The Court Records of Prescot 1640-1649
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The Record Society of Lancashire and Cheshire Volume 143: start THE RECORD SOCIETY OF LANCASHIRE AND CHESHIRE FOUNDED TO TRANSCRIBE AND PUBLISH ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS RELATING TO THE TWO COUNTIES VOLUME CXLIII The Society wishes to acknowledge with gratitude the support given towards publication by Lancashire County Council © The Record Society of Lancashire and Cheshire Walter J. King ISBN 978 0 902593 78 7 Printed in Great Britain by 4word Ltd, Bristol THE COURT RECORDS OF PRESCOT 1640-1649 Edited by Walter J. King PRINTED FOR THE SOCIETY 2008 FOR THE SUBSCRIPTION YEAR 2005 COUNCIL AND OFFICERS FOR THE YEAR 2005 President J.R.H. Pepler, M.A., DA.A., c/o Cheshire Record Office, Duke Street, Chester CHI 1RL Hon. Council Secretary Dorothy J. Clayton, M.A., Ph.D., A.L.A., F.R.Hist.S., c/o John Rylands University Library of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PP Hon. Membership Secretary Maureen Barber, B.A., D.A.A., 7 Rosebank, Lostock, Bolton BL6 4PE Hon. Treasurer and Publications Secretary Fiona Pogson, B.A., Ph.D., c/o Department of History, Liverpool Hope University College, Hope Park, Liverpool L16 9JD Hon. General Editor Peter McNiven, M.A., Ph.D., F.R.Hist.S., 12 Longacre Road, Carmarthen SA31 1HL Other Members of the Council Diana E.S. Dunn, B.A., D.Ar.Studies B.W. Quintrell, M.A., Ph.D., F.R.Hist.S. M.R.V. Heale, B.A, M.Phil., Ph.D. D.A. Stoker, B.A., M.Ar.Ad. B. Jackson, M.A., D.A.A T.J. Thornton, M.A., D.Phil. V. McKernan, B.A., D.A.A. G.J. White, B.A., Ph.D., F.R.Hist.S. C.B. Phillips, B.A., Ph.D. T.J. Wyke, B.A. CONTENTS Acknowledgements vi Abbreviations vii Map viii-ix Introduction xi The Court Records of Prescot 1640-1649 1 Glossary 163 Indexes 167 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am deeply indebted to more people than are noted here. The DDCs collection has been prepared for publication by kind permission of Tickle Hall Cross, solicitors at Prescot, and the BBKc/PC collection by kind permission of the Provost and Scholars of King's College, Cambridge. No Record Office has a more professional and helpful staff than the Lancashire Record Office in Preston. To each and every one of them I owe more gratitude than these mere words can convey. I wish to thank Mr T. Kevin Campbell, former head archivist at Bolton Archives Service, for his generous assistance in transcribing difficult passages, and Mr Keith Fitzpatrick for his very kind permission to investigate manuscripts still housed at Tickle Hall Cross. Lachelle Fehr scanned and formatted the volume, and Dr Jerome Rosonke resolved several computer challenges. Dr DeLloyd Guth critically read a draft of the manuscript. To Dr Peter McNiven, General Editor of the Record Society, I owe much gratitude for his generous, professional and constructive editorial assistance. Any errors that remain are mine. I am also grateful to Northern State University in Aberdeen, South Dakota, for providing a sabbatical in 2002 during which much of the research for the intro duction was completed and for a Nora Staael Evert Research Stipend during the summer of 2003. My understanding wife, Janet, made the late nights of writing seem short. Walter J. King vi ABBREVIATIONS BIHR Borthwick Institute of Historical Research, York CRO Cheshire Record Office, Chester dec. deceased esq. esquire f. folio gent. gentleman husb. husbandman jun. junior LPRS Lancashire Parish Register Society LRO Lancashire Record Office, Preston m. membrane of a roll of parchment RSLC Record Society of Lancashire and Cheshire sen. senior THC Tickle Hall Cross, Prescot THSLC Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire TNA The National Archives, Kew wid. widow WRO Wigan Record Office, Leigh yeo. yeoman Knows ley SI etherforth Wei I Lower HIgher Field Huyton Whlston Prescot: sites mentioned in the Court Records of the 1640s (Based on Bailey, 1937, and Knowles, 1980. See p. xi, note 1.) viii ix Dedicated to the residents of Prescot during the seventeenth century INTRODUCTION No attempt has been made here to write the history of Prescot, not even of the 1640s.1 However, because the events in Prescot during the 1640s, as set down in these records of the court leet and court baron, occurred in a context and affect ed subsequent years, this introduction will provide some of that context and effect and therefore will range beyond the 1640s. When in 1447 Henry VI granted to King’s College in Cambridge the rectory of Prescot, which had descended to the Crown in 1399 when John of Gaunt’s eldest son became Henry IV, the College became the lord of the manor of Prescot and so remained into the twentieth century. What has become known as the Prescot charter of 1447 contains privileges granted to the College’s estates, including the manor of Prescot, though Prescot is not specifically mentioned.2 On 29 March 1613 eleven residents of Prescot and the deputy steward gathered in the court house and agreed to assess on tenants and undertenants a tax of £10, or more if necessary, for confirming that charter. A year later on 24 June at anoth er meeting one or two of the nineteen in attendance expressed disapproval at rais ing money to defend the privileges and liberties of Prescot, but they eventually ‘Conformed’, and in October 1614 James I issued a charter confirming Prescot’s privileges.3 Since some of these privileges are recognizable in the court records transcribed here, it is appropriate to discuss a number of them. The residents of Prescot paid 1. For the history of Prescot see F.A. Bailey, ed., A Selection fi-om the Prescot Court Leet and Other Records, 1447-1600, RSLC, lxxxix (1937); Bailey, ‘The Court Leet of Prescot’, THSLC, 84 (1932), pp. 63-85; Bailey, ed., The Churchwardens’ Accounts of Prescot, Lancashire, 1523-1607, RSLC, civ (1953); Thomas Steel, ed., Prescot Churchwardens’ Accounts, 1635-1663, RSLC, cxxxvii (2002); F.G. Paterson, The Histoiy of Prescot [n.p.p. (Prescot), 1908]; Robert A. Philpott, Historic Towns of the Merseyside Area: a Survey of Urban Settlement to c.1800, Liverpool Museum Occasional Papers No. 3 (Liverpool, 1988), pp. 21-34; P J. Davey, Prescot Action Area: an Archaeological View (Liverpool, 1978); Dora Bailey, Prescot Court Leet [Liverpool, n.d.p. (1970s)]; E.P. Turton, Bibliography of the Ancient Parish of Prescot, Lancashire, Including the Modern Boroughs of St. Helens and Widnes [n.p.p. (1962)]; William Farrer and J. Brownbill, eds, The Victoria Histoiy of the County of Lancaster, 3 (London, Constable, 1907), pp. 353^1; and Jack Knowles, ed., Prescot Records: the Court Rolls, 1602-1648-from notes left by the late FA. Bailey (Huyton, 1980). Knowles devoted only four large sheets to selections from the paper books of 1640^-8, while the original manuscripts con tain 237 sheets and the parchment rolls twenty-four membranes. Statements such as for 1640 ‘Absence. 15 persons’ and for 1647 'Jury. List of 23 names’, without supplying those names, render this work of limited value. 2. Bailey, Prescot Court Leet, pp. 60-73. 3. LRO: DDCs/Paper Book and Parchment Roll/1614. For the charter, see LRO: DDKc/ 5213 which is a copy in Latin made in 1843 by William Beamont; Tickle Hall Cross (THC) in Prescot also has a copy. References for the paper books and parchment rolls of the 1640s deposited at the Lancashire Record Office will be found in this volume at the beginning of each year’s records and are not usually repeated in these notes. xii Introduction no tolls in the market at nearby Liverpool4 and were exempt from jury service outside the manor, including at quarter sessions,5 and they paid no fifteenth or county tax.6 Prescot also enjoyed the right to appoint its own coroner (who elsewhere was selected in the county court) and to license its alehousekeepers (normally licensed by any two justices of the peace), and its court baron heard pleas in any sum, while other localities were restricted to under 40s.7 Residents also claimed through custom the right not to pay an alienation fine to the mano rial lord when they were admitted to land by the court baron as a result of descent or purchase, though they did pay rent.8 In 1680 Prescot’s jurors9 confirmed that no fine was due, but in 1721 King’s College disputed that custom and claimed that for many years lessees of the manor had appointed local men to be steward who mismanaged and did not collect fines that were legally due.10 Another privilege was the right to determine within Prescot ‘all Matters... either of a publick or private nature’ that arose on the manor.11 In 1617 jurors ordered 4. Bailey, Prescot Court Leet, pp. 62-3; 300, note 3. Liverpool disputed the exemption in 1646 and 1648. George Chandler, Liverpool Under Charles I (Liverpool, Brown, Picton and Hornby Libraries, 1965), pp. 359, 374,411. However, at least as late as 1765 Prescot continued to claim the right to pay no tolls. THC: ‘The Charities and Other Publick Affairs Concerning the Township of Prescott, 1754’, ff.93-6. This volume measures 24.5 cms x 38 cms. Because the binding has decayed from damp, all sheets are loose and some text near the binding has been lost. While paginated to 122, most sheets are blank and unpaginated. The volume contains ref erences to individuals, court actions and documents as far back as 1508, though mostly from 1754 on.