WILTSHIRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY 1RecorZ>s Branch VOLUME XI FOR THE YEAR 1955 Impression of 300 copies WILTSHIRE QUARTER SESSIONS AND ASSIZES, I 736 EDITED BY J. P. M. FOWLE ASSISTANT ARCHIVIST TO WILTSHIRE COUNTY CCU DEVIZES I955 PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY HEADLEY BROTHERS LTD IOQ KINGSWAY LONDON WC2 AND AS]-IFORD KENT CONTENTS PAGE PREFACE vi INTRODUCTION The Clerks of the Peace V111 Custody of the Records xii Publication of the Records xiii The Seal of the Court xiv Great Rolls xiv Minute Books xlii Order Books liv Process Books of Indictments lvi Instruction Books of Indictments lix Draft Estreats of Fines lix Records of the Assizes lx Appendices lxii Editorial lxiii PROCEEDINGS IN QUARTER SESS1oNS, 1736 Hilary Sessions I Easter Sessions 25 Trinity Sessions 56 Michaelmas Sessions 81 Process Book of Indictments 99 PROCEEDINGS BEFoRE THE ]UST1cEs or ASSIZE, 1736 Lent Assizes I19 Summer Assizes I23 APPENDICES I The Justices of the Peace I27 II Freehold Book I30 III The Sheriff's Cravings I50 INDEX or SUB]EcTs I51 INDEx or PERSoNS AND PLACES I61 LIST or MEMBERS 208 PUBLICATIONS or THE BRANCH 213 iii PREFACE The Quarter Sessions records printed in this volume are in the custody of the Clerk of the Peace for Wfltshire. This Branch is indebted to the Wiltshire County Council, to the former Custos Rotulorum (the late Evelyn Francis Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, who died in I954) and to Mr. P. A. Selborne Stringer, Clerk of the Peace, for the various services they have rendered towards furthering the publication of these records. Mr. Fowle was Assistant Archivist to the County Council from I949 until March of this year when he was appointed Archivist to the Government of Uganda. The Branch is grateful to him for devoting so much of his leisure to editing the documents printed here. Thanks are also due to Mr. M. G. Rathbone, County Archivist, for help in several directions. To make the tale of judicial proceedings in the county for I736 the more complete I have myself added an abstract of the relevant records of the ]ustices of Assize for the Westem Circuit, which are preserved in the Public Record Office. These are the first post-medieval assizes records to be printed. Mr. Fowle's introduction is more than an explanation of the docu- ments presented here; for he has surveyed in some detail all the surviving Quarter Sessions records for the county up to the Local Government Act of I888. It is believed that no such survey of the records of a county has ever before been published. Northwood. N. ]. WILLIAMS. August I955 V INTRODUCTION In the editing of Quarter Sessions records for publication, County Councils and record-publishing societies have adopted one of two policies. The older, and now discredited, system was to crowd the records of as many years as possible into a single volume, by the selection of material to be included in it according to the editor’s arbitrary and personal esti- mation of its importance. By this method some counties have covered a great many years : in one case (Derbyshire) the whole range from I558 to I896 appeared in two volumes, and in another (Cheshire) a single volume contains the records of I559 to I760. The second policy, which some counties still happily maintain, is that of the systematic publication in abstract of all extant records, beginning with the first and proceeding forward year by year, though now somewhat more slowly in many cases because of the increasing bulk of material and a parallel contemporary increase in the cost of printing. Thus while several counties, such as Wanvickshire, have reached a late date in the seventeenth century, none has so far entered upon the eighteenth. It was with this last consideration in mind that the decision was taken that the second volume of proceedings in Wiltshire Quarter Sessions to appear in this series should be abstracts of the records of a year in the eighteenth century, and more particularly of a year after 1733, so that the documents being wholly in English would provide as great a contrast as possible to the numerous editions of seventeenth century Quarter Sessions proceedings. The year I736 was chosen almost at random. It is, of course, the historical year I736, and begins therefore in January with Hilary Sessions.‘ The application of uniform systems of abbreviation to the majority of documents is necessary because of the large number of those in common form, but examples of the various types of form then in use are fully transcribed, as are most entries in the Order Book, the whole of the Minute Book and all the relevant portions of the Process Book of Indictments. A section of this introduction on the editorial method employed in compiling the text will be found on pages lxiii to lxv. It is not, of course, solely from the point of view of legal diplomatic that this text recommends itself. Quarter Sessions was until I888 the chief administrative authority in the county, and its proceedings con- stitute a rich source of local history. VVhile it is hardly possible to find in any single year many events of outstanding importance, there are in most years a few items of general interest ; and though a text such as this may serve as an introduction to the records themselves for those who wish to begin a study in the original documents, perhaps its chief value will be in giving a general impression of the work and pre-occupations of the Justices of the Peace in the early eighteenth century. It is evident that the genealogist and the topographer will find here much grist for I Documents appearing in the text dated between I January and 24 March are given the year of the original MS. vii 10 INTRODUCTION their voracious mills. Details given in the ubiquitous presentments for non-repair of highways make them specially valuable to topographers, while the series of jurors’ rolls and books are frequently used by those wishing to find a parish in whose registers essential genealogical informa- tion may be sought. Appendix I was added for the administrative historian ; Appendix II is largely for the genealogist. The records of the Assizes and Appendix III are not local records, but have been included in order to complete, so far as is possible, the tale of local judicial proceedings for the year. They were contributed to this work, together with a note concerning them, to be found towards the end of this introduction, by Mr. N. Williams, the general editor of this series. Editions of Quarter Sessions records for other counties over the last sixty years or so have commonly contained in their introductions, besides a few paragraphs which point out items of general interest in the text, some account of the administrative system of the county in the seven- teenth century and of the procedure of Quarter Sessions.‘ In these particulars there is little difference between the seventeenth and eigh- teenth centuries, and it is not proposed here to cover ground which has already been thoroughly surveyed by several learned scholars. The main body of this introduction will be devoted to a discussion of the Wiltshire Quarter Sessions records as a whole——-their form and the manner of their making and keeping by the successive clerks of the peace for this county up to the date of the Local Government Act of I888. It is believed that such an introduction will throw some light on a fresh facet of local admin- istrative history, and by providing an introduction to the whole range of Wiltshire Quarter Sessions, contribute something towards the other object which the editor has in view. THE CLERKS or THE PEACE. Since they are referred to frequently in this introduction, a list of the known clerks of the peace for Wiltshire and their dates from the mid- sixteenth century is necessary for the reader's reference.“ To this list has been added all the names of clerks from I390, provided by the Pipe Rolls. I390-I413 . Richard Collingbourne. I413 . John Lambard. I417-I420 Richard Harden. I425-I444 . John Giles. I444-I458 John Uffenham. I461-I480 . John Chaffin. I See especially: Warwick County Records, ed. S. C. Ratclifi and H. C. Johnson, vols. I-VI ; Minutes of Proceedings in Quarter Sessions held for Parts of Kesteven . , ed. S. A. Peyton, vols. I and II ; Surrey Quarter Sessions Records (SQSR), vols. I-VIII ; Wilt- shire Archaeological and Natural History Society Records Branch (WASRB), ed. H. C. Johnson, vol. IV ; London Sessions Records, I605-I685, ed. Dom Hugh Bowler (Catholic Record Soci'ety, vo1. XXXIV, I 934). 2 Throughout this introduction and occasionally in the text the letters H, E, T and M have been used to denote Hilary, Easter, Trinity and Michaelmas sessions respectively. viii INTRODUCTION I481-1483 . John Hampton. I486-I513 . Thomas Chaffin. I516-I520 . Charles Bulkley. I523-1525 . Leonard Chaffin.‘ I537-1567? .. Christopher Dysmers. I567?-1580 .. Walter Berington. I580-1581 . Robert Strensham. I581-I582 . William Staples. I582-I587 . Robert Strensham. I587-I588 . William Staples. I588-after I592 Daniel Appleford.’ T. I601?-T. I626 John Kent. M. I626-T. I645 George Frampton. deputies: Francis Bennett, William Coles. T. I646-H. I658 William Coles. deputies: Francis Bennett, John Champion. E. I658-T. I659 Gabriel Barnaby. M. I659-H. I660 Samuel Pordage. M. 16603-T. I696 Seymour Bowman. deputies: Francis Sambrooke (from at least I662), Thomas Bennett (of Salisbury), Robert Constable (of Warminster), John Gough, Thomas Eyres, James Edgell (from at least I692). T. 16974-E. 1729 James Edgell. T. I729-E.