorities offered him
£50 if he would return to the original bargain. He
consented on certain conditions; large quantities were
distributed amongst the starving poor, the rest was sold
at below the market rate within twenty days, and the
Corporation after aU had a balance of £774 on the
transaction, Whitson had served as sheriff in 1590, In 1597,
another year of dearth, he went to London to buy corn

for the poor, and on his return it was ordered that every
alderman and burgess should, at their own houses, pro
vide food for a certain number of poor persons, each
according to his abUity, In 1 599, when forty-two years
of age, he was made an alderman; this year, as wUl be
seen by our article on the Schools of Bristol, he was
very active, as one of a committee of six, in the affairs
of Queen Elizabeth's Hospital, During his mayoralty,
in October, 1603, the heaviest faU of snow on record
occurred ; the trees, not having shed their leaves, were
broken down, and the orchards were utterly destroyed
in many parts of the west country,
2, Soon after James' accession the Puritan clergy
(who are synonymous with the Evangelicals of the
present age), to the number of 800, presented a petition
to him in which they prayed that certain things in the
worship and discipUne of the church should be amended;
the most notable of these were the quaUfication of the
clergy, the sanctity of the Sabbath, reformation of the
Ecclesiastical courts, enforced residency of the clergy,
that the lessons from the Apocrypha and the bowing at
the name of Jesus should not be enforced, and that in
future subscription should be restricted to the doctrines
of religion and to the king's supremacy. The king's
answer was, "If you aim at a Scotch Presbytery it agrees
as weU with monarchy as God with the devil." To the
other party [the bishops] he said, "If you are out and
they are in I know what wiU become of my supremacy
, . . , for no bishop, no king," The king's mockery of
their petition soon reached every Puritan fireside, and
produced the foUowing determination : "We are driven
from the court, now we must look to our footing in
Parliament; the elections are at hand, we wiU appeal
to the constituencies." Thus commenced the struggle
between the court and the country party, which ended
so disastrously for the Stuarts,
The Puritans must not be confounded with the Non
conformists, Although ultimately driven, many of them,
into separation, they, the fathers of the constitutional
movement, were, both clergy and laity, members of the
National church, their ministers were aU university
men, and the parish church was endeared to them by
haUowed sacraments and religious services, their funda
mental rule was that aU matters of church polity should
be based on Scriptural authority alone. This y«<s divinum
claim was met by James with another, "the divine right
of bishop and king."
With the Puritans were joined the Patriots, a less
numerous but more distinguished body, men who re
garded the safety of the nation as inseparable from the

270

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1603.

safety of its Protestantism, men who were jealous of
any encroachment by the clergy on the province of the
magistrate, who regarded Eomanism as hostUe to civil
freedom and social improvement, and who would, many

seizing, in any market, provisions for the king's use.
Corn, meat, every description of food, wood, &c,, they
took at their own prices, to be paid for when it suited
the king. Carts, horses, carriages, ships, were impressed

of them, have crushed
by force the papal system
as a power which invaded
the conscience and des
troyed the soul. Coke,
Selden and Pjmi are well-
known names amongst
the talented leaders of
this the united Constitu
tional party, and now, in
1605, John Whitson was
sent by Bristol to the
House of Commons to
aid them in the struggle
for liberty.The great trading
towns had also other
grievances which pressed
upon the mercantUe class
in the form of commercial Mural Decorations of a Dormitory
monopolies, unjust impositions and restrictions and
purveyance. Purveyance had been for generations an
acknowledged grievance, though no one spoke out
and denounced it as against the spirit of the con
stitution. When the wants of the king's household
could not be supplied from the royal demesnes, a body
of officers, caUed Purveyors, had the right by custom of

m the Deanery, Temp. James I.

in the same manner.
This power was grossly
abused, EUzabeth in her
day caUed the purveyors
"Harpies," but it became
an intolerable evU under
James, and Bacon says,
"These purveyors, under
their commission from the
Board of Green Cloth,
lived at free quarters on
the country ; terrifying
dealers by their claims of
immense quantities of
provisions at an insuffi
cient price, out of which
they made a profit ; cut
ting down woods without
the owners' permission,
and even demanding the

labourers to work for them at their own grinding rate
of payment," Whitson, as mayor, denounced the exercise of this
despotic prerogative, and initiated an opposition, which
was begun in this Parliament by Thomas James, one
of the members for Bristol, and ceased not untU the
obnoxious impost was declared to be iUegal, Vol, I,

A.P. 1603,

WHITSON DENOUNCES PURVEYANCE.

271

of the Journal of the House of Commons, 185, records
that — "Mr. James, of Bristowe, informeth the House
of the proceedings of a Purveyor at Bristowe, of the
opposition made by the Mayor, and of a letter directed
to the Mayor from the offi
cers of the Green Cloth,
upon the Purveyor's com
plaint, the copy of which
letter he produced, and
which was read in the
House as foUoweth : —
"After our hearty commen
dations, &c,, &e. Forasmuch as
by yourself and certain other
Merchants of BristoU an Indict
ment has been framed against
JohnDowles, Esq., his Majesty's
Customer of that Port, for receiv
ing Composition upon Grocery
wares, by virtue of his Majesty's
Commission, and other sufficient
warrant on that behalf, as it is
usual for all other his Highness's
Household Provisions, in great
contempt of His Majesty's most
Eoyal Prerogative, contrary to

we hold to be greatest of all, for that you being Mayor and principal
Magistrate of the said City, would once give consent, or suffer such
audacious proceedings in your Court, the which you ought rather to
have suppressed and severely punished than any way to have main
tained, as in the sequel you shall perceive, if in the meantime you do
not cause good satisfaction to he
made to the said Mr. Dowles, with
acknowledgment of that unadvised
error, which else must be made u
precedent for all future offenders,
the like being never attempted by
any heretofore.
"And so leaving the matter
to your own consideration we
bid you fareweU. The Court of
Whitehall the 20th February,
1603, ' ' Your loving friends
William Knowles,
Edwakd Wolton,
EicHABD Browne,
Barth Fowke,
E, Vernon.
" To our loving friend
John Whytson, Esq,,
Mayor of the City
of Bristol,"

your wonted acknowledgment to our late Sovereign Lady
Queen EUzabeth, of famous memory; although at this time
we have spared to send our Warrant for you as we have done
for the rest, because of your nece-isary residence in that City
(considering the present sickness and mortality wherewith it is now
sore visited, as we are informed) nevertheless you must hereafter
expect to liear from us to answer your own contempt therein, which

Mural Decorations of a Dormitory « the Deanery. Temp, James I.
Bristol may well be proud of this just magistrate and
fearless man, 'whose actions were dictated by principle ;
but hedged in by the plague, and encircled by the stal
wart citizens to whom his humanity had endeared him
no less than his firmness, in throwing open his court to
do justice against the unprincipled officer of the king.

272

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1604.

his conduct had won their approval, and he suffered no
molestation. In 1604, Whitson, James and Kitchen, were ap
pointed to foUow the suit for relieving the city and its
inhabitants from the execution of any commission for
purveying provisions of wine, oU, grocery, or other
foreign commodities, within the said city; to attend the
Lord Treasurer, and the Barons of the Exchequer, and
the King's Council, unto whom the hearing was referred,
to employ such counsel as they thought fit ; and whatever
the said Whitson, James and Kitchen consented to, the
city was to observe.
In 1606, Whitson was requested to travel to London,
with letters for answering and discharging the merchants
of Bristol from the payment of the contribution required
by the Lord Treasurer's letters, directed to the Customs
of Bristol, The said Lord Treasurer was then Thomas
Sackville, Earl of Dorset, and Lord High Steward of
Bristol, The attempt did not then succeed; for the next
year Whitson and James, who were then the members
for the city, were instructed to deal and take such order
as they may to prevent the execution of the commission
for the purveyance of wines in Bristol,
During the mayoralty of Christopher Kedgwin
(1604-5), grocer, on July 12th, the king, at West
minster, conflrmed the Bristol charters of 1559 and
1581, George Snigge and Thomas James were the
representatives in Parliament, and the former was this
year knighted and made one of the barons of the Ex
chequer and Mr, Laurence Hyde was made recorder ;
Pryce confounds him with Nicholas, who, in 1626, was
made lord chief justice of the King's Bench, having been
the previous year chosen member for the city, which he
resigned for the higher dignity. This year the plague
had decreased greatly in virulence, but it stiU lingered ;
150 persons succumbed to it, and a fresh tax of sixpence
in the pound was levied in order to cleanse the city.
This was the year when the authorised version of the
Bible was ordered to be translated. Whitson was elected
as member of Parliament in the place of Snigge, and
the House met on March 1 9th. They shortly after laid
before the king a "form of apology," in which they
reminded him that their privileges and liberties were
their right and inheritance, no less than their very
lands and goods, and that their making request at the
beginning of a Parliament to enjoy them was only an
act of manners, and did not weaken their right. They
practicaUy asserted their privileges in the case of For
tesque, Goodwin and Shirley,
The union of Scotland and England was proposed,
and on the 24th October, 1604, James assumed the
royal title of "King of Great Britain," Happily de

Uvered from the detestable plot of Oatesby, on the 5th
of November, this Parliament began its labours. The
foUowing Acts wUl cause it to be remembered: — An
Act for repressing the odious vice of drunkenness ; the
celebrated 5s, and costs Act (stUl extant) ; an Act by
which common people could not indulge in the kingly
diversion of foul swearing without paying to the poor
I2d. for each oath.
How the graceless king (whom "the courtiers dis
tinguished as Queen James, and his iUustrious prede
cessor by that of King EUzabeth," ^ who was usuaUy
carried to his bed drunk, and whose royal example,
writes Harrington, encouraged the ladies of the court
to "abandon their sobriety and to be seen roUing about
the court in a state of intoxication") coiUd pass this
Act, 4 James I,, c, 5, or say, " Le Roi le veut" to the
latter, whilst he himself was either swearing obscenely,
listening to ribaldry, beating with a stick his servants,
or else kissing and beslabbering his men favourites,
passes comprehension. No wonder such a king hated
the Puritans, i.e., the godly members of the Church of
England, Whitson does not appear to have often spoken in
this parliament, but he was a diligent worker on com
mittees. On February 4th, 1605, he was appointed on
the Spanish Incorporation committee ; on several for pri
vate biUs ; on the one for new making Chepstow bridge
in 1606 ; on the Beer committee ; the Tanners and Cur
riers in 1607; on the importation of logwood; one to
avoid the double payment of debts, 1609. The next
year Dr, John CoweU, king's professor of civU law at
Cambridge, published, by advice of Archbishop Ban
croft, Tlie Interpreter, in which he stated " that the king
was not bound by his coronation oath ; that he needed
not to caU a Parliament, but could make laws by his
own absolute power ; that it was a favour to admit the
consent of his subjects in giving of subsidies," The
Commons, feeling that this was a gross infringement on
the liberties of the subject, determined to prosecute
CoweU, and Whitson was placed on the committee ; but
James interfered and stayed proceedings, by promising
to condemn the author and his doctrines himself. Whit
son served also on the committees to consider and devise
an Act for the suppression of idleness ; the search for
books of the outports, and several others of no great
note. On the 11th of July, 1610, the great debate took
place on the king's demand of £200,000 as a yearly
revenue, and more than £100,000 as compensation for
giving up his feudal revenue. There was a great con
flict of opinion in the Commons as to the amount to be
' Disraeli's Curiosities of Lit,, 282,

A.D. 1605.

GREAT FLOODS IN BRISTOL AND THE WEST.

273

granted; it was finaUy fixed at one subsidy and one-
fifteenth, which amounted to less than one-sixth of the
king's demand. In this debate Whitson spoke, and
that emphaticaUy: — "Mr, Speaker, — I am for granting
one subsidy and no fifteenth." On the question of the
fifteenth the House divided : —

NoesYeas

Majority

129149 20

On July 1 2th he asked leave of the house to depart,
perhaps to carry home the decision of the Court of Chan
cery, passed that day, that the mayor should be always
the special governor of Queen EUzabeth's Hospital,
Unable to wring sufficient money from the dissatis
fied House of Commons, James imposed heavy dues on
merchandise under the authority of the great seal alone,
instead of by Act of ParUament, And now began the
mutterings of the storm, whose thunders roUed louder
and louder, untU the bolt crashed on the head of his
unfortunate son Charles. With an arrogance that was
almost sublime, the king commanded the Commons
" not to enter upon this question, as it touched his pre
rogative;" and, in a rage, he dissolved the house on
February 9th, 1611.
The Earl of Dorset dying m 1607, Eobert CecU, the
poUtic Earl of SaUsbury, succeeded him in his office of
Lord High Treasurer of England ; and the city of Bristol,
with an eye open to the main chance, forthwith elected
him as Lord High Steward of the city ; in 1612 Whitson
was deputed to wait upon his lordship at Bath with the
usual present of wine and sugar, which cost £15 4s. 8d.,
given annuaUy as a compUment to the High Steward,
[This was continued down to the Municipal Eeform Act
of 1835,] Thomas James was mayor in 1605-6; he also re
presented the city in ParUament, and was one of the
commissioners for promoting the union between England
and Scotland. He was mayor for the second time in
1613-14; but being elected again as M,P,, he was aUowed
to vacate the municipal chair, which was filled by
Francis Knight. James died in 1615, and was buried
in the church of St. Mark.
3. When John Barker was mayor, 1606-7, on 20th
January, in the morning at high water the sea, driven
by a violent south-west wind, broke over the banks,
flooding the lowlands on both sides of the Severn,
driving the people to the housetops and the trees for
shelter, where many of them had to remain in that
inclement weather two, and some even three, days, until
they were fetched off by smaU boats despatched from
Bristol by the mayor and corporation. The water in
[Vol. L]

the city was so high that a boat of five tons floated over
the present site of the cab-stand at St, Nicholas church,
and the man in her pushed off from the crypt door
with his oar. In Temple, Thomas and EedcUff streets
it was breast high, and the damage done to the stocks of
the merchants was immense. At Treen MUls (Bathurst
basin) the water was five feet deep on the river bank ;
the flood at ebb tide brought down large quantities of
trees, and the bridge was in great perU, but escaped
without much damage to the houses thereon.
The foUowing account of this disastrous flood is
extracted from a pamphlet written soon after the event,
which is preserved amongst the Harleian MSS,, &c.
It is dated January 27th, 1607 : —
The first bursting of the sea over the banks in prodigiously
high waves was tremendous. The whole vale from Bristol to
Gloucester was overflowed for six miles distance from the river on
both sides, and most of the bridges and buildings were destroyed.
From Chepstow to the further end of Carmarthenshire it came on
so fast that it was supposed 500 persons, on a moderate computa
tion, lost their lives, beside many thousand cattle, and vast num
bers of sheep, hogs, horses and poultry, and many climbed to the
tops of houses, trees and towers, whence they saw their cattle
aud other substance perish, and sometimes their wives and chil
dren, without being able to afford them any assistance.
At Cardiff a great part of the church next the river was carried
away. Children at school and travellers on the road were alike
involved in the general calamity ; if they fled to the housetops or
the tops of the hills they were alike iu danger of perishing with
hunger or cold, but many were involved before they were aware
of their danger. On the English coast the same calamity was
suffered the whole way from Barnstaple to Bridgwater, It is a
most pitiful sight to behold what numbers of fat oxen were
drowned, what flocks of sheep, what herds of kine have been
lost. There is little there remaining now to be seen but huge
waters like to the main ocean ; the tops of churches and steeples
like to rocks in the sea; great ricks of fodder for cattle are
floating Uke ships upon, the water, and dead beasts swimming
thereon, now past feeding on the same. The tops of trees a man
may behold remaining above the waters, on whose branches mul
titudes of turkeys, hens, and other such Uke poultry were fain to
fly up to save their lives, where many of them perished, for want
of relief, not being able to fly to dry land by reason of their
weakness. The famine that foUowed was sore in the land, and
great numbers of people perished for lack of food.
Large imports were made by the merchants ; sixty
ships, freighted with corn, came into Bristol in 1608,
bringing a total of 112,439 bushels, at a cost, as shown
by the books of the Custom-house, of £24,017 5s, ^
Virginia was this year colonised,
4, During the mayoralty of John Barker a census
of the city was taken, and it was found to contain
10,549 people. "This was done because they should
know how much corn would serve the whole by the
week," A dispute between the mayor and corporation
1 Evans, 166, T

274

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1608.

and the cathedral authorities occurred this year, for
particulars of which see Ecclesiastical History, 72,
Barker died suddenly, at the close of his year of
office, on September 1 3th, and the corporation gave him
a pompous funeral in St, Werburgh's church, which
was hung with black, AU the incorporated companies,
together with the municipaUty, attended, and the church
was much damaged by the press of people, A tawdry
monument, bearing on an altar-tomb a coloured effigy
of the deceased in his municipal robes, with gauntlets
and other insignia, marked his last resting-place. The
day after the funeral the chamber chose Eichard Smith,
tanner, as mayor for the remainder of the year. " This
year a fish, 5ft. long by 3ft, wide, was caught in the
river ; it had two hands and two feet, a very wide
mouth, and was caUed a ' Friar,' WiUiam ChUd, the
weU-known Doctor of Music, was born in Bristol this
year; he lived to be ninety years of age. Single
beer was 3s, 4d. per barrel; double beer, 7s, Ale,
3id, per gaUon the best; the second sort, 2d, per
gaUon ; and ' London ' barrels and kUderkins were
aUowed to be made in Bristol," ^ A smith was most
righteously whipped, in the PiUory, for putting out the
eyes of a horse,
5, Matthew Haviland, merchant — born in 1550, was
a native of Poole, Dorsetshire; he married Alderman
Kitchen's daughter, and bought several manors in
Somerset — succeeded Smith, and during his mayoralty
there occurred a frost, which for intensity and duration
appears to have been without paraUel in this country.
It began on November 20th, 1607, and lasted untU the
8th of February foUowing, The temperature had been,
doubtless, gi-eatly lowered by the floods of the previous
year, and the saturated land had no chance of recovery
during a cloudy summer,
"Many of the poor would have perished from hunger and cold
had not the mayor and his brethren, at their own private costs,
distributed bread, wood and straw. The Severn and the Wye
were so thickly frozen that people passed from one side to the
other, A fair was held, and fires made upon the ice and victuals
cooked. Oxen and sheep were roasted whole on the Severn, No
long trows nor wood bushes could come to Bristol, yet the Avon
at the Back and Key, and downwards to Hungroad, was not
frozen. When the ice broke it came down with the tide, doing
much damage to the shipping in Kingrode, The frost made great
havoc with the birds, and did much injury to the com in the
ground," 2
' ' John Boucher, draper, mayor in 1 608-9, has not left
traces of his footprints ; but his widow, who became Mrs,
Catherine Searchfield, gave the corporation, about 1620,
two pairs of candlesticks, snuffers and pan, weighing
lOOoz, lOdwt,, which, in the reign of Anne, when any
thing antique could not be tolerated, were exchanged
1 Tovey's Local Jottings, 2 Old Chronicle,

for a bowl, cover and skinker, weight 60oz,, to which
was added 40oz, and lOdwt,'"- John Fownes left £4
a year for raking and cleaning the walks in the Marsh.
The tavern in High street, kept by Henry Hobson, was
shut up for a fortnight and guarded by watchmen night
and day, because the plague had appeared there.
On Monday, April 10th, the king's uncle, Ludovic
Stuart, Duke of Lennox, came to Bristol, and was
honourably entertained by the mayor. He slept at Sir
John Young's house, on St, Augustine's back, where
Bishop Thornborough then dwelt, he showed his good
taste by going down the Avon to Hungroad; he de
parted next day, being sent for by the king.
The Mayor's Calendar informs us that Matthew Havi
land, in 1619, bequeathed to the Corporation of the
city £4 per annum, out of certain lands, for twelve
sermons in Newgate, When he was chief magistrate
an Act was passed "that none of the council of this
city shaU sue to the king's majestie for any office of the
city, upon paine to be dismissed as weU from the house
as also the liberties of this city,"
6, Eobert Aldworth, who succeeded Boucher as
mayor, born in 1561, became an eminent merchant.
He was one of the promoters of the voyage of Martin
Prinne, or Pring, in 1603, who surveyed the coast of
Maine, hoping to find a passage to the westward, [We
shaU refer again to this distinguished Bristol mariner,]
In 1607 Aldworth purchased of Eobert Chambers,
gentleman, the noble ancient mansion of the Nortons,
famiUar as St, Peter's hospital, A MS, informs us :—
He builded the faire house in St, Peter's churchyard, with all
the cellars and lofts, for refining sugar. Another large building
he made in the Marsh, and made two docks there for shipping,
which came to nothing.
The site of these docks was on the Quay, abreast of
Alderskey [Aldworth's quay] lane.
In the year 1609 Aldworth was chosen mayor, and
during the foUowing year "the Duke of Brunswick
came to Bristol, and was honourably entertained by
Aldworth and his brethren. He was saluted on his
arrival with the discharge of twenty-five pieces of ord
nance in the Marsh, He slept at the ' White Lion,' At
supper-time many voUeys of small shot were given him
by three hundred of the train band of the city; and
the next morning the mayor, with some of the magis
trates, gave his grace a walk about the Marsh to show him
some pleasure, and in the meantime the ordnance was
twice discharged, and after being accompanied by the
mayor and magistrates to his lodging they took their
fareweU of each other, and so his grace departed the
same day, being Easter- evening, for London."
' Tovey's Local Jottings,

A,D, 1611.

DR. THOMAS WHITE'S GIFTS.

275

Aldworth died, without issue, on the 6th November,
1634, aged 73. By his wUl, dated seven days before
his death, he left "towards the setting of poor people
to work within the city of Bristol the sum of £1,000,"
which money was to be lent on security in sums
of £50 each, interest free, for ten years, to such
persons as should "set the poor to work," He also
gave £100 out of a house in Broadmead towards the
maintenance of eight poor women or widows in the
almshouse of St, Peter's, The almshouse was near the
churchyard. He also buUt the Parsonage-house, oppo
site St. Peter's pump, which remained, witti the date
1613 [see IUustration at 129 of our Ecclesiastical
Histoby], tUl destroyed by fire some thirty-five years
since. 7, Dr, Thomas White, son of John White, of Temple
street, where he was born, became a student of Mag
dalen coUege, Oxford, in 1566, rector of St. Dunstan's,
D.D,, in 1584, and a prebendary of St. PaiU's, canon of
Christ church, Oxford, 1591, and canon of St, George's,
Windsor, 1593. He founded the almshouses stUl known
by his name, thie entrance to which was under the haU
of the Tuckers' guUd, in 1610-11, completed in 1613.
These houses were for six men and six women. In the
chamber of Bristol there is a quaint portrait of him,
with some Latin verses ending, Quique Albos cosli por-
tamque invenit apertam. The property was enfeoffed to
the corporation, who now maintain therein thirty-two
poor people, each of whom has two rooms, 8s, per week,
half a ton of coal at Christmas, and certain articles
of dress periodicaUy. The buildings are a paral-
leUogram, 240ft. X 21ft,, a quaint relic of an olden
time. The doctor also left the sum of £100 a year for
the repairs of the highways about Bristol; he especially
specified ten miles on the Oxford road, and the whole
road to Bath («',«., vid Hanham and Bitton — the other
road, vid Keynsham, was not then made), and five mUes
in every road leading to a market town in either Somer
set or Gloucestershire, He died March 1st, 1623, He
left in his wUl directions as to the form and manufacture
of two communion cups, one of which was for the church
of St, Werburgh ; he also left £40 with which to buy
chains and manacles for the prisoners of Newgate, that
they may be brought chained in a body on Sunday to
St, Dunstan's to join in worship, and to be a warning
to others not to become evU-doers, Another item was
a sum to warn the parishes of London before the execu
tion of a convict, in order that they may pray for the
culprit, and that a sUver trumpet of the sanctuary may
be sounded to that effect. He also bequeathed money
to build a strong house of brick, with open windows to
ventilate the same, for the reception of the bodies of

persons executed, and which are to be undressed, and
portions of their bodies covered with sorry Unen by two
aged decent females and the executioner, ^
The new work over against AU Saints church, at
the Tolzey, was buUt ; also the Fish market in the
Shambles (Bridge street) ; and the corporation advanced
money to set up the manufacture of Colchester baize in
the Smiths' haU, Beggars and poor people in want
were set to work at spinning worsted and knitting
stockings, under the inspection of the officers of the
parishes. Goods brought by Irishmen from London
and other places infected with the plague were deposited
without the city tUl they could be shipped,
"July 12th, by a decree of the Court of Chancery,
the mayors, for the time being, were made special
governors of the Grammar school, St, Bartholomew's
hospital," When, in 1611, WiUiam Carey was mayor, "there
was a very great drowth, so that much cattle was starved,
and ye comon ground and grass was burnt up, not one
drop of rain f eU for four months ; butter was sold for
Od. per lb, (double its usual price), cheese 33s, 4d, per
cwt,, and hay £3 per load," ^ A multiple of ten will
give an approximate value, Carey was a draper ; he
in his old age appears to have faUen, if not into poverty
at least into disrepute, "He was made keeper of the
Back haU, and being a widower of upwards of fourscore
years, with sons nearly sixty, he married his servant, by
whom he had a son," ^ Posts and raUs were set up at
Gib Taylor by the Merchant Venturers in his year,
8, In 1612, Anne, wife of James, came from Bath to
Bristol, and was right royaUy received, the mayor, Abel
Kitchen, presenting her with a fair purse of satin, with
£110 in it, and for three days she was entertained with
fair shows on the Elizabethan style, Eobert Naile, a
Bristol apprentice, wrote a poetical account thereof, the
style of which may be seen from the last six lines : —
" It is good to keep alive what would be dead,
Therefore hee hits the Naile not on the head.
But yet he hath done the office of a naile,
To fix that fast, which otherwise would faile.
As now proues true, his name matching his fate.
In nailing fame on eaternities firme gate,"*
We have some little gauge by which we can measure
the purveyors' method of doing business through this
queenly visit to Bath, Neither Anne nor her ladies "of
honour could have been very temperate if they con
sumed the thousandth part of the rich wines provided
for them during her brief stay in that city. She is
1 Bristol Times, 1853, ^ old MSS, = Aid, Haythorne's MS,
* For a full account of the proceedings see Seyer, II,, 264-67,
find Evans, 108-70,

276

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1614.

charged with 5 butts, 5 tuns, 2 pipes and 49 hhds. of
wine (equal to 5,229 gaUons); 207 lbs, sugar; groceries,
£152 18s. 8d,; spices, £94; pepper, £9 6s,; oU, £8 12s,
4d, ; the sum total being £1,016 7s, 8d, — an enormous
sum, if we consider the value of money in those days,
Whitson was a creditor for at least three tuns of fine
old Gascony wine, for which he eventuaUy received £60
(just five farthings a pint). Her majesty also con
descended to borrow money of him, and repaid him and
the citizens with the remark (empty words) that, such
was their profusion and hospitaUty, ' ' she never knew
she was a queen until she came to Bristol."
In 1613, Whitson was empowered, under the Cor
poration seal, to recover — 1st, The sums of money due
to the Corportion and citizens for certain wines, &c,,
provided for her majesty when at Bath, 2nd, The
money lent his majesty under his seal, 3rd, To obtain
a commission for apprehending pirates. His attempts to
recover the moneys were not successful, and, in 1614, he
and Thomas James, as members of Parliament for the
city, were further requested to present a petition to the
Lords of the Treasury for the repayment of the above
claims, as weU as for any additional sum for various
things provided for his majesty when at Woodstock and
Oxford, No money was forthcoming, but as a sop to
the Bristol men a commission was granted to them for
suppressing piracy in the Severn, and three ships were
at once fitted out for that purpose.
Nevertheless, persistent in their purpose, with dogged
resolution, the mayor and commonalty in this same year
again petitioned the Lords of the Treasury, in the name
of the Corporation, "that it wiU please you to order
the payment for the wines, sugars, spices and other pro
visions, which were taken up for the queen's majesty's
household at Bath last year,"
9. Abel Kitchen, mayor 1612, by wiU executed 1639,
devised that the ring, given to him by Queen Anne,
valued at £60, should never go out of the family, but
be handed down to posterity. It, however, mysteriously
disappeared at his decease. Three of this mayor's de
scendants were, in 1824, pensioners of the Chamber of
Bristol, Kitchen died in 1639, and was buried beside
his wife Dorothy, in Christ churoh. He was a bene
factor to the city and bequeathed : — £ s. d.
For apprenticing poor boys  14 0 0
To All Saints church  3 g g
To Temple "  ' 3 2 0
To Christ "  3 18 0
To Westbury "  0 13 4
To the Vicar of Kendal for a Sermon  ... 0 10 0
To the Vicar of St. Stephen's one Sunday in Lent ... 0 10 0
In Kitchen's year of office, on the 9th June, the

chamberlain of Bristol died, and Thomas Wliite was
chosen as his successor, "but the same year he broke
for debt, and Mr, Nicholas Meredith was put in his
place." No stage players were aUowed to play at Bristol at
St, James' fair, on account of the plague which was
raging in Wales, Much corn was again imported;
from September, 1613, to June, 1614, 104 ships brought
25,105 qrs, ; this was in the mayoralty of Francis
Knight, who served the city two years in succession,
these being his second and third years of office.
The king's necessities compeUed him, in 1614, to call
a parUament, being led to believe that under proper
management he might do with the members pretty
nearly as he pleased. The gentlemen of England,
however, who had not learned the court fashions, were
a spirited as weU as highly inteUigent race ; they had
studied closely their country's laws and the history of
its constitution ; they brought not only solid arguments,
but precedents to bear against impositions, benevo
lences, monopoUes, purveyances and proclamations which
claimed to be good as statute laws. They dreaded cor
ruption, hated tyranny, and showed a bold front to the
king's insane crusade against the liberties of their
eountry. Whitson and James had, for the third time, been sent
by the city to represent it in the Commons. Stormy
were the debates, perilous the times ; not a single bill
was passed when the king dissolved this two months' old
assembly, which has been as wittily as truthfuUy called
the "addled ParUament." Whitson had estabUshed
his character in the estimation of his coUeagues, for on
the first assembling of the House he was put to serve
on the "Committee for the Statutes on the Church of
England and the Commonwealth," which sat every
Monday during that session. He was also one of forty
appointed to confer with the Lords on the allowance to
be made to the Elector, Prince Palatine Frederick (the
father of Prince Eupert), who was the Protestant cham
pion and the king's son-in-law. He moved also, on the
10th of May, that the ChanceUor of the Duchy of Lan
caster, who was accused of interfering with the Stock-
bridge election, be heard at committee, as others had
been before. On the 11th, on the Act for the recovery
of smaU debts, he says :— "I wUl not suffer my biU to
be rejected, without speaking one word for it, as a
learned serjeant of this House has done with his,"
BiU referred to committee, of which he was a member.
On the 2nd of June, Lovatt, a Popish recusant, was
before ParUament, having accused the Bishop of Lich
field of taking money for passing him as a Conformist.
Whitson moved that one of the Privy CouncU be at

A.D, I6I5.

THE CITY LIBRARY FOUNDED.

277

committee in the afternoon to take Lovatt's oath ; later
on in the day he spoke at some length, "We were
lately told that they that dissuaded a Parliament wUl do
the best they can to dissolve it." [The king's message
that day was to the effect that if they did not forthwith
treat of his supply he would dissolve them,] This was
now found to be true. The Commons' Journal gives
only the foUowing fragmentary remarks of Whitson's
speech: — " The bishop's book <?» ^o^mot. . . . That the
king calleth a Par
liament but for form.
. . . That my Lord
Treasurer sent for
the merchants of the
three out-ports and
told them, 'That it
was a miserable
State where the king
may not impose taxes
of himself,' . . . ,
They, the House,
would appeal from
PhUip sleeping to
PhUip waking," A
good hit this last.
He could scarcely,
with safety to his
head, have said,
from PhUip drunk to
PhUip sober. It took
immediate effect,
nothing so severe
had been uttered in
the debate, and that
afternoon the king
dissolved the Parlia
ment, Whitson's conduct
in the House met
with the approval of
his f eUow - citizens ;
for on the next muni-

Brlnce Rnpert.

cipal election, in 1614-15, he was again made mayor of
the city ; his late constituents thus ratifying the votes he
had given in the Imperial Legislature, During his mayor
alty one of those horrid scenes which descended from
barbarous feudal times was enacted in Bristol, Phelps,
a felon, refused to plead in the usual form and say he
would be tried by "God and his country," but insisted
on saying by "God and Somersetshire," Heavy weights
were placed on his chest until he was crushed to death.
The law was imperative; it dated from Henry III,, and.

to the disgrace of our legislators, was retained on the
statute book until the last century.
In the year 1613, Eobert Eedwood, a good old
Puritan, gave his garden house on the city wall for
a library; the alterations were finished in 1614, and
Eichard WiUiams, the vicar of St, Leonard's, was ap
pointed as the flrst librarian ; the books were free to aU
citizens. This was, we believe, the first free library ever
established in England. Whitson, during his year of
office, paid the li
brarian's salary, but
there is no record of
his having been a
donor of books.
The Bakers' Com
pany this year, deem
ing the city laws
oppressive, endeav
oured to free them
selves from their
liabilities, Whitson
made sharp work
with the master,
whereupon all the
bakers struck, and
every oven in the city
went cold ; nothing
daunted, the mayor
sent messengers
through Somerset
from Portbury to
Wrington, to say
that the laws which
excluded foreign
bread [i.e, aU bread
not baked in the city)
were relaxed and in
abeyance. In flocked
the countrymen, with
all the bread they
could make, and sold
From an old print, o c n i ,
0 fa ounces 01 wheaten
loaf bread for 2d. and 26 ounces of white'loaf for the
same price, being 10 ounces and 8 ounces more than
the Bristol bakers had been used to give. This brought
the refractory tradesmen to their senses and a shower of
blessings on the head of the man who had again con
sidered the poor.
The bakers carried the matter to London, where it
was not decided until 1619, when, we are told, that
"this business, commenced by Mr, Whitson in his
mayoralty, caused great controversy in the Michaelmas

278

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1616,

Term before the lords of the Privy Council, which
business was followed up and prosecuted by Mr, Whit
son," As far as can be gathered the bakers had obtained
from his majesty one of the patents he was so ready to
seU, and the then mayor and Council, led by Mr. Whit
son, determinedly and successfully opposed the monopoly.
In 1615, Whitson caused the Piazza or Colonnade
at the Tolzey of AU Saints to be raised in the roof. No
cart having wheels bound with iron was aUowed to enter
the city. These improvements were followed up in the
ensuing year by the heightening and enlarging of the
Tolzey Colonnade at Christ church.
The spirit of gaUant rivaUy which animates our
volunteers is not of mushroom growth. In May, 1616,
great chaUenges were made between certain merchants
and shopkeepers of Bristol against the same number of
Exeter, "for the exercise of shooting with musquets,
opensighted and soldierlike, at a butt with buUets,"
Covenants were drawn and our men went to Exeter,
"with 15 musquets chested on horseback, themselves
being weU suited, and every man's bandolero suitable,
and covered with crimson velvet, silver lace and silver
fringe, which cost them 50s, a piece, Sheriffe Tomlin
son rode with them, accompanied with two captaines of
our cittie and other worshipful men, to the number of
forty horse and upwards, aU expert men in mUitary
discipline," Exeter won two rounds and our men one,
whereby they lost 100 nobles, and this, the old chronicler
says, was through the Exeter men (not the shooters)
"giving a supper and many healths, and when they
brought our men to their lodgings there were many
more healths, and burnt sacke was spent aU night, so
that our men were sicke with drinking and watching,"
They were not suffered to pay for their entertainment,
but they gave away to the poor and the city officials
£100, '''for every man that rode thither did put £5 into
a common purse,"
In July the Exeter men returned the visit, and were
met by our three captains and above three hundred
horse, lodged and bountifully treated at "The Bear,"
The next day, they refusing the butt in the Marsh,
another was erected in St, Augustine's green, with three
tents, and one fair one for the mayor and council, as
" expectators and judges for the business," The result
was a complete success for Bristol ; ' ' our men were first,
second and third, won the three rounds and £100 in
money, besides much bets won on our side, all which
was spent upon them, and £100 to double repay their
curtesie. Our captaines willed their treasurer to jnit
every penny to account which they had laid out and
repaid them again, not suffering them to give aught to
any officer or poore in our cittie. So on Friday they aU

took horse, and our men accompanied them a good part
of the way," Whitson was captain (not ex-officio J of
the trained bands when he died ; it is therefore but a
fair inference that he took a Uvely pleasure in soldier
ing. This year, by virtue of his position as mayor, he
was the chief officer.
We have already seen that Whitson took a deep
interest in Queen Elizabeth's Hospital, where there were
some twenty boys with white flannel letters sewn as
badges on their blue gowns ; and now his shrewd per
spicacity selected one destined to do honour to his choice
from the Free Grammar school, caUed the Bartholo
mews, to which he was also a benefactor. The lad, a
cooper's son, of Baldwin street (a Ungering predilection
for his old trade may have quickened Whitson's good
wiU), WiUiam Haywood by name, was a sharp, keen
witted boy, and the worthy alderman, his patron, rested
not, until at sixteen years of age, he got him entered as
a scholar at St, John's, Oxford, He became at the ear
liest opportunity a feUow of his coUege, then domestic
chaplain to Charles I., then Doctor of Divinity, vicar of
St, Giles and canon of Westminster ; he was afterwards
sequestered, and his Ufe may be read in Walker's
Sufferings of the Clergy. There is great reason to sup
pose that Whitson's success in discerning so early in
life the talents of Haywood determined him to make
that provision in his wUl for "the support of academi
cal students, the same being two poor men's sons of the
said city, at the University of Oxford or Cambridge,
that had first had their education and bringing up in
the Grammar school of the said city, to each of them
£ 1 0 per annum, and to have continuance from time to
time for evermore," which indenture first bears date
only five years after Haywood was sent to coUege, and
probably in the very year of his obtaining his feUowship.
Another benefactor to the city was George Harring
ton, brewer, residing in Corn street. In 1639 he be
queathed the corporation " £540, for them to distribute
£26, at 10s, weekly, to poor householders in the parishes
of Bristol, and to pay the clerk 20s, a year for keeping
the accounts," He was mayor in 1617, when "he went
through the city trying the weights and measures, and
renewed aU that were faiUty, Moreover, he tried the
colliers' sacks, cutting to pieces those that held not their
measure; and butter being dear, he bought it out of
the ships that were outward bound, and sold it in the
market at a reasonable price," He married Thomasine,
daughter of Simon Herbert, brewer. He was buried
in St, Peter's chui-ch, in which is his monument, with
the effigies of himself and wife kneeling before a lectern.
His widow left "Is, per week to the poor of St, Mary
Eedcliff parish for ever." The Earl of Arundel (privy

A.D. 1617.

JOHN GUY COLONISES NEWFOUNDLAND.

279

councillor) came to Bristol this year (1617), but receiving
no pubUc entertainment was very wroth ; when it was
afterwards proffered, he refused it. The secret was
that Bristol was Protestant, leavened with Puritanism,
and the earl was a Eoman Catholic.
During the mayoralty of WiUiam Pitt, in 1623, the
foUowing Act was revived : —
That the burgesses of this city shall by [buy] boardes or plankes
freely and sell them again to their neighbours, but not to strangers,
on pain to forfeit for every hundred 6s, 8d.
Thomas Farmer, who was mayor in 1616-17, gave
50s, yearly for ever to the poor of the parish of St,
Philip and Jacob, This year occurred a dispute for
precedence in the council, Whitson claimed to be the
senior alderman, and, consequently, to take precedence
of aU but the mayor and the recorder ; by courtesy, if
not by right, in the absence of the mayor the senior
alderman would act as his deputy. The mayor is always,
of course, the chief magistrate, but his tenure of office
is brief ; to-day he is the equal of the king's judges
and can claim his seat by their side, to-morrow he may
faU back into a town counciUor, or even a private bur
gess, whilst the senior alderman's position was a Ufe-
long honour, contingent only on his good behaviour.
On the 30th day of September, James (he who shot poor
Gethin in the wood bush) took precedence of Whitson,
A baUad written in the olden style by the late C, J,.
Harford, says : —
" And Captain James there too was borne,
As histories olde do tell ;
An alderman of that cittie.
Of courage bolde and stoute.
Alderman AVhitson thrashed did he.
And kicked his worship out,"
Mr, Harford's authority is a MS, chronicle of Page,
then in the possession of Mr. Morgan, of Ashton. It
was an ungracious and an unmanly assault on a man in
his sixtieth year, Whitson went into the country for
six days, and forbore to say anything as to the matter
of precedence at that time; but on his return he brought
the matter before the mayor and aldermen in council,
and like an honourable man, as James was not present,
he withdrew whUst they discussed the question. The
mayor, Thomas Farmer, and seven aldermen — Hixe,
Vaiver, Kedgwin, Haviland, Butcher, Carey and Kitchin
— gave the precedency to Whitson ; but two aldermen —
Aldworth and Egglesfield — were of a contrary opinion.
The majority decided on the ground that Whitson was
a justice of the peace and a mayor before James : —
For the better explaining of the case, and to give true light
unto the truth, Mr, Whitson did put downe the case in writeing,
and sent it unto the principal garter king-at-armes, who lykewise
gave it under his handwriteing that the place of preoedencie was
due to Mr, Whitson,

Maister Seager's words are : —
A maior of a cittie is to have precedency of all other aldermen
that have been maiors before him, in regard that hee is the king's
lieutennant pro tempore; but being out of his maioraltie, hee
shall go according to his seignioritie in aldermanship. If hee
hath been twice or three times maior, his reputation shall be the
more, and take his place above all other aldermen that have bene
but once maior, and next unto the maior present. And therefore
I conclude that Mr, John Whitson, being seignior alderman and
twice maior, shall preceed Mr. Thomas James by prioritie, although
Mr, James was the second time maior before Mr, Whitson,
On the 19th August, 1617, is a note : —
It is this day agreed, with the assent of Mr. Thomas James,
alderman, that for the avoyding of contention between Mr. John
Whitson, alderman, and him, the said Thomas James, touching
their precedence, with the mayor and rest of the aldermen, the
said Thomas James shall take his place next unto the said Mr.
John Whitson, provided always that if Mr, James shall show any
cause hereafter that he ought in right to have his place next to
the mayor for the time being, then he shall have aud -enjoy such
place as in right shall appear to belong to him,
10, Mr, John Guy deserves honourable mention on
account of his enterprising spirit. He twice represented
the city in Parliament, in 1620 and 1623.
"In a MS, penes me,'' says Barrett, "one Mr, Guy, in 1609,
took out a number of persons of both sexes, designing to form a
settlement all the winter in Newfoundland, He was a member of
the common council of Bristol, and mayor in 1618, He procured
a charter and license of the king (James) for his intended planta
tion, having some rich merchants of London, as well as Bristol,
joined with him for the better and more effectual prosecuting of
the scheme. Many of this city did advance money towards it ;
and so Mr, Guy, with some other young merchants, being fitted
out with more men and all necessaries, took shipping here for
Newfoundland, to make a trial of the place by staying .there all
the winter," In Stow's Chronicle, continued by E, Howes, at 943,
we have a very particular relation of this voyage : —
"After the patent was obtained, and several noblemen, gen
tlemen and citizens being thereby made a body corporate by the
name of the treasurer and company of adventurers and planters
of the cities of London and Bristol, for the colony and plantation
of Newfoundland, in the southern and eastern parts, lying between
the degrees 52 and 46, the company sent ships with men, women,
and all necessaries thither, and ordained Maister John Guy, a
citizen of Bristol, a man very industrious and of good experience,
to be their general in this plantation, who planted a colony of
men and women in the island of Newfoundland (which was first
discovered by Sebastian Cabot, and ever since yearly frequented
by the English in- fishing time) ; with them, also, they, for their
use to increase there, transported hennes, ducks, pigeons, conies,
goats, kine, and other live creatures, all which did very well
there. This General Guy stayed there with the colony both
winter and summer, whose natures and conditions in general
agreed very well with the soil and clyme. In this plantation
there were sent none but men of civill lyfe, and of some honest
trade or profession, by which course they lived and prospered the
better. Since the date of their charter (8 James I., 2nd May,
1610) they have sent yearly supplies thither unto the year 1614,
Master John Slaney, Esq., being their first treasurer."
"1611, Mr, John Guy, with a preacher and several men and
women, returned to Newfoundland to his son."

280

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1618.

Another MS, says (during John Guy's mayoralty) : —
" He sett upp the rayles on the Kay, where shipping is built.
These rayles inclosed a yard at the mouth of the Froom ou the
east bank. In 1622 Guy was sent for to London, to consult on
the decay of 'trade and corn,' "
Sir George Snigge, knt,, one of the barons of the
Exchequer, a native of Bristol, for many years its
recorder, and one of its members in Parliament, died
in 1617. His body lay in state in TaUors' hall six
weeks; he was buried in the church of St, Stephen,
The Dials almshouse, in Old Market street, was buUt
this year.
In 1618 Whitson was one of a committee appointed
for the purpose of employing and setting to work poor
children of this city ; and he made an agreement with
Gamage and Son, which was satisfactory to the cor
poration, for employing those children whose parents
were in poverty. In 1620 he was again sent to Parlia
ment, and the moneys coUected by the inhabitants of
this city to assist the Elector Prince Palatine in the great
battle he was fighting against Catholicism in Bohemia,
were sent to Whitson and John Guy, Members of ParUa
ment, to be by them paid to the proper authorities,
James was playing fast and loose with both sides,
and this ended in what the Puritans caUed the greatest
misfortune the Church of God had received since 1617,
— the Elector, the King's son-in-law, the bulwark of
the Protestant Church on the Continent, being through
default of the king's promised assistance driven from
his throne. Volunteers and money were raised by the
English, and just when it was too late 4,000 of these
were aUowed to go on their useless mission.
On February 8th, 1620, Whitson delivered in a biU
for the making good and sufficient cardes of wool, ^ and
on the adjourned debate in March, he says, — " The
Dutch bring over dry fats of old wool -cards, which
prejudice the poor and the clothiers," February I7th,
in a debate on the recusant Catholics, who returned, it
was said, estates of the value of £3,000 per annum at
£50, he says : — " Take them in their own craft, let
them have aU they return, and the King all the rest,"
On March 1st, on a bUl for taking tithes of fish, Whitson
could not see why a poor mariner fisherman should pay
tithe rather than other mariners, who make better
voyages. The next day, in an Act for free trade in
Welsh flannels, &c,, he pleaded for no restraint for
country towns if London was to be free, for he himself
had ever had power to carry these commodities. On
the 6th, on a bill for the restraint of abuses in the
levying debts for common persons in the name and by
1 Card-making was a Bristol trade ; William Ware, Sheriff in
1587, and WiUiam Vawer, Mayor in 1601-2, were card-makers.

the prerogative of the king, he objected to the con
ditions, inasmuch as the farmers, whereof he was one,
were tied to take bonds in the king's name. On the
14th, on a motion for an increase of members in the
County Palatine, as desired by the prince, he moved
that instead of two burgesses, as asked for, there be
only one for each town. On the 20th, he said, "there
are so many calf-skins in this kingdom that they must
be cast away if the monopoly is not relaxed and they
be aUowed to be exported." In 1621, he said: "Sir
Thomas Sherley, M,P,, had protected a man, being none
of his servants or attendants," Ordered to be examined
and punished. Members' servants were privUeged from
arrest, but "members shaU not seU the privUege."
On the 27th April, Whitson complained that every
place or way of trade was a monopoly by patent from
the king; that it was time to enlarge it, — no reason
why free subjects should be so restrained. On the
30th, on an Act to restrain the export of wool, he sug
gested to except the coarse wools of Northumberland,
Cumberland and Westmoreland, May 1st, one Floyd,
a Eoman CathoUc barrister, being charged with slan
dering the Prince Palatine and his lady (the king's
daughter), also with being a Popish recusant, and
bringing over rosaries in a chest, aU the Puritan blood
in the House was waxing woefully intolerant, and
Whitson advocated the use of the lash.
On the 7th of May, Whitson spoke on the usury
bUl, contending that it would be ineffective, would
ruin most of the gentry of England, bring down the
price of land, and that, under its provisions, no man
would lend money. On the 9th he spoke on the im
portation of cattle from Ireland, to which he seems to
have been adverse. On the 14th he advocated Uberty
to export iron ore. The Commons then adjourned untU
November, and in December they made the now cele
brated protestation, wherein they claimed Uberty of
speech as their ancient and undoubted right, and the
king at once dissolved them. Finding no record of
Whitson's name during these two months, either on
committees or as a speaker, though he was so frequently
found at his post in the early part of the session, we
incline to think he was busy arranging in Bristol the
deed of gift for his various charities, which bears date
the foUowing March,
The highest commendation of James is this : " that
he was a good classical scholar and a lover of peace,"
During his reign the kingdom increased in wealth, and
made rapid progress in liberal institutions, learning,
science, and the arts which adorn social Ufe. He,
however, sought to estabUsh his authority by maxims
60 dangerous, and on assumptions so much at variance

A,D. 1620.

STRUGGLE BETWEEN JAMES AND THE PEOPLE.

281

with the spirit of a constitutional monarchy, that he
was constantly involved in contentions with both Parlia
ment and people, and at his death he left his unfor
tunate son exposed to the fuU current of a popular tide
that had been for a quarter of a century gathering head
against the overstrained prerogatives claimed by the
monarchy. James' great aim was a personal govern
ment uncontroUed by people, parUament, or counseUors,
But this had been met by the impeachment of a host of
monopoUsts, through whom he had sought to raise a
revenue. The craven spirit of former ParUaments had
to a great extent disappeared, the
members were more inteUigent,
shrewd, and practical, and they
ventured to measure the strength
of the People's House with the
Kingly WUl, They prosecuted Sir
Francis Bacon, the Lord Chan
ceUor, and fined him £1,000 for
corruption in his office. Sir Giles
Mompesson and Sir F, MicheU
(the Sir GUes Overreach and Jus
tice Greedy of Massinger's play)
for monopoly, oppression, and in
justice, were degraded by them
from knighthood, fined and ban
ished the kingdom. This was
their practical answer to the King,
who had told them, with a sub-
Ume impudence, "That their
privUeges were derived from the
grace and permission of his an
cestors and himself," had com
manded them not to meddle with
matters that concerned his gov
ernment, or the mysteries of the
State, and said "he would not
spare any man's insolent behav
iour in Parliament,"
II. Both Houses demanded
a Protestant marriage for the
heir to the throne, "Bring chairs for the ambassa
dors ! " James roared out with bitter irony when the
deputation from the Commons appeared before him.
He refused their petition, forbade discussion, and
threatened to commit them to the Tower, The House
met the Eoyal command to abstain from discussing the
subject by a protestation, in which they claim, " That
the liberties, franchises, privileges and jurisdictions of
Parliament are the ancient and undoubted birthright
and inheritance of the subjects of England; and that
the arduous and urgent affairs concerning the king,
[Vol. L]

State, and defence of the realm, and of the Church of
England, and the making and maintenance of laws,
and redress of grievances, which daUy happen within
this realm, are proper subjects and matter of CouncU
and debate in Parliament, and that in the handling and
proceeding of these businesses every member of the
House hath, and of right ought to have, freedom of
speech to propound, treat, reason, and bring to con
clusion the same,"
The king's answer was a violent outrage. He sent
for the Journals of the House, and tore out the pages
that contained the protest. But
the sentiments embodied therein
could not be eliminated from the
manly hearts of Englishmen ; nei
ther did the king's epigrammatic
assertion, " I govern according to
the common weal, but not accord
ing to the common wiU," tend to
pacify their minds,
A few days afterwards he dis
solved the Parliament ; but, to
his chagrin, found that he stood
aU but alone. In his mad pursuit
after personal government he had
taught men to think but lightly
of council and crown. The ablest
of his ministers had been brow
beaten by his favourites and driven
from office for corruption. The
king's policy of a Spanish mar
riage for his son, a CathoUc house
hold for the infanta, and a Cath
olic education for their children,
roused the national instinct and
banded together men of widely
divergent views in opposition to
the royal wiU. Then came the
rupture with Spain, Prince
Charles returned to England in
disgust, and the betrothal with
the infanta was broken off.
The prince now took the helm. The petty weak
nesses of character he had displayed and his humUiating
concessions to Spain were obliterated from the public
memory by the caUing of Parliament, in which a decla
ration of war was demanded with that country, A
subsidy was eagerly voted, persecutions of the CathoUcs
commenced, the lord treasurer, Cranfield, who was the
head of the Spanish party, was impeached for corruption
and dismissed from office, and Prince Charles married
Henrietta, of France, a sister to the king of that country,
T 2

¦' House. From Millerd's Alap.

282

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1621.

James, swept along by the sweUing tide, was yet
shrewd enough to see that his son and Buckingham
were by these concessions making a rod for their own
backs ; but he seems to have lost aU authority — it had
been by the people loyally transferred to Prince Charles,
whose manners, dignity and reserve contrasted favour
ably with his,
12, In 1621, when Eobert Eogers, ropemaker, was
mayor, it was now enacted : —
"That no soapmaker or other person cast or lay, or cause to
be cast or laid, any soap-ashes, either in the river or within one
hundred foot of full sea, on pain to forfeit for every default duly
proved 20s,"
High street was at this period a centre of busy
interest. In 1583 there were to be no more "standings"
set upon it. It was enacted : —
' ' That there should be but five hucksters in High street, and
them to be bound with two suflScient securities not to forestall
any friend coming to the market, privily or otherwise, upon pain
to forfeit for every default 2s., and any person for seUing fruit
without license to forfeit for every time 6s. 8d., and also but two
hucksters for selling oatmeal under the pentice at the Back. ''
Eogers resided at "the great house at the bridge
end." While mayor, "in Whitsun-week, the Earl of
Essex, his brother, and Lord Clanricarde, their father-
in-law, came to this city from Bath, and were enter
tained by the mayor. And grete guns were discharged
in the Marsh at their coming. They lay at the White
Lion, in Brode streete, and after dining at the mayor's
they returned to Bath." Eogers married Elian, the
daughter and co-heiress of D. Cooper; he died 11th
Ajoril, 1633, aged eighty years, and was buried in St,
Thomas' church. He gave £100 to the corporation to
be lent to ten burgesses, interest free; also Is, per week
to the poor of EedcUff for ever. The Earl of Pembroke
was made Lord High Steward in 1621,
WiUiam Pitt, mayor in 1623-4, gave £10 to the
Bristol Library and £80 to the poor of St, Thomas,
Eedcliff and Temple, John Doughty, who was mayor
in 1620, became member of Parliament in 1625, and in
1627 was made alderman and captain of the trained
bands. In 1623 the ship Jonathan, of Bristol, was lost
when entering the Straits ; she struck on a rock and
went to pieces. The men were saved, but the loss was
estimated at £12,000,
In 1624 the Corn market was built in the broadest
part of Wine street. The roof rested upon sixteen
piUars, divided by four arched entrances ; in the pedi
ments over these were placed the city arms,
A weU was sunk at the end of the building and a
pump set up for the use of the inhabitants, at the cost
of the corporation. To show the rapid advance in the
value of labour and materials within the century, we

append for those curious in such matters copies of the
bUls for the construction of both conveniences.
Particulars op the Cost op Building a Corn Market in Wine
Street, at the Expense of the Chamber, in the Year 1624.
£209 9s, 8d,
1624, Payments op the Third Quarter.
Item paide unto Edward Hereford in parte of his paynes
in filling the vates with Eubbel at the New Corn-
markett 
Item paide to John Settlee Freemason £3 in parte of his
worke at the newe Markett, soe the whole already
paide him is £43 the residue being charged the last
year to my account 
Item paide John Settle £8 more towards his worke at
the new Market, and taken Bond to finish it 
Item paide to Goodwyfe Nayler for 10 Tonnes of Wall
Stones which were used at the saide Newe Markett
Item paide to Wm, Lloyde 2/6 for 3 vates of Stones
used there 
Item paide John Kenn Freemason in more parte of the
worke at the newe markett 
Item paide the Pitchers ; viz, to John Walter Moore for
8 days and a half a piece for pitching there 
Item paide Eobert Price Cordwainer in more part of his
worke at the New Markett £5 soe the whole paide
him hitherto is 
Item paide to John the Pitcher and Walter Moore for
4 Days worke a piece at the New Markett place at
Ud 
Item paide to John Leman £14 2s, Od. and is for two
Tuns of Led more to cover the Market place soe the
whole paide for 8 Tons of Led is 
Item paide John Kenne £3 more in parte of payment of
the worke at the Newe markett 
Item paide unto Thomas Daker Plumber, in parte of
his worke done at the Newe markett 
Item paide for another Tomie of Led for the New
Market 
Item paide for the hire of two horses to Eide down to
OldweUs poynte about the Quarr Stones for the New
Markett : and for our Passage at Eownham and for a
man's Paynes that brought us to the Quarr 
Item paide to Eobert Price in parte of his worke at the
New Market 
Item paid to Eobert Price £9 at three several payments
in full of his worke a the New Markett according to
agreement for £4 and 5s, paide him over and above for
his journey to Gloucester to see the Markett place
there 
Item paide to Thomas Daker Plumber in part of his
worke at the New Market 
Item paide to John the Pitcher for 5 daies work a piece
in Wyne Street about the saide Newe Markett
Item paide to the workmen to drinke when they had
finished the paveing of the New Markett 
Item paide Thomas Daker Plumber in full of his worke
for cartinge of Ledd into sheets and Battlements for
Sodder, making of pipes Ledd-heading Nayles &c.
Item paide Thomas Woodward rough mason for paveing
of 156 Yards at the New Markett at 2s, he finding
workmanship and stuff 
Item paide John the Pitcher for work in the New
Markett 

£ s, d.
2 0 0
43 0 0
8 0 0
0 9 0
0 2 7
2 0 0
0 15 7
25 0 0
0 7 4
56 14 0
3 0 0
5 4 0
7 1 0
0 3 0
6 0 0
9 5 0
5 0 0
0 9 2
0 0 4
10 16 2
15 12 0
0 9 6

A.D. 1624.

WELL SUNK IN WINE STREET.

28c

£ s, d.
Item paide John Keane the Freemason £5 whereof three
£ is iu full of £60 which was agreed with him and
John Settle for their worke and stuffe for the Newe
Markett and the other 40s, is given them over and
above by Order of Mr. Mayor and Alderman in re
spect of their hard bargain therein  5 0 0
Item paide John DiddoU for 3 way of lime us'd about
the plompe at the New Markett  0 10
Item Paide to Thomas Woodward £3 more which is
aUowed him by the Surveyors and Auditors in re
compense of his losse in taking the work  3 0 0

Total Cost of the Markett  £209 9 8
Order of Comon Councill 18th Feby. 1622 for the Errection of a
Corn Market in Wine St., Comon Council Book No, 2 foUo
112, 18 Febraary 1622,
It is ordered and agreed by the whole house in General that
there shall be with all convenient speed a Market House (for
Come) Builded a erected at the cost, and Charges of the Chamber,
in Wine St, upon the Eidge over against the Meal Market dore of
fowerscore fte, in length and twelve fte, in breadth and to be
covered over with Lead, and that the Sheriffe of the city for the
time being shaU yearly for ever hereafter be paid by the Chamber
lain two shillings and sixpence for every fte, of ground which shall
be taken up for erecting and the building the said house, and that
the Chamberlain from henceforth shall take the profit and benefit
of St, James' Fair yearly for all standings that shall be erected
and buUt under the said House,
Particulars op the cost of sinking a well, in Wine St,, and
for putting pump therein and at the Chambers expense
IN THE Year 1624, £27 8s id.

1624, Payments op the Third Quarter,

£ s.

Item : paide unto Walter Howell Hallier the somme of
50», f is for hailing off rabble from the Well in Wyne
Streete, untiU the 15' of December, as f his Note ... 2 10 0
Item i^iore paide unto Edw<i Hereford Labourer in parte
of filling rubble there 3s. lOd,, soe the whole paid
him hitherto is  0 13 4
Item paide unto John Jones in more parte of sinking
the WeU 5s, so the whole paid him hitherto is .. 1 18 0
Item paide Hereford for filUng of 4 Doz, of Eubbell
more  0 14
Item paide John Settle in part of his work there  1 0 0
Item paide John Jones in more parte of smking the Well 10 0
Item paide for filling of 6 Doz, of Eubbell more  0 2 0
Item paide John Jones in more parte of sinking the Well 0 5 0
Item paide and given in earnest to twoe me that under-
" tooke to finish the same Well  0 2 4
Item paide more to the sinkers of the Well in full of
theire worke 18/7 and 3/- given to three men that
did worke all nighte to drawe the water out of the
same well  117
Item paide unto divers men that did draw the well drye
whereby it might be walled up  16 8
Item paide for Tymber used aboute the Well and for
digging up the Poaste and carriage to the store house 0 2 4
Item paide unto Thomas Woodward £12 10s, Od, more
whereof £8 10s, Od, in fuU for walling up the Well
in Wyne Street according to his agreement, £2 more
thereof is in parte of paveinge aboute the pumpe and
the other £2 is allowed him by the Surveyors towards
his losse in undertaking the worke at the same rate
as by his accompte and petition appeareth  12 10 0

£ s, d.
Item paide unto Thomas Belsire and John Walker
Masons for 6 days' worke a pice at the newe draw-
inge of the WeU in Wyne Streete is 18s, and two
Labourers for 6 dayes worke a piece to helpe drawe
the Well and putting in of Posts and Beams 12/9 all
is  '. ... 1 10 9
Item paide Wm. Lloyde 6/1 and is for bucketts, roapes
and other things us'd about the Well as W his note 0 6 1
Item paide 2/- viz., 1/6 to the workman to drinke for
setting up the Pump at the Well and 6d, for the
saweing of it  0 2 0
Item paide John the Pitcher 7/4 for 4 dayes worke, a
piece for himself and Walter Moore  0 7 4,
Item paide to the two pitchers 7/11 for 2 dayes worke
and a half a piece for their extraordinary paynes to
make an end of the Plompe and for a Labourer to
help them 2 days and -|  0 7 11
Item paide Berrowe the Turner for the Case to the
Plompe &c  18 0
Item paide to Evans the Joyner for carving the head of
ye Plompe  0 13 0
Item paide for hailing of Paveing stone to the Plompe 0 0 8

Total Cost of Well, Pumpe, &c  £27 8 4
Barrett, in his account of AU Saints church, says : —
"In the chancel is a monument, with his statue half-
length, of Mr, John Doughty, mayor and alderman and
burgess in ParUament, with English verses underneath.
He died in 1629, aged 67." This monument has disap
peared. SacrUegious hands were ever and anon laid
upon these records of departed worthies.
Some years since, during alterations in AU Saints church, to
gratify a morbid feeling to behold how the venerated philan
thropist, Colston, had borne the still silence of the tomb for nearly
a century and a half, a coffin, assumed to be Colston's, was ex
humed, and the features of the shrouded form compared with
those of the marble monument. The resemblance was pronounced
extraordinary, as it would have been had there been any. It was
more probably the corpse of John Doughty, who wore gauntlets
officially. Colston was not a member of the corporation, and if
his "directions for my funeral" were followed, the mortal re
mains of Colston were lying about ten paces off in his ancestral
sepulchre, ^
In 1629 John Doughty bequeathed to the corpora
tion £100, to be lent, interest free, for five years, to
handicraftsmen. During his mayoralty the society of
St, Stephens' ringers, whose merry peals and witty feasts
continue to this day, was founded,
Henry Gibbes, brewer, resided in St, James' back,
at that time a very different neighbourhood to the
present, as the remains of medifeval mansions testify.
He was a son of W. Gibbes, Bedminster, He married
Anne, the sister of Mathew Warren, and was mayor in
1624, His third son, Philip, went to Barbadoes, and
was ancestor of Sir Philip Gibbs, bart. During his
official year it was ordered that "no burgess of this
city shaU buy any merchandize for strangers within the
Uberties of this city on pain to lose 12 pence on every
* Tovey's Local Jottings.

284

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1625,

pound," His daughter, Elizabeth, married Thomas
Lloyd, Mary married Eichard Neathaway, Margaret
married WUliam BUd, and the fourth daughter married
Walter Stevens, the leader of the Iconoclastic mob who,
in 1642, destroyed the Virgin Mary chapel on Bristol
bridge. Seven persons were hanged in Bristol during
this year, viz,, two for witchcraft, two for murder, and
three for unnatural practices.
In 1625, Brandon hiU was purchased by the Cor
poration, to be holden yearly by the mayor and the two
sheriffs for the time being, at the yearly rent of two
marks (£1 6s, 8d.), on the foUowing terms, viz,, "To
keep it weU prepared, maintaining the hedges and
bushes, and admitting the drying of clothes by townsmen
and townswomen as had anciently been accustomed,"
"On the 2nd of AprU, 1609, Thomas Moze, one of
the ordinary yeomen of the king's chamber, and WiUiam
Edgeley, groom of the same, petitioned his majesty for
a sole Ucence to stamp farthing tokens for the cities of
Bristol and Gloucester, which petition was referred by
the king to the commissioners appointed by his majesty
for suits. The petitioners state that the city had re
ceived, many years past, authority from the queen
(EUzabeth) to stamp farthing tokens in copper, and
that such authority ceased upon. his majesty's (James I,)
coming to the crown. The petition is printed on p, 3
of the Appendix to T, SneUing's View of the Copper
Coinage, 1766, from Sir Julius Csesar's MS,, p, 101,
"Whether Moze and Edgeley ever received the
licence they asked for does not appear, nor are any
Bristol tokens known which can be assigned with
certainty to James I,'s reign," ^
13, The death of James, on March 24th, 1625,
placed Charles I, upon the throne at the age of twenty-
four. His character was a curious compound : he was
weak but obstinate, lavish of promises without thought
of fulfiUing them, and ever ready to subordinate the
highest political considerations to pique or to personal
vanity. His early training had been in a school adverse
to Constitutional government, and the favourite, Buck
ingham, had monopolised court influence to the exclu
sion of more able men, but was utterly incompetent to
advise the king how to direct, as EUzabeth had done,
the current of popular opinion and feeling, Charles
was proclaimed by Sheriff Clements, at the High Cross
on AprU 1st, as King of Great Britain, France and
Ireland, amidst the blare of trumpets, the clang of
beUs and the roar of artUlery, whilst the mayor and
councU, clad in scarlet, stood bareheaded at the Tolzey,
The interest of the ceremony was heightened by the
presence of Ali Galigha, a Turkish pasha, who, coming
1 Henfrey, 361.

as ambassador from the Sultan, had brought with him
sundry strange birds and beasts as presents to the
king, together with a far more acceptable present to
the people, viz,, fifty EngUshmen, some of whom were
natives of Bristol and Somerset, redeemed from slavery.
On his route from Plymouth to London, Galigha arrived
in Bristol, March 31st, and was royaUy entertained by
the mayor, Henry Gibbes ; after dinner he walked
around the city and supped with the merchants at the
GuUdhaU, AUve to their own interests, for they had
suffered heavUy from the depredations of the corsairs
in the Mediterranean, the burgesses would not suffer
him to be at any cost in the city, and at his departure
they presented him with a handsome gelding, richly
caparisoned, many of them accompanying him as far as
Bath, " And so lovingly they took leave of each other,
since which time we hear of no EngUsh ship that hath
been taken at sea by the Turks, being at the instant
writing here of a whole year since," ^
There is ample evidence that at this time Bristol
was weU and loyaUy disposed towards Charles, and its
subsec[uent estrangement and ultimate antagonism was
simply a result of the king's crooked poUcy and ter
giversation, Bristol was Protestant, but the king vio
lated his word and made important concessions to the
CathoUcs, The Puritans had declared that every Church
man who favoured Popery was a traitor in the ranks,
Charles' answer was to place Laud at the head of aU
ecclesiastical affairs, and Doctor Montagu was set to
preach the divine right of the king and the doctrine of
the Eeal Presence, The Commons met this by com
mitting Montagu to the Tower. MeanwhUe war with
Spain had not been declared, and the cause of Charles'
quarrel with that nation had, it was discovered, been
anything but sympathetic with the people's loudly ex
pressed abhorrence of Popery, The king went on
manning and coUecting a great fleet, yet he refused to
say against whom it was meant to be employed. But
the people held the purse-strings. The last subsidy
had been spent, in what manner was best known to the
courtiers ; another was needed, but the Commons in
granting it, against aU precedent, restricted to one year
certain Customs' duties which had usuaUy been granted
to the sovereign for life. This was taken as an insult,
and the king refused to accept the grant, burdened with
such a restriction. Another demand for a subsidy was
made by the king, but it was denied without even a
debate, Charles now showed his hand by taking Montagu
from the Tower and making him one of his royal chap
lains, and by levying the disputed customs upon his
1 Old MS,

A,D, 1625.

FIRST ARTILLERY GROUND IN BRISTOL.

285

own authority. The house met at Oxford ; but having
determined that its first step should be to enquire into
grievances, it was dissolved.
Whitson, who was now for the fourth time member
for Bristol, spoke on the first day the house met, on the
subject of the Commons proclaiming a fast among them
selves and aU receiving the Communion. " He was
accordant, for that there had been no such cause for a
fast in the last ParUament as now in respect of the
plague and other occasions," He was requested by the
corporation to wait upon the lords of the councU, to
obtain their consent that persons from London should
not be aUowed to come to Bristol fair, lest they brought
the plague with them, which consent he obtained, and
by "the blessing of God, though it came even to Law
ford's gate, it entered not the city."
14. "In the year 1625 the captains, trained men
and young men of Bristol petitioned the councU of the
realm for authority to set up an artiUery yard within
their city, where they may learn and practice the use of
arms," ^ The site granted was not as yet city property,
being the courtyard of the castle. The tourists from
Norwich who were in Bristol in 1635 say: — "To grace
and add to her beauty Bristol maintains three foot com
panies, besides a voluntary company of gentle, proper,
martial, disciplined men, who have their arms lodged in
a handsome artiUery house newly buUt up in the Castle
yard, where once in a year they invite and entertain
both earls and lords and a great many knights and
gentlemen of rank and quaUty at their mUitary feast,
and this yard affords them a spacious and large place to
drUl and exercise in. The castle is of great extent, and
hath formerly been a most fair and strong hold, but
now it is almost quite demolished." ^
John, son of John Barker, mayor in 1606, was ele
vated to the mayoralty in 1625, when it was enacted : —
"That it shaU be lawful! for the owners or masters of shipps
to take shipwrights or ship-carpenters in the graving of shipps,
in whose work soever they bee, "
This mayor "gave an annuity to the churchwardens of
Temple parish of £4 6s, 8d, per annum for ever out of
a house in Temple street, for thirteen sermons in the
year, viz,, one for every first Sunday in the month,"
John Barker was M,P. in 1623 and 1627; he died in
1636. Charles' next poUcy was to divert attention from
home legislation by a foreign war, and 10,000 men
were sent to invade Spain, A man-of-war of thirty
guns was buUt at Gib Taylor, and named The Charles
when launched. Then reports were rife of danger from
» Dom, Cal., Oct. 22nd, 1625,
" Brayley's Graphic Illustrator, 375,

a foreign invasion ; there were great musters of men,
and the seaports were watched day and night. In
Bristol, by command of the Privy CouncU, corporals,
with their squadrons of trained bands, forty or fifty in
number, furnished with halberts and muskets charged
with buUets, watched at the several gates whUst gentle
men walked the rounds, keeping their watch for six
teen nights, beginning on July 22nd, until St, James'
fair was ended and strangers had gone home, Whitson
was deputed to petition the Lord Lieutenant to appoint
a muster-master to view the men-at-arms in the city
during the winter, "Yet," says our chronicler, "few
men knew the cause, and many were of opinion that no
real cause existed, but that the king's ministers raised a
false alarm that they might have a better pretence of
levying money," The attempt was a failure, and the
king was constrained by his growing necessities to caU
another Parliament, from which he excluded the lead
ing spirits of the previous house by pricking them as
sheriffs of their counties. There was, however, no
lack of leaders of the Constitutional party ; Eliot,
Hampden, Pym, and other kindred spirits found seats,
and when the king sought to stamp out opposition by
sending Eliot and Digges to the Tower he precipitated
the contest. The Commons declined to proceed to busi
ness untU their members were restored ; and after a
struggle of ten days Eliot was released, the Parliament
was dissolved, and the king proceeded to raise subsidies
under the exploded form of "benevolences," By writ
the king demanded a loan from private persons, chiefly
from those who had presumed to think that grants of
money and redress of grievances ought to go together.
If this loan were refused by any person of station or
local authority, he was struck out of the commission,
Whitson was a sufferer ; being aged, he went not
again to Parliament, but graduaUy gave up his public
life. The last parliamentary act of his recorded is that
he served on the committee for examining into the
abuses which had crept into the Charter House school,
" and so to rectify that which was past as to provide for
the future" — a truly congenial work for the grand old
man. But though free from parliamentary harness, he
was not idle, or a laggard in the business of the city.
On the 7th of November, 1626, he sat with Alderman
Guy (the Newfoundland coloniser), by virtue of a decree
of the High Court of Chancery, to decide a controversy
of long standing between WiUiam Trestram and Chris
topher CaUowhiU, They found that CaUowhiU owed
£48, but, in consideration of his "weak estate," they
only adjudged him to pay £20 ; upon which the said
CaUowhiU flew at Whitson, and with a knife stabbed
him in the face, thinking to kiU him. The knife pene-

286

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1628.

trated through his cheek, nose and lip, into the mouth,
but the assassin failed in his intention. At the foUowing
council meeting Guy moved : — " That on account of the
heinousness of the offence, CaUowhiU have shackles put
on his legs," Whitson, in thankfulness for his escape,
left £3 per annum to St, Nicholas church and 20s, per
annum for two sermons to be preached there for ever.
Two years after this, in 1628, he attended the councU
chamber for the last time ; and in 1629 he was thrown
from his horse whilst he was captain of the city trained
band. This accident ending in his death, the soldiers
attended his interment and performed the usual honours
over his grave, according to mUitary custom. He was
buried in St. Nicholas church on the 9th of March, in
the same grave where his
two wives and three daugh
ters had been laid, and his
widow, Eachel (who was
alive in 1634), is also
buried with them, in the
tomb which is just before
the monument in the crypt
of the church.
This monument is an
arched canopy, under which
lies the effigy of Whitson,
in aU the stiff formality of
the 1 7th century, with the
cut in his face perpetuated. The inscription (now
erased) was as foUows :— 1741,
' ' In memory of that great benefactor to ye City,
John Whitson, Merch Twice Mayor and Aldn
& four times Member in Parliament for y" City,
Who died in the 72d year of his Age A.D. 1629.
A worthy Pattern to all that come after him."
There was also erected, mainly through the exertions
of Alderman Daniel, under the tower of St. Nicholas,
an elegant and costly tomb, in Perpendicular English,
the design of Mr. T, Clark, the architect of the present
Bristol cross. Beneath a rich canopy Whitson lies in
his robes of office, his book in one hand and his alder
man's gloves in the other. On the left panel the in
scription originaUy on the tomb in the crypt has been
reproduced, and that on the right hand contains a simUar
one in Latin, He was the author of a pious meditation
entitled The Aged Christian's Fareiccll to the IVorld,
When Whitson's residence, then known as "The
Queen Bess," was demolished, in 1853, two chimney-
pieces, one a small carved one from his library, the
other a large one from his great room, were removed
to the Eed Maids' school, where they still remain.
The one now in the dining-haU of the school is very

John Whitson's Arms.

large, and profusely ornamented with carved work,
having in the centre the royal arms of the time of
Elizabeth, Eden says there were on it the foUowing
inscriptions in Latin (we presume they must have been
in an outer border or scroU; they are not now extant) : —
"Qui Leo de Juda est, et flos de Jesse Leones.''
"Protegat et Flores, Elizabetha, Tuos,"
On the left side is —
"Non est mortale quod opto,''
On the right —
"Est mihi grata salus,"
"Est mihi dulce mori,"
The Eed Maids have also his picture, said to be the
original likeness ; a good, thoughtful head and face it
is. It bears the foUowing line in the upper left-hand
corner : —
"Nun quam desperabo de miseri cordia tua, Domine,"
15, Christopher Whitson, merchant, was mayor in
the year 1626; of him the annalists report, "This mayor
was not reverenced, neither was he exceeding liberal,"
One of the ordinances of the CouncU was, that aU
strangers' goods shaU be put in the Back haU to be
sold, and any burgess that returned them as his own
was to be discommoned.
On August 18th, 1626, Charles granted for money a
charter of confirmation for Bristol. Prayers were or
dered to be offered up in the churches, as the summer
was a very wet one ; a fast day was appointed for the
2nd of August, " and that same day it pleased Almighty
God to send us fair weather, which lasted a considerable
time, and we had a plentiful harvest."
John Gunning, merchant, became mayor in 1627.
" This mayor gave 10s. per week to good uses whUe he
lived, as did Alderman Kitchen at his death," The two
beautiful Misses Gunning, famous for their marriages,
were descended from his uncle, Eichard, who settled in
Ireland, "The corporation purchased of Sir Charles
Eedcliff Gerrard, knt,, for four hundred and fifty
pounds, the advowsons of James, St, Peter, Christ, St.
Ewen, St, Michael and St, PhUip's churches," ^
The system of forced loans, arbitrary taxation and
extortion by the king was aUenating aU classes of his
people from the throne. The "refusers," as those were
termed who declined to comply with the royal demand,
were imprisoned by the score, and popular discontent
grew ripe, John Langton, son of WiUiam Langton, of
Cumber worth, sheriff in 1614, a merchant and member
of the Soapmakers' Company, was mayor in 1628, His
beautifuUy decorated drawing-room stiU exists in the
manufactory of Messrs, Franklyn, Morgan and Davey.
1 Evans, 175,

A.D. 1628.

LOYALTY ON THE WANE.

287

The door of this room is a beautiful specimen of early
I7th century art; beneath a gracefuUy carved figure of
justice, on a shield are the initials J. L,, with the date
1628; the pUlars are exquisitely chaste, and are inlaid
with mother of pearl and ivory. The mantelpiece is, we
think, the finest specimen of the many that are to be
found in the city, and the ceiUng is richly ornamented.
In the adjoining
room there is a
shield containing
the merchant's arms,
and on another there
is the date, 1623,
J, L, The noble
staircase, with its
ornamented balus
trades and heraldic
lions, is one of the
finest examples of
that style extant.
(Business require
ments prevent this
room being indis
criminately shown.)
Langton died in
1636, and was bur
ied in St, Nicholas
church. He left 40s,
per year, to be paid
quarterly, to four
poor householders of
St, Nicholas parish,
and 12s. a year for
a sermon to be
preached at Horfield
on the first Sunday
in Lent for ever.
The tide of pop
ular resistance to
unconstitutionaltaxation was stead
Uy rising aU over
the land, and Char
les was at his wits end for money. Another foreign expe
dition, under the command of Buckingham, professedly
in aid of the Huguenots, in France, had failed. Over
whelmed with debt, the king was obliged reluctantly to
caU a third Parliament, to which John Doughty and
John Barker were sent as members for Bristol, The
Court candidates were everywhere rejected and the men
of the people fiUed the House. Charles demanded that
they should take his word for the redress of grievances ;

Drawing-room Door of John Langton's hcmse. Temp, 1614.

but the house insisted that the ancient laws should be
enforced which protected the subject from arbitrary
taxation, forced loans, obligatory benevolences, punish
ment by imprisonment, outlawry or confiscation of goods
(except by legal judgment), the biUeting of soldiers
upon private families, and the enactment of martial law
in time of peace. They caUed the king's attention to
the breaches of these
laws by the late
king, and also by
himself since the
dissolution of the
last Parliament, and
drew up the famous
"Petition of Eight,"
The contest be
tween the king and
the sturdy Com
mons, who refused
to grant supplies un
til their grievances
were redressed, is
matter of general
history. It ended
in the dissolution of
the House by the
king who "hated
the impertinence of
Parliaments," Men
were forbidden even
to speak of another,
and for eleven years
the kingdom had no
other government
than the wiU of the
monarch, who,
claiming absolute
power to be his by
Divine right, inade
quately replenished
his exchequer by
open violation of the
constitution in im
posing and levying fresh taxes on the sole authority of
the crown, and by forcing all men, who had estates worth
£40 per annum, to become knights, by which means
alone. Baker states, he raised a sum of £100,000, The
contest was protracted to this length by the support given
to the king by the Eoman Catholics and the English hier
archy under Laud, who preached the doctrine of passive
obedience, and turned religion into a deadly weapon of
attack upon the liberties of the nation. During the

288

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1629.

struggle there came 1,500 soldiers into Bristol, who
were very unruly ; but when news came that the Duke
of Buckingham had faUen by the knife of an assassin
"these soldiers were Uke lambs, walking the streets
like ghosts not knowing what to do, and soon after
they were aU sent off to Ireland." ^
Bristol, the second city in the kingdom, was deeply
interested in the above contest ; and whilst a large
minority of its inhabitants were content to be passive
in the king's hands, the majority were undoubtedly con-
stitutionaUsts, Humphrey Hook, merchant, who had been sheriff
in 1614, was mayor in 1628-9. He has been mistakenly
identified with the more prominent man of the same
name, who was his son, and was mayor in 1643, Hook
was a member of the Soapmakers' Company, and, in
1630, he joined with other merchants in fitting out an
adventure for the discovery of the north-west passage
to India, During his mayoralty it was enacted, " That
it shaU be lawrful for Tuckers, being freemen of this
city, to roll, boil and smoke the cloths they make them
selves," Also, "That it shaU be lawful for whittawers
and pointmakers to buy sheep's feUs and lamb's feUs,
neat, to be shorn or puUed, and that none shaU ingress
into their hands any of the feUs to seU them again,
untarred or unwrought, contrary to the true meaning
of the statute," A narrow spirit of monopoly stiU
jealously guarded every trade, and the very men who
were ready to buUd a church for the glory of God, or
to endow an almshouse for the poor, considered it to be
as sacred a duty for them to exclude aU men not born
or apprenticed within the waUs of the city from the bene
fits arising from its commerce. The sum of "£5 13s, 4d,
is charged this year for gunpowder expended at the
funeral of Mr, Alderman Whitson, paid to John Corsley,"
Whatever may have been the sanitary condition of
Bristol as compared with other cities in the way of gouts
and drains, it is evident that the cleansing of the streets
must have been very inefficient, for the salary of the
"common raker," or town scavenger, was up to this
period only £30 per annum. No wonder the plague
often visited and Ungered long in towns overcrowded
with inhabitants, ignorant of the commonest sanitary-
laws. The salary of this official was this year aug
mented to the sum of £70, for which he was to provide
a sufficiency of carts, horses and servants, and to cleanse
more streets than he formerly did and in a proper
manner, A portion of the salary was paid by the
Corporation, and the following parishes were thus
assessed: — St, Nicholas, £6; St, Stephen, £4; St, Wer-
bui-gh, £4 ; Christ church, £4 ; AU Saints, £3 10s, ; St,
1 Old MS,

Leonard, £2; St. Ewen, £1 10s,; St, John, £3 10s,;
St, Mary-le-port, £2 10s,; St, Peter, £3 10s,; St, James,
£3; St, Michael, £1 10s,; St. Thomas, for a part of the
bridge, £1 10s, : St. Mary Eedcliff, Thomas, Temple,
St. Augustine, and St, Philip are not named in the
assessment. It could not have been because they needed
no cleansing, but probably because they employed their
parish poor to do the work.
16, One of Charles' expedients for raising money
was the granting and confirming charters. The Bristol
magnates were aUve to their opportunity, and on April
13th they obtained a charter by which the castle of
Bristol was finally withdrawn from the county of Glou
cestershire and was annexed to the city and county of
Bristol, This was done at the special request, it is
said, of queen Henrietta, For five hundred years
and upwards this property had been, with but few
intermissions, a dower for the queen ; it now passed
into the hands of the city authorities, who took pos
session of it on Wednesday, August 12th, and incor
porated it with the city. The original intention seems
to have been merely to bring it within the jurisdic
tion of Bristol, "to controul its occupation by thieves,
malefactors or other disorderly Uvers, including persons
proper and fit for service in war, who have fied there
when there has been occasion for their service," and
also in order to escape capture by the city authorities.
But having thus changed the jurisdiction, the king, by
a second charter, on October 26th, in consideration of
the sum of £959 and a ground rent of £40 per annum,
granted the castle to the mayor, burgesses, &c., with
aU its rights, members and appurtenances, including
a mansion house, then in the occupation of Francis
Brewster, yeoman ; a close, lying outside the ditch,
eaUed the King's orchard, containing two acres ; a
piece of ground called the Inner green ; a woodyard,
three gardens and forty-three tenements, with appur
tenances, held by persons named in the charter ; the
whole of which, with the waUs, towers, fosses, banks
and ditches enclosing the castle, had, by letters patent,
dated August 23rd, 1626, been leased to the said Francis
Brewster for the term of eighty years, at the annual
rental of £100. The advowsons, knight's fees and mines
were excepted from this purchase. In September, 1634,
the city purchased Brewster's interest in the estate for
an additional sum of £520, Thus the castle precincts
became indissolubly a part of the city and county of
Bristol, John Tomlinson was the mayor who, in 1 629-30,
completed the purchase from the crown. He was a
merchant, with a residence in All Saints' parish, and
had been sheriff in 1615; he belonged to the parlia
mentarian party in the city, and lived long enough to

A.D. 1631.

BRISTOL ITEMS.

289

witness their success ; he died in 1647. Bristol, how
ever, was as yet outwardly loyal ; for when the news of
the birth of prince Charles, on the 29th of May, reached
the city, " it was accepted with great joy, and expressed
with thanksgiving and prayer in aU the churches for his
prosperity. ¦ The beUs rang aU that day, and in every
street were such bonfires that the like in Bristol was
never seen." ^
17. In the year 1631 wheat was 8s. per bushel, and
would have been much dearer but for the importation
of large cargoes. Some of our Calendars state that it
took £500 to purchase commodities this year, which in
1530 coiUd have been bought for £100, so enormous
had been the rise in price of aU articles of consumption.
This is, we think, however, an exaggerated statement,
a fairer average of the increase in value would be from
£250 to £300, "This year the armour house in the
castle was built, also the tower in the churchyard of St.
Ewens, by the Tolzey, which building cost £196," ^
Certain ancient privUeges, as to cutting wood and
making enclosures in the Forest of Dean, had been
withdrawn by the crown from the tenants. This had
excited an angry feeling that almost amounted to in
surrection amongst the foresters, A messenger being
sent down from the King's Privy CouncU to enforce the
royal wiU an emeute took place, and one Vertie, the
ringleader, was arrested, and by Bonerag, the king's
officer, was committed to prison in Bristol, This being
contrary to the municipal law, Vertie was encouraged
to arrest Bonerag in an action for false imprisonment,
in which Vertie claimed £500 damages, Henry Hobson,
innkeeper, was then mayor, and Thomas Jackson, mer
chant, was the acting sheriff. The Common CouncU,
quailing at the prospect of a conflict with royalty, re
leased Bonerag, after one day's incarceration, "with
good entreaty to pacify him ; they were much grieved
that their officers should so err in disobeying the king's
authority and abusing his servant. But he, riding to
London within a few days after, caused our sheriff and
many other officers to be sent for to the Star Chamber,
where it cost them dear before they were aU discharged."
Henry Yate, a soap-boiler, was sheriff in 1616, mayor
in 1631, alderman in 1634, He survived ten sons, and
died without male issue in November, 1636.
By his will, dated 1634, he directed his body to be buried
between his father's and mother's sepulchre at the upper end of the
chancel of Christ church, "inclosed in a chest or coffin, placed
deep in the earth, so that his bones be not disturbed, and a faire
free stone to bee laid over him. Forty poore men of the Church
to proceed him to the grave, to each of whom he gave a frieze
gown and a hat." He gave a chief rent of £4 per annum, 20s. for
a sermon, and £3 for the poor, also 20s, per amium "towards the

Seyer, II,, 276,

2 OldCaL

[Vol, I,]

maintenance of an expert and skilful! musician, to laud and praise
God upon the organ in Christ church before and after sermons
there preached, and after the first and second Lessons at Divine
Service, morning and evening upon the Sabbath days, to move and
stir up the people's affections more cheerfully with David to laud
and magnify God's most Holy Name, as it hath formerly been in
the most flourishing and peaceable estate of the Church,"
Mine host of the "Gylders"' inn — Henry Hobson —
was prosperous and respected, and considered a meet
person for municipal honours ; accordingly we find him
sheriff in 1616, and in 1632 elevated to the civic chair,
alderman in 1635. He died the same year, and was
buried in All Saints church. His son, WiUiam, married
the daughter of WiUiam Colston.
During the raging of the plague in 1605, on July 19th, it was
' ' Ordered that the dwelling-house of Henry Hobson, victualler,
being in High street, shall be kept fast until the 4th of August for
the avoidance of the infection," August 4th, The Chamberlain
ordered to pay ' ' the sum of £3 10s, towards watching the house
during the infection, the residue to be defrayed by Hobson, and
the watchmen to be discharged." We have seen {but have been
unable to obtain a copy for this work) a rude drawing with the
title, Ye Oullors Inn, Hygh street, Bristoll, It is without a date,
but from certain figures in the drawing it may be inferred it was
taken when ' ' mine host " was Mayor. Two men intended to re
present Mayor's sergeants, with heads uncovered, are profoundly
bowing to a corpulent personage, leaning against the porch, in
tended for no less a personage than Henry Hobson, Mayor of
Bristol. The porch is supported by carved wooden piUars. Over
the porch is a sign wholly illegible ; the house is of two stories,
with projecting transomed and muUioned windows. On either
side of the porch, separated from the street by wooden palings, is
a narrow strip of garden, and before the house are two stunted
poplars, with birds as large as babies on the branches. ^
In 1472 the " Gylders' " inn was bequeathed to St.
Stephen's church, but it appears to have been for a
considerable period the residence of the Hobson family.
18, To check the growth, if possible, of discontent,
in 1632, Charles enjoined by proclamation all land
holders to reside upon their estates, and he contracted
with Flanders for a supply of troops and ammunition
for service in England. Meanwhile the recently founded
colonies of North America were sought as havens of
refuge by many of those who felt that liberty was
endangered in England, and, in 1633, Connecticut was
added to the number. At this period the royal navy
consisted of fifty ships, with an aggregate of 23,695
tons, carrying 1,430 guns and 9,470 men.
Never was Charles more iU-advised than when Noy
twisted precedents for the raising of a navy by seaport
towns for the nation's use in times of war, into a royal
prerogative to raise a revenue for a king in a time of
peace, by means of which he might rule with absolute
sway, John Hampden, who, in 1626, had openly re
fused to contribute to a forced loan on the ground of its
1 Tovey's Local Jottings, V

290

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1634,

iUegality, now came again to the front as the champion
of English liberty, "If the king," he reasoned, " can,
without the consent of his Parliament or people, raise
money to equip a navy, he can do so to levy an army ;
this once raised, on pretence of danger of an invasion,
he could carry it abroad, the better nominaUy to effect
his object. This power would make the monarch abso
lute at home and formidable on the Continent ; the
attempt to levy such an impost is illegal, and contrary
to the constitution of the kingdom." He refused to
pay, and appealed for protection to the law.
The fii-st writ for the collection of "ship money"
was issued on the 20th of October, 1634, to the city
of London ; and a simUar writ appears, soon after, to
have been sent to Bristol, ordering the contribution of
£6,500 to be raised for the year 1635, ^
The pretence made was that Holland had joined
France in an aUiance that was likely to be detrimental
to British interests. Adams, our local chronicler, who
was a Eoyalist, says: — "Towards the maintenance and
setting forth of this great fleet our city gave £2,163
13s, 4d." This was but one-third; the actual levy was
as above, Eushworth, under the year 1636, gives the
distribution of ships to the several ports of England
and Wales, with their tonnage, number of men and
charge, together with the sum set on corporate towns in
each county : —
Bristol... one ship of 100 tons... 40 men .. £1,000 charge.
By way of contrast, and in order to show how an
insigniflcant seaport town has, by wise and judicious
municipal regulations, risen to the proud position of the
greatest seaport in the world, despite its lack of natural
advantages, we turn over one leaf of the chronicle and
read the foUowing entry : —
Liverpool  no ship  £25 charge.
Ere we close these pages we shall endeavour to show
how it has come to pass that Bristol, from being the
second maritime city in the kingdom, within little more
than one hundred miles of the metropolis, having one
of the safest roadsteads in the world at her doors, with
space therein for the navies of aU nations to ride securelj',
and an open seaway far less dangerous than the ap
proach to Liverpool, has sunk from her proud preemin
ence and had to yield the palm to her heavily-weighted
rival, whose distance from London and shoals at the
mouth of the Mersey, combined with the dangers of
the longer passage through St. George's channel, placed
her at a great disadvantage in comparison with Bristol.
Be it remembered that the cotton manufacture of Man
chester and Lancashire was not then in existence. That
J C?il, State Papers, 297,

mighty commerce which has clothed the whole world
and gathered such a dense population into the Midland
counties would, under happier auspices, have grown up
amid the valleys of Gloucestershire and Somerset, and
have spread over the wolds of the Cotes and the upland
downs of WUtshire. Bristol, had she then been more
liberal in her charges, would have been the great gate
way through which the immense cotton traffic passed,
and the wooUen manufacturers wotUd not have been
driven, by heavy import and export duties which barred
their markets, to seek a more profltable home and to
cultivate a less reputable trade amidst the rugged deUs
of Yorkshire, Eeturning, however, to the question of "ship
money," we find that, in 1637, whUst Hampden's trial
was pending, and the country was in such a ferment that
all strangers were ordered by the king to leave London,
Bristol was particularly annoyed by fresh attempts at
extortion. An endeavour to invalidate the municipal
authority, as exercised under existing charters, to prove
the acts of the corporation to have been iUegal, and so
to mulct the city in heavy damages, was, it is evident,
the object of "a special commission to enquire what
monies have been iUegaUy coUected at Bristol," It is
dated at Westminster, November 30th, 1637, and is
directed to the Marquis of HamUton. It begins by
acknowledging the illegality of the collections by and for
his father (King James) ; the harshness and injustice of
the method of levying ; distraint of ships ; orders in
spection and copies to be taken of all cases, and enquiry
into all frauds and oppressions, under penalties, &c.
Such was the promise of redress,
Adams [a loyalist], in his Calendar, shows how this
commission was carried out. He says "such oppres
sions were a prelude to the civU war, and were in fact
one great cause of it,
"Our marchants of Bristoll were much troubled this year
(1637-8) and the year before by pursuivants, and many were
served to appear in London, where by oaths they were severally
examined and constrained to swear what commodities they had
sent to sea and what commodities they had received home from
foreign countries in many years before in sundry ships, according
to notes of information, which the commissioners had procured
and collected of their entries iu the Custom-house books ; and
likewise what they did know of others, their friends and part
ners, that had not made true entries, whereby some were con
strained, for discharge of their consciences, to accuse one another.
These examinations and answers were recorded, and many of our
marchants after their coming home were served up again and new
examined. From September to the month of December, 1637,
our city was never free from commissions, commissioners, and pur
suivants of sundry sorts, which lay in several parts of our city,
to make enquiry not only against marchants, but against other
tradesmen, who were examined and sent up to London, and great
impositions laid on them to the grief of many ; insomuch that all
shopkeepers stood in great fear of them, especially sopemakers,

A.D. 1635.

HARDSHIPS INFLICTED UPON THE CITIZENS.

291

who were constrained to pay £4 custom for every ton of sope they
made, and every man rated what quantity he should yearly make ;
and account of every man's doings was weekly taken by some
appointed for oversight thereof. Some were known to make more
than they were allowed or paid for ; whereupon about thirty of
them were served up to London, where against their wills they
were retained long with great expences, imprisoned and fined in
above £20,000, and were bound to more inconveniences before they
could be discharged, *******
"These men Ukewise made enquiry of all ministers, clerks,
constables, churchwardens, and other officers and antient men,
examining them what they knew more than such notes and names
of houses and reUgious places, which they brought with them ; so
they were brought unto sundry places, from whence they collected
great sums of money for matters not enquired of in many years
before, "Those foresaid commissioners for marchants were so extreme
that they examined clerks belonging to the marchants to hear
what they could inform ; of whom one clerk they here imprisoned
for not giving them satisfaction ; and then carried him to London
and imprisoned him again. Another clerk being from home, they
came about midnight into his house and bedchamber to take him
away ; where not finding him, they searched his house for books.
"All these severe extremities, being more than their commis
sion could maintain, our marchants taking into consideration, four
aldermen and other marchants of good estimation rode voluntarily
to London in the cittie's behalf, accompanied with attendants to
wait on them, and some others Ukewise that were served up with
them. These gentlemen upon their knees made petition to our
king's majesty to take consideration of their miseries : whereupon
his most excellent majestie graciously embraced them, being sorry
that by wrong information he had granted such commissions,
which then he could not recall. He gave them Uberty to prefer a
bUl against them in the starchamber, and to retain any counsel
lors whom they pleased to plead for them before the lords of his
most honourable privy council, which was a most gratious favour,
for before, those commissioners, being their adversaries, were as
lords and judges over them ; as if all law and justice lay in their
own hands. These gentlemen stayed in London about eight weeks
at no small expences for trial, whereof as yet they could come to
no end. But his majesty graciously wished them to follow their
suit, aud when it came to the highest his grace would mediate
between them. It cannot be matter of surprize to find that after
such provocations a considerable part, perhaps a majority, of the
inhabitants of this city joined in the opposition which was made
to the king and his ministers,"^
A more unjust commission, in which the prosecutor
became judge in his own cause, could scarcely be devised.
For twelve days the trial of Hampden progressed, and
"ship money" was on every tongue. At last aU the
judges but two decided in favour of the king, on the
broad principle "that no statute prohibiting arbitrary
taxation could be pleaded against the king's wUl," One
of them. Judge Berkeley, said, "I never heard that law
is king, but it is common and most true that the king
is law." Finch, the chief justice, summed up to this
effect: — "That no Act of ParUament could take away
the king's royal power to defend his kingdom, or bind
the king not to command his subjects, their persons,
1 Seyer, II,, 292-4.

goods, and, I say, their money too, for no Acts of Par
liament made any difference," Hampden was cast, he
had lost the trial, but the cause for which he had striven
was won. He had roused all England, shown the real
character of the royal claims, and that this decision
placed every man's property and life at the mercy of
the king's wiU, Calvinistic Scotland, to her honour,
led the van in rejecting both the old tax and the new
Prayer-book ; her people by tens of thousands renewed
their covenant with God, to which they had solemnly
sworn in the hour of danger to Protestantism, from
Spain and the great Armada. They demanded the
withdrawal of Laud's Boole of Canons and the £ook of
Common Prayer, a free Parliament and a free General
Assembly, Charles threatened war ; "I wiU rather die
than yield to these impertinent and damnable demands,"
But from every quarter came men ready to battle for
the truth, especiaUy veterans who had been fighting for
Protestantism on the Continent, under the great Gus-
tavus of Sweden, A voluntary war-tax was levied in
every shire of Scotland, Charles temporised, and sought
to borrow money from Spain and troops from Flanders ;
then he yielded and weakly withdrew his concessions.
He gathered an unwUUng army at York, his fleet entered
the Forth, and he crossed the Tweed and met the Scotch
under Leslie, at the hUl of Dunse Law. Two hundred
men from Bristol had been pressed into the king's ser
vice, but they refused, at the passage of the Tyne, to
fight the Scots, whom they esteemed as friends ; others
foUowed their example, and the Covenanters won with
out a battle.
The king then despatched Strafford to Ireland to
raise men and money, making another but an ineffec
tual appeal to the Commons for a supply. The house
was resolute : redress of grievances must precede any
grant ; and although the king offered to reUnquish his
claim of " ship money," they would not yield, and after
a brief session of three weeks they were dissolved.
Humphrey Hook and Eichard Long, the members for
Bristol, were both of them EoyaUsts,
When the Scotch forced the passage of the Tyne
and occupied Newcastle, Charles summoned the Lords,
who had been more tractable than the Commons, to
meet him ; they did so on September 24th, but caUed at
once for a new Parliament, Charles was in despair :
before him was the Scotch army, behind him England
tremulous with revolt ; the London 'prentices had mobbed
Laud and broken up the High Commission at St. Paul's,
whUst the king's raw levies had murdered their officers
when suspected to be Eoman CathoUc, destroyed the
altars in the churches and deserted to their homes. In
his extremity Charles again yielded and summoned a

292

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1637.

Parliament, that which, under the name of the "Long
Parliament," became famous for its deeds and the
lengthened period of its existence. To this house
Bristol sent two sturdy Constitutionalists to represent
it, viz., Eobert Aldworth and Luke Hodges.
19. Eeverting to the year 1633, we find that Matthew
Warren, merchant, then fiUed the office of mayor. His
father, after whom he was named, gave by wiU, dated
1634, £20 to the poor of Temple parish. During his
mayoralty the High Cross was taken down, enlarged
and raised a story higher for the reception of four new
statues; the eight were as foUows (the four new ones
are in itaUcs) : — Facing Broad street, Charles I. and
John ; " facing Wine street, Henry VI. and Henry III, ;
facing High street, James I. and Edward IV.; facing
Corn street, JElizabeth and Edward III. It was sur
rounded by iron palisades, and the cost of the altera
tion was £207 ; whether this sum included the four new
statues is not known. In 1634, "the old crane" on
the Back was re-buUt, at a cost of £100; St. Peter's
pump was re-buUt; the weU, sunk in 1474, by WiUiam
Spencer, mayor, was originaUy surmounted by a cross of
pierced stonework. Warren was, January 14th, 1647,
on a committee which presented to Parliament a petition
relating to certain grievances that affected the city. In
1652 he petitioned to be released from his duties as a
counciUor, pleading "sickness, which unfitted him for
pubUc service." He was probably of EoyaUst proclivi
ties, which rendered him obnoxious to the powers that
then ruled the city, inasmuch as we find that his petition
was agreed to upon his paying to the chamber £100,
He died in 1654, and was buried in the church of
St, Thomas.
The next mayor was Andrew Charleton, merchant,
who had been apprenticed to Alderman John Barker.
He resided in AU Saints parish, and was sheriff in 1620,
mayor in 1634, alderman in 1636, and master of the
Merchant Venturers in 1639. He was appointed one of
the colonels of the auxUiaries, We shaU find his auto
graph, with Eobert Aldworth's and others, attached to
a letter to the ParUament, 29th AprU, 1643, He died
during the year, and was buried in St. Werburgh's
church. His daughter Joyce married John Somerset,
gentleman. On the 22nd of January, 1635, it began to snow in
Bristol, and continued to do so with but little inter
mission during the remainder of the month. Great
numbers of people died and much cattle. It hindered
the barques coming to the fair, and the wood bushes and
trows could not come down the Severn for a month
because of the floating ice. After Candlemas day the
people were commanded to clear the snow from the

streets before their houses. It was "frozen so hard
and thick that it put the city to great charges, and
people were forced to break and dig it up with pick
axes, bars of iron and hatchets," ^
Before the institution of mail coaches, messengers were em
ployed for the conveyance of letters. In the king's book of pay
ments is an entry, dated in the 11th year of Henry VIII,, of 13s,
id. paid to Eichard Dynes, for riding from Greenwich with a
letter to Mr, Baynton, Eedland, near Bristol, for a greyhound for
the king, ^ The rude method generally followed, before 1635, of
letters being carried by foot messengers, who went some sixteen
or eighteen miles a day (so that it was full two months before any
answer could be received from Scotland or Ireland), was in that
year superseded by a regular packet post, which went forward day
and night without delay, insomuch that letters from London even
then could be received at Bristol in 24 hours, the cost being four-
pence a letter, ' The postmasters on all the roads in England were
to have in their stables one or two horses to carry the messengers
with their portmanteaus. If the carrier had "occasion but for one
horse, then to leave him where he shall take a fresh horse, paying
2Jrf. per mile ; if two horses, then to take a guide and pay 5d. per
mile," In the civil wars there were exceptions to this regular
mode of conveyance, and the office of letter-carrier might be one
incurring special danger. One Catherine de Luke, a widow, in a
petition, in 1660, to Charles II,, quaUfies a request for the grant
of certain lands at Yarmouth, by pleading that she had "served
the late king in carying letters, when none else durst hazard it ;
was sent to Bridewell, whipped every other day, burnt with
lighted matches, and cruelly tormented, but would not betray her
trust," She mentions also that she "discovered the plot at Bristol,
and her husband was so wounded in the service that he died, her
son was sold by the enemy, and she obUged to Uve sixteen years
in banishment,"* In a further petition she complains that she
had not only been "stripped and whipt, " but that besides other
sufferings her husband had been four times plundered and £1,000
taken from them, '¦ Another complaint, December 10th, 1660, was
against one Tegg, an anabaptist, former postmaster of Bristol, who
broke open letters directed to the king's friends, and more recently
got Langham, an honest man, put out, and his own ostler installed
in the office. ">
Eichard Holworthy, merchant, became mayor in
1635. He married Mary, the daughter of Eobert
HavUand, of whose wUl he was executor. In 1621,
while sheriff, he was chosen a member of the Soap-
makers' Company, and alderman in 1637, During his
Ufe he gave 20s, per annum to the poor prisoners in
Newgate. He died in 1643, leaving a son, Thomas,
also a merchant.
Yet once again was the city visited by the deadly
pestUence. Business was at a standstUl; the hum of
traffic and the stir of active life yielded to the toU of
the passing beU, the rumble of the dead cart, and the
croaking cry, " Bring out your dead," TyndaU's park
was appointed as a fit place for examining persons in-
' Adams' Calendar. ^ Lewin's Her Majesty's Mails, 341.
= Brewer's State Papers, III,, 1538.
* Cal, State Papers, Chas, I,, Anno 1635,
" Mrs, Green's State Papers, I., 292,
" Ibid, 409. Taylor's Book about Bristol, 285.

A,D. 1639,

THE PLAGUE.

293

footed with the plague and for airing their household
goods ; and hovels were there buUt for the infected.
The nest of houses just below the Eoyal fort acquired,
from the above fact, the name of Stinkard's close, now
modernised into Tankard's close, AU persons coming
into the city from infected districts were obliged "to air
themselves thirty days," and two burgesses kept watch
and ward day and night at each of the city gates. The
autumnal showers and the winter frosts sweetened the
city and purified the air, and busy life again crowded
the narrow streets, to the inconvenience of their inhabi
tants, insomuch that it was deemed necessary, on the
5th of January, 1636, to pass the foUowing by-law : —
" It is this day ordered, that for the prevention of the danger
which may happen from the riding of brewers in the streets and
the careless driving of their horses with drays at their heels, that
if any brewer or brewer's servant or apprentice shall be at any
time taken driving or riding any horse or mare with a dray at the
heels, whether laden or unladen in any of the streets of Bristol or
Uberties thereof shall forfeit for every time so offending three
shillings and four pence, and in default of payment thereof, the
person offending to be set four hours in the stocks, the money
received to be employed to such good and charitable uses as the
mayor and aldermen shall appoint, "
For some years a king's ship. The Lion, or one of
The Lion's whelps, as her tenders were eaUed, had been
stationed in the Bristol channel to guard the commerce
from corsairs, but we learn by a letter from Plymouth,
dated July 23rd, 1636, that "there are flve Turks in
the Severn, where they take weekly a large number of
EngUsh and Irish ships," "Bristol this year paid
£25,000 for customs," ^
Eichard Long was one of those honourable merchants
whose enterprise and reputation enhanced the commercial
dignity of the city. He was the son of Thomas Long,
merchant, of Axminster, was apprenticed in the year
1580 to W. Merrick, merchant, and was admitted to the
freedom of the city in 1608 ; we find him soon distin
guished as a member of the Corporate body, being
sheriff in 1621. In 1629, the vestry of St, Werburgh's
voted him thanks for "beautifying" the church. The
foUowing year he belonged to a company for " discover
ing the North-west passage into the South seas."
Elevated to the civic throne in 1636, he took his seat
as an alderman the foUowing year, and, in 1640, was
chosen one of the "parUament men " for this city. He
was also chosen in 1642 and two foUowing years as an
assistant to the Merchant Venturers, and to "settle
such things as should be necessary for its welfare," A
fervid royalist, he was dismissed from the Corporation
by order of the Lords and Commons, December 12th,
1645, "for being disaffected to the Parliament, and
forward and active in promoting the designs of the
1 Old MS,

enemy," At that period the residences of our opulent
merchants and tradesmen were in the heart of the city.
Alderman Long resided in Corn street, and occasionaUy
at West Bringsea, in the county of Somerset, His death
occurred at the former residence in 1647-8, He left a
widow and five children, and was buried in St, Stephen's
church on the "11th February, His funeral sermon
was preached by the Eev, John TiU-Addams, from
Psalm XC, 10. For the sermon and to purchase a
"mourning gown" he left £10, By his wiU, dated
16th June, 1646, he bequeathed £100 to raise £5 per
annum for the poor of St, Stephen and St, Werburgh
parishes in bread. Also lands at Siston for clothing
ten poor men in the Merchants' almshouse every three
years, "ten sea-water green coloured cloth coats, which
should reach down to the gartering place, ten caps to be
made of the same cloth, ten pair of knit stockings, and
as many pair of shoes. His truly loving wife, Mary, he
appointed his executrix," This distinctive dress is no
longer worn by the almsmen.
In the early part of this year aU kinds of corn were
very scarce in England, wheat was sold for 8s, per
bushel, and it was thought likely to reach in price even
to 20s, France, however, was blessed with abundant
crops, of which the Bristol merchants took advantage,
and imported so much grain of aU kinds between March
and August that it fell to 5s, and less per bushel. Then
foUowed a most plentiful harvest, with good seasonable
weather; but the people of the land were so much
affected with "a fainty sickness and weakness" that
they had scarce strength for its ingathering; "whole
famUies were so weak that they were not able to mUk
their own kine, but gave it to those that would fetch
it," " The 28th July this year a ship was launched at
the end of the quay which capsized and eleven boys
were drowned, and she was caUed thence the Drown
Boy." During sickly seasons, such as we have been com
peUed so frequently to notice, Bristol must have been
as dismal as it was unhealthy. What the customary
time was for the sexton to toU the passing and the
burial beUs we know not, but that they were inordi
nately long is evident from the foUowing ordinance,
which limits the kneU to eleven hours for each person,
passed by the Corporation on the 9th day of August,
1639, With deaths in every parish daily, this incessant
dismal kneU from the twenty churches of Bristol and
Bedminster must have been the reverse of a sedative to
the sick and an awful horror to the healthy : —
"It is this day ordered and enacted that noe parish clerk
within this city shall hereafter ring for any person's knell longer
than four hours in the parish where the person dieth, and on the

294

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1640.

burial day five hours before the person is interred and two hours
after, and not longer at that one church only, unless the corpse be
buried in any other parish than where he dieth, and in that case
one hour before and another after, and noe more."
George Knight, draper (son of Francis Knight,
mayor in 1613), was chosen sheriff in 1625, chief
magistrate in 1639. February 18th, 1655, being then
eighty-five years of age, ostensibly on account of his
infirmities, he retired from the Corporation, in reality
being dismissed by command of General Desborough,
political considerations thereunto moving. He died
13th December, 1659, aged eighty-nine years, and was
buried in Temple church beside his wife, Ann, who died
19th August, 1645, He left two sons, Francis and
John, and bequeathed £36 to the parish of Temple,
10s, of the profits thereof for preaching a sermon
annuaUy in the parish church, 2s, 6d. to the clerk and
sexton, and the residue to be bestowed in bread to be
distributed weekly upon the Sabbath-day for ever.
The practice of utilising amusements, such as fancy
fairs, bazaars, &c, , and applying the money to religious
uses, is not a modern invention. Bishop Skinner
"threatened to interdict a faire kept in the parish of
St, James, in Bristol, if they would not set up a pair of
decayed organs in that church," '¦
John Taylor, merchant, became mayor in 1640; he
was son of John Taylor, of the city of Lichfield, gentle
man, was apprenticed in the year 1603 to John Eow-
brough, merchant, and in 1609 he was admitted to the
freedom of Bristol as a merchant. He married the
daughter of Alderman Henry Yate, a soap manufac
turer. In 1624 he was admitted into the Corporation,
and the foUowing year was sheriff. In 1628 and 1634
he was churchwarden of St, John's. WhUe sheriff he
was chosen by the corporation "one of the captains of
the trained bands of soldiers within this city in the place
of Captain Wm, Younge, who is wiUing to resign the
same," Young was one of the aldermen, Taylor was
made an alderman in 1639, vice Alderman Harrington,
and took St, Michael's ward, July IOth, in the foUowing
year, John Locke being chosen an alderman, Taylor
exchanged the ward of St, Michael for that of Trinity,
and on September 15th, "upon the motion of Mr, John
Taylor, mayor elect, and one of the captains of the
trained bands, the House doth take his resignation.
Whereupon Mr, John Langton, late sheriff, is fuUy
chosen to be captain in the place of Mr, Taylor, and he
is desired to make choice of his colours, October 9th,
Mr, Eichard Aldworth and Mr, Giles Elbridge resigned
their appointments as captains of the trained bands, and
on the recommendation of the mayor, Mr, Thomas Hook
^ Prynne's Antiq,

and Mr, Wm, Cann were appointed to the vacancies,"
At this period the mayor's salary was increased from
£52 to £104 per annum, and when the same person
had twice fiUed the office it was augmented to £208.
The resignation of the above gentlemen was significant,
to a very large extent, of the change that had taken
place in the views and feelings of the populace. " 8th
AprU, 1642, — Upon a general fame and brute given
out that there would be a rising by Temple, Eedcliff,
and St, Thomas on Tuesday next, and that they had
gotten divers clubbs very lately, the sheriffs with their
men and the constables of Temple are now sent down
to the parishes to take in the clubbs and weapons of
the people that are suspitious to be accessories and
principaUs in the commotion."
In 1643, on the approach of the royal army, Taylor
was impUcated in the attempt of Yeomans and Boucher to
render the city to Prince Eupert. Afterwards, when the
king had possession and during the occupation of Bristol
by Prince Eupert, Taylor was sent to be one of the
king's ParUament, better known as the " Oxford Par
liament," in contradistinction to the "Long ParUament"
then in session at Westminster. He was there seventy-
eight days, for which service he was paid 6s. 8d. per
day, making £26, and also £58 for house rent. On his
return he was made colonel of the auxiliary forces,
which were being raised in- the city and neighbourhood
to act upon the king's behalf. These troops were to
number one thousand and to be furnished with arms
and ammunition, Taylor lent the Corporation £100 at
£6 per cent, for this purpose, "When Bristol was in
daily expectation of being besieged by the ParUamen-
tarians, under the command of Sir Thomas Fairfax and
his Ueutenant- general, CromweU, March 5th, 1645, a
committee was appointed to consider the safety of the
citty, with the assistance of the two colonels. Alderman
Taylor and Mr, Thomas Colston, and to proceed with
the business, the mayor (Alexander James) and Mr,
WaUice to join with them, and also to consider of a
remonstrance to be presented to the prince and his
council of such grievances as shaU be thought meet."
The prince, afterwards Charles IL, was at this time
residing at the Great House, St, Augustine's Back.
" September 3rd, — It was also agreed that such
soldiers, as weU trained bands as auxiUaries, whose con
tinual duty in these hard times, and especiaUy during
the siege, may suffer want and have great need to be
supplied, shaU have relief from the citty in some
moderate way ; and it is ordered that when Col. Taylor
and Col, Colston shaU have brought in their lists of the
most needfuU in that way, that the mayor and aldermen
shaU make aUotment for the proper time to every soldier.

A,D. 1641.

CONSTITUTIONALISM IN THE ASCENDANT.

295

and shaU order the issiung of it and whence it shaU
arrive." September 9th, Col, Taylor attended the Common
CouncU for the purpose of fiUing up several vacancies.
It was his last attendance. The foUowing day he feU
fighting at the head of his men, and on the 13th was
buried in the crypt of St, John's church. The house in
which he resided was in Broad street, opposite the offices
of the Bristol Mercury and Daily Post. It was sold by
John Taylor, probably
a son of the colonel,
on the 16th AprU, in
the sixteenth year of
the reign of Charles
IL, to Eobert Aid-
worth, Esq., for £315
14s. 8d., subject td a
fee farm rent to the
chamber. It is de
scribed in the deeds
as "a capital messu
age or tenement, be
hind which a large
garden, with a stable
in Tower lane," It
eventuaUy became the
property of Thomas
Edwards Freeman,
Esq,, and on account
of its ruinous condi
tion was taken down
about the year 1777.
Col. Taylor was in
terested in three ships.
The Bonaventure, The
Faithful Lady and The
Great St. David's.
20. In the year
1641, the pendulum of
pubUc opinion in Bris
tol, which had oscil
lated so long between
the king on the one hand and the constitution upon the
other, began sensibly to preponderate towards the latter,
Charles had wearied out the loyalty of the mass of the
people, although a powerful and wealthy minority stUl
clung to the royal traditions in which they had been
bred. Considerable aUowance should be made for those
who vacUlated between the extreme parties. It was no
Ught matter for men to abandon the opinions in which
they had been educated, to forfeit the esteem of relatives
and friends, to incur the designation of "apostates" and

Colonel Fiennes. From an old Print.

the penalty of treason if unsuccessful. It needs a strong
faith to risk the forfeiture of goods, the disruption of
family ties and the possible loss of one's life, for the
assertion of a principle, which is known to be held as
wicked and criminal, by men whom we respect, and
whose opinions and judgment are in other matters felt
to be at least equal to one's own. That some men
should, under these circumstances, trim their sails to
catch a favourable gale, and strive ever to be upon the
winning side, was to
be expected, nor to
the student of human
nature is it at aU sur
prising. Such an one
was John Locke, who
was mayor of Bristol
in 1641, when Parlia
ment was strengthen
ing its position by
arming men and forti
fying towns in different
parts of the kingdom.
He was the first mayor
in the kingdom who
openly appealed to
arms in this terrible
internecine struggle.
In conjunction with
Eichard Balman, one
of the sheriffs, he had,
in February, 1641-2,
signed " a warrant for
the conveyance of
four cannon to Marl
borough to assist in
fortifying that place
against the king,"
The royalist party in
Bristol opposed the re
moval, dismounted the
cannon from the carri
ages and took posses
sion of them. Sir Baynham Throgmorton, who was
in the city as the bearer of a message from Charles
to the mayor, remonstrated with and upbraided Locke
with treachery, and in the king's name commanded
him not to aUow the guns to leave the city. The
mayor, however, was equal to the occasion ; he caUed
out the trained bands, dispersed the EoyaUsts, rescued
the cannon and sent them off,
Locke, who was cousin to the celebrated John Locke
(a Wrington man), had been apprenticed, in 1626, to

296

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1642,

Alderman EUis, then sheriff, and was made an alderman
in 1640 ; he was a man of substance, for we find him,
in 1643, advancing £600 to Lord Stamford, for which
he was paid by the citj^ £15. This was when Fiennes
held the city for the Parliament; but when Prince
Eupert had taken Bristol, and it was agreed to present
the king with £10,000, as a present of love and affec
tion, Locke became loyal, subscribed £50, and served
upon the Eoyalist committee that was appointed to treat
with the inhabitants as to the best way of raising the
money. Again, when, in 1645, Fairfax and CromweU
were approaching the city and preparing to attack it,
each alderman, accompanied by the clergyman and
parochial authorities of his ward, canvassed the same,
in order to raise money to defray the expenses of the
defence. Alderman Locke worked zealously to this end,
and contributed " one horse completely furnished."
Their efforts were vain, the city was captured, and the
alderman trimmed to sail with the popular party,
taking his seat as usual in the councU, where he was
once more avowedly ParUamentarian. For a while
tolerated, his instabUity had made him an object of
suspicion to the ruling powers, and in 1655, he, George
Knight and Gabriel Sherman were requested to resign.
Major-General Desborough wrote thus to the mayor
then in office, on February 13th, respecting the three
above-named persons : " If they will not tacitly resign,
but stand upon their justification, I must take that
course as will not stand with their credit ; for accordinsr
to his highness's declaration, there are no persons that
are scandalous in their lives, or enemies to the govern
ment of the commonwealth, that wiU be suffered in
places of magistracy or trust." To which the three
made answer : "Gentlemen,' — For as much as through
age, and weakness of body and other infirmities, we
are now unable to give that attention to our several
respective places, as aldermen and members of the
Common Council, for the good of the Corporation, as
we ought to perform : we do now desire to make it our
joint and several request that we may be discharged
from our said places, and do hereby severally and
actually resign the same. Witness our hands and seals
this 18th February, 1655. " George Knight,
"John Locke.
" Gabriel Sherman,
" To the Eight Worshipful the Mayor, Aldermen and
Common CouncU of the city of Bristol,"
Knight could, indeed, plead age and infirmity ; he
was eighty-five years old, Locke, however, was only
sixty-six, and Sherman forty-six years of age. Whether
Locke's private life was as disreputable as his public

career had been flagitious is not known. One expression
in Desborough's letter implies as much on one or more
of the parties named therein ; at all events after the
restoration, the chamber were strongly disinclined to
receive him back in their midst. On June 1 9th, a man
damus was read in the House, restoring to their dignity
as aldermen, John Locke and Gabriel Sherman, who,
with George Knight, deceased, had been removed by
Major-General Desborough, The council, which was
then royalist, answered, "They never were removed,
but resigned," and did not obey the writ. Another
was procured by the claimants, and was presented on
September 10th by the mayor; this commanded the
House to admit the ex-aldermen to resume their dignity
and office under a penalty of £40. The answer to this
was postponed, upon the plea that the recorder, who
was the senior alderman and the legal adviser of the
Corporation, was not present. Persistency, however,
prevailed, and on the 8th of November, Locke took his
seat as alderman. He died in 1666, and was buried
in St, John's crypt by the side of his wife, whose de
cease had preceded his by eleven years.
The constitutional party in the city had, in 1642,
become the strongest, and a man of pronounced opinions,
active and energetic in the cause of the people, was
chosen to fill the civic chair ; this was Eichard Aldworth,
He must not be confounded with Eobert Aldworth,
who lived in the great house by St, Peter's, nor with
Eobert Aldworth, the town clerk, to neither of whom
does he appear to have been related. Eichard was a
mercer, in High street, in partnership with John Young;
they had a joint capital of £3,000 embarked in their
business, a large sum for those days. When John
Gunning was mayor, in 1627, Aldworth, being a man
likeminded and an opponent of the encroachments of
royalty, was chosen sheriff. In 1629, Aldworth was
captain of the trained bands, which office, as we have
seen, he resigned in 1640, when Colonel John Taylor, a
devoted loyalist, was elected mayor. Now the demo
cratic tide prevaUed : Aldworth was made chief magis
trate, and Hugh Brown and John Jackson, men of
kindred proclivities, supported him as sheriffs. Men
were still scrupulous about asserting their rights and
taking action openly against the king, and if Charles
had been surrounded by prudent counseUors and had
consented to sacrifice some portion of his claim and to
admit a limit to his prerogative aU might yet have been
saved. That the people were wiUing to uphold their
king in a just cause is evident, for when, in October,
1640-1, a rebeUion broke out in Ireland, attended with
circumstances of great ferocity, two hundred men were
sent from Bristol, in February, 1641-2, to garrison

A.D. I64I,

CONSTITUTIONALISM IN THE ASCENDANT.

297

Dungannon fort against the rebels, and soon afterwards
three hundred more were sent by way of Minehead. It
is only just to state here that Ireland had been most
unfairly treated by. the EngUsh kings, they had been
deprived not only of their religious freedom but also of
their rights of property and of trade. The injustice
meted out to that unfortunate country may be exempli
fied by a reference, to the coinage: "Henry VIII,
coined sixpences for Ireland that were only current for
fourpence in England, Mary issued base shiUings and
groats for Ireland ; aijd when Elizabeth restored" the
purity of the EngUsh coinage, she stiU further debased
that of Ireland. When James I. made the experiment
of an issue of copper farthings they were made of two
sizes, in order that if they faUed in England they might
be sent to Ireland as pence and halfpence," '^ This re
beUion was after the Long Parliament had sat some
months, during which period the king's chief advisers.
Laud and Strafford, had been impeached, and the latter
had been tried, found guUty, abandoned by his master,
and executed as a traitor in May, 1641. The Parlia
ment had been active in other directions, they had can-
ceUed the judgment of the Exchequer against Hampden,
had aboUshed the hated Star Chamber, ship money,
tonnage, poundage and aU other arbitrary imposts.
Charles had declared the ParUament permanent, not to
be dissolved without its owti consent, but at the same
time he was covertly seeking aid from France. The
Irish massacres enabled him to raise an army. Parlia
ment, when 50,000 English had been slaughtered in a
few days, could not stand idly by, th'ey voted £200,000,
6,000 foot and 2,000 horse for service in Ireland. But
they soon saw, or fancied they saw, in this Irish revolt,
a vast scheme to enable the king to overawe themselves,
Charles had made terms with the Scots, who had
withdrawn their army from England ; the EoyaUsts
ralUed around the king, and, although in a minority,
made themselves a power in the House. Then the Con-
stitutionaUsts, led by Pym, passed the "Solemn remon
strance amidst great opposition and protracted clamour,
upon which occasion Ughts were, for the first time,
brought into use in the House of Commons, The Par
Uament in this paper narrated the work it had done, the
difficulties it had surmounted, the dangers which stiU
threatened the people and declared that it had no wish
to abolish episcopacy, but only to reduce the power of
the bishops. It repudiated the taunt of having revolu
tionary aims, and demanded the observance of existing
laws against the Papists, the due administration of
justice, and the employment of ministers who possessed
the confidence of ParUament," Charles Ustened to it
* Humphrey's Coin Collector's Manual, 511,
[Vol. I.]

suUenly and withdrew the guard of soldiers from the
house ; but London sided with the Commons almost to
a man, and the people crowded to Westminster to form
a voluntary guard.
The strife also between the two parties in the church
now culminated. Seven hundred clergymen petitioned
for the removal of the bishops as spiritual peers from the
House of Lords, and a bUl to that effect passed the Com
mons almost unanimously. The Lords hesitated, but a
maddened rabble stopped the carriages of the prelates,
and the peers protested that it was not a free Parlia
ment, The answer to this protest was sharp and de
cisive : eleven of the prelates who signed it were com
mitted to the Tower as prisoners. The terms " CavaUer "
and "Eoundhead" now became words of reproach, and
bloody brawls were of constant occurrence, Charles
stiU refused the house its accustomed guard of soldiers,
promising " on the honour of a king to defend them as
he would his own children; " but his answer had scarcely
been read when a herald-at-arms demanded the surrender
by the Commons of their leaders Hampden, Pym, HoUis,
Strode and Haselrig, who were accused of high treason.
This was setting aU constitutional law aside, as the
charge proceeded personaUy from the king, and would
have deprived the accused of their legal right to a trial
by their peers, and brought them before a tribunal which
had no jurisdiction over them. The Commons promised
to consider the demand, and again requested a guard,
"I wUl reply to-morrow," said the king. Gathering
around him three hundred gentlemen, the next day he
embraced his queen, and promising her he would return
master of his kingdom, went down to the house, took
the speaker's chair and demanded the five members.
The birds had flown. The house sat in silent dignity,
and Charles in angry mood withdrew, having taken
nothing by his motion. Cries of ' ' PrivUege ' ' rang around
him as he returned through the streets, the writs issued
for the arrest of the accused members were disregarded
by the sheriffs, and the proclamation, which designated
them as traitors, was answered by the trained bands
and watermen of London, who, forming a sworn guard
to the ParUament, escorted the "flve" to the house.
Charles withdrew from WhitehaU, where he was no
longer safe ; he had drawn the sword, and now, throwing
away the scabbard, he despatched Newcastle to raise
forces in the north, and his queen, from Dover, with the
crown jewels, to raise the munitions of war. The Lords
reluctantly joined the Commons, who threatened that if
they did not "they would alone save the kingdom."
Both parties now broke through constitutional precedent.
The king had no right to raise troops save to repress
rebeUion or meet a foreign invasion. He had, however,
V 2

298

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1642,

assumed the right, and was busy levying forces. The
ParUament foUowed suit by passing a Militia biU, and
giving the command to trustworthy officers. Then the
waverers in the house were compeUed to decide for King
or Commons, and the EoyaUsts withdrew themselves
from both houses, being in number rather less than
one hundred ; these joined the king at York, Short of
arms, the king marched to HuU, the great magazine of
the north, and was refused admittance by Sir John
Hotham, the governor.
Parliament justified the
refusal, and then, on
August 22nd, Charles
hastened to Nottingham
castle and raised his
standard for a final ap
peal to arms, "For,"
said he, in answer to
the last proposals of
Parliament, with a dig
nity worthy of a better
cause, "if I granted your
demands I should be
no more than the mere
phantom of a king,"
21, In July, 1642,
the Marquis of Hert
ford arrived in Somer
set, where he raised
troops on the king's be
half; and, in Septem
ber, Eichard Aldworth,
mayor of Bristol, imme
diately set about increas
ing the defences of the
city. The old waUs were
repaired, the gates were
strengthened, chains of
iron were suspended
within them, the port
cullises were cleansed

SOUTH

',— f'.1Sdt:'jeaj

,Sket^/l.^clu: a„nv<,rkj of Bnstol in J6.^..j.
The line is tlic same co-'istructed foi- the siege of 1643.
from rust so as to faU easily, and great strong raUs, fuU
of iron spikes, were kept in readiness to hinder the en
trance of cavalry; the many forts upon the waUs were
found to be very strong, as weU as the great tower of the
castle, and were mounted with cannon, whUst the battle
ments were made good wherever necessary; in short,
the city itself was weU defended, whUst the castle in
the opinion of the most competent engineers and miU
tary men on both sides, was capable of holding out for
many weeks, even if the city itself were taken, ^
^ For further particulars, see Seyer, II,, 301,

22. In addition to its ancient defences, an outer Une
of fortification was by Fiennes drawn around the city
on the west, north and east sides, in order to prevent its
bombardment. Our readers wiU speciaUy note this por
tion of the defences, as it was the only one that had been
entered when Fiennes surrendered the city to Prince
Eupert, The line began at the top of the steps which
lead up from WoodweU crescent, where are the remains
of the water fort which commanded the river, from
which it is distant less
than 100 yards. Here
seven cannon were in
tended to be mounted.
From this fort a double
ditch, with ramparts,
was carried to the top
of the hill in a straight
Une ; at about one-third
of the distance this was
strengthened by a semi
circular bastion. From
this point a loop ditch
and rampart was thrown
out towards Clifton hill
for about 100 yards,
when it re-curved, and
was carried also up the
hill in a direction nearly
parallel to the first, or
inner line, but sUghtly
inclining towards it.
The conical mound
which crowned the hUl-
top, which was 45 feet
in diameter and 25 feet
in height from the sur
rounding ground, had
a platform added to it
which projected like a
spur westward ; this plat
form was 46 yards long

. rf,.A'T„.,Vrf/tV,/u,j,

at ia£h Jlalte^ ,mt'n

by 30 yards wide, and was surrounded by a ditch 15 feet
deep in places, which was faced by an inner waU 3 feet
in thickness. Here there were six cannon. The distance
from the water fort was 320 yards. The ditches of the
Une were intended to be from 10 to 15 feet deep, to
which the ramparts of earth would have added perhaps
5 other feet. This part of the line was unquestion
ably strong, although it was not finished at the time of
the first siege. From the cone of the hiU the graff was
carried down across BuUock's park (Berkeley square) to
a spot where it crossed the site of the present road in

A,D, 1642,

LINES OF DEFENCE AROUND THE CITY.

299

front of the Blind Asylum, from whence it ran up the
opposite hUl (TyndaU's park) to the WindmUl fort.
The rocky nature of the ground had here in places hin
dered the citizens from making the ditch of sufficient
depth (mUlstone grit is hard to work), and in several
places the defence was left unfinished, a neglect which
cost the Parliamentarians dear. There were several
angular redoubts on the site of Berkeley square, and
behind the spot on which now stands the Blind Asylum ;
between the two forts stood another smaU fort on or
near the New Theatre Eoyal, i.e., about 100 yards
within the line — this, in honour of the general of the
people's army, was designated Essex fort. The second
hUl was crowned by a smaU fort, converted to warlike
purposes out of the base of a windmiU, which mounted
five guns. From the WindmiU fort the graff was bent
round to the east, when it foUowed the line of South-
weU street as far as the "Montague" tavern, at the
back of which there was another redoubt of considerable
strength ; smaU angular sconces on the intermediate
Une strengthened this, as weU as other portions of the
defence. The lane at the back of the houses on the
northern side of Kingsdown parade points out the con
tinuation of the vaUation, and its angles were the points
of the sconces which enfiladed this portion up to Prior's
hUl (Fremantle square) ; this last was intended to be a
large and strong work, but it was unfinished, and only
three guns were mounted therein. It stood outside the
graff, which here bent round to the south-east, and was
carried down the hiU by HiUgrove street, (A few years
since, when Jamaica street was being made, the writer
measured a section of the ditch, 10 feet wide, and saw
a skeleton disinterred.) The line then crossed Stoke's
croft, which was guarded by a gatehouse, unarmed with
guns apparently, at least we read not of any having
been mounted there ; it was thence carried on by the
Pest house in the fields to the Weir, just where the
Frome is crossed by the footbridge, and from thence by
the line of New street to Lawford's gate, which had
seven guns mounted, from which it was carried down
Whipping Cat hiU a short distance, when it bent round
to the south-west until it joined the Avon. This graff,
or line of defence, consisted of a ditch about three yards
wide and five feet deep where possible, but owing to
the rocky nature of the ground it was very much shal
lower in many places, and in some places consisted of a
mere scratch in the surface ; the earth thrown up formed
a rampart on the inner side of the fosse, and was, on
the average, about three feet in height ; this ramp ran
through the above-named batteries, between each two
of which there was one or more ravelins, or sconces,
thrust out at an angle to enfilade the Une, The forts

were palisaded. The brief time had not been sufficient
to make the work thorough in any part (the Brandon
hiU portion appears to have been the best), neither had
the citizens up to the time of the first siege levelled the
hedges and stone enclosures on the outer side. This
was the outer defence. Beyond it, on the west, at the
HotweUs and the foot of Clifton hiU, were a few huts,
chiefiy of fishermen ; Clifton was itself a smaU village
of twenty or thirty houses, two of which, of considerable
size, stood on the brow of the hill that faced Brandon,
MiUerd's view of the city, drawn about twenty years
subsequent to the date of these events, gives us a view
of the ground covered by houses and gardens in the
suburbs that were enclosed by the lines. From the
deanery and old college buildings the houses ran along
Trenchard street to the Eed lodge, and vid Maudlin
street to St, James' church. From the Barton they turned
south to the castle ; along the Weir there were a few
houses and gardens. Old Market street was a lane, so
narrow and deep that one ancient MS, says "in one
part a lad sprang upon a passing wain of hay and
jumped thence to the other side," Here, as far as
Lawford's gate, were groups of houses, that thinned
off into cottages with gardens as the distance from the
protecting waUs of the castle increased. These were
outside the city wall, but within the lines.
The inner defence, the gates and towers of which
were armed with guns, consisted of the walls of the
ancient city, which we have already described. Across
the river the bend of the Avon had been connected by a
waU, on which were armed batteries, viz., at Tower
Harratz, on the eastern bend, and Temple gate, these
two were armed with fourteen guns, and Eedcliff gate
with fifteen guns. The western bend was protected by
the guns on the Grove and Back, and also by Eedcliff
church, which was made into a strong fort. This line
of the wall was very strong, the ditch having been the
course of the Avon during the time that the bridge was
being built, hence it was broad, deep, and of very un
sound bottom, in fact a defence of itself almost sufficient,
but backed as it was with a lofty and very strong waU,
with batteries, it offered an insurmountable obstacle to
an assailing force,
23, The citizens were stiU pushing on the work,
when news came of the battle of EdgehiU, October 23rd,
1642, in which fight the king had been victorious,
Denzil HoUis was appointed by ParUament to the com
mand of the Bristol mUitia, and he subscribed £1,000
towards its maintenance.
The king knew the importance which attached to
the possession of Bristol; in 1642 he had early sent a
letter to the mayor, Locke, in which he exhorted "the

300

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1642.

city to obedience," and complained of "certain upstarts
in religion," of some who " were rebeUiously malevolent
to his person," and he commanded the citizens not to
join the forces then being raised against him, not to
admit any soldiers either on his side or on that of the
Parliament, but to keep and defend the city for his
majesty's use,'^
When, therefore, in August, 1642, the Marquis of
Hertford and Lord Paulet sent Sir Ferdinando Gorges,
of WraxaU, with Mr. Thomas Smyth, of Ashton, "to
get leave to bring certain troops of horse into the city
for the king," the mayor (Locke) refused, pleading the
king's orders. Hertford then retreated to Sherborne.
Soon after Aldworth's accession to the civic chair. Sir
Alexander Popham sent 500 horse to Bedminster, intend
ing them to be the nucleus of a regiment of 1,000 which
he hoped to raise in Bristol for the Parliament. But
the Mayor and Common Council refused him admittance
into the city greatly to his chagrin ; and showed that they
were in earnest by setting " the trained bands to watch
and ward as weU without the gate as within, to keep
out,aU strange forces by night and by day, 100 at least
armed with pikes and musquets and baU." In Novem
ber, Colonel Thomas Essex, who held Gloucester for the
Parliament, at the suggestion and upon the invitation,
it is said, of some of the men of Bristol, left that city
with two regiments in order to secure Bristol for the
Parliament. He arrived before the waUs on the 2nd of
December, 1642, The citizens were divided in opinion,
the pronounced EoyaUsts formed a powerful and rich
minority, the Constitutionalists outnumbered them, but
there was a residuum, numerous enough to turn the scale,
who were doubtful and wavering. The council wished
to keep Bristol a free city, by stiU obeying the king's
orders. Therefore the gates were doubly warded, large
stores of ammunition were provided, and 300 new mus
kets were furnished as additional arms for the trained
bands and volunteers. The loyal party readily helped
in the defence, two guns were planted at the High Cross
to sweep the streets, if the soldiers forced the gates, and
two were mounted at the Frome gate, at which Colonel
Essex was expected to make a forcible attempt ; there
the Eoyalist party stood to their arms awaiting the
assault. Meanwhile the mayor and council met at the
Tolzey. The majority of the house seem to have been,
like the mayor, attached to the party of the Parliament,
News came in that Essex had passed Thornbury, and
the house coiUd arrive at no decision ; when, lo ! another
army, whose only weapons were their tongues and their
tears, gathered and marched on the Tolzey. They were
led by the mayoress, and Lady Eogers and Mrs, Hol-
1 Mercurius rusticus,

worthy, ex-mayoresses, and Mrs. Vickris, an ex-sheriff's
wife ; they carried the Tolzey incontinently, and con
quered the council. WhUst this was passing, Essex's
van had reached Frome gate, and exchanged shots with
its defenders ; probably this was only a feint, as the
colonel himself, with his main body, came by the way
of the New gate, where they were at once admitted
through the contrivance of the women ; and Colonel
Essex immediately took upon himself the governorship
of the city and castle, without any written commission,
but by the appointment of the Earl of Essex, com
mander-in-chief of the Parliament forces, and the ap
proval of Parliament. The same day, December 4th,
Colonel Popham was admitted with his regiment from
Bedminster, and on the 30th he left with 1,000 men for
Exeter, Colonel Essex disarmed the trained bands and the
citizens whom he suspected of disaffection to the Par
liament, and on the 23rd of January he shot one of his
own troopers for mutinously demanding with others his
pay,' 24, On January 7th a petition, emanating from the
inhabitants of the city of Bristol, praying for peace,
was presented by four aldermen of the city to the king
at Oxford. The text of the petition and the king's
answer may be seen in Seyer, IL, 3 1 5-1 9. It decries the
cruel war and prays for tranquUity ; joins heartUy with
London in invoking the king's assistance in restoring
the same ; complains that the foreign trade of Bristol is
being ruined ; that the ships Ue rotting in the harbour,
without mariners, freight, or trade ; that home dissen
sions have injured the credit of their merchants abroad,
to the decay of the customs and his majesty's revenue;
that no man enjoys life, wife, chUdren, or estate, and
that the misery consequent on the strife is unutterable,
fathers and sons fighting on opposite sides ; and the
city of Bristol being at great expense, obliged to main
tain such a costly garrison as not even in the wars of
the Barons or any other civU war had happened. They
pray his majesty no longer to be divorced from his par
liament ; to forsake the councils of notorious malignants,
who for selfish and sinister ends seek the ruin of the
Commonwealth ; to check the assumption of the prelacy,
which is forcing new canons and doctrines on the people ;
and to devise some speedy way for a reconciUation with
the parUament, &c. To which the king replies, through
Lord Falkland, that he is pleased with this early demon
stration of their duty, and accepts in good part their
hearty advices ; that he compassionates the afiUctions of
his people; that he is ignorant of any innovations of
the Church of England, and wUl check the pride of
^ For further particulars, see Seyer, II,, 320,

A,D. 1643,

FIENNES AS GOVERNOR OF BRISTOL.

301

prelacy ; that he covets nothiijg so much as a reconcilia
tion with parliament ; that he wUl do his utmost to
preserve the Uberties of his people, and wUl have a
provident and pious eye upon the city of Bristol, &c,
25. Colonel Essex was of a gay disposition, he liked
feasting, good company, and sporting, and was not in
accord with the Puritan party in the city, who viewed
with suspicion his intimacy with known EoyaUsts like
Yeomans, and were jealous of his corre,spondence with
Prince Eupert. These causes being brought under the
notice of the Earl of Essex, he considered that Bristol
was not safe in Colonel Essex's hands, and consequently
he gave orders to Colonel Fiennes, the second son of
Lord Say, to remove Colonel Essex from the command,
on the ground of the distrust of him in the city owing
to his great friendliness with those of Eoyalist proclivi
ties. On the 27th of February, Essex was accordingly
poUtely waited upon whilst feasting at the house of
Colonel HiU, at Eedland, and was escorted by a strong
party of horse towards Berkeley castle,
Fiennes being now governor, established himself in
Broad street, and placed his younger brother, John, in
command of the Castle, At first he was subordinate to
Sir WiUiam WaUer ; but he had sufficient infiuence to
procure a second commission, which rendered him inde
pendent of that general. He associated with himself
as a committee the mayor, Eichard Aldworth, Joseph
Jackson and Hugh Brown, the sheriffs, Eichard Hol
worthy, Luke Hodges and Henry Gibbs. These levied
a tax of £55 15s, a week on landed and personal pro
perty, the first payment to be on March 1st, 1642-3,
which parUament confirmed. Finding this insufficient,
together with the twentieth part of the sequestrations
of deUnquents' estates, they proposed to add portions of
the three adjoining counties and to raise the proportion
of Bristol from £65 to £400 per week, in order to finish
the fortifications and maintain three regiments, two
troops of horse, one of dragoons, and three regiments
of trained bands. But this plan feU through for want
of money. Fiennes complained that he had lost £5,000
of his own money, and that out of the sequestrations
he could not raise altogether £300, the creditors seizing
on the property, or the estates being concealed. The
Protestants of Ireland being in great distress, large
voluntary contributions were made by the Constitution-
aUsts of the city and the adjoining counties, which,
being laid out in food, were despatched to Ireland in the
ship Mermaid on the 14th AprU, 1643, and the remainder
in the ship Sampson on the 27th of the same month.
The schism between the two parties in the church
was rife in Bristol, They must be classed as high
church and low church, for separatists or dissenters

were then unknown in Bristol, The Eoyalists consisted
of Eoman Catholics and the High Church party. The
Puritans or Low Churchmen (who to a great extent
became either Independents, Presbyterians, or Quakers
in the course of a few years) were to a man on the side
of the Parliament,
26, A curious MS, is quoted in extenso by Seyer
II,, 338 — 41, as being iUustrative of the manners, and
spirit of the age. It purports to be a relation of
sundry visions, forewarnings, and prophetical relations
accorded to Mrs, Grace Carey, the widow of Walter
Carey, of Bristol, She, having in vain sought at great
travel and expense an audience of His Majesty, was
induced to commit her experience to writing, December,
1644. Not to weary our readers with her rhapsodies,
we come to the chief point : " WhUst at church on the
Lord's day, she saw the perfect shape of a king's head
and face, without a body, which looked very pale and
wan ; which head had a crown, and the crown was all
bloody in a circle round about," &c. She subsequently
was presented to the king at Eichmond, and gave him
her "writing," which he returned to her unread, he
being about to take horse, saying, "She meant well,
and was a good woman," She foUowed him to York
and Newcastle, where she feU on her knees before him
in the presence chamber, but he utterly refused to hear
her. She came back to Bristol, resting satisfied with
her conscientious attempt to discharge her duty, Seyer
says in a note: "The MS, is dated 1644, four years
before the king's death, and has internal evidence of
being written at that time," He adds his own belief
of the truth of the story. " Credat Judmus."
The Eoyalist party in the city were now overborne
by the men in authority, whose hyper-Calvinistic doc
trines were assumed by numbers who had no portion of
the divine life of the man whose name has become a
synonym for the views of God's sovereignty which he
held, Calvin had a great soul but a hard heart. His
foUowers in Bristol and elsewhere during this age,
appear to have inherited aU the latter with added
sterUity, but to have compressed their modicum of the
higher nature into the smaUest possible compass, forcing
it between grooves that converged into egotistic fana
ticism. It cannot be concealed that these men violated
the spirit of true religion, and by their narrow views,
iconoclastic excesses, and bitter bigotry, brought dis
grace upon their cause, Eeligious freedom ran riot;
possessed with a thorough hatred of forms and cere
monies, the men who claimed it for themselves dese
crated the churches, demolished the organs, broke the
stained glass windows, overturned the altars, defaced
the monuments, and battered the statues. Clerical

302

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1643,

habits, lectionaries and prayer books they destroyed
and burned, and insulted, imprisoned, and plundered
those who adhered to the tenets of Laud or of Eome,
whom they classed together as Papists, WiUiamson,
of AU Saints, Standfast, of Christchurch, Towgood, of
St, Nicholas, and others of the clergy were ejected
from their livings by Fiennes, who replaced them by
Toombes, Craddock, Bacon, Walter, Simmonds, and
Hazard, These, however,
were conscientious men,
and of some education,
compared with their suc
cessors, of whose vagaries
it may be truly said, "the
worst of madmen is a saint
run mad,"
27, One cannot won
der, therefore, that an
attempt should be made
to throw off this burden
by the loyal adherents of
the king. These were in
number about 2,000 of
aU grades. The principal
leaders were Eobert Yeo
mans, merchant, who had
been sheriff in 1641 — 2,
and George Boucher,
merchant. Shortly before
Colonel Essex had arrived
in Bristol, Yeomans had
obtained a commission to
raise a regiment in the
city for the service of the
king. On the removal of
Essex, many of whose
officers and soldiers were
greatly displeased, Yeo
mans advanced £40 to
four of these officers. Cap
tain Hilsdon and Lieu
tenants MarshaU, Moore,
and Cheyney, with which
they were to win over as
many of their men as
possible for his majesty. Communications were opened
with the king and Prince Eupert at Oxford, and his
majesty despatched Dr, Marks and Captain Cockram
to treat with the conspirators, Charles approved of
their design and promised them he would make Bristol
a famous city when it came into his hands. Prince
Eupert was directed to move upon Bristol, and upon

the night of Tuesday, March 7th, 1642-3, to have a
sufficient force on Durdham down ready at a given
signal — the ringing of the beUs of St, John's and St.
Nicholas — to march down to Frome gate and enter the
city. Yeomans' house was in Wine street (the site of No,
6) ; it had a back door into a lane, which was dark and
convenient for assembling and arming a party without
attracting attention. The
guard -house (the gate
way of which is shown at
264) was on the opposite
side of Wine street, and
Captain Hilsdon and
Lieutenant Moore, were
on the appointed night,
in command of the main
guard, the intention being
for Yeomans to surprise
the guard-house and de
tain the men.
Boucher's house was
in Christmas street, abut
ting on the river Frome ;
both his and Yeomans'
house were stored with
firearms and ammunition,
which were to be eked
out with clubs and
swords. At Boucher's
there were, in addition,
chains and locks for se
curing St, John's gate
way, so that the con
spirators might not be
taken in the rear by the
horse soldiers. Another
party was to assemble
at the house of Thomas
Milward, outside the
walls, on St, Michael's
hUl, and another at the
house of Eobert Luckett,
Hotert Yeomans. The Eoyalists woro, by
Eupert's direction, to dis
tinguish themselves by wearing a piece of white tape
upon their breasts, and another upon the hinder part of
their hats. The watchword was "Charles," The plan
was for Yeomans and his coUeagues to quietly secure
the guard, seize upon the ordnance, and if need be
sweep the streets with a central fire from the High
Cross, A proclamation was ready, commanding "AU

A.D. 1643.

YEOMANS AND BOUCHER'S ATTEMPT ON THE CITY.

30

inhabitants of the Bridge, High street, and Corn street
kepe within your dores upon paines of your lives. All
other inhabitants of this city that stand for the king, the
Protestant reUgion and the Uberty of the city, let them
forthwith appear at the High Crosse, with such armour
as they have for the defence of their wives and chUdren,
and foUow their leaders for the same defence," Boucher
and his men, who had forced open the door of St, John's

child, save those in the houses that had the king's mark
upon their doors, and that Captain Boone, with the
saUors, had orders to fire the city in divers places, and
the mayor was to be kiUed in order to secure the keys
and the treasure,"
The Prince on Monday had marched from Basing
stoke to Sodbury, Kej'usham bridge having been broken
down by the Bristol Council of War, On Tuesday his

Wine Street, with the entrance to the Guard-ho^ise : 17th centni-y. From an old Pr

crypt, to be used as a prison, were to aid in seizing on
the Frome gate. MUward's party outside were to rush
down Steep street and Christmas steps to their help,
and Luckett's party was detaUed for the seizure of the
Pithay gate. As soon as the Frome gate was in their
hands the beUs of St, John's were to ring for the
saUors, St, Nicholas for the butchers, and MUward, by
ringing St. Michael's as the signal of success, was to
summon Eupert to descend and secure the prize.
The accounts differ as to the after-play in the event
of their success. The Eoyalists' statement is "that aU
was to be done if possible without bloodshed," Their
adversaries averred that Prince Eupert had given orders
" that no quarter was to be shown to man, woman or

army lay at Westbury, Horfield and Durdham down,
and that night he had a party ready at the GaUows on
St. Michael's hiU, just outside the lines, awaiting the
signal. Had he then made a brisk attempt the Consti-
tutionaUsts admit that he might have carried the city,
there being in it but two regiments of foot, and less
than a regiment of horse, the townsmen overdone with
the duty of watching, many of the soldiers disaffected,
and a large and powerful array of Eoyalists waiting to
further his efforts. But
" The best laid schemes o' mice an' men.
Gang aft a-gley,"
Some talking females, who were active on the ParUa-
ment's side, had, Barrett says, the night before dis-

304

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1643.

covered the plot, and revealed it. Prynne says it was
Clement Walker, who was made acquainted with it by
one Dobbins, who told of the frequent assemblage of
disaffected persons at "The Eose" tavern (in Temple
street, lately pulled down). At ten o'clock at night
Major Langrish, with a party of horse, and Capt, Buck
marched upon Yeomans' house, at the entrance of which
and in the lane they found a party armed. Upon his
threat to batter the house with cannon, twenty -four men
yielded and laid down their arms; these were sent to
the castle. Many others escaped over the house-tops.
One of the prisoners, to curry favour, confessed that
another detachment was ready for mischief at the house
of Boucher, in Christmas street, Boucher's house ad
joined the bridge ; it was buUt around a court in the
middle, and was supported on that side by large freestone
piUars, On the side opposite to the entrance there was
a large room, which looked out upon the river, Lang
rish hurried to the spot, but Captain Goodiere was
aUeady there with his soldiers, breaking open the door ;
here they captured but six persons that night, although
there were upwards of sixty in the house ; the remainder
escaping by a back door, or by dropping from the
windows into the Frome, Many of these, who were
taken the next day, affirmed that their adherents in the
city and adjacent parishes were at least 2,000 in number.
When the prisoners were secured Langrish was ordered
to take a party of horse and " dragooners " and attack
Prince Eupert, near Mr. Hill's house on St. Michael's
hUl. With twenty men of each arm he, at four o'clock
in the morning, made the attempt, and fired upon the
enemy as they sat round a fire. They immediately
retreated and joined their main body on Durdham
down. These, making a display of their force about
seven o'clock on the Wednesday morning, were thrice
fired upon from Brandon hiU by Fiennes, "A white
horse was kiUed by the shot, and then the whole body
wheeled about and marched off. Scouting parties were
immediately sent out, one of which, consisting of four
troopers, encountered seven of the enemy, who at the
first discharge of pistols fied, two of them abandoning
horses, pistols and rich coats, swam the river ; two
others escaped on foot through the woods, and two
appear to have been slain, inasmuch as a trumpeter was
sent into the city the next day to demand the bodies of
— Weston and another whose name he declined to give,"
The foUowing narrative is generally supposed to
have been written by Colonel Taylor; it shows how
narrowly he escaped with his Ufe, and is an evidence of
the strong confidence which the Eoyalists had in the
ultimate success of the king's cause. It was written
when Prince Eupert held Bristol, in 1643-4,

"a wonderfull escape from the enemy.
"Seeing that the Eoyal Armes are victorious on all sides, on
the East, and on the West ; on the North, and on the South ; and
that his Majesty (God bless his Most Gracious Majesty King
Charles 1st) has nough tt to do, but to march triumphantly to the
Throne of his Ancestors, to array himself in the purple robe of
Authority, and to adorn his Serene Brows with the Golden Crown
of Dominion ! No longer let by tremulous forebodings, I am con
strained to indite this narrative of my escape from the loathsome
dungeons of the Castle, and an ignominious death, Uke the doom
of those Holy Martyrs, Sheriff Yeomans and Good Master Boucher,
who are gone to their Blessed Eeward, honoured, respected, and
beloved ! To the end that God's merciful Providence may be
holden in Everlasting Eemembrance,
' ' I was with Yeomans, at his house in Wine street, on the 6th
March, 1643, when he received warning that our plot was dis
covered, and I volunteered to go to Master Boucher, in Christmas
street, aud instruct him to dismiss his men, Yeomans was much
dejected, and with a grave and sorrowful aspect, said mournfully
and impressively — ' Go at once, and tarry not, or you may be too
late, ' They were the last words I heard from his Ups ; nor did I
behold him again ; before I could venture from my privacy, Yeo
mans and Boucher were hanged, and gone down into silence. For
the other Eoyalists were torments and chains, darkness and misery.
I am not a young man, but it would not have been safe for Clement
Walker to have crossed my path as I went to Master Boucher,
Giving the pass-word I was admitted, and had scarcely communi
cated my fatal intelhgence, to the dismay and consternation of the
assembled Eoyalists, before we had time for deliberation, a violent
knocking was heard at the outer door, and an imperative order to
' put out lights ' (i.e, ' hang out lights '), which we did, but not in
the manner indicated by the command. All was confusion. Every
noble feeling and patriotick sentiment fled before the instinct of
self-preservation. The Window, the only chance of escape, was
blocked with the conspirators, who let each other's egress by all
striving to get out simultaneously, and became jambed ; whereas,
had they quitted in an orderly manner there would have been
no let, and all could have escaped from the room m the which so
many were taken, I could hear them drop, drop into the shining
bed of the river ; fortunately the tide was low, but they were
almost smothered iu the mud, I could see nothing save ruddy
glares of Ught from the cabins of phantom ships in the distance,
reflected in the sluggish water. Commending my soul to God's
Providence, I dropped from the window, and fell with my face in
the mud, and should have been suffocated, had not Edward Dacre,
plumber, 11 St, Michael's hill, who foUowed, assisted me to rise,
for the which he is remembered in my daily prayers, and I have
recommended him as a good and skillfull workman, who does his
utmost to give satisfaction at moderate charges. But om- situation
was critical, Eepeated shots were fired from the window without
effect, save to awaken the barking of dogs," [The rest of the
MS. is imperfect.] — Tovey's Local Jottings,
Hitherto neither of the two great parties into which
the kingdom had become divided had taken the life of
any adversary, save in fair fight; hence the EoyaUsts,
in concocting this conspiracy, seem to have had no idea
that they wore incurring the penalty due to treason.
There can be little doubt, we think, that the law was
strained to meet a case which had never been contem-
jplated, and fidelity to their king was, in the peculiar
circumstances of the case, crueUy treated as "treason
to the nation," The prisoners were chained by the

a,d. 1643.

PRINCE RUPERT STORMS BRISTOL.

305

neck and feet in a dungeon in the castle, and aUowed
neither fire, Ughts, nor visits from their friends or fami-
Ues, Fiennes received the thanks of both houses, and
was appointed president of a commission, wdth special
orders to proceed with aU celerity and severity against
his prisoners. After frequent examinations at the house
of Eobert Eogers, barrister, at the Bridge end, they
were found guilty — Yeomans on May 8th, and Boucher
on May 22nd ; WiUiam Yeomans and Edward Dacres,
who had escaped, were Ukewise tried and found guUty,
and the four were condemned to be hanged. '^ The king
attempted to save his faithful servants, and the Earl of
Forth, lord-Ueutenant of his forces, was instructed to
write to Fiennes, threatening to retaliate and hang the
prisoners then in his hands if Yeomans and Boucher
suffered the extreme penalty. But, unfortunately for
them, Fiennes held in custody Sir Walter Pye, Sir
WUUam Crofts, Colonel Connesby, and many other
Eoyalists, men of noble and gentle blood, whilst the
king's prisoners were chiefly of low degree, so that the
threat avaUed not. Charles then tried to induce the
mayor and the magistrates to raise the city trained
bands and rescue them ; this effort also failed. But, to
their credit be it spoken, Aldworth, the mayor, and the
aldermen interceded and begged their feUow-townsmen's
Uves, but in vain, Fiennes himself hesitated to carry
out the sentence untU he had acquainted the two houses
and the general with its purport. Then, by command
of the Earl of Essex and by a vote of the Commons,
who considered that a stern example was needed, he
proceeded to carry it into effect. Fearful of rescue, the
city gates were shut, and- the troops lined the streets
when the mournful procession issued from the castle.
The gaUows was raised at the western end of the
Market-house, in Wine street (where the pump now
stands), opposite to Yeomans' house. Here the two
leaders suffered. Yeomans, weakened by his imprison
ment, fainted away as he was brought out. They
desired that their friends, the Eevs, Standfast and Tow-
good, might be with them to the last ; but even this
consolation was denied them, Craddock and Fowler, two
of their foes, being appointed to attend them to the
gaUows. Captain Langrish, whose name wiU again
appear in unenviable notoriety in these pages, displayed
the innate cowardice of his nature by taunting the
sufferers and disturbing them in their last devotions,
WhUst Captain Clifton smote sorely the hand of Yeo
mans' brother-in-law. Master John Haggat, because he
stayed the oscUlation of the body of the victim as he
was swung off the ladder. Yeomans left a widow near
her confinement and eight little chUdren ; Boucher left
* For further particulars, see Seyer, II, , 375-377,
[Vol. I.]

a widow and seven chUdren, The loyal martyrs were
buried, Yeomans at Christ church and Boucher at St.
Werburgh's. Yeomans left a lengthy confession, which
Seyer supposes to have been garbled to suit a purpose
by Clement Walker ; but we should rather term it an
honourable justification of his proceedings.'^
We mentioned in its place that, in May, Charles
had sent a proclamation to the mayor in favour of the
condemned prisoners. Previous to this he had sent
others, one in March, which especially commanded " aU
seamen, mariners and officers of his navy not to serve
imder the Earl of Warwick." This was proclaimed on
the Friday ; but on the Saturday, in fuU market, Fiennes
came in his coach to the High Cross, attended by a troop
of horse, where he declared the said proclamation to be
a scandalous and UbeUous paper, which deserved to be
burned by the common hangman. He then caused the
sergeant who had proclaimed it to burn the document,
holding pistols to his breast and threatening to shoot
him dead if he did not hold it up so that aU the people
might see it burn,
28, Eupert, on the faUure of the plot, retreated vid
Cirencester, and rejoined the king at Oxford, from
whence men were despatched to augment the Eoyalist
force in CornwaU, which forthwith marched eastward
into Somerset, capturing Taunton, Bridgwater and
Dunster castle. Sir WUliam WaUer was sent by the
ParUament to check their advance ; he made Bath his
head- quarters, and drew his suppUes from thence and
from Bristol. Colonel Popham joined him from this
city on July 3rd, and on the 5th he marched out of the
city of Bath and joined battle on the north-west spur
of Lansdown, within sight of the city of Bristol, where
the flash and the boom of the guns were both seen and
heard distmctly. Here the gaUant Su: BevU GrenviUe
feU (a handsome monument records the spot). The
fight ceased at eleven in the evening, and the battle was
drawn, both armies retreating, WaUer, who was in
reality victorious, although he knew it not, sought shelter
within the waUs of Bath, As soon as he discovered his
error he foUowed the king's army to Devizes, where he
besieged them ; but their horse broke through his Unes,
and joining a force under Wilmot, which had been sent
to their reUef, turned back upon WaUer and cut his
army to pieces on Eoundway down, WaUer fled to
Bristol with but a handful of men, bringing with him
the first tidings of his defeat. It was now "ruin upon
ruin, rout on rout;" disaster foUowed disaster, Hamp
den feU at Chalgrove, Essex feU back upon Uxbridge;
the west was up for the king, and Fiennes, rightly
> For a list of the men concerned in this attempt, see
the end of this Chapter.

306

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT,

a,d. 1643.

judging the coming event, caUed home from Bath the
remainder of his men, who had been lent to WaUer,
busied himself in finishing the Unes to the north of
Bristol and in making preparations to withstand a
siege. By sound of trumpet he ordered aU citizens to
lay in three months' stock of provisions, and, storing
weU the castle, made known his determination to hold
it to extremity. The Constitutionalists of the city and
the adjacent country sent in thither their valuables,
money and plate, and contributed UberaUy towards the
expense of fortifying it, Fiennes gave orders to de
molish the churches of St, Peter and St, PhiUp, which
were dangerously near to the castle, but the rapid
approach of Prince Eupert prevented the execution of
his command ; and although the citizens laboured night
and day, the rocky nature of the hiUs, as we have
stated, prevented also the completion of the outer
defences, especiaUy between Brandon and the WindmiU
forts. On the 22nd of July the Eoyalists, in smaU parties,
were scouting on the south and east of the city. Next
day they increased in number and encamped, the general-
in-chief (the Marquis of Hertford) and Prince Maurice
on the Somerset side, with the Cornish army, and Prince
Eupert, with that from Oxford, on the Gloucestershire
side. The force altogether consisted of fourteen regi
ments of foot, two wings of horse, the prince's Ufe-
guards and nine troops of dragoons, altogether between
14,000 and 20,000 men. The besieged had sent away
WaUer with 500 horse as an incumbrance, and with
him many of the gentry had sought refuge in London.
Fiennes had about 2,000 foot, 300 horse and 200 volun
teers, townsmen who helped to man the works, 100 of
whom were stationed along the Une from the WindmiU
to Prior's hUl fort. The officers boasted that they could,
if need arose, arm 6,000 or 8,000 more able-bodied men
in the city.
On the ^4th an attack was made by the Cornish men
on the south-west side. Prince Maurice and the Mar
quis of Hertford's men rushed on and gained the foot
of the wall that enclosed Temple and EedcUff, but were
beaten back with loss. The same day the prince, with
the help of some loyal saUors, seized the shipping in
Kingroad, On the 25th a violent attack was made
upon the Une on Kingsdown. Fiennes had been strongly
advised to occupy the higher ground outside this Une,
and to erect a fort on the present site of Highbury
Congregational church, which advice he neglected, con
tenting himself with a smaU sconce on the hiU at the
back of the "Montague" tavern, Eupert, wiser than
Fiennes, who was a good lawyer perchance, but a poor
soldier, saw his opportunity and planted a strong bat

tery in the neglected spot, under cover of the fire from
which his men, " with fire pickes, grenadoes and scaUng
ladders," attempted the line, but were repulsed with
great loss. A council of war was held on this day, the
plan of attack was decided upon, and every preparation
made for storming on the foUowing morning.
On Wednesday, the 26th of July, the storming of the
city began in six different places. The watchword was
" Oxford," the colours green. The orders were to fiU in
the ditch as soon as and wherever it was carried, so that
the horse might enter ; also to seize upon and to main
tain the church of St, Mary Eedcliff. The Cornish
regiments, " ambitious to win the works first," made a
start too early (half-past two in the morning), under
Prince Maurice and the Marquis of Hertford. They
were divided into tertias : the first, under Colonel Buck,
consisted of his regiment, Hertford's and Maurice's ; the
second, under Sir Nicholas Slanning, comprised, besides
his own troops. Lord Mohun's and Trevanion's men;
Bassett commanded the third body, having with him
Godolphin's and the late Sir BevU GrenvUle's regiments,
Slanning, with five field officers and 500 men, was
ordered to attack Temple gate. Buck was to faU upon
the Tower Harratz, Bassett to carry Eedcliff church and
gate, whUst Maurice, with the reserve, occupied PUe
hUl, The troops marched courageously to the attack,
pushing before them carts wherewith to fiU the back
Avon, which here formed the fosse. Through haste, or
mistake, they had left their faggots and scaUng ladders
behind, but Slanning's men actuaUy got over the ditch,
and some of them mounted the waU ; Buck also reached
the top of the waU, when, wounded by a halbert, he
feU back, and perished in the moat, Slanning and
Trevanion, neither of them eight-and-twenty years of
age, were both mortaUy wounded at the same moment,
and the attack was repulsed with great loss both of
officers and men.
On the north of the city Colonel BeUasis, with his
tertia, assaulted Jones' fort (the outwork which after
wards was caUed Colston's fort), at the corner of Alfred
place and SouthweU street. His forlorn hope of thirty
musketeers was led by six men having pikes wrapped
round with saturated tow and wUdfire, and six others
with hand grenades ; these, headed by a Ueutenant,
reached the ditch of the battery, but were driven out,
and feU down the line on their right towards WindmiU
fort (afterwards known as the Eoyal fort), where they
sheltered behind a stone waU, waiting they said for
faggots to fiU the ditch and for scaUng ladders. Ubi
quitous Eupert strove in vain to drive up the laggards ;
his horse was shot in the eye, but, eooUy dismounting,
he cheered the men on foot untU another charger was

A.D. 1643.

WASHINGTON FORCES THE LINE.

307

brought ; but his efforts were vain, his men refusing to
renew the assault.
Lord Grandison, "a young man of incorruptible
virtue and justice, of unimpeachable piety and cour
age," had charge of the attack on Prior's hUl fort.
Here Blake was in command, he who afterwards, as
admiral, conquered Van Tromp and swept the Spanish
Main. Grandison's orders were to storm the fort, sweep
the Une on the bill-top, taking Jones' battery in flank,
after which he and BeUasis were to carry the Wind
mUl fort. Grandison despatched two forlorn hopes of
twenty pikemen and five musketeers, each under a
Ueutenant, to cut the Une on both sides of Prior's hUl
fort, whilst he with Colonel Lunsford, backed them with
300 men ; both Ueutenants failed, and therefore had to
retreat. Grandison, however, who had got near enough
to discover that the ditch did not run close up to the
glacis, and that it was not paUsaded, encouraged his
men to foUow him up the hUl. CheerfuUy they rushed
the steep and leaped the moat, but having no scaling
ladders, had to huddle helplessly under the waUs,
Blake, one of whose guns had been dismounted by the
EoyaUst cannon, could not touch them with the other
two. Changing his defence, he rained down cold shot and
stones upon his assaUants, whilst from the Unes that ran
up the site of HiUgrove street and along the Parade the
Commonwealth soldiers took them in fiank with a hot
fire of musketry ; down the hUl the EoyaUsts ran, but
being reinforced by Sir Ealph Dutton' s pikemen, they
tried another charge. Sir Ealph, pike in hand, leaped
into the ditch, trying to force the line ; his efforts were
vain, his men feU back, but Grandison and he refusing
to fly, their men raUied, and for a moment became mas
ters of that portion of the Une, Lunsford, prowUng
about in the dark, found a ladder in the fields against a
haystack; with a loud "hurrah! " they bore it to the fort
and tried to moimt, Alas for them, it only reached to the
paUsades ! Disheartened, they wavered ; at this critical
moment a detachment of Bristol men arrived to aid the
defenders ; these charged into and cleared the ditch ;
Grandison f eU, wounded mortaUy in the right leg ; the
command then devolved upon Colonel Owen, he also was
shot down ; and the Eoyalists fled, carrying off their
stricken commanders, but leaving the pleasant hUl-side
strewn with their dying and dead comrades. WhUst
moodUy sheltering in the vaUey and smarting under
their faUure, a messenger reached them with the news
that Washington had succeeded in forcing the line on
the west and needed help. With the cry, " They run !
they run ! " this tertia now, in aU haste, marched by
Cotham brow to join BeUasis, with whom, sweeping
round under TyndaU's hiU, they entered the breach in

Bullock's park between five and six o'clock in the
morning. The fifth attack was made by 250 men on the spur
thrown up at Stoke's Croft gate. Here they got "at
pistol and push of pike through the bars with the de
fenders ; they flung nine grenades into the work, blew
off some bars of the gate with a petard, but at the
end of an hour and a half had to retire just as the
day dawned."
Smitten with panic and deeming the assault had failed
in aU quarters, the troops on, the south side suUenly with
drew. Some of the cavalry had reached Whitchurch in
their hasty retreat, when to their amazement they were
recaUed by the information that the sixth attack (meant
for a feint to distract the besieged) had proved unex
pectedly successful, that the dragoons had forced the
Unes, and that Fiennes had demanded a parley.
Colonel Washington, with about 300 dragoons (which
were then mounted infantry, armed half of them with
pikes, half with muskets), had been ordered to threaten
the north-west portion of the defences ; more especiaUy
was he directed to guard two solitary houses in Ber
keley place, Clifton hiU, flUed with stores, and prevent
their being burned by a saUy from Brandon hUl or the
WindmiU forts. Twenty men from Brandon hUl did
attempt this during the night, but failed.
Unprovided with infantry, it seems unUkely that
any serious assault on that portion of the line could
have been intended. But the quick eye of a true sol
dier had detected the weak place. The vaUey across
which the ditch ran from Brandon hUl to the WindmUl
fort was so deep that the guns of the forts on either
side could not be depressed sufficiently to bear on the
hoUow; whUst the graff, because of the rocky nature
of the ground, was shaUow, and in several parts was
not finished ; more especiaUy was this the case close to a
barn just outside the lines, which ought to have been
demolished. This spot was opposite the present chapel
of the Blind Asylum, Washington was probably aware
also that the Essex redoubt within the line (somewhere
about the site of the New Theatre Eoyal, Park row)
was unarmed. This portion of the defences had been
entrusted to Major Langrish, a personal friend of the
governor, but one who, it was averred, had previously
been convicted of cowardice and accused of incapacity.
Only the day before the assault, as Fiennes and he
were riding past the place, a private pointed out the
weak spot to them and advised that a hundred soldiers
should be posted there to defend it. "What doth he
prate ? the saucy knave, ' ' said the self-sufficient Governor,
whose pride revolted at the idea of taking advice from a
common soldier. His incapacity is evident, A single

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D, 1643.

Church and (3ri^n Lanes from Park Rem,
gun in this little redoubt woiUd have swept the hoUow,
and saved Bristol.
Noting weU the assaUable spot, Washington stole
quietly down when the appointed hour drew nigh, and
as the clock struck three, his men lit up the wUdfire on
their pikes and, with a shout, 150 dragoons dashed at
the gap. Eeceived with a hot fire, the pikemen stag
gered, but their musketeers were firm, and the officers,
seizing the blazing pikes, foUowed by the hand-grenade
men, rushed in, a dozen musketeers poured in a voUey,
joined their comrades, and, using the butt-end of their
pieces as clubs, cleared the way. Colonel Littleton
leaped the rampart and rode up and down with a fire-
pike. Neither horse nor man could stand this, — "the
wUdfire did it." Once within the Unes, the Eoyalists
began to level the half-finished vaUum ; hands, halberts,
and partisans were busily at work to make a way for
their horse to enter. Now was the time for Langrish
with his troop of cavalry to charge. Instead of doing
so, however, the craven fied down Park row into the
city. Lieutenant EouseweU with three men defended
the breach, untU wounded to the death he had to retire,
reviUng Langrish as a coward for running away, and
vowing that if he had twenty musketeers he would trap
those that were in and repulse the rest,
Washington, having spent his ammunition, seized on
the Essex redoubt and the few houses near it, and pru
dently waited there for reinforcements. Park row was

then a narrow road,
leading as now to
Clifton, gardens di
vided by stone fences
ran from it, both up
the hUl towards the
WindmiU fort and
down to BuUock's
park. The colonel
had no space in
which to deploy his
troop, and he had no
fancy to be caught,
cooped up between
stone waUs, in a dark
lane, liable to a
deadly ambush if he
should attempt to ad
vance. How slowly
the minutes passed
we can scarcely ima
gine ; he had broken
the sheU, yet was
himself Uttle better
than a prisoner. About six o'clock, however, BeUasis
and Wentworth joined him with a part of their forces ;
then Wentworth, turning to the right dowm Culver street,
seized on the churches of St, Mark, St. Augustine, and
the Cathedral, and was within easy musket shot of the
city waU on the quay. Washington seized on the Great
House, and placing therein a party under his Ueutenant,
he, with the remainder of his men, lay perdu in Pipe lane
and Trenchard street, ready, by a flank movement, to
cover an attack on the Frome gate, and, if needful, to
flre the shipping on the quay. Colonel Lunsford had
joined BeUasis, and with horse and foot they charged
down by Host street. Steep street, and Christmas steps,
jostling and crowding in those narrow thoroughfares.
The gaUant Puritan, Captain NeviU, from WindmUl
fort with twenty horse dashed out upon the invading
foe from Church lane, cutting the Eoyalist line in twain,
and driving the one portion with accelerated force down
Griffin lane, whilst their rear guard were thrust back
towards the Essex redoubt, crying loudly, many of
them, for quarter, and swearing that they were en
trapped. " Had he but twenty more men," he testified
afterwards, "he could have beatenthemout of theUnes,"
Meanwhile the townsfolk in Griffin lane and Steep
street kept up a hot fire, and the guns on the quay
played upon the openings in the streets. That the fire
was returned we have evidence in buUets found embed
ded in the city waU on the Broad quay when, in 1880,

A.D. 1643.

LOSSES IN THE ASSAULT.

309

the lower portion was uncovered for buUding, BeUasis
was wounded by his own sword, which was struck back
upon his head by a bullet. Lunsford f eU shot through
the heart on a narrow street with steps, behind the
"Ship" inn, [now destroyed], thenceforth to be known
as "Lunsford's stairs,"
There were three Lunsfords in the Eoyalist army,
aU of them colonels, dashing soldiers, who were ever
foremost in the fight. They were consequently con
founded with each other, and the pubUc, hearing of
their acts of daring in widely different parts of the
kingdom, on one and the same day, supposed these to
be the actions of one man, who had become ubiquitous
by favour of the devU, to whom he had sold his soul.
So terrified were they at the name, that mothers used it
as a bugbear with which to quiet unruly children. In
song and broadsheet literature, he was described as a
cannibal, whose favourite food was the flesh of little
children ; drawings were made of him as an ogre in the
act of cutting an infant into steaks, Butler, in Hudibras,
referring to this rumour, says —
' ' The preachers
Made children for their Uves to run for't.
As bad as bloody bones, or Lunsfort,"
And a contemporary lampoon, aUuding to the death of
the colonel at Bristol siege, says —
" The post who came from Coventry,
Elding on a red rocket ;
Did tidings teU, how Lunsford fell,
A child's hand in his pocket,"
This victim of the war was, however, neither the " tru
culent one-eyed man," Thomas, who, by his conduct,
had affixed on the family name its vile notoriety, nor
Thomas' twin brother Herbert ; but he who feU dead on
the steps was Henry, their younger and better brother,
whom Clarendon describes as an officer of extraordinary
sobriety, industry, and courage,^
* The following letter will prove that the elder brother was in
Bristol eight months after Henry was slain. It is an appUoation
for troops — Herbert's regiment, if possible — in order to surprise
and attack Massey, who commanded a small brigade in the West
during the organisation of the model army. The request probably
was compUed with, as Massey was shortly afterwards defeated at
Ledbury : —
"Sir, — Being unwilling to trust my business to you without a
cipher, I have imparted it to Arthur Trevor, I humbly desire
your Highness to take it into so timely a care, that it may afford
prevenc'on, and (if my brother's regim' cannot be spared) that it
may please ytf Higs=|= to order 300 foot out of theise parts theither :
to raise any in that countrey will be dangerous, for I apprehend it
so more than Massey', I have not bin yet ten dayes in possession,
have 200 men daily at worke, and lay in provision as it can be
upon any tearmes obtained ; but for the rest I beseech yo' Hig''"
orders, aud wUI ever make it my care to appeare to be,
"S"-, y' Higs'« most faithfuU and obed' servant,
"Bristoll, 9'" Mar., 1644, "Thomas Lunsford,
' ' To his Hig"'" Prince Rupert. "

The Eoyalists' loss here was heavy, from the windows
in Steep street especiaUy had the fire been deadly upon
the pent up mass below, so that the soldiers forced the
doors, and slew aU whom they found within. The
garrison, however, bravely kept the walls and gates of
the city ; they drew cannon out into the Marsh, planted
one at the head of the quay, three at Gib Taylor, and
one on the top of Alderman Hook's house on the quay,
they also stationed musketeers in the houses on the quay,
and succeeded in driving the enemy from the Great House,
CoUege green and the CoUege waU, So matters stood at
nine o'clock in the morning, by which hour there were
about 1,600 men within the Unes between Brandon hUl
and WindmiU forts and the city. Not one of aU the
forts on the line had been captured, neither had the
line itself been forced save in the one place ; the waUs
of the city had not been breached, not a gun dismounted
(save in Prior's. hiU, which was an out fort, and not a
portion of the city waUs). The enemy had lost by their
own estimate more than 500 men, Fiennes himself says
1,000 ; whUst the garrison had lost only six or seven
men {i.e., within the waUs), But stone waUs are a poor
defence for brave men, when commanded by a poltroon,
against others equaUy brave,
"The assault cost near 500 lives. About 1,000
soldiers joined the royal army, 1,700 barrels of powder,
with match and buUets, 60 brass cannon, aU the arms
of the soldiery, 18 merchant ships, four belonging to
the Earl of Warwick ; these paid a composition of
£1,400 — Bristol taking, Exeter shaking, Gloucester
quaking. The report is Bristol is to pay £50,000 com
position and to clothe 1,500 soldiers — men £3, officers
£6 a suit — which amounts to £140,000, There was
found in the castle £100,000, as is reported," ^
29. Fiennes was a large-mouthed braggart, who,
when danger was distant, " spoke plain cannon, fire
and smoke, and bounce," a " mUk-Uvered man."
' ' Bold at the council board.
But cautious in the field, he shunned the sword,"
The only thing that can be said in his favour was that
which he himself pleaded at his trial, ' ' that he was no
soldier." Unnerved and incompetent himself, his chief
counseUors were men of like kidney (such as Langrish).
When urged to reinforce the breach and told how few
were they who had at first entered, and who were en
tirely unsupported for hours, Fiennes, instead of playing
the man, sent orders for his men aU along the line upon
pain of death to retire within the city waUs, He
enforced this order in person ere daybreak by riding
up to Kingsdown from Newgate under cover, and
making the men retire ; this they did with murmurs and
1 Eoyalist Letter to the Governor of Oxford,

310

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1643.

execrations, and disgusted with their commander, it is
said, "few of them joined their companions, but went
off to bed or to the ale houses," Although the governor
had boasted that if the outer line were forced he would
defend the waUs, and if they were stormed would dis
pute every inch of ground in the streets until he was
forced back into the castle, where he would make its
flag his winding sheet, and there would lay his bones,
the first whistle of the bullets made him sing another
song. He prudently kept houses and waUs between
himself and his foe, early spoke in private to his friends
about conditions of surrender, inquired as to the best
plan of retreat, and, in fact, had, amidst aU his taU talk,
kept every prisoner of standing in order to make condi
tions if driven to surrender. By nine o'clock his fear
had so far mastered him, that (although, as we have
already stated, the city was unscathed), he sent a drum
to the Eoyalists for a parley, to which they seem to
have paid no attention, but drove him in. Two or three
hours after he had refused pressing requests to make
an attack, and when the Eoyalists had quadrupled their
forces within the lines, he, when it was too late, con
sented to a saUy, Accusations of avarice and confisca
tion of property to his ov/n use are laid to his charge,
but these are vague, and we deem them to be groundless.
We cull the foUowing curious evidence borne against
the governor when on trial by two Bristol women, one
of whom has acquired notoriety as the first prominent
dissenter in Bristol : —
"testimony of DOROTHY HAZARD,
" , , , I did send into the castle of Bristol during the siege
thereof above three months' provision for one family there, and a
great part of our estate, hoping the same would be there preserved,
aud the castle defended to the utmost, according to the divers
promises by the governor to defend the same ; and that when the
newes came into the sayd city on the Wednesday morning that
some of the enemies had entered within the line this dejioneni and
divers other women and maydes, with the help of some men, did
with woolsacks and earth stop up Froome gate, to keep out the
enemy from entering into the city, being the only passage by
which the enemy must enter ; and when we had so done they, the
said women, went to the gunners [this deponent being one of
them], and told them if they would stand out and fight they
would stand by them, and told them they should not want for
pro^-ision. But the governor treated with the enemy and yielded
up the castle, whereby aU her goods in the said castle were lost
and seized on by the enemy," "JONE BATl'EN,
", , , There were about 200 women of the said citie who
went to the colonel begging that by no means the city and castle
might be rendered to the enemy, offering themselves to work in
the fortifications in the very face of the enemy, and to go them
selves and their children into the mouth of the cannon to dead
and keep off the shot from the souldiers if they were afeared. " ^
' Fiennes' trial before a Council of War,

Equity demands that we aUow Fiennes to make his
own defence, which was that the bombardment with
smaU and great shot for four days, the sharp assaxUts
on Monday and Wednesday, the unfinished state of the
outer line, the insufficiency in number of his troops,
and the wish of the mayor and citizens to surrender,
together with the advice of the council of war, influ
enced him in his decision to yield the city. The articles
of surrender were recovered by Mr, Sholto Vere Hare,
and were by him presented to the city; they hang in
the CouncU-house. They provide that the officers retain
their arms, horses and baggage ; the foot soldiers leave
their arms ; the troopers retain their horses and swords;
a convoy to be given them as far as Warminster ; car
riages provided for the baggage and the sick ; a truce
of three days to be observed ; aU prisoners delivered
up ; gentlemen to be aUowed to return to their homes ;
the charters and liberties of the city to be preserved;
the ancient government and officers to remain unaltered ;
the mayor to quarter the soldiers, and goods deposited
for safety in the castle to be delivered up to owners ;
aU cannon, ammunition, arms, colours, with the before-
named excepted, to be surrendered. These terms were
not kept : piUage ruled the day, and the robberies and
outrages irretrievably damaged the royal cause. The
governor neglected to publish the articles of surrender,
nor did he send notice to Husbands in Brandon-hUl
fort, or to Blake in Prior's hiU fort, that he had capitu
lated, thus putting them in danger of their lives. The
fiery Eupert threatened to hang Blake, because in his
ignorance of the surrender he fired on the troops.
After a trial of nine days Fiennes was found guilty
of cowardice, and was condemned to be beheaded ; but
his family interest in both houses was so great that the
Earl of Essex remitted his sentence.
We have seen in the Eev. G. W. Braikenridge's
admirable coUection of Bristol papers a drawing of a
medal that was issued on the capture of the city. It
bears, on the obverse, the king's head to the right, with
the legend magna brit . . . ; on the reverse, a view of
the city, with crviTAs beistoll beducta, 1643.
The earliest book known to have been certainly
printed in Bristol is a copy of Tlie Solemn League and
Covenant, 1643, for Eichard HarseU. On the capture of
the city Charles made use of its press, as pamphlets are
extant, by appointed printers to the king.
On July 28th, being the day after he had entered
the city, Eupert despatched an express to the king
announcing his success, and requesting the governor
ship of the city for himself, to which request the king
thoughtlessly consented. But the victors had already
begun to quarrel over their spoU, The Marquis of

A,D, 1643.

PRINCE RUPERT APPOINTED GOVERNOR.

311

Hertford, Eupert's superior in command and the lord-
Ueutenant of Bristol, who was chagrined at not being
consulted by the fiery prince as to the articles of sur
render, had promised the governorship to Sir Ealph
Hopton, To reconcUe the conflicting parties, Charles
came to Bristol on August 3rd, accompanied by his sons,
Charles, Prince of Wales, and James, Duke of York,
Sir Edward Hyde, and others of his ministers. The
king and his suite lodged at the houses of Mr, Colston,
in SmaU street, and of Alderman Creswick, which was
next door. The princes found accommodation at Alder
man Holworthy's, on the oppo
site side of the way.
"WhUe the king was here
he received a petition from the
clothiers of Gloucestershire,
which was presented to him on
Monday, August 7th, by Sir
Baynham Throckmorton, high-
sheriff of that county, who re
sided at Stapleton, or at least
had a house there. The peti
tion and answer were printed
at Oxford, 1643, in a pamphlet
of four pages. They represent
that Prince Eupert had ' com
manded them to keep theire
poore people at worke for the
space of one month,' which
they say they are ready to do
to the utmost of their power ;
but they complain that they
are in a most distressed situa
tion, some having lost their
whole estates, and many having
the residue of their property
in the hands of merchants in
London, from whence they can
not procure it, that their credit is lost with their goods,
and that their cloth being made they have no place of
safety to keep it and no means of vending it. The king
answers that he has given express answer to aU his
officers and soiUdiers to protect the persons and estates
of the petitioners, and he permits such of them as are
weU-affected to him and may be trusted to repair to
London to fetch their money from thence, and he wiU
adopt the best means to enable them to sell off their
cloth and to treat with the merchants of Bristol and
other ports within his power for the' exportation of it.
Very wretched must have been the situation of England
at that time, when the communication between its com
mercial towns was thus interrupted by the civU war.

Sir Ralph Hopton.

"During his abode- here the king confirmed Prince
Eupert in the government of the city ; but it was set
tled that he should appoint Sir Ealph Hopton his Ueu-
tenant-governor, partly to recover his health from the
effects of the unfortunate explosion at Lansdown, and
partly because it was weU known that the prince's
talents would be more useful in the field than in the
administration of a government. How long the king
continued here our Calendars do not express, but cer
tainly not many days, for on the 1 0th August he was at
the head of the army in sight of Gloucester,
"When great affairs have
proved unsuccessful, nothing is
more easy than to enumerate
the causes which have contri
buted to their ruin. Perhaps,
among the many errors com
mitted by the royaUsts in this
unfortunate war, it is to be
lamented that after the taking
of this city the king did not
make it his residence, partiaUy
at least, as weU as Oxford, in
stead of paying it a transient
visit. It abounded with men,
trade and money ; it command
ed by land and sea a vast
extent of country, advantages
which Oxford did not possess;
it might have been easily
rendered secure against the
miUtary efforts of that age ;
and whereas the whole sup
port of the rebeUion lay in
London, Bristol would at that
period have been a formidable
opponent to that factious city,
From an old print. which had not then reached
that overwhelming superiority to which it has been gra
duaUy attaining for these last hundred years, and Bristol
probably would not have been unwUUng to have caUed
forth its ancient rivalry into action. Lord Clarendon
speaks of this plan. He says that if the Marquis of
Hertford, when hostUities were about to commence, had
fixed himself in Bristol instead of WeUs, it would pro
bably have been attended with success ; and in another
place he speaks of removing the court to Bristol or
Exeter as a plan which had been mentioned, and he
has a favourable opinion of it, though he enumerates
some difficulties which would have occurred. And it
may be seen in the examination of John Boucher above
mentioned that it was commonly said at Oxford that if

312

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1643.

the king should get possession of Bristol he would
make it a famous city, which seems to refer to some
prospect of this kind. But the king's deficiency in
mUitary habits and talents, except that of personal
courage, was one main cause of his final ruin.
"We may be assured that a military establishment
was settled here immediately after the taking of the
city, although we have no account of it untU December
4th, 1644, On that day Edmund Turner, Esq,, of Stoke-
Eochford, in Lincolnshire, was appointed treasurer and
paymaster of the garrison, but his office was to com
mence November 1st, 1644, His arms are ermine, on a
cross quartered, pierced argent, four mUl-rinds sable,
impaling or, on a cross azure five pheons of the first,
which are carved in wood in the haU of Corpus Christi
college. Oxen, toward the improvement of which room
he contributed £40, having been formerly a member of
that society. If a judgment may be formed from the
perusal of a memorandum-book belonging to him, he
was a person of very great piety and worth. On 10th
February, 1644-5, he was appointed captain of a troop
of cuirassiers, to bring in contributions to the garrison
of Bristol, At the battle of Worcester he was taken
prisoner, and was knighted soon after the Eestoration,
He died in 1707, aged 88, and was buried at Stoke-
Eochford, in Lincolnshire, the place of his residence.
From his papers his descendant of the same name com
pUed an account of the miUtary establishment of Bristol,
as settled by the king after its capture, which he read
to the Society of Antiquaries June 11 and 18, 1801.
The appointment was by letter : ' Charles, by the grace
of God, king, &c., to our trustie and well-beloved ser
vant, Edmond Turner, Esq., thesaurer of our garrisons
at BristoU, Bathe, the towne and castle of Berkeley,
Nunney castle, Farley castle and PortshaU pointe, &c,'
The substance of the letter is, that 'whereas he has
thought fit to settle garrisons at the above-mentioned
places, with regular weekly pay, as expressed in the
schedule annexed, and has ordered £200 per week to be
paid out of the customs for their maintenance, he there
fore appoints Edmond Turner to be thesaurer of the
said garrisons from the Ist November last past, and
aUows him 13s; 4d, a day for himself; 5s, a day for
each of two deputies; 2s, Qd, a day for each of two
clerks ; for eight eoUectors of contributions, to each 4s.
a day ; to three keepers of the stores or magazines for
provisions and victuaUs, to each 3s, 4d, a day; and
allowance for books, bagge, paper, inke, pens, and all
such other necessaries as the service shall require.'
The expenses are as foUow : —
" Three regiments of foote, 1,200 in each regiment, officers and
all, each regiment to bee paid aocordinge to theise ensuinge par

ticulars : — Per week. To a Coloimell, £5. — to a Lieut.-colonnell,
£4 3s. id, — to a Sarjeant-major, £3 16s, 8d, — to a Captaine, £2 lOs,
— to a Lieut., £1 8s, — to an Ensigne, 18s, — to a Gentleman of
Armes, 8s, — to a Corporal, 5s, — to a Drumme^major, 8s, — to a
Drummer, 5s, — to a Quarter-master, £10, — to a Chaplaine, £1, —
to a Provost-marshall, £1, — to a Chirurgeon, £2, — to a Carriage-
master, 18s, — to a common souldier, 33, M, — After which rate
three regiments of foote theire pay amounteth weekely to
£833 1 7s,
"A regiment of seaven troops of horse, consistinge of 60 horse
to each troope, officers and all, and his Highnes troope of Horse,
consisting of 200 beside officers to bee paid according to theise
ensuinge particulars : — To a Colonell, £7. — to a Lieut, -colonell, i'6.
— to a Serjeant-major, £5 lOs, — to a Captaine, £5, — to a Lieut,,
£3, — to a Coronet, £2 5s, — to a Quarter-master, £1 lOs,— to a
Corporal, £1 Is, — to a Trumpeter, 17s, 6d, — to a Chirurgeon,
17s, Gd, — to a Chaplaine, £1 8s, — to a Trooper, 10s.— After which
rate one regiment of horse their pay amounteth weekly to £352 2s.
His Highnes troope of horse their pay weekely, £120 I7s.
' ' The chief Officers of the several garrisons to be paid weekly
as followeth, viz, : — The Governor ; the Treasurer to supply his
charges, — the Lieut, -governour, £21. — the Deputy-governor, £10.
— the Major, £5, — the Commissary-general or Muster-master,
£3 10s, — the Quarter-master-generall, £2 6s, 8d, — the Engineir,
£2 6s, 8d,- — the Petardier, or Engineir for fireworks, £5. — the
Provost-marshall, £2 6s, 8d, — the Keeper of the Stores, £1, — the
Proviant-master, £1, — the Governour of Bathe, £7, — the Gover
nour of Berkeley, £7, — the Governour of PortshaU Pointe, £5, —
the Governour of Nunney Castle, £5, — the Governour of Farley
Castle, £5, — the Treasurer, £4 13s, id, — to him for eight Collec
tors, i£ll 4s, — to him for two Deputyes, £3 lOs, — to him for two
Clarks, £1 15s, — to him for three Keepers of the Magazine of
VictuaUs, £3 10s, — To the Gunners and other inferiour officers, as
followeth, viz, : —

Master-gunner 
Water fort (John Greenfield, Master-gunner

Ordinance 7,
Brandon hill
fort.
Ordinance 6.
Greate-Forte,Ordinance 22,

Eedoubt,
Ordinance 7,
Prior hill.
Ordinance 13.
Lawford's gate.
Ordinance 7,
Temple,
Ordinance 14,
Eedcliffe .
Ordinance 15.
Castle and
Newgate. Ordinance 16.

< Eichard Abbot, Mate
(.to three Gunners, each 10s. ...
(¦Francis Pitt, Master-gumier...
¦( Henry Gosse, Mate 
(to two Gunnners, each 10s, ...
I John Skinner, Master-gunner
John Sherland, Mate 
to six Gunners, each 10s,
Commissary of victuaUs
/Walter Daniell, Master-gumier
•< John Gilburte, Mate 
Ho two Gunners, each 10s, ...
(¦Joseph Tucker, Master-gunner
\ William Howlett, Mate
I to tliree Gunners, each 10s, ...
(.John Simonds, Master-gunner
•j, John Jones, Mate 
(to sixe Gunners, each 10s, , . .
(James Fuller, Master-gunner
¦j John Scott, Mate 
(to five Gunners, each 10s, ...
(John Sterry, Master-gunner,..
{ Eichard Hamans, Mate 
(to four Gunners, each 10s, ,..
John Eobert, Master-gunner
John Wai'den, Mate 
to eleaven Gunners, each lOs,
Commissary of victuals 

£ s.

d.

... 2 6

8

... 0 17

6

... 0 14

0

1 10

0

... 0 17

6

... 0 14

0

1 0

0

... 0 17

6

0 14

0

..3 0

0

1 10

0

... 0 17

6

... 0 14

0

... 1 0

0

0 17

6

... 0 14

0

... 1 10

0

... 0 17

6

... 0 14

0

..3 0

0

.. 0 17

6

0 14

0

... 2 10

0

.. 0 17

6

... 0 14

0

„. 2 0

0

... 0 17

6

0 14

0

,„ 5 10

0

„. 1 10

0

A,D, 1643,

IMPOSTS FOR THE KING.

313

SfSlJ"''' M*- ''•¦.¦¦'?

"¦I :T'-*' ¦¦/

.^1 :¦#¦

^

1 ,.,^_  ^i!ti;flli''l^";!fli"rtT:9ji— f~''f[iii(ij^^''"'-^^""
<._-)i.i{j
Facsimile of a letter from Sir Ralph Hopton.
£ S. d.
Froome gate
... 0 14
0
... 0 14
0
... 350 0
0
... 219 0
0
and I WilUam Purser 
Pithay gate, f WilUam Crookebank 
Ordinance 2, '
For makinge of armes and ammunition 
For ffuishinge the workes 
Which is to be raised upon the assignations follow
ing, viz. : —
Out of the Hundreds of Somerset hereunto annexed,
rated weekly att may yield  830 0 0
Out of the Hundreds of Wiltes hereunto annexed,
rated weekly att may yield  500 0 0
Out of the Hundred of Gloucester, being the whole
division of Berkeley, rated weekly att , but
may yield  300 0 0
[Vol. L]
£ s. d.
150 0 0
200 0 0
Out of Bristol hereunto annexed, rated weekly att
Out of the Customes 
The only particulars which the author of this communication
[Edmund Turner, Esq.] is possessed of are as foUows :—
Hundred of EadcUffe cum Bedminster payeth 200^per inonth
Long Ashton 
Bedminster 
Barron [Barrow] 
Eatcombe [Butcombe] and Regilberry
Baokwell 
Chelby [Chelvy] 
Winford 
X 2
 £40 0
0
... 40 0
0
. ... 20 0
0
 20 0
0
 33 6
8
 6 13
4
 40 0
0
£200 0
0
314

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D, 1643.

Portbury Hundred— WraxaU and Foyland .
Naylsie 
Broxton [Bourton]
Walton 
Portbury 
Abbot's Leigh . .
St. George's 

£25 0 0
18 15 0
6 5 0
7 2 4
31 0 6
16 10 8
16 17 0

£121 10 6 '

Bristol was the key to the west. Bath surrendered
after WaUer's defeat, and soon Berkeley castle was
taken, and by it the fertile valley of Gloucestershire
was secured for the king,
30. Under the Eoj'alist r<'giine the services of the
CJiurch of England were restored, as we find b}' a " Visi
tation Sermon preached at the church of St. Nicholas,
August 1 6th, 1644. Bristoll, printed by Thomas Thomas,
and are to be sold at his shop in Broad street, 1644."
The Marquis of Hertford and Sir Edward Hyde stayed a
whUe ; but the king drew off the greater portion of the
garrison, and Prince Maurice, with the remainder, joined
the Earl of Carnarvon in Dorset, so that Sir Ealph, now
become Lord, Hopton, had to raise fresh troops to
garrison the city.
On September 5th, 1643, the Earl of Essex forced
the king to raise the siege of Gloucester, when its gaUant
defenders were reduced to their last barrel of powder.
Then the governor, Massey, built a frigate on the Severn,
and with it surprised Chepstow, and carried off most of
the officers of Col. O'Neal's regiment as prisoners ; he
also captured a Bristol ship laden with wine, oil, sugar,
&c. This stirred up the Bristol royalists, who forthwith
despatched divers frigates to guard the river. At the
end of the year, the Duke of Hamilton, being arrested
in Oxford by order of the king, was sent in custody to
Bristol castle.
Let us again glance at the state of parties. The royal
cause was now in the ascendant, the bishops and the bulk
of the clergy were purely episcopal, and in places held
by the Parliamentarians were expeUed as delinquents.
Those of them who adopted the Puritan views had be
come practicaUy Independents, a denomination which, if
not born of this strife, was nurtured by it into a vigorous
manhood ; these men gradually became Separatists, and
formed the backbone of the commonwealth. The other
great section of the people's party were the Presbyterians,
Scotland held aloof, biding her time ; the adoption of
" The Solemn League and Covenant" was the price she
asked for her aid. In other words, that England should
adopt the Presbyterian form of church government,
Pym and the leading Eoundheads were stiU nominaUy
Episcopalians, the doctrines held by both the churches
' Seyer, II. , 420-425.

were identical, the difference consisted merely in forms
of government, "New presbyter was but old priest
writ large," as Milton afterwards put it; but the Inde
pendents dreamed not that it woiUd assume such unjust
proportions, and the general assembly offered at least
a nearer approach to their own ideal, which was that
of a religious democracy. So in the darkest hour the
Parliament flung the Scotch sword into the wavering
balance, and by so doing saved the kingdom from re
verting to despotism, Charles, as a counter move, made
peace with the Irish, which enabled him to recaU to his
aid the army under Ormond, But, with a fatuity that
is inconceivable, he took into his service a large force of
Irish Catholic rebels, whom he despatched into Scotland
to support Montrose in the attempt to recover that
country for himself. This was a fatal step for the royal
cause, it was a violation of his oft-pledged word. The
memory of the fearful massacres perpetrated on 50,000
EngUshmen by these men was stiU fresh ; the gaps they
had made by murder in ten thousand famUies were as
yet unfiUed, and the very name of Irishman was held in
abhorrence. The king's best friends turned from him
in disgust, the peers who had joined him at Oxford
returned to London, the Eoyalist reaction in Parliament
died into silence, many officers resigned their commis
sions, country gentlemen, like Sir Eoger Twysden, who
could not arm against the king, left England, because,
as that gaUant gentleman said, "It is impossible to
serve a king who never spoke a word of truth in his
life," 1
The Commons, "with uplifted hands," swore in St,
Margaret's church to uphold the covenant ; and three
armies, comprising 50,000 men, were raised for offen
sive operations. The Earl of Essex, at the head of one,
watched the king at Oxford ; WaUer marched into the
west to confront Prince Maurice ; and CromweU raised
his famous Ironsides and joined 14,000 men under Man
chester, who marched into Yorkshire to cooperate with
Fairfax and the Scotch, Eupert, who had gathered
men on the Welsh border, raised the sieges of Newark
and Latham house, crossed rapidly the Lancashire hiUs
to aid Newcastle in York, WaUer, from the west, fell
back to help Essex in his blockade of the king at
Oxford, Then Eupert, "the daring," measured weapons with
the Ironsides on Marston moor, where ' ' God made them
as stubble to our swords" wrote CromweU that same
evening. The king's cause in the north was irretrievably
ruined by this defeat ; Newcastle fled over sea, and the
fiery Eupert rode southward, with but a handful of men,
to join the king. This was a terrible blow which nuUi-
^ Kcmble's History of Governments,

A,D, 1643,

BRISTOL COINS OF CHARLES I,

315

fied all"-the triumphs that elsewhere had attended the
Eoyalist arms, Charles, who had eluded Essex, had,
two days before Marston moor, beaten WaUer and
driven him back to London ; then shutting in Essex,
who had most unwisely marched into the hostile west,
between Prince Maurice and himself, he had forced
his infantry to surrender, Essex himself barely escaping
by sea. To counterbalance this defeat, Montrose, on the
selfsame day, had
achieved a great vic
tory at Tippermuir,
after which he sacked
Aberdeen, occupied
Perth, and threatened
Edinburgh, On the
receipt of the fatal
news from the north,
Charles felt that aU
his conquests were
vain, and to avoid
being shut up in the
west he turned and
made a bold stroke
for London with his
O'wn ¦victorious forces;
the conquerors of
Marston moor awaited
him at Newbury, with
them was the army of
Essex that had sur
rendered, but who
now, brought afresh
into the field, wiped
out their disgrace by
re-capturing the can
non they had pre
viously lost. The fiery
charges of the cava-
Uers faUed to break
the solid squadrons of
the Parliament; and
but that Manchester,
like Essex, shrank from a crowning victory, the fate
of England would have been decided by CromweU that
27th day of October, 1644, Charles withdrew to Oxford,
and he who was destined to become England's greatest
although uncrowned king, became henceforth the cyno
sure of every eye and the hope of the Puritan party.
In March, 1644-5, Charles, Prince of Wales, aged
flfteen years, came to reside in Bristol with his council,
which consisted of six persons, the future Lord Claren
don being one of them, A counter-plot by the Eound-

Prince Maurice. From an old print.

heads to deliver the city to Waller failed, but the con
spirators escaped. And now the Puritans had a sore
time of it at the hands of the Cavaliers. The house of
Mrs, Hazard, a grocer's shop in High street, was re
peatedly assaulted, because " she was the first woman
in Bristol that practised that truth of the Lord which
was then hated and odious, viz.. Separation," Those
who held the same views met for worship in each others
houses, but the novelty
had no charms for the
masses ; it was such
an unheard of thing
"a church with a
chimney in it!" So
the windows were
smashed and the wor
shippers mobbed,
31, "The Bristol
coins of Charles I, are
very numerous, al
though they were aU
minted in the period
between July 27th,
1643, and September
10th, 1645, During
this time the city was
in the hands of the
royaUsts, and the fol
lowing coins were pro
bably struck by them
in the castle, AU have
on the reverse the
declaration which
Charles made at the
commencement of the
war, viz., that he
would preserve ' the
Protestant religion,
the laws and liberties
of his subjects, and
the privUeges of Par
liament.' It is in an
abbreviated Latin form, eelig. prot. leg. ang, liber.
PAR,, and occurs together with this motto, from the 68th
Psalm, EXVRGAT DEV8 DISSIPENTVR INIMICI ['Let God
arise, let his enemies be scattered '],
"The dates on the Bristol coins of Charles I. are
1643, 1644, 1645, and they are distinguished by the
mint mark of br, for Bristol, in monogram.
" The gold pieces are sovereigns and half-sovereigns, weighing
140J grains and 70J grains respectively. The gold is 22 carats
fine, the same as the present standard. The sovereign bears.

316

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A,D. 1643.

obverse, half-length portrait of the king, looking to the left,
crowned, and in armour. He holds a sword in his right hand and
an olive branch in his left. The numerals xx. [for 20i. the value]
behind the head. Beaded inner circle around all, and the legend
CAROLVS. D : G : MAG : BR ; FR : ET : HI : REX, Mint-mark, br in
monogram, Ileverse, the declaration rel ; pro, leg : an, lib, pa :
on a scroll across the centre of the coin. Three plumes above,
and the date, 1645, below the scroll. Mint mark, br in monogram
before rel. All within a beaded inner circle. Legend round the
margin, exvkgat. devs. dissipentvr, inimici,
' ' The half-sovereign is similar in type to the sovereign, but
has mint-mark, a plume on the obverse, and x. [for 10s.] behind
the head, and reads B : F : et. hib : rex. The reverse is also of
the same type, but reads ang : in the declaration, and has the br
monogram immediately after inimici. Three plumes and date,
1645, as before,
"The silver coins are half crowns, shillings and six
pences, with the dates 1643 and 1644, halfcrowns and
shiUings onlj' of 1645, groats of 1644, and a half-groat
without date,
"Of the halfcrowns there are several varieties, differing much
in the details. They bear, obverse, a figure of the king on horse
back to the left, crowned, with a sword in his right hand, A
plume behind the king, in the field. All within a beaded inner
circle. Some have the bb monogram under the horse. Legend,
CAROLVS . D . G. MAG. BR. PR. ET. H. [HI., HIB., Or HIBER.] REX.
Mint-mark, a plume, or a circle between four pellets, or none at
all. Reverse, the declaration in two straight lines across the field,
variously. abbreviated, thus — relig: [or kel:] pro. [or prot:] le:
an: li: pa: Above the declaration are three plumes, and below
it is the date, 1643, 1644, or 1645. All within a beaded inner
circle. Legend around, exvrgat. devs. dissipentvr. inimici.
Mint-mark, BR in monogram, or sometimes no mint-mark. The
BR monogram is also placed under the date on some varieties.
[Engravedby Snelling, plate xu., Nos. 3, 4; Ruding, plate xxiv.,
No. 2 ; Hawkins, figs. 485, 490.]
"The shillings have, obverse, profile bust of the king, crowned,
to the left. The numerals xii. [for 12(Z. the value] behind the
head, and sometimes a plume before the face. All within a beaded
inner circle. Legend, carolvs. d. g. mag. br. fr. bt: h. [or hi.]
REX. Mint-mark, a plume, a circle between four dots, or with no
mint-mark. Reverse, the declaration in three lines, helig: [reli:
or rel:] pro; [or prot;] leg; ANG: lib. par: Three plumes above
the declaration, and the date, 1643, 1644, or 1645, below it. The
monogram br under the date on some shillings. All within a
beaded inner circle. Legend, exvrgat, devs, dissipentvr, inimici.
Mint-mark, BR in monogram, or with no mint-mark, [Engraved
by Snelling, plate xi,, Nos, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 ; Ruding, plate xxiv..
No. 3, supplement plate v., Nos. 15, 16 ; Hawh'ms, fig. 519].
"The sixpences have, obverse, king's bust, as on the shillings.
On some sixpences the bust is smaUer than on others. The
numerals vi, [for Qd.] behind the head, and a plume before the
face on some pieces. All vathin a beaded inner circle. Legend,
CAROLVS , D , G , MAG ; E : F : ET . H : RE.\. No mint-mark. Re vers?,
the declaration in three lines — eelig : [or reli :] pro : leg : ang ;
LIB : PAR : Three plumes above, and the date, 1643 or 1644,
below. All -ndthin a beaded inner circle. Legend, christo ,
AVSnCE , REGNO, Or EXVRGAT , DEVS , DISSIPENTVR . INIMICI,
Mint-mark, br in monogram, [Engraved by Snelling, plate xi,,
Nos, 20 21; Ruding, supplement, plate v,. No, 14; Hawkins,
fig, 531],
The groats have, obverse, bust as on the shillings, with or with
out a plume before the face. The numerals IIII. [for id.] behind

the head. All within a beaded inner circle. Legend, carolvs :
D : G : MAG : B : F : [or BR :] r : [or FR :] ET : HI : [or HIB ,] REX,
No mint-mark. Reverse, the declaration in three lines — rel ; pro :
[or PROT :] LEG : ANG : LIB : PAR : Three plumes above, and the
date, 1644, below. Some groats have br in monogram under the
date. All within a beaded inner circle. Legend around, exvrgat ,
devs , DISSIPENTVR , INIMICI, Mint-mark, br in monogram, or no
mint-mark, [Engraved by Snelling, plate xi,, Nos, 11, 12 ; Ruding,
plate, xxiv.. No. 9; Hawkins, fig. 535].
"The half -groats bear, obverse, bust as on the shillings. The
numerals II, [for 2d ] behind the head, but no plume before the face.
Beaded inner circles on both sides. Obverse legend, carolvs : D :
G ; M : B : F : ET H ; REX. Reverse, the declaration — EE : PR : LE :
AN : LI : PA : iu three lines. Under the last line is br in mono
gram. Legend around, exvrg . DEVS , dissip , inimici. No mint-
mark on either side, [Engraved by Snelling, plate xi,. No, 3;
Ruding, supplement, plate v,. No, 11],
"Besides the legal money just described, it appears
that a large number of counterfeit tokens were made at
Bristol during the occupation of the city by Eoyalist
troops. According to the Diary newspaper, published
13th September, 1644, it was declared in the House of
Commons, on the 6th of the same month, 'that his
Majestie payed his army for the most part with far
thing tokens which were minted at Bristol ; and, being
cunningly and secretly conveyed by sea to London, they
oftentimes received silver for them,'
" The only legal farthing tokens of that period were
made under the authority of a royal patent to Lord
Maltravers and Sir Francis Crane, and issued from the
Farthing Office in Lothbury, London, In 1643, how
ever, the issue of these royal farthing tokens was put
an end to by the Parliament.
" The pieces here stated to have been counterfeited at
Bristol were no doubt the farthing tokens struck in
copper and brass, of very smaU size, being the third
variety, made subsequent to 1635, or between 1635-43,
See Snelling's Copper Coinage, p, 5, illustration E,"^
We have nearly 100 of these coins, which have
been dredged up out of the harbour ; they are of two
sizes, one about the diameter of a threepenny piece,
the other rather less. They bear on the obverse a rose
crowned, on the reverse, a crown with two sceptres
saltier, either underneath the crown or below it on
the exergue. These worthless coins were abolished by
CromweU, and a fresh coinage of Bristol farthings was
substituted, these bear the initial "E" under the date.
The Hooper's, or Cooper's, trade in Bristol was select,
no other place save London made such casks. Munson,
of Lyme, paid £6 4s, Qd. for twelve casks from Bristol.
In April, 1644, Prince Eupert removed Sir Francis
Hawley from his office as Governor of Bristol (Castle).
The youthful Prince Charles, who held his father's
commission as General of the four associated western
1 Henfrey, 362-3,

A.D. 1643.

PRINCE CHARLES IN BRISTOL.

317

counties, and had been promised by the authorities £100
per week for his support, and a body of horse and foot
guards, found a great deficiency in both men and money.
The prince went, therefore, to Bridgwater, where the
commissioners of the said counties met him ; he stayed
there a week, returning to Bristol on April 23rd, 1645.
With the summer heat the deadly pestilence made its
accustomed appearance, to avoid the danger from which,
as weU as from the threatened approach of the people's
army, the prince withdrew to Bath on June 1st, and slept
at WeUs on the 2nd, passing from thence through Bridg
water to Barnstaple. After he had left the city there
arrived a messenger from the king, advising him to
reside at Mr. Smyth's, at Long Ashton. Prince Charles
left 500 of his guards in the castle, to strengthen the
garrison of the city, which had been denuded of men
for service before Taunton, Upon the surrender of the
city to Eupert it was determined in order to propitiate
the king, to present his majesty with the sum of £10,000,
in addition to the £1,400 paid to the prince, to prevent
its being sacked. Toward this sum Eichard Aldworth,
the mayor, contributed £300, John Gunning gave £150,
Hugh Brown £150, WiUiam Cann £60, Joseph Jack
son £100, Myles Jackson £20, John Locke £50, We
suspect that "this token of the love and affection of the
citizens " was akin to the benevolences which Charles
in the earUer part of his reign, and his predecessors on
the throne, had exacted from the people. The names
of leading EoyaUsts as contributors are conspicuous by
their absence. When men of devoted loyalty, such as
the two Colstons, Humphrey Hook, Creswick, Fitz-
Herbert, &c,, &c,, have no place in the list, and when a
thorough EepubUcan such as Myles Jackson, who seems
to have been (perhaps wilfuUy) short of cash, is set
down in addition to his £20 as giving 198^^ oz, of silver
plate, it looks very much like "spoUing the Egyptians;"
in fact, the EoyaUsts were making the leading Puritans
pay smartly for their past misdeeds. It wUl be re
membered that of the four men who had to pay the
hea-yiest sums as a proof of their "love and affection to
the king," three of them, viz, Aldworth, Jackson and
Hugh Brown, were in office as mayor and sheriffs when
Yeomans and Boucher were executed,
WhUe Eichard Aldworth was mayor the foUowing
items appear in the audits : — £ s, d.
Paid the king's trumpeters, as a fee due to them,
being the prince represents the king  3 0 0
Paid Captain Thomas Derham, being wounded aud
sick  0 8 3
Paid Eichard Aldworth, mayor, what he paid the
king. Prince Eupert, and Prince Maurice, officers,
and for money paid maimed soldiers in August
last, and straw for them  122 8 4

Paid Prince Eupert's trumpeters  £2 0 0
Paid Mr, Mayor for what he gave to a footman for the
porterage of a letter which he took to London . , . 0 10
Humphrey Hook was mayor in 1643. He was also
one of the members of the Parliament of 1640 for the
city. Hook married Florence, daughter of Sir Hugh
Smyth, of Ashton, He was a Eoyalist, and his family
were conspicuous for their loyalty. In 1644 he was
paid a considerable sum of money for arms, &c,, with
which he had supplied auxiliary troops for the king.
He also advanced a sum of money to the corporation
for the support of the king's cause in Bristol, On the
26th October, 1645, he was removed by Parliament from
his seat for " promoting the views of the enemy,"
The total indebtedness of the king to Hook was
£2,000, for which he was promised the bonds of twenty-
two knights and esquires, but only ten of them, viz,.
Sirs J, Stawell, E, Berkeley, E, Eodney, T, Bridges,
and Messrs, W. Walronde, E, Kirton, — Speke, Warre
and Wyndham signed it. When the king's cause was
lost in the west, the sequestrators who had been ap
pointed April 1st, 1643, by Parliament, to seize upon
the property of aU "deUnquents and malignants" — i.e.,
aU who had openly espoused the king's cause — raised
large sums in Bristol and Somerset, One of these
sequestrators, named CurU, teUs us that in 1649 he
discovered this loan of Hook's, and he received orders
from Captain Latimer Sampson to demand the money
from the bondsmen. Accordingly he summoned several
of them ; but he found that the Bristol alderman had
been too sharp for him, he having outlawed them for
the amount, CurU adds that he received orders to stay
aU proceedings in this case, A letter from CromweU to
Mr, Speaker LenthaU, dated June 20th, 1650, explains
this. After stating that at the siege of Bristol, in the
year 1645, for something considerable done by Hum
phrey Hook, alderman of that place, in order to its
reduction — which for many reasons is desired to be con
cealed — General Fairfax and himself had given Hook
an engagement that he should be secured by the
authority of the Parliament in the enjoyment of his
life, Uberty and estate, it proceeds: — "I understand
that lately an order is issued out to sequester him,
whereby he is caUed to composition ; I thought it meet,
therefore, to give the Hon. Parliament this account,
that he may be preserved from anything of that nature,
for the performance of which in order to the good of
the Commonwealth we stand engaged in our faith and
honour." In what way Hook played the traitor is not known
to us, but that he was in great danger of confiscation is
evident from a deed which we have inspected, in which

318

BRISTOL: PAST AND PRESENT.

A.D. 1643.

for the sum of five shiUings he conveys his mansion and
its appurtenances in the Marsh to Sir Eobert Cann, of
Kingsweston, his very good friend. After the Eesto
ration he was, in 1660-1, re-elected, "Also this year
Hum, Hooke, Esq., and John Knight were elected bur
gesses for the city to serve in Parliament, but Mr.
Hooke did desire that the Lord Ossory should be in his
stead; who was returned and sat in the House of
Commons until he was taken into his majesty's Privy
Council, and then Sir Humphrey Hooke was in his
former place, of being ParUament man." ^ He was
this year knighted for his courtesy. Amongst his
descendants we number Abraham Hook, merchant,
sheriff in 1706, and Andrew Hook, who commenced,
in 1748, a history of Bristol, entitled Bristolia. He was
on the commission of the peace for Gloucestershire, and
is most probably identical with the Andrew Hook,
M.D,, who is mentioned by Gough as "having the
management of the printing office in Bristol," Sir
Humphrey built Ashley court, on Ashley down, for a
residence ; he had another mansion in Corn street, and
a country residence at Kingsweston, Dying on the
16th of October, 1677, he was buried in St, Stephen's,
where there is a memorial tablet to his memory. He
left to the corporation £680, to give 8s, per week to the
parish of St, Stephen to be distributed in bread and
coal, the residue to Queen Elizabeth's Hospital for ever.
The manor house, formerly the hospital of St, Laurence,
on La^wrence hUl, together with 250 acres of land, was
the property of Eobert Hook, of Bristol, who was
father to the mayor. During his mayoralty. Captain
Samuel Pitts, of the Kirtlington gaUey, on his passage
from Jamaica to Bristol, bravely defended his ship
against a Spanish rover of superior force, whom he
finaUy made to sheer off and retire. In consideration
of his conspicuous gaUantry the society of Merchant
Venturers, of the city of Bristol, presented to him a
richly chased silver monteith and collar, which weighs
266 ozs, 11 dwts,, bearing an inscription to the above
effect. This handsome piece of plate, which is a silver
1 MS, Calendar,

bowl with a rim of open filagree work, upon which the
topers could hang their second glasses to cool after
rinsing them in water, is now in the possession of the
corporation, and is amongst the items of the city plate
at the Mansion house. It was purchased at a sale by
auction, for the sum of £148 16s. on December 31st,
1821, for the city.
Between December I7th, 1642, and February 20th,
1643, Colonel Essex was paid by the city in cash for
the present occasion of the king and kingdom, £3,400 ;
Fiennes, from March 2nd to May 2nd, on the same pre
tence, £2,000 ; WaUer had in AprU £2,000, and from
July 7th, 1644, to AprU 30th, 1645, the king and Prince
Eupert had about £3,400, aU independent of the cost
of fortifying the city, viotuaUing the fort of Dungannon,
paying the crew of the Lion frigate, a gift of £5 in
charity to the Bishop of Waterford in July, 1 643 ; a
butt of sack to Lord Hopton, and sugar, £22 ; pro
visions sent to Colonel Washington at CUfton, July
27th, 1643, £9 4s, Qd. In AprU, 1644, the queen, who
slept at the Great House, St, Augustine's back, was
presented with £500 in three leather bags, this sum
being coUected amongst the inhabitants, the corporation
giving £100. In January, 1642, ten barrels of gun
powder were spared to the city of Gloucester for £60,
On December 30th, 1643, Bristol lent to Somerset
county, on bond, £1,000, and in 1644, on November
23rd, £400. Also on January 16th, 1644, the city lent
the county of Gloucester £1,000, In March, 1643,
plate to the amount of £600, at 4s. 4d. per ounce was
lent to Parliament. In March, 1644, 45 tuns of beer
cost the corporation £81, On August 16th, 1646, there
was paid for burying of the dead people about the line
to Peter Spurrier £1 6s, In 1645 Prince Charles was
at the Great House on February 1st, The corporation
presented him -with a hogshead of Canary wine at £ 1 4,
i.e., without excise duty about 4s, 5\d. per gaUon ; also
three hogsheads of Gascony wine, £16 10s,, about
Is, 9d. per gaUon free of duty. The excise on the
above was paid by the corporation being £5, coopering
2s. Total, £34 12s,

END OF VOLUME I,

PRINTED BY JAMES WILLIAMS ARROWSMITH, QUAY STREET, BRISTOL,

YALE UNIVERSITY L